A ride to Haalu Raameshwara

Bored by the daily routine, I desperately wanted to explore and move outside. This Saturday was one hell of an enjoyable and refreshing ride. I reached my home town around 5 AM, my brother was waiting for me. As per our planning we were to leave for Haalu Rameshwara at 6:15 Am sharp. We have planned for numerous times to do a lot of things but without success. So this time we really did not want to screw up this plan. We both got ready and went to our cousins home. From there we went to another cousins home, collecting everybody, It was 7:30 when we all started our journey.

Totally we were 8 cousins riding on a Pulsar 150cc, Pulsar 180cc, Discover 125cc, LML Freedom and Honda Activa. Davangere, my native place is the geographical center of Karnataka,previously famous for its cotton industries. We took the by-pass and rode to holalkere. This part of the journey was enjoying because it was the first time that I saw ducks in their natural habitat at a lake on the way. There was thick mist, cold weather and we were shivering. I have never seen such thick mist ever,it made the sun look like moon. We could see the mist drops on our face. We stopped at random locations enjoying nature and taking a few snaps.

(on the way to holalkere, can see mist in the background)

After the 60KM long journey to holalkere we moved towards Hosadurga which is about 30 KMs away. We moved at almost safe speed, Activa leading the way with an average of 70KMPH. We had Idlis and pooris for breakfast at hosadurga and started towards 'Haalu rameshwara' which is about 11KMs from there.

Haalu raameshwara is famous for the the small stream which is worshiped as Ganga devi .

People believe that this place has the special powers and grants their wishes. There is a small well which has a flowing stream of water. A small housing is built for this well and the idol of goddess is placed here. People come here pray to her asking for their wishes or questions and leave some offering into the well and stand at a particular corner of the well. Due to the flowing stream, the things offered into the well float back. It is said what floats towards you gives a hint about what may happen to the wish you asked. The priest interprets and tells what different objects signify. The place became famous recently when a famous Kannada program 'heegu unte' aired an episode about this place. In front of the well, there is an Eshwara temple with a Linga in the Garbha gudi.

(the temple housing the goddess and well)

After offering our prayers, we started towards holalkere. We did not find good eateries at Hosadurga, so we decided to go to Holalkere to have our lunch. Though these places are historically prominent not much development has happened here.

(the monolithic idol of bayalu ganapathi )

After 'haalu rameshwara' we were left with some good amount of time that we had not planned how to spend, After enquiring about nearby places to visit and the large board placed by the tourist department, we learnt about 'bayalu ganapati'. Just 1KM away from holalkere, it is a monolithic statue of Ganapati. As the name 'bayalu' meaning open space suggests, it was in open space earlier. A shelter has been built some 10 years ago.

We had ample amount of time and we did not know what to do, after discussing possibilities of going to shimoga, and other places, we decided to go to Chitradurga.

Chitradurga is a famous for its fort with seven spirals. It takes almost a whole day to see the fort completely but as we did not have that much time we decided to go to Chandavalli tota (garden) in chitradurga itself. Chandavalli tota has a beautiful lake and people from nearby places frequent here as this has become a picnic spot. The main attraction of chandavalli tota is the caves & forts. The fort is known to have secret passages which were used to escape during invasions. Most of the openings to these caves are closed due to security reasons. But there is one cave which is left open for exploration. The cave is completely dark and a bit smelly. The entrance leads into a passage which has a few openings to explore. There are multiple entries and exits built for the sole purpose of confusing strangers. One has to bend,crawl to go through these passages. People advise not to adventure inside without a guide,though it doesn't seem that much a danger if you have some source of light capable of lasting for a some time. The cave also houses a big Linga and is said that seers used to stay here. There are small passages, hideouts among the big rocks. We had only our mobile phones guiding us and we also had to think about the dying batteries. We lost track of time exploring them.

(one of the exits from the cave)

We had a cup of tea outside Chandavalli tota and hoped to spend a whole day at chitradurga.
We were back on our bikes, driving back the 60KM distance back to Davangere. We stopped somewhere in the middle to see the beautiful sun set.

(the sun set on the way back to home)

It was eight when we reached our homes.
Pics are here.