I had to meet a prospective
groom with whom I had been speaking with for a while and we finally decided to meet up. What better
way to know somebody than to travel with them! I was looking for something
which would offer us a mix of places to visit and at the same time spend some
quiet time together. Hampi seemed to be a perfect option for a weekend getaway
with friends and him.
Located in Northern
Karnataka, approximately 6 hours’ drive from
Bangalore, Hampi was known to be one of the richest and largest cities in the
world during its prime. Tourists travel from all over the world to this UNESCO
Heritage Sites to witness its historical richness and to wander around to the
nearby fields or villages on cycle or by foot.
As the new year was round the
corner, I did a lot of research to find that perfect weekend getaway where I
could convince my best friends to accompany us. Once Hampi was finalised, it
was not surprising that all the places of stay were booked. As cancelling the
trip was not an option, we almost decided to stay in a place called Bellary which
is 60 Kms from Hampi. However, luckily enough, we managed to find a stay in a
place called Hospet, about 12 kms from Hampi through one of the travel
websites. With no plans chalked out, we decided to explore Hampi as it comes
by.
Arrival of “The Boy”
As the days of meeting “The Boy”
were coming closer, I started to have a lot of apprehensions and jitteriness.
There were lot of questions in my mind, what if we click and what if we don’t!
Nonetheless, the belief that Hampi would be great, calmed me down.
Finally “The Boy” arrived and
meeting him only made me more excited for the trip. We planned to start early on Friday, reach Hospet on time and
visit Hampi in the evening.
The Road Trip
Given the late night partying
and early morning binging of idlis and chai at Vishnu idli shop, we started the
trip at our own leisure by 10
am. Driving through the traffic, the songs, the laughter, the
teasing, “The Boy” sitting in the front seat when you wanted him to sit next to
you, the pee breaks, drinking galleons of coconut water on the way, visit to
the Tungabhadra dam reservoir and the endless photography sessions made up for
the 7 hour drive to Hospet. We reached Hospet at around 5 pm only to know in
despair that our rooms were in fact not booked!
The Stay!
Since I was the one taking
care of all arrangements and knowing my stars and love for Murphy, I ensured
that all precautions were taken while selecting and booking the rooms. I wanted
everything to be perfect since this time it was all about making the first
impression. When we reached Hospet, we found out that our rooms were not booked
because of lack of communication between the travel website and the hotel
management. I tried my best to convince the hotel reception to get us any room
since my reputation was at stake in front of the “prospective groom” and of
course, we needed a place to stay in a new city.
I could see my friends give
me that “oh! we are not surprised look!” and we all started to get worried.
While I was standing by the window when a friend was negotiating with the
hoteliers to give us a room for the night., “The Boy” comes up to me, puts his
hand around my shoulder and assures me with a smile that this trip will
definitely be amazing and that we will find a room to stay. While he scouted
for other hotels around, the rest of us searched for hotels / guest houses on
the internet and made frantic calls to them convincing them that even one room
for five of us will suffice. While we waited for responses from various places,
“The Boy” comes running to us shouting “ a booking has been just cancelled in a
Hotel”!
Hampi, Day One
With little time left that
day, we drove to Hampi. We reached quite late in the night to find out that the
famous Virupaksha Temple was closed. So we decided to have a quiet dinner close
by and explore the market. Since it was a long weekend and places were packed,
we couldn’t book a guide for ourselves. While we were enquiring around, a local
boy, in his late teens, offered to be our guide without any commission.
Hampi is divided into two
sections by the river Tungabhadra. While on one side are temples and other
monuments, the other side is a complete hippie place. Though it was quite late
in the night, we thought of taking a chance of crossing the river and exploring
the other side for dinner. The walk after crossing the river through the fields
to the restaurants was the most beautiful 30 minutes moonlight walk through the
fields that one could ask for. The place is totally trippy and people are
mostly high on the herbal smoke all around.
