27-Jul-2019 (Saturday) : After almost a year, I am writing
my another travel blog. This time it is on a short trip yet memorable one!! If
you are staying in Bengaluru and looking for traffic free single day trip around - to explore our culture/devotional stories, I
suggest this would be a perfect plan.
After me and CK (My brother
Karthik) met with an accident, I was not even in a condition to walk for 2-3
months. Though CK did not have major injuries, he was not comfortable to drive
and used to get leg pain post driving. So we were forced to sit at home with no
travel plans. I was completely frustrated because of injuries, pain, medicines
and boredom of sitting at home. Even mom-dad were stuck at home taking care of me. This
time we all badly wanted a day out to boost our energy back.
Though we had decided we would
leave early, somehow we got late to bed previous day and I was the last one to get
up next day. By the time I got up, mom had finished all household work. She was
in the kitchen preparing “Tarakari Uppittu” for our trip. If you have read my
first blog, by now you are all very well aware that we do not forget to pack
food for our journey 😛.
Kolaramma and Someshwara temple:
We all got ready and started by
8:15 AM. As per the plan our first visit was for – Kolaramma temple, Grama
Devathe of Kolar district (Do I need to mention about Kolar here?? Remember KGF
chapter 1 movie?? KGF stands for – “Kolar Gold Fields” 😜). It is about 70 Kms away
from Bengaluru on Bengaluru-Thirupathi highway and takes around 1.5 hrs to
reach. Though we got late, we were happy that we could visit the goddess in
Rahukala. Yes, there is a belief that it is auspicious to seek Devi’s blessings during Rahukala. After months of gap, I could drove my Jupiter for about 35-40
kms. If you do not know Jupiter - that’s what we have named our Golden Orange
Grand I10 – as it is of the colour planet Jupiter 🚗.
Since it was Ashada Masa Last Friday
(previous day of our travel), entire temple was decorated with flower garlands.
There were 2 big elephant statues kept near main entrance to welcome devotees.
Kannada holy songs were playing in big loud speakers, which was setting a sacred ambiance and would automatically take one to bhakti mood. I guess – as local
devotees had visited temple on auspicious Friday, temple was not much crowded
on Saturday. The Devi vigraha on the Nandi Kambha (pillar in front of the
temple) at the entrance of the temple was full of smile wearing a new saree 🙏. Even the main Durga
Devi vigraha inside Garbha gudi was also beautifully decorated with new saree,
colourful flowers and Moggina Jade (long plait decorated with flower buds, mainly
using Jasmine). It is a 1000 year old temple built by cholas. The uniqueness of
this temple is - deity is not facing towards the door entrance and hence we
could see her through the big mirror kept inside the garbha gudi in front of her. There is another shrine inside for deity Chelamma, scorpion goddess. It
is believed that seeking her blessings would protect us from scorpion bites. People
believe - there is a well below Cehlamma Idol where lakhs of scorpions still
exists. There is another one in walkable distance – Someshwara temple. It is
constructed in 14th Century and protected by Archaeological Survey
of India. It has shrine for lord Shiva and goddess Parvathi. Most of the time
Parvathi shrine would be closed after early morning pooja. However, we had her darshana by peeping into the shrine door. The temple courtyard is
surrounded by many sacred plants and trees. It feels so good to sit in open
space of temple for some time and to inhale the fresh air.
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| Kolaramma Temple |
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| Someshwara Temple |
After seeking lord Shiva’s
blessings, we purchased Nandini Doodh Peda and curd for our breakfast at
Nandini parlour near temple. Last time when we purchased peda here, I felt it
was bit hard than the usual tasty Nandini peda. This time I observed slight
difference in 2 packets – one with cream colour and another one - light brown. I
guess the light brown was the hard peda. Not sure if it is a duplicate product
!!
Kurudumale Ganapathi and Sri
Kshamadhamba devi temple:
On the way to next destination,
we halted for breakfast. It’s always awesome to have food in the shade of a tree
with cool breeze 😇.
