Mixed Bag » Travel

Europe Vacation – French Connection – II

Venkat — Sat, 03 Oct 2009 17:45:15 +0000

Second day in France, we stepped out of Paris to see Versailles and then came back to Paris to see it by night.

Versailles is famous for the famous chateau, called the Palace of Versailles. It is an imposing palace with sprawling gardens running all around the palace.

Palace of Versailles

The palace was closed down for renovation, however the gardens were open. And luckily, entry was free again. The gardens were split across – one on the left of the palace, on in front and one on the right.

Amongst the lush green, there was this beautiful flower garden with lots of colorful flowers in it.

Flower garden in Versaille Palace

Lawns on the left of the palace…..

A view of the sprawling garden on the left of the palace

The lawns in front of the palace ….what opulence…..

In front of the palace

Sham and I took considerable time out to kind of chill here, while the kids thoroughly enjoyed themselves in the lush green gardens; their parents ofcourse had a tough time!

All smiles!

We headed back to Paris around 6:30ish in the evening; the objective very clear – look for Indian food. It had already been more than 48 hrs since the folks had some desi khana. We headed to Gare du Nord (this is also where the Eurostar train station is). And as we came close to this area, there were significant sights and scenes of indian / south east asian establishments.

Indian / SE Asian restaurants .... finally some familiar food:)

We narrowed down to place called Madras Cafe. Not great, but good enough given the situation. Once dinner, was done, we decided to do Paris by night as this was our last night in Paris and for that matter in France. We drove down Champs Elysees and then headed to Eiffel Tower and were greeted with stunning views of the tower … we stayed at the tower for about an hour till 11 ish; that’s when they also put some special lighting on the tower; its beautiful…

Eiffel By Night

Down the road, Arc De Triumph, also looked majestic …

Arc De Triumph lit up

…and with that, we called it quits for the night and for Paris.

All in all, an amazing experience. Two days, by any stretch of imagination, is too short to even sniff Paris. But, then we had a good detailed trailer, and would definitely like to come back and spend some more time here. Before that, i guess we should put in some effort to learn French also!

Next on agenda – Switzerland!

Europe Vacation – The French Connection – I

Venkat — Fri, 25 Sep 2009 13:21:35 +0000

At its best, Paris is chic, stylish and flashy. Paris has its own share of shady parts of the town! And we tasted both. All in all, at the end of two days we were left longing for much more. And the impression that I came away with from the french land is that, for those looking for it, there is unlimited fun available!

We set out for Paris on the morning of Aug 1st. The plan was to take the ferry to Calais from Dover, and then drive from there to Paris. All in all, total trip time was to be around 9-10 hours. Since we were to gain time on reaching Paris, we hoped to reach Paris by around 10 pm local time. We left Warrington around 10 am on a wet Saturday morning, running behind schedule.

All packed and ready to go!

The drive took us longer than usual, as there was heavy traffic on the M-ways. We had to reschedule our ferry booking as we were not able to make it on the time for the original booking. Finally, we took the 5:00 pm ferry and reached Calais at around 5:30 pm, local time.

From left side to right side (driving)

The drive from Calais to Paris took us another 3-4 hours and and by the time we checked into the hotel we were quite exhausted. After check-in, there was not much to do, and we tucked in for the night, eagerly awaiting the next morning

Good Morning, Paris!

Charged on a breakfast of cereals, muffins, juices and other goodies, we set out see Paris. The weather was cloudy and chilly, but still pleasant. We walked down to the nearby train station, La Garene Colombes to catch a train to the city centre.

At La Garene Colombes station

As we got to the city, we walked around, taking in the sights and smells of Paris.

Sights in the city

Then, we came across the fashion opulence, the city is known for – a diamond and what else studded shoe

The Glamorous Shoe

The plan was to get on to one of those sightseeing buses to get the big picture of the city, initially. Later on we visited some of the more famous attractions (as much as possible in two days). The first half of the day, hence was spent in going around in the hop-on / hop-off bus. We drove by on the Champs Elysses, passed Eiffel Tower, Arc de Triumph, the Louvre, Cathedral of Nostra Damus, and others.

I loved these squares in Paris

A first look at Eiffel .. . .

Eiffel Tower - in the daytime

Once the survey was over, we decided on three attractions – Louvre (ofcourse), Cathedral of Nostra Damus and Eiffel Tower. By the time we finished off a full round on the sightseeing bus, it was lunch time, so we proceeded to one of the street cafe to scout for some veggie stuff. After a quick lunch, we proceeded to the Louvre.

