Mumbai - Hubbali - Bengaluru - A road trip

Drove down to Bengaluru last week and no this is not about a boring drive down the superb NH4, part of the Golden Quadrilateral. Am aware that everyone and his dog have been there and done that. Hence i decided to do this drive slightly differently. Since the rains were around till quite late this time, the greenery on both sides of the highway was soothing. Added to that was the burst of colour in the median. Just before reaching Satara there was this beautiful sight. No idea which flower this is but it did brighten up a cloudy day! Had heard about a lot of unexplored temples near Hubbali so decided to stop over at Hubbali before continuing ahead.

Hotel Swathi in Hubli - we stayed here. and ate 'Rava idli' and 'Palak Dosa' in Swathi restaurant

Did a bit of walking around in Hubbali in the evening and captured some interesting sights.

Durga Mata Mandir There are 2 idols in the temple - Dhammamma(left) and Durga Mata(right) A bylane Mishra Pedha - The most famous and trusted sweetmeat shop in Hubbali The array of sweets on sale Hubbali florists Shiva Krishna Mandir in Hubbali ShreeKrishna idol in the temple The Hubli Dharwad Municipal Corporation office The Hubbali skyline at dusk viewed from the Hotel Swathi

Early next morning left for Bengaluru via Gadag. Saw two beautiful temples on the way. The first one, Amruteshwar, was 35kms from Hubbali in Annegiri. The Amruteshwara Temple was built in the Dharwad District in 1050 CE with Dravida articulation, and was the first temple made of soapstone. Built in the Kalyani Chalukyas style, the temple has a roof supported by 76 pillars and carvings of mythological figures on its walls. Next was the Someshwar temple in Lakshmeshwar which is another hour’s drive from Annigeri. The temple complex with three main entrances and surrounded by high walls looks like a fort. It is a splendid specimen of Chalukya architecture. In middle of the Temple complex, there is a Someshwara temple, surrounded by many small temples mainly dedicated to Shiva, along the compound wall, built with granite, some Halls in the complex meant for resting devotees. The Nandi and Shiva Parvati idols in the temple are exquisitely sculpted. These idols are referred to as Saurashtra Someshwara because these idols were brought by a Shiva devotee from Saurashtra and installed at Lakshmeshwara. There were some more temples that needed to be visited but due paucity of time we moved on to the glorious NH4 onward to Bengaluru. On the way had to meet up with a budding novelist, a great story teller and a fellow blogger – Karthik, in Davangere. We had scheduled to have some Davangere special ‘Benne Doasas’ in a restaurant that he had written about in one of his stories but unfortunately there was some strike on in town, hence just met up with him for a short while before continuing onward to our destination. Karthik blogs at Eloquence Redefined In quite a few places along the highway there was corn spread out to dry. We reached the outskirts of Bengaluru at six in the evening but it took us another hour and a half to crawl through the congested streets before reaching Malleshwaram, a beautiful laid back area in Bengaluru.