And when the food is mom cooked hot uppittu, it is even more heavenly feeling😍. After having breakfast, we had coffee and started to Kurudumale Ganapathi
Temple. It is near mulubagilu village - around 40 Kms from Kolaramma temple.
The early name was KooduMale (koodu means sit and Malle means hill). Over the
years it got changed to Kurudumale. The temple consists of giant 12-13 feet
Saligrama Ganapathi (Made of single stone). History says this Ganesh Idol was
established by Thrimurthy – “Brahma-Vishnu-Maheshvara” to destroy Tripurasura.
It is also said that lord Rama - before his fight with Ravana; Pandavas -
before mahabharatha fight with Kauravas; and lord Krishna - to get the Ganesha
Chaturhi Chandra Darushana Dosha cured (the accusation of Syamantaka Mani
theft) worshiped here for their win and success. As the temple authorities
were informed about a MLA visit, Ganesha idol was very well decorated and the
Garbha gudi was lit up with colourful lights. It was a real festival to eyes to
see the huge Ganesha in those different colour lights 😍🎉.
From there we walked to another
nearby Sri Kshamadamba devi temple. As the name says, she is the Goddess of
forgiveness. The temple had big nandi statue. I could not get more info on the
temple. If I visit next time, will try to collect some information.
Koladevi Temple:
Our next planned destination was
another mythological, ancient and very powerful - Koladevi temple. We can reach
this temple by 2 routes – One via highway and other via Viroopaksha temple, we
chose the latter (The history says, Shiva
Linga in in Viroopaksha temple could be seen in 3 different colours during 3
times of a day – Morning, Afternoon and Evening. We could not visit this place,
but would make it happen some other day). The road was very narrow which
cross through villages. On the way, we saw a little girl staring at us and ran
to her home smiling. 2 kids were returning from school in cycle, guess they
were having slow cycling race 🚴.
That is the real beauty of a journey – to witness such small happy things. We
did not feel any development is required for either the road or the temple.
Else the place would become heavily crowded and ostentatious. By the time we
parked our car, I noticed the MLA who visited Kurudumale visited Koladevi too.
We ran to temple thinking temple authorities would stop us if that MLA reaches
the temple first. But unfortunately we were asked to stand outside as he
and his entire gang was allowed inside the temple. After they went out, we were
allowed inside in a batch where 15-20 people can stand at a time.
Before the aarthi, priest will explain the glory
and significance of the temple in detail to each group.
Koladevi is a temple for lord Garuda (Eagle – Vahana of lord Vishnu). This is
the only temple in the world which gives Garbha Gudi to Garuda Deva (we can see
Garuda in most of the Vishnu temples standing outside on Garudaghamba, right front
of Vishnu Garbha Gudi). The idol of Garuda here is carrying lord Vishnu on one
shoulder and goddess Lakshmi on the other. It is surrounded by 7 sarpa’s, we
could see one on his diadem. When Ravana abducted Seetha, Jatayu (A Bird) tried
to save her. Ravana later chopped Jatayu’s wings in the war. They say after
crossing many places Jatayu finally fell down and died in this place chanting
Rama’s name. Hearing Jatayu’s scream, lord Anjaneya came here in anger to save
the devotee of Rama holding Brahmasthra in hand. Hence, there is a small cave
with Hanuman idol next to Garuda temple. (It was predestined that Ravana
would be destroyed by Rama which Hanuma was aware, hence he did not kill Ravana
when he was abducting Seetha). Only at this place, you can see Hanuma
idol with canine teeth and Brahmasthra in hand. It is also said that, all types
of Sarpadosha is cured if you visit this place.
Avani:
Last but not the least; we
reached a very calm, cleanly maintained village Avani. Though it is an ancient
place of 10th century with lot of mythological importance related to
Ramayana, we could hardly see tourists visiting here. There was some
maintenance work going on and we were bit disappointed as it was not having the
charm of a significant place. The village has shrine for Ramalingeshwara and
Shri Sharada Maata. It is said that, when Shankaracharya visited this place,
Maa Sharada was following him. When Shankaracharya turned back to see her, she
turned into Idol form.
There is a hill next to the village called ‘Avani
Betta’. The legend says the hill is the place where Shri Valmiki Maharshi had
his Ashrama. When Rama exiled Seetha, Lakshmana brought her to Valmiki
Asharama. The priest informed us that we could find the cave where Seetha gave
birth to Lava-Kusha, the pond where she used to wash their cloths and trace of
other incidents like - Lava-Kusha tied the horse of Rama’s Ashvamedha Yaga.
We could see 3 big rocks kept one on the other without any support. Tale says
those are the rocks used by Lava-Kusha to play. This hill is also evident of
the syamantaka Mani incident of dwapara yuga. Hence, there is a shrine
dedicated to Jambavantha too. As I was still not fit enough to climb, we did
not go up on the hill. Once I am fit enough, we would be planning a trekking
day, especially to explore this hill and would add the details here. As it was
already 1:30, we had lunch and visited Ramalingeshwara temple. Ramalingeshwara
temple has 100 linga’s established by entire Rama’s family and Sena-gana
(including Lakshmana, Bharatha, Shatrughna, Sugreeva, Anjaneya and others) to
cure the sin of war between Rama and Lava-Kusha. Cool air was wafting lavishly
due to temple architecture. We relaxed for 15-20 minutes inside the temple. After
coming out from temple I sat again on the stone bench outside a house. Mom
accompanied me. People over there seemed welcoming us unlike city culture. This
culture could be seen only in rural areas.
On the way back to home, we had a
list of things to buy from a well-known street vegetable market. Fresh veggies are directly
sold by farmers here. The colour and texture will leave you amazed thinking if
it is artificial ones kept for decoration. The crowd of customers will attract
any one passing the highway. We purchased lot of vegetables and green leaves. A
person was cutting a Jackfruit there and a recipe flashed in my mind –
Jackfruit Kheer 😃. We purchased a dozen and headed back to home. But while
searching for the kheer recipe I found one more !! Jackfruit Mulka – a
Mangalurian dish 😋. On one end recipes were crossing my mind but on the other, I was
actually exhausted and feeling uneasy as my leg pain started increasing. I felt I was not able to take even a step and once reached home, I slept
for almost 3 hours. When I woke up, I got to know my family had finished Jackfruit. All my plans of preparing Jackfruit dish went in vein 😞.
Ayurveda at home !!
I wanted to end this blog with
above details (I know it’s is bit incomplete with missing details on
Kshamadhamba, Viroopaaksha temple and Avani Betta), but it would be unfair if I
do not share the details/benefits of the Ayurveda medicine I came across at the
end of my travel day. However, my plans of having yummy jackfruit recipes got
ruined, I was not much disappointed as I was anyways more concerned about my
pain and did not have energy to stand and cook anything. Mom could not see me in
such pain and post dinner she prepared an Ayurvedic medicine for my injury
called “Ragi Poultice” which I think I should definitely share with you all here.
She mixed 2 spoons of Ragi (Millet grain) in water to prepare a thin batter and
heat the same in a small deep-fry pan (you can use vaggarane sautu – the tadka
Kadai) to turn it to thick paste like ragi balls. Later add 1-2 spoon of castor oil to mix
well. Keep the hot ball on the injury/pain area (like we use heat pad, but ensure
you are NOT using this method on fresh injuries). The heat gives relaxing
effect on the pain. Once the hotness reduced, heat it again for few seconds and
repeat the procedure for 2-3 times. As the last step, cut banana leaf into 2
small pieces so that it can completely cover your pain area and spread some
drops of castor oil on both the sides. Now heat the Ragi paste again for few
seconds & spread it over one banana leaf and cover it with other banana leaf. Cover
the pain area with this hot pad and tie the same with a cloth and keep it
overnight. I must say this treatment really gave soothing effect on my injury
and the burning sensation was reduced a lot !! Hope this helps you as well 👍.
Hoping to catch you up soon with
details on Avani Betta and many more places. Happy travelling 😎👍 !!
-Sandhya.