Now we’ve heard and read about this place so much; t’was quite overwhelming to be there; and quite overwhelmed were we after entering the museum.

Infront of The Louvre

To even wonder whether we could cover the museum in on day would be blasphemy. The museum has three huge wings like the one in the photo above and extends several feet below the ground! Being the first Sunday of the month, there was a huge queue (on the first sunday’s of the month, entry is free). Once we got in, we two stood there like two kids lost in a huge city. Then we did what we thought most people were doing; ask the helpdesk to suggest the must see’s. Armed with the map and the key attractions marked out, we proceeded towards Venus De Milo. Amongst others, we covered Coronation Crown, The Grand Feast, and others paintings and sculpture, finally coming to Mona Lisa – the most seeked after and crowded place in the museum. We spent at best 45 minutes in the museum, enough to get a look at some of the best attractions.

FIL at the glass pyramid in Louvre

We got out of the Louvre by around 4 pm and then proceeded towards the nearby Cathedral of Nostra Damus, the great fortune teller.

Cathedral Of NostraDamus

The cathedral is also apparently famous for the beautiful glass work inside the church.

Glasswork inside NostraDamus Cathedral

The church is as beautiful inside, as outside. A service was in progress or about to commence, I guess. Hence, access to that altar was restricted, unless you wanted to participate in the service. It looked even better there.

A service in progress in NostraDamus Church

We spent some time admiring the glass work and going around the church, before proceeding to the grand attraction for the day – Eiffel Tower.

At the Eiffel tower and Guess what time it is!8 pm

It was 7ish, and still bright and sunny (refer the european summer i talk about in my ealier post). And there it stood in all its mighty glory. It leaves you breathless even to think how they would be able to put up such a massive mass of steel together

A look at all the metal

Eiffel tower has two viewing decks – one at the second floor and the other, right at the top and the views from both are amazing. You can see all of Paris, with the Seine flowing through the middle of the city. I know I have written about how amazed I am with all of this (you really can’t help but get amazed); but if you take a look at the elevators, you will be amazed again! It not straight up vertica; it glides along the strussess; simply mind boggling. And to think that they built this between 1887 and 1889!

Awesome view from atop Eiffel Tower

We spent a considerable amount of time, close to some two hours, gazing with amazement at the views of Paris below us. It was almost close to 10 pm by the time we left, and as we did, the lights on the tower came up.

Eiffel Lit ...look at the blue sky

So that was Day 1 in Paris. An attractions packed day. We still had to see Paris and the Eiffel Tower properly lit up in the night; that was planned for the next day. It became a bit of s struggle to get back to the hotel, as we took some time to find the metro, and which did not take us near the hotel; we ended up taking a taxi, which cost us 25 euros (that’s a lot by the way)! What’s a day without adventure, anyways:)

Europe Vacation – Welcome to UK

Venkat — Mon, 14 Sep 2009 12:53:00 +0000

You can see the first post of this series here.

First stop, immigration. The orderliness and the way things are managed in these western international airports never fails to impress me (we in India sure seem to be getting there, albeit slowly). There was a slight hiccup at immigration. The immgration officer wanted to double check on Sham’s visa as it has been rejected once earlier. We had to wait for about 5 mins, before the officer came back and approved our entry to UK. And so we passed through the gates into UK!

We had some more time on our hands to admire the airport. BIL was on his way to pick us up and he was still 45 mins away. As we waited, we filled ourselves on some muffins and hot chocolate. Finally BIL arrived, and we stepped out of the airport. As we did two things hit us – plenty of cigarette smoke with people puffing away like chimneys and the chilly morning air. We lugged our luggage some more distance till the pick up area and then loaded it into the car. After the greetings and handshakes, we were all set to head home – Warrington – a three hour drive from the airport.

The drive home was fairly nice. Driving on these freeways, or motorways as they call it in the UK, is not as exciting as driving on Indian roads:). By the way, for those who don’t know, driving system in UK is similar to that in India. The “monotony” of the drive had already put Sham to sleep and I was beginning to feel a bit dazed. So we decided to quickly break for 10 mins and pulled into an exit area. Another few muffins and a coffee later, we were on the road again. We passed Birmingham on the way, the only big city / county that we passed on the way.

