Eclipsed Unheard unseen face of the mother of all illegal mine for a reason, that's Bellary you got me...

It was 12^th June Sunday, time 6:45pm. I went to Keshav’s house, then the two of us left for Hari’s place to discuss all unnecessary stuff that needn’t be carried! Retuned home to have dinner and at 10pm walked to my pickup point, near Geetanjali Theater. The road was deserted and after a few minutes spied on a conspicuous dangerously over-loaded maroon maruthi800, with Sharan’s dad driving, Sharan in the passenger seat with Hari and Keshav at the back. I somehow squeezed and adjusted at the back and we were off to the KSRTC bus stand. We reached the bus stand at 10:45 pm, as our bus was to depart at 11.50pm. We found ourselves a comfortable spot and we put our entire luggage there. Hari and I then decided to take a walk to check out the huge expanse of the bus station and the ongoing Bangalore metro work. Narayan was dropped by his twin brothers and we all met up at the platform.

We found our bus and boarded immediately. We hit the road to bellary at 12 in the morning. We talked about nothing and everything till the wee hours of the morning. I was admiring the stars dancing in the moon-lit sky while Keshav kept ranting about crap that not only me bothered to take the trouble of listening to. The monkey (Keshav) even made it a point to keep everyone awake till the other passengers shouted him down! It was 3 when I slept. We reached Bellary (Ballary) and groggily got off the bus looking for our saviour/host. In a few minutes our chauffer Karthik Machani arrived in his Tavera (incredible!!).

 We landed in his basement and to our dismay, we had to send up our luggage by the elevator and we had to walk up the stairs. How we wished it was the other way round. We were welcomed warmly by the Machanis with the sumptuous Andhra style breakfast. We then left to visit a Neolithic site where rocks had been inscribed with pictures of bulls and deer.

 Our next stop was supposed to be the Emu farm. Fortunately for us, we took the wrong route and ended up on a mud track with a few local tractors showing off their skills. The much hyped Tavera was put through a serious test which involved us lifting the vehicle from a deep gorge. After this awesome experience we headed towards the famed Bellary Fort,

 where we had to climb 542 steps to scale. A few of Keshav’s photos which I took with my 3.2 mega-pixel, deserved to be his profile picture

 We found a shallow-algae infested pond, where we poked around for crabs whilst talking to Praveen who missed the first three days of the four day trip ‘cause he was busy catching fish in BheemeshwariK. At around four in the evening, Karthik’s dad very generously allowed us to drive/ride (since I don’t know :-what you say for a machine which is lever-operatedJ) his Crop-tiger, the harvesting vehicle. Uncle also took the trouble of explaining the working of the entire machine, about other machines that they were going to invest in and finally gave us a small anecdote on ex-Sathyam’s ex-chairman Ramalinga Raju who happens to be a family- friend. We then trooped into the Bosch diesel service centre (which also belongs to them!), learnt more than we did in an entire semester! Now it terrifies me to think that Karthik has been playing with these “toys” since his childhood. We were even allowed to fill diesel in his Bolero for freeeeeee! (‘cause it’s his bunk!)

.. Unfortunately, the day had to come to an endL. 

The following morning we forced ourselves up by 5:30amL, queued up in front of the rest-room and banged at the door until the one inside came out cursing usJ. Then breakfast! (Which was again awesome!) Viva Hampi! Let’s rollJ.  We had to take a guide with whom we bargained for his fees to be reduced from Rs1200 to Rs1000 (since we’re students only outside class and when we get a discount for such a title). However, the guide was good and worth every rupee! Nothing much I can say, since all locations deserve a paragraph. We decided to luncheon at The Mango Tree, although in the opinion of the others the food was amazing, I don’t agree because I’m ignorant when it comes to the platter.  The famous Virupaksha Temple whose history goes beyond that of Hampi’s itself!  I took more than 150 snaps here! 

  Back in the restaurant I mean hotel in Hosapet (Hotel Malligi),  Keshav snored away while waiting in reception for rooms. We immediately stripped and jumped into pool.  We then dragged ourselves into a restaurant and ate just lightly.

This marks the end of day 2…..

Day three was even better! We got to sleep for almost 10 hours!  Followed by a complimentary breakfast! This time round even I didn’t show mercy. We then drove to the Tungabhadra dam where we had an escort and a guide to take us to places where, others are spotted would be shot at sight!  We consider ourselves lucky to have unraveled the mysteries of a hydel power generation unit, turbines, shafts rotor “the whateva” explained by the AJ, to be mentioned would not have happened without the influence of machani’s doddappa. We got the chance of walking on the wall of the dam which is restricted for public, because of the interstate dispute regarding sharing of energy generated there. The reservoir was terrifyingly big and the wind was so powerful, that even I had trouble holding my groundJ. We even got access to Vaikunta, the highest point anywhere in the vicinity of dam, the guest house which house VIP’s (used on by our beloved CM nowadays). The view from the tower is the place where one can get the best view of entire dam (my current FB profile picture).

 (read photos in reverse order, only here)
 We returned to the pool on returning back to the hotel, to the dismay of the helper staff of the hotel since all we ever did was displace the water from the pool especially Karthik and Keshav! On our return journey to Bellary we visited a bear sanctuary where we spotted a bear as soon as we reached!

 We took a solemn oath to not sleep the whole night, and I was hell bent on watching the lunar eclipse.  While watching The Orphan, Nano(name changed) fell asleep like a good little girl with his thumb in his mouth ;-), giving the excuse that he wasn’t interested, although none of us missed realized that he had already pissed his pants!  It was 3.30 when Hari and I fell asleep. Although, the other three stayed up the rest of the night and even made garlic bread at 4 in the morning! Phew! That brings us to the end of day 3 or rather to the beginning of the last day of our stay in BellaryL…

The following morning, Praveen’s (Chittu) arrival and his story of Bhimeshwari took the entire morning. We then took off for Chitradurga in an Innova (perhaps the only time Karthik has had some rest). All wickets except Nano were out, however Praveen doesn’t agree as even he claims to have stayed up. A few funny incidents took place whilst on the high way (you probably should ask Hari, ‘cause at that point of time even I was in dreamland).  The conceptual design of the fort was spell-binding with ever tactic and the reason for the fort’s design being beautifully explained to us by the guide. Thanks to Karthik’s parents, we were able to witness the most amazing wall climber of India climb up the vertical walls of the fort with no harness or ropes but only with the strength in his fingers and determination in his heart!

The return journey had everyone complaining about a broken a back because of the pristine condition of the road and our darling driver who believes the one should drive on the extreme right of the road met for those coming in the opposite direction. That night we had dinner in Hotel Bagheecha (the food being really good!) with the Machanis whom we had terrorized for the past 4 days by literally emptying their pantry! We were forced to bid quick good-byes to the people who had so generously offered their house and every nook and corner of their kitchen to us! 

p.s. For all humiliating events that took place please contact Sunil, Narayan, Karthik, Hari, Sharan or Keshav. (Praveen’s name has been left out for a reason).