We had dinner at a restaurant
where the seating was on the floor and everybody was lying lazily, chit
chatting, playing board games and enjoying the beautifully lit up Hampi across the river. Tired
from the road trip, we decided to head back to the hotel room since we had to
wake up early the next day and catch the most famous sunrise at the Matanga
Hill.
Sunny, The Guide
The teenager boy who heard us
enquire about places to visit in Hampi, intervened and started to explain the
direction to Matanga Hill. Realizing that we have way too many queries with no
real plan chalked out for the trip, he decided to volunteer as our guide.
Sunny was born to a British
father and a Kanadiga mother. His father had visited Hampi in early 90s as a
tourist and that's where he met Sunny’s mother and decided to get married to
her.
Sunny and his mother stayed
in Hampi while his father was no more. During our trip Sunny’s aunt from UK had
come to visit him to discuss his future plans to study abroad.
Being born and brought up in
Hampi, Sunny was a fantastic guide and a great company.
Hampi, Day Two
The only thing that the two of us planned and looked forward to in the
trip was the famous sunrise at the Matanga Hill. We were both convinced about
watching the sunrise to an extent that we would have put up tents in Hampi to
climb the hill next day had we stayed in Bellary! I even made sure the night
owl friends of mine wake up as early as 4 30 am to watch the sunrise. Still not
sure why I didn’t carry my trekking shoes!
Five of us and Sunny, our
volunteer guide, started climbing the Matanga Hill at 5 am. While climbing the
hill, Sunny, our young enthusiast guide, was telling us the stories of Hampi.
Hampi has so much history to it that the climb to Matanga was just not enough to cover it all. It was a
45 minutes climb and when we reached on top, there was already a hustle bustle
of people waiting there at the best photography locations waiting for the
sunrise. From the top of Matanga Hill, one can see the whole of Hampi town. The
sunrise was worth every minute and so were the innumerable photos that we
clicked.
We climbed down the hill from
the other side, visited a couple of places before heading for breakfast. Sunny
recommended a local place to us run by two aged aunties. Very close to the
Virupaksha temple, this small shop serves the world’s best idlis and paddu, so
the boy said. We pounced on the idlis
and paddus as there was no tomorrow.
We had about 5 plates of idlis and paddu and two rounds of tea all for INR 200.
A much recommended place.
We went back to our hotel at
Hospet in the afternoon to take a quick nap before we could start visiting the temples and other historical
temples. Before we had our lunch, “The Boy” and I were sitting together and for
the first time we didn’t speak much. With a few moments of awkward silences and
without giving me much time to think, he asked me if we could take this to the
next step and I said “Yes, why not?”
In the evening we ventured
out again to Hampi and saw the popular places like Lotus Palace, Stepped Tank,
Shivlinga, Quuen’s Bath, Statue of Ugra Narsimha, etc. We could not explore
more places since all the places close by 5 pm. We decided to have our dinner
across the Tungabhadra river, only this time we decided to drive down 35 kms
via Hospet.
Bangalore, Day Three
Before we headed back to
Bangalore, we were supposed to wake up at 4 am in the morning to visit a
Waterfall which Sunny had mentioned to us. But we were so tired from our
previous day’s expedition that we didn’t wake up on time. I was also
intentionally trying to delay our trip since “The Boy” had to take a flight
back to Delhi that very evening and I am not guilty to confess that I wanted
him to miss the flight. Anyways one of our friends decided to show loyalty to
the boy and drove the car at such speed that we ended up reaching the airport
just on time!
Climax
We may have come long way
from a prospective marriage proposal to being acquaintances, friends, date and
now in love, I would say much of the credit goes to Hampi. Hampi was a perfect
place to get to know each other, be it the good or the not so good side. Hampi
had so much to offer us in its tranquility, richness in history, culture and
adventure that one trip wasn’t enough. From the initial disaster of no place to
stay to leaving the boy at the airport, every minute spent in Hampi was worth
it.