Warrington is one of the sub-burbs about three hours from London. Beautiful lanes, manicured lawns and pleasant looking houses greeted us as we reached Creswell Close around 1:00 pm. The second round of greetings – mom and dad-in-law and sis-in-law. And the most exciting of them all – Honey – our very cute 1.5 year old nephew. After the general chit-chat, we freshened up, had lunch and then had a good nap, making up for all the sleep lost on the flight.

Evening I went along with BIL to pick up the car for the trip. The car was to be picked up from somewhere in Bradford, about 30 mi from Warrington. The drive gave more sights of the UK countryside. After we came back, we generally went shopping in the neighbourhood malls, purchasing stuff for the next day’s trip.

We got back around 8 pm, daylight still there in all its glory. Now this is one of the things (for better or worse) about the summer with which I was quite impressed. We ofcourse enjoyed the this aspect even more in the later part of trip. Later on, we finished dinner, finalised the packing for next day, and then settled in for the night….eagerly anticipating day break…

Europe Vacation – I – Bon Voyage

Venkat — Wed, 02 Sep 2009 15:12:22 +0000

With work opportunities in Europe not looming anywhere on the horizon:), I guess we decided it would not do us much harm (except financially), to make a short getaway to Europe. Aiding the decision, was the fact that, with Shamala’s bro and parents already there, it would make for good family vacation, and more importantly, a less costly one (more heads to split the cost against!). Add to that the fact that we did little or no work in planning the trip, apart from getting our visa, tickets to and from London, and investing in Lets Go Europe guide book. Rest all on BIL, the great!

The visa process turned out to be relatively easy. UK visa turned up 4 days after we submitted our application, and the Schengen visa took a week. Bottomline – provide as much information and documents as possible, and the process is generally a cake walk. We also got tickets to our liking; Jet Airways at around 54k return for the two of us

So our departure from India was planned on July 30th night. What is a trip without some adventure right at the beginning:). 15 mins into our ride to the airport, the rain came pouring down and with it came the traffic jams. For a 9:30 departure flt, we left home at 6 pm. We reached at 8:15 pm, taking 30 mins more than expected to reach; in the end it was quite safe, but there were some tense moments along the way. Maybe a little bit of judgement error on my part also, in hindsight. Shouldnt have trusted bangalore traffic so much.

So we flew out of Bangalore and landed in Mumbai. Our flt to london was at 1:45 am. Immigration was a breeze. Few things I noticed. The departure forms (and the arrival ones) look much more professional. 6 years back they looked pretty pathetic. Secondly, I was really taken aback by the amount of people traffic at the international airport. Talk about recession! I was not seeing any of that at the international airport.

Anyways, by the time we finished immigration, we were ready to board. We enviously passed the first class (full reclining), business class (semi-reclining) to our economy class seat (very little reclining!). Though I think the seats were quite comfortable and good leg room- Jet Airways is pretty decent. We took off on time. It was to be a 9 hour flt, reaching Heathrow at 6:45 am London time. We dozed on and off. I used the time to catch up on some movies – Wolverine is one of them I remember (mebbe the scotch got to me a little:) ). After a fairly comfortable flight, we finally landed in London! Ta – da!

Wayanad – Back to Mom’s Childhood

Venkat — Sun, 30 Nov 2008 15:13:09 +0000

This Oct end we got a chance to visit Wayanad in God’s Own Country. We were wanting to do Wayanad for quite sometime, but somehow it never fit our plans. However, a recent marriage function there gave us a chance to visit the place.

I have been to Wayanad before, but that was loooooong back. The last I visited Wayanad was in April 1990, a good 18+ years back. I have very vague memories of that visit. And since Mom/Dad were also coming down for the marriage, it was a reunion of sorts with the extended family – my mom spent a significant part of her childhood here. Though she was brought up in Madras (now Chennai), she used to spend all her summer vacations in Wayanad with her cousins; she spent her last few years before marriage here etc. Even Prakash, my elder bro and Vidya, my elder sis were born in Wayanad. So you see, lots of memories attached to Wayanad . . .

Overlooking the estate from my Uncle new house

On our second day in Wayanad, Mom eagerly took us around to see the Sapota (chiku) trees where she used to hang out with her cousins, the pozhas (ponds) – equivalent of the modern day swimming pools (infact utopian compared to the pools) -

The magical pozha

where they used to freak out, our great grandfather’s house and last but not the least, the house where Mom spent her last few years in Wayanad before getting married to Dad. Infact, Dad came to “see” Mom in that very house.

In front of my Mom's House

What’s really amazing is that these structures still stand tall! Our great grandfather’s house is pretty much in a dilapidated state, but yet its there!

In front of Great Grand Fathers house

You might have seen those movie scenes wherein a flashback scene suddenly becomes colorful and full of life; very similarly the images unfolded in my mind as Mom related all the interesting stories of how all the siblings (and they were many!) would sit out under the stars while grandma fed them all, of how once great grandpa fell down in the garden and so many more. The images were all the more vivid and colorful, colored with the glee with which Mom regaled us with those stories.

Then we visited the house where Mom spent her last few years in Wayanad. The people who had bought over the house then, still live in that house and it was a pretty happy reunion after so many years for all of them. Even the odd owner of chai kadai remembers my mom!! after soooo many year!!!

Well, that done we returned to our relatives house for a nice tasty lunch. Post lunch, we proceeded to do some sightseeing around Wayanad. The idea was just to spend some time. We went to some park (dont remember the name:( ). Parents and bro took a boat ride in the lake,

Boat ride in the lake

while Sham and I took a nice stroll around the park.

Sunshine thru the trees in the park

Back from sightseeing, we then spent the evening at our relatives place again. Sham and I again proceeded to take a long walk around the village area. There was no electricity; the evening lit up under the setting sun’s glow was made all the romantic.

Well that’s pretty much about it. Dinner done, we returned back to the hotel and then caught the bus back to Bangalore in the night.

It was a great trip and more importantly, all of Mom’s wishes were fulfilled; she had really wanted us to be there so that she could show us glimpses of her childhood; quite sure that it would be difficult to get this chance again. The only thing, or should I say persons, missing was Vidya and her family. If she too had come, it would have been 100% complete . . .

Hampi – The Wonderous Ruins – Part II

Venkat — Fri, 10 Oct 2008 17:58:54 +0000

You can check out the first part of the post here which gives general info I gathered on our trip to Hampi.

We had planned for a 3-day trip to Hampi. Our idea was for a chilled and relaxed trip, so three days made sense; however in general (if time is a constraint), 2 days might be enough. Though, I would seriously suggest that you plan a 3-day trip; reason being that its one thing to just go down and see all the popular places/monuments and take patel photos and totally another to venture out and explore the lesser known locations on your own.

Day 1

We reached Hospet around 8 am in the morning. The train was only 15 minutes late, pretty much on time by IST standards.

Awaiting arrival at Hospet

We were out of the station and on our way to Hampi in about 10 mins. There was not much bargaining with the auto guys; we quickly settled for 120 (we knew that was a fair price). The roads were not great and it was a pretty much bumpy ride into Hampi, except for the last few kms, which apparently had been laid new only a couple of months back – so much for a rollicking tourist spot.

Our rooms were thankfully still booked (our booking had been done over phone and given the experience, I was a little skeptical); we quickly checked in and moved out for breakfast. We first went and sat in Sanghameshwar; 10 mins up, the guy did not even come to take an order; pissed we took off and had breakfast in a shady hotel called Amrutha something. Dont even try this place.

We finished breakfast and then hung around the main street for sometime doing timepass. We decided to check out what the KTDC office there had to offer in terms of Hampi sightseeing. They had a package worth 175/- per person, in which they would take you around all the important monuments in Hampi and also take you down to have a look at Tungabhadra dam. So we booked the package and then headed back to the guest house to freshen up.

We came back down to the main street. We were still hungry and hence we set out in search of that famous restaurant called Mango Tree. It is in the direction behind Virupaksha temple. It was a good long walk from our guest house, offering us nice views of the TungaBhadra river along the way.

Nice view across Tungabhadra - on the way to Mango Tree

Lunch at Mango Tree was a delicious affair. We enjoyed the local (mango tree thali) and mediterranean cuisine and topped it with Nutella Banana Pancakes and mint tea. The restaurant also offers excellent views across the river.

: View from Mango Tree

After the sumptuous lunch, it was time to decide on what to do for the rest of the day. We thought of hiring bikes and going around the city; that didn’t happen as we got into a fight with the bike guys when they asked us to give them our driving licenses as security; they were acting also very pricey; one thing led to another and we decided to drop the idea. Finally, we decided to hire an auto and go off to Anegundi, a nearby village.

Anegundi is a small village some 15-20 kms from Hampi. After getting to the banks of the river by auto, to get to the Anegundi village, we had to cross a river using a coracle. It was a pretty adventurous ride with 9 people and one hero honda bike in one coracle.

