I am continuing from part 1 of the trip where I take you from Hemakuta hill to Krishna temple to Narasimha & Badavi Linga. If you guys want to watch it check out the video below.
Part 2 starts from Prasanna Virupaksha Temple aka underground Shiva temple. Where I talk about the ruins, some restoration and show you around a bit.
After that we go straight to the Mosque which was later built by the muslim rulers. There's also a band house and a watch tower near the mosque. I then go to the Royal Enclosure which is known as the 'Mint'. I would rather you check out this video so you'll get a better idea of what I am writing.
So, I hope you watched it, now after the 'mint' we go to the Queen's palace area known as the Zanana Enclosure. At this site i saw the ruins of the Queen's palace, the basement, a huge wall, a couple of watch towers and the Lotus Mahal.
Right behind all of this lies the famous Elephants stable. Its humongous! 11 adjacent rooms & all having stylish domes with a huge courtyard in front of it. Lush green well maintained lawn was good to see. The heat was bad and I had a small water bottle which was already empty. I was looking around but a small store which is behind the museum was also closed. The only option I had was to buy a water bottle or coconut water. I chose coconut water and it was very small and not at all enough for me. I thought to myself that I would visit one more site and then head back to the hotel for lunch.
The next stop is Hazara Rama temple, My auto driver told me that there are 1000 stone carvings from Ramayana depicted inside the temple. He also claimed that most of the Ramayana happened near Hampi. I went in and quickly came out which I regret a lot now. I didn't even take any photos, only video from my cell phone. Looking back now I think I should have spent more time in this trip and at each site! I will probably plan a trip again very soon. I also felt that the afternoon hours are not good to explore Hampi. Only the morning and evening time gets you good shots and is pleasant as well.
From the temple I went back to explore the other side of the 'Mint'. First I saw the underground rooms, the viewing area and then the Step tank. Step tank is made in black rock and has no reliefs on them. Its all plain and smooth. Lots of steps to fetch water, there's also an open pipe system, huge pipes lead all the rain water to the step tank.
After this I went to the Public bath which is a huge swimming tank like structure. I assumed it as the Queen's private bath but it doesn't look very private and also my auto driver told me there's an octagonal shaped Queen's bath later which I didn't go to. Also, part of all the Royal Enclosure is the Mahanavami Dibba which is around 3 flights high pyramid like platform. This is where I went next.
The platform offers a great view of the entire Royal Enclosure. You get the scope of the Grandeur of the Vijaynagar Empire & how glorious it was. There are two staircases from the East & West. The tourism department I guess has also installed a ramp which leads from the parking to the base of the platform, not to the top. The platform also has hinges on it which can mean they had a roof like structure over it. That would have been a cool hangout for the King I'm guessing. The King used this platform to watch the performances and the festivities from here.
By this time I was super exhausted and hungry too! I went straight to the hotel took a nap, had lunch and I'll do another write-up for the rest of the day from here. I am also going to create a new video which I'll upload by this Saturday i.e. 24th Nov 2018. So, please subscribe to my YouTube channel for updates or follow me here on Tripoto.
Thank You.
Ajinkya.
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