I am not
sure why I picked Anantapur, instead of Srikakulam for field trip.
It’s been more
than one year.. I cannot be specific to details and I have no wish to bore you
with the mundane office work.
After
sending a friend off at airport, started my journey to Anantapur at around 10
AM. Anantapur is 350KM from
Hyderabad. As I have traveled on NH7 so
many times, I got bored , so I am not
going to spend much time writing about it.
I would like to mention few things though!
1. Not many food joints or tea stalls
between Judcherala and Kurnool. If you are hungry, eat at
Kurnool. Very limited food joints and
petrol bunks between Kurnool and Anantapur.
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| ISKON Temple at Anantapur |
NH7 is kind
of highway, you can enjoy if you are with friends and travelling by car. The
highway is bland. The March Sun is not helping either.
Reached
Anantapur in the evening. Checked in at
Annapurna Hotel. Rs. 300 per day. Its cheap and relatively neat.
As part of
my job, first I have to take the blessings and permission of District
collector. Election time is bad time for any kind of survey project. On top of
it, my project is on Right to Information Act. The single most law, all the
govt employees collectively hate.
On day one I
visited museum . It’s a small one with sculptures without noses and all. It has
the board displaying the evolution of Telugu Script.
Roamed
around Anantapur for a while in the Evening.
I wish to write few things about Anantapur city and then will jump to
tourist places I visited there.
Food
Cafes are good. They are not like
Hyderabad cafes , refreshing in terms of place, not so impressive in terms of
chai. Café usually, is an open area with
lots of plastic stools and a Bamboo tent for shade.
Uggani is the staple food in Karnataka and Rayalaseema. Its ubiquitous. Its cheap , its easy to eat. Raagi Mudda is something everyone must try
when they visit the place and Kushka (kind of pulao) , though my taste buds
didn’t approve of it .
“Nannari” is the beverage you don’t want to miss there. Its counterpart
of Rooh afza in Hyderabad. And of course
you will forced take lot of butter milk to put up with the heat.
Geography
Let me give you a Geography lesson on
Anantapur.
Did you
notice the stone-slab on which Dosa is made at Hotels? Anantapur is that one big stone-slab. Rock,
only rock and nothing but rock. And you
can practically see, how lack of greenery will increase the temperature.
If you go
from Hyderabad to Bangalore, on bike, the area where you are scared, sweat
oozing like sprite from a shaken bottle, where you are depressed and start
cursing yourself for not taking public transport, where you cross a dried up
river, with no taddy trees, that’s Anantapur . No need to check Name boards.
People
People are
generally cool and good at being hosts. Even
at Govt offices one thing you cant miss is the Rayalaseema Hospitality. Top officials don’t shy to be good
hosts and wont allow you take leave without lunch.
Having said
that, I have to mention this thing so to
give you an unbiased view. I have noticed, every Road divider on road were
destroyed, when I enquired, they told me they have destroyed them, because they
did not like the idea of Andhra Pradesh
state is getting divided.
Tourist
places
These are
the places I visited.
1. Penukonda Fort ( I wrote about it in the previous blog post )
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| Timmama Marrimanu |
2. Kadari temple ( Didn’t go in there):
I passed by it on the way to Timmamma Marrimanu.
3. Timmamma Marrimanu : It’s an old
banyan tree, occupying vast area. It got a gunnies book record too. Negative
is, one cant have a walk under the tree. A fenced path is laid. And there is
tiny fort near it, not a must visit, but if you visit it, your idea of forts
will change.
If you enjoy the lonely road, that takes you to Timmamma Marrimanu.
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| Idol of Yogi vemana |
Vemana Temple : Yogi vemana is one
of the greatest Telugu poets of all the time.
He didn’t write to please gods or kings but shared his wisdom to common
folk through poetry. His famous poems
were embedded into the walls of the temple. Except for architecture , it’s a
normal Hindu temple, with a priest , Prasadam and all. In the nearby village
you can locate his grave, in total contrast to the tiny village.
After 22
days , I could not sustain Anantapur
anymore. I had to drink two liters of
buttermilk , one large bottle of Mirinda daily to avoid dehydration. Last two
days, I stayed at Tadipatri, which is hell on earth. The temperature flirts with 50 degrees
centigrade mark.
Tadipatri
is a rocky area. Most of the polished stones which are used for flooring come
from here. You must of heard of
Bethamcherla stones if you were a Telugu guy.
Residents got adopted to the frying temperature, and enjoy their hot
snacks in the evening. They so used to the heat, they stopped building houses
with normal bricks but use the spoiled polished stones.
Thanks to Tadipari
region MRO who let me get out of the furnace without delaying. Selected the route map to Hyderabad via
Kurnool, and I was good to go next day morning.
Woke up
before dawn , woke the Hotel Manager and checked out. Jumped on the bike to reach Home, but it
refused to start. I had to kick it to make the engine roar. All electricals are
down. No turn lights, no horn. 
No mechanic
available at that hour. I thought of waiting for mechanic to open but piled up
frustration due to sweat and heat all these days kicked me in the shin. Decided to get it repaired at Kurnool. I have
to be away from Anantapur even by walk.
Two routes
to reach Hyderabad. One via Gooty ,
another via Betamcherla . I chose the second one to cover few tourist spots on
the way home.
Got up
early to start my journey before sunrise.
Bike wont start. It want to spoil my plan. One kick on its shin and engine roared with pain. All the electrical of bike are down. I thought fuse is the culprit. I have theoretical knowledge on changing the
fuse. I don’t have much time to waste with experiments. I thought of getting it
repaired at Bethamcherla or Kurnool. No
indicators , no horn , no light. I have to go but I have to go slow.
Due to
elections, all road works were come to a halt. Worse are the roads which are
half laid. Traffic is confined to one half of the road leaving the other half
for dogs to walk and rest. Its becoming
too hard without a horn.
A traveling
for an hour or so, i approached a cement
factory. The dry mountains , the early
morning mist gave it an eerie look, like the eye-tower in Lord of the rings.
Trucks are struggling on the half road to cross. Reflex made me honk in the traffic and the
extra horn shouted its lungs out on the bullies.
Yes, my
bike has self-healing capacity.
First halt
is at Belum caves. Its not on my list
but I thought why not? Belum caves open at 10 AM, 3 hours to go. Had a tea and
left to Yaganti.
Taking a
picture of Yaganti bull is the first thing on to-do list.
Belum caves
to Yaganti route is single way with a bit of traffic. One should watch out for
Tractors.
On the way
to Yaganti, these are the places I visited
1. Veerabrahmendara swamy caves ( These
are the caves in which he wrote kalagnyananm)
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| Hotel at Orwakal |
2. Arundhati palace ( The palace shown
in Arundhati movie. Locals says , in the past , the local king built this
palace to take after when he comes out for evening walk ) .
3. Yaganti . It will take time to
explore the temple, but my point of interest is only Yaganti rock bull which
grows with years. There is a board by archeology departments confirming so.
4. Orwakal rock hotel . Orwakal is a
rocky area, APTDC constructed a hotel there.
Don’t expect much from this hotel.
It was evening by the time I reached
Kurnool. Bought cova-buns from Pulla
Reddy sweets for Dixit. He been asking
for then since I landed in Anantapur.
After one year, I don’t remember inane details about the trip, but I reached
home safely by 10 PM or so.