: Looking across to Anegundi

There was not much to do in Anegundi except for a fort which didn’t really seem accessible. There are lots of rocky boulders around here and we had a good time climbing these rocks, peeping into some of the caves we found etc.

On the way back, the coracle ride was even more adventurous with 3 bikes and close to 15 people. And there were nice photo opportunities as the one below.

: Man fishing in river between Anegundi and Hampi

Returning, we headed for the most important activity of the day – climbing up the Matanga Hill. This is the vantage point to see the sun setting over Hampi, but alas, the sun hid itself behind the clouds that very evening.

: Climbing up Matanga Hill

Nevertheless, we proceeded to climb the steep hill; the climb was taxing and the view rewarding.

: View from Matanga Hill

The climb up the hill was taxing, but the path was neatly laid out for us. The climb down was much more more treacherous. There was a path, but not very well defined. We had to do some discovery on our own. Of course, we made it safely down, and landed up somewhere near the Achutaraya Temple.

: We landed up here from the Matanga Hill

By the time was came down, dusk was setting in Hampi.

: Dusk setting on Tungabhadra

We walked the long stretch back to the guest house, freshened up and then proceeded for dinner.We went to some KTDC restaurant in search of some good beer – Knock Out greeted us! The food was pretty ordinary here. Done with it quickly, we all returned back to the guest house and retired for the night.

Day 2

Today, we had the KTDC tour of Hampi lined up starting 10:30 am. We finished off breakfast at Sri Venkateshwara and then got to the KTDC bus. The tour started off from Virupaksha Temple

Virupaksha Temple

and ended with the Tungabhdra Dam. We saw various places, the highlights being the Sasvekalu Ganesha, Lakshmi Narashima monolith statue,

: Lakshmi Narasimha Monolith

Lotus Mahal,

: Lotus Mahal

Stone Chariot and Musical Stone Pillars at Vithala Temple and various other amazing pieces of architecture.

: Stone Chariot @ Vithala Temple

Below are the Anjanadri Hills, the birth place of Hanuman. This comes on the way to the Vithala Temple.

: Anjanadri Hills – Birthplace of Hanuman

The Vijayanagara architecture was fairly advanced – the public water tank having limestone layers to filter / purify the water for drinking,

: Public Tank for drinking water

structures having multiple floors, the innovative cooling system in Lotus Mahal (which was the summer palace for the queens) – water pumped through cylindrical holes on the walls to create the cooling, the umpteen marketplaces,

: Marketplace in front of Vithala Temple

and many more simple yet extremely innovative architectural marvels.

We wound up the day after seeing the Tungabhadra Dam, in itself looking majestic. I really did not know that the Tungabhadra River was so expansive.

: Overlooking the Tungabhadra River across the TB Dam

On the way back, we stopped at Hotel Malligi for dinner and drinks. Hotel Malligi was a really nice place to stop at! Dinner was punctuated with some really good / loud / heated discussions.

We returned to Hampi using the public bus. Back at the guest house, we retired for the night after a few rounds of poker.

Day 3

Today was a total chill out day. We started off with breakfast at Sanghameshwar’s consisting of masala dosas and puri bhajis. The one item which stood out was Coffee Lassi. If you are the adventurous type, try it out! After the breakfast, we decided to check out few others things in Hampi on our own. The first was the monolith bull, a gigantic Nandi.

: Monolith Bull

We spent the next hour and half sitting here itself discussing topics such as karma, destiny and fatalism.

: Fatalism, was it?

We moved on hoping to explore some new places and hit some nice views across the Tungabhadra river along the way.

: Magnificent View

And then we proceeded to explore the Achutaraya Temple, in general loitering around Hampi.

: Sitting in the Achutaraya Temple Tank

Then we explored the Achutaraya temple, a temple with equally amazing architecture and sculptures

: Inside Achutaraya Temple

We hit the main town back for lunch at Mango Tree. The restaurant really deserved a second visit. With this, our stay in Hampi was pretty much over. We spent the next couple of hours generally loitering around shopping and then proceeded back to the guest house to pack up and leave.

But hey, there was one thing in Hampi which was still unaccomplished and I was determined to finish that – capturing sunset in Hampi. The sun had been nice and strong for the last few hours and was just setting. With half an hour left for departure, I set out to capture my dream pictures in Hampi and am glad that I was not disappointed.

