Through My Lens

It was the month of October 2015 ,when my son has winter holidays and we were planning for a trip to a nearby place on a weekday as weekends will be having a lot of rush in heritage sites.The choice to be made was between the Tipu Palace in Bangalore and the place called Lepakshi where i have heard the stories are written on the stones and pillars build in the Veerabhadra Swamy temple.Finally we decided for Lepakshi. The place is around 130 kms from Bangalore and we started the journey on an early morning,so that we reach the place in around 2 hrs time.The approach road towards this place is having tolls and the road is good also,perfect for a road trip. We reached the place at around 11.00 am.This place,Lepakshi, is a small village near Anantpur. This place is built on a low rocky hill called "Kurma Sailam" (meaning tortoise hill in Telugu). History As the history of the place goes this place is famous for the Veerabhadra Swamy temple.This temple was bu...

It was in the month of Sep 2011,we were on a holiday to our home town Payyanur. On holidays if i am in Kerala, i will be the most lazy person to start with an idea of an offbeat destination tour.The idea came from none other than my wife for the tour of the Payyambalam beach.In Kerala touring is always fine but the sweating is something which i hate a lot while touring in Kerala.Even though it was the month of Sep, still the sun god has given a lot of sweating with a cool breeze in the country side.I just asked about what other places other than the beach we can see around.She just mentioned about St.Angelo Fort.I told her lets go to the fort first and then by evening we will have our tour towards the Payyambalam beach. We set out for our destination.The Fort was some 55 km from my place,which is Payyanur. We set out for the journey at 2.00 pm in a hired white ambassador,which was still the pride of taxis in Kerala at that point of time.We reached the destination at around 3.10 pm. ...

My May 2015 visit to the Hassan and Chikmangalur belt was an eyeopener for me as an individual to know about the Hoysala architecture and its history.The Belavadi trip was not a planned one and we came to know about this place through Nitin,who is the owner of Thippanahalli Home stay where we stayed for 2 nights in this trip.Once our stay in the home stay was through we were planning to go to Belur and then Halebid. Seeing our ignorance about the place,Nitin came forward and had a word with the driver who was knowing some of those places.He told him why not he drive to Belur through Belavadi and see the Veera Narayana Temple. He agreed and we started our journey towards Belavadi.  As i was reaching Belavadi,one thing which i noticed in this part of the world was,the villages were really prosperous and in the surrounding villages of this place all the basic infra for the villages was available.The Indian villages in it's real glory can be seen in this part of the world.The ride...

It was the month of Jan 12 and i was in Kerala along with my family for a short visit during the 26th Jan holiday.On a sunny lazy day in the morning the family decided to go for an outing.But the place was not decided.Some suggestions came that why can't we go for a beach as we always go for heritage and architectural sites and the suggestion came to be Muzhappilangad beach.I have heard about this beach a lot but what lies there needs to be seen when we reach there.We booked a taxi and there we were travelling towards the beach. This beach is located parallel to NH 17 highway which is between Kannur and Thalassery. This is said to be one of the best drive in beach in India and in Asia.We reached the place at around 3.00 pm in the noon and there we see the vast beach with the shores inviting the vehicles to run through it for a ride of their lifetime.The beach is as long as 5 km in length and it allows the tourist for a ride in the beach up to a stretch of 4 km.On the shores...

This vacation was in the month of Dec 2012 when we were travelling to our own ‘God’s own country’, Kerala. After my visit to the Padmanabha Swamy Temple in Thiruvanathapuram we moved to the place called Padmanabhapuram which is in the Kanyakumari District of Tamil Nadu.We were to this place to see and explore the Padmanabhapuram Palace. I was surprised why a Kerala palace is in Tamil Nadu?  As soon as I reached the place I enquired regarding the same and what I came to know was that even though the palace is located in Tamil Nadu, the palace and its surroundings is owned and governed by the Kerala State. The place called Padmanabhapuram was the capital city of the erstwhile Travancore kingdom. This place is about 60 km from Thiruvananthapuram and around 20 km from Nagercoil.This palace is located in the backdrop of the Veli Hills which is part of the Western Ghats. We reached in the afternoon and then moved to the ticket counter. After some time we assembled at the gate and on...