My Window Seat: August 2006

Ganesh Chaturthy 2006 @ our home:
Today we celeberated Ganesh Chaturthy. Today God Ganesh visits every worshipper's house in the form of Murti (made of clay...sometimes painted too). You can see that the Murti is decorated with his favourite "White Erukku", Arugampul" (Grass), and flowers. This murti is worshipped for 2-10 days and immersed in a nearby Tank, River or Sea!

We make Modagam (Kozhukkattai in Tamil) which is his favourite food! (A modak is a dumpling made from rice flour with a stuffing of coconut, jaggery

and some other condiments & Steam Cooked)

Other food items were: Ellu Urundai, Sundal, Paruppu Vadai, Athirasam!

Writing this blog after overwhelming lunch with all the above mentioned South-Indian specials!!!

OTHER PLOGS (Photo Logs!)

Yediyur Lake - getting ready for a month-long idol immersion from today!

This view is from my Balcony...

A view from my Dashboard…

{Own driving: Bangalore – Hosur – Krishnagiri – Dharmapuri – Salem – Namakkal – Musiri – Kulithalai – Trichy} [Hired Vehicle: Trichy – Madurai – Krishnapuram – Kutralam]

5:40 am: Started from Jayanagar, Bangalore (after visiting Ganesha temple @ RV Road)

NH-7 feels like hot-knife-on-butter! Except for a small stretch of bad road-yet to be done to NH levels - between Krishnagiri and Dharmapuri.

Zooming past Electronic city, Hosur, Krishnagiri we reached Dharmapuri (133 Kms) at 8:15 am. Filled the petrol-tank (few Rupees cheaper than Bangalore...dude) and decided to fill our stomach with delicious Idly, Dosa, Vada and stopped at my favourite spot "Sri Saravana Bhavan Hotel" near main junction, Dharmapuri.

9:05 am: Drove via Salem (196 kms - 10:20 am) reached Namakkal (246 kms) at 11:20 am

Visited the temples of Hanuman and Narasimha swamy...
( The cave sculptures were engraved by GUNSILA Adhiyan Kula, