All about that peak summer visit from Bangalore to Kanipakam via Tirupati, AP!

I spent 9 months in Bangalore regarding a styling project, and during the time period, I visited Tirupati thrice and I was really fortunate that Lord Venkateshwara made me visit the holy place on the most auspicious days of Brahmotsavam, Sri Rama Navami & Vaisakha Pournami. Among these, I have attended the Garuda Seva where the Lord Balaji, with his two consorts, can be seen amidst the huge procession on the Mada streets of Tirumala on his mount Garuda. As a Vaishnavite, I felt extremely lucky to participate, and it was on the full moon day of May 2025. And one can imagine the kind of rush this place actually gets during summer holidays, but all I wanted to do was to visit the place at any cost. I chose to climb the stairs of Tirumala from Alipiri after taking an early morning bus from Indiranagar, Bangalore, which took around 5 hours to reach the holy hill.

After dropping my heavy trekking bag at the counter near the Alipiri Mettu, I set out to climb the 3250 stairs to reach the Ananda Nilayam of Sri Varu. Every time I climb these stairs, I feel overwhelmed with divine happiness. It took me hardly three and a half hours to complete the stairs. This time, I felt more confident than ever because I knew exactly what to do. By the time I reached the hill, it was around 4 o'clock. And I got a chance to attend Sahasra Deepalankara Seva at 5 o'clock. I enjoyed every bit of it, and once it ended, I rushed to Pushkarini and did my holy bath to freshen up for my upcoming Garuda Seva, followed by Special Darshan at 8 o'clock. By the time the temple management started to prepare for the Seva and the crowd started gathering at the galleries, I had completed my Darshan at our mutts of Narasimha Swamy and Varaha Swamy near the galleries.

The next day, I woke up pretty early, freshened up at the Pushkarini. Went one more round to visit all the temples of the Mada streets, and after having a lovely breakfast and tea, I boarded the bus to return to Tirumala city because I planned to visit one of the important holy shrines of Lord Ganesha at Kaanipakam in Andhra Pradesh!

It takes around one and a half hours to travel from Tirupati to Kanipakam, covering around 65km. I chose public transport to travel. As I have already taken the bus from the Tirumala hill to Tirupati bus stand, I got a bus to Kanipakam at the station itself. I relaxed like a baby in that bus and woke up in the village of Kanipakam when the bus stopped right in front of the temple premises. It was pretty hot when I reached the temple because it was around 11 o'clock, and I came to know that the temple was closed temporarily for an hour during the offering rituals inside the temple.

There's a Koneru near the temple where devotees can take a holy dip, there's also Varadaraja Perumal Swamy temple, another beautiful Vaishnava shrine, and on the other side, there are the temples of Subramanya Swamy and a huge Shiva temple with amazing and magnanimous architecture with idols of Shiva, Parvati, Ganesha, Karthikeya, and Nandi. After exploring all those temples, I bought some Prasadam and had it for lunch. I thought of going to Anna Prasaadam, but there were way too many people. I roamed outside, bought some articles as souvenirs, and finally bade a bye to Ganesha, only to return to Tirupati again.

So from Bangalore, I reached Tirupati for the Darshan of Sreenivasa Perumal, after spending a night at the hill, I reached Kanipakam for the Darshan of Ganapathi and Varadaraja Perumal, and continued for the Darshan of Govindaraja Perumal; those two days went spiritually devotional yet physically tiring but the trip hasn't ended because that night I took one more spontaneous decision to visit another Perumal at another place, indeed another state. Stay tuned to read all about it, too!