: Sasuvekalu Ganesha against the setting sun

: Ruins standing tall against the sunset

: Ruins against Sunset – II

These amazing sights of sunset ended the Hampi trip on a real high.

Never have I seen historical ruins on such a large scale. They really bore testimony to what a flourishing period it must have been. At times, it was really sad to see how much havoc the invaders wreaked upon the empire. On our way to Hampi, we had met a gentleman who said that one really feels sad when returning from Hampi, sad to see such a beautiful empire in ruins. I couldn’t agree more:(

Hampi – The Wonderous Ruins – Part I

Venkat — Thu, 09 Oct 2008 05:40:00 +0000

Land of the magical musical stone pillars. Land of the historical Kishkindha empire and the epic fight between Sugriva and Vali. Land of India’s biggest, grandest and most flourishing empire (not kingdom , mind you) – the Vijayanagara empire. And last but not the least, home to some of the most amazing examples of architectural excellence . . . and more . . .

Welcome to Hampi!

Getting to Hampi

We were initially planning to drive down to Hampi. It is apparently a 7-hr drive. The route to be taken is in the direction of Hubli / Bellary. However, the feedback on the road condition was not great (info from other blogs). We personally also saw that…atleast in Hospet the roads were far from a good condition. So we ended up choosing train as choice of transport. In hindsight, I think the train option was great. Hampi Express (6592 / 6591) will take you to and bring you back from Hospet, the biggest town near Hampi. Hampi is around 14 kms from Hospet. From the station, you can get to Hampi by auto. It should cost you around 120 bucks, no more. If you are the really miserly type, you can try to bargain down to Rs. 100. But that is as low as you would go. You leave 10:30 in the night from Bangalore and you are in Hampi by 9 am next morning. That’s pretty good, eh?

Staying in Hampi

There are two options – either we stay in Hospet which offers a far wider range of acco options or we stay in Hampi closer to the action. Hospet offers even I think 4-star acco. Hotel Malligi is one of them. In Hampi, there are mainly guest houses or maybe guest homes. People let out couple of rooms in their house.

Getting a booking in these guest houses proved quite tough, until just a day before we were to leave. Either some of them were not ready to take a booking (e.g. Shanthi GH) or some were incommunicado (Padma GH). Finally, on the last day we got through to Padma and booked our rooms. Shanthi just plainly refused to book in advance and kept saying that they will only give us rooms after we landed up there. Pretty strange, I thought!

The Padma Guest House cost us 600/- per day. The rooms were nothing great . . . but then they were not bad either. But, ya, do not go with great expectations. We had our problems with there being no curtains in the room, bathroom windows not covered, fans not working, power cuts in the night (this can be a serious problem in hot Hampi). The other problem we faced was regarding the honesty of this GH (Padma Guest House) owner. I got cheated out of Rs 500/- . I dunno how she did the trick, but she claimed that I gave her only 500/-, when I actually gave her 1000/-. The 1000/- rupee note that I gave her somehow disappeared. I couldn’t prove her wrong and took the 500/- loss, but all I can say is that you have got to be really careful . . .

The other guest house that we heard of was Shanthi Guest House. This is the place where apparently all goras come and stay. We did not manage to get a booking at all at this place! Can you beat it; getting treated like second class citizens in our own country?

For the budget travellers, I think these Guest Houses offer an excellent option.

Eating in Hampi

For all the joints that you see in Hampi, in my opinion, there are only three worth eating at. Mango Tree is the best place by far. The place has a comprehensive menu spanning across local, north indian and mediterannean cuisine. Mango Tree is also very nicely located overlooking the Tungabhadra river and is the neatest of all the places. Service is also very prompt. Do try out the Falafal + Humus item. Very delicious. Hence a must visit.

Chilling out @ Mango Tree

Delicious Nutella Pancakes @ Mango Tree

Two other joints – Sanghameshwar and Sri Venkateswara – are also worth eating at. Nothing great out here, but the food is average and maybe worth visiting for breakfast / snacks. Here, however, be prepared to spend some time waiting for your order. Hurrying up will not work.

Another place worth checking out is Temptations @ Hotel Malligi in Hospet. The only A/C restaurant that we went to during our stay in Hampi. Another advantage here, is that the place has a good range of liquor (alteast you get KF beer!). If you didn’t know, within the perimeter of Hampi meat and liquor are banned, hence you got to go out to Hospet or atleast outside Hampi. And Temptations above offers an excellent choice amidst a good ambience.

In Part II of this post, I will write about what we did in Hampi over 3 days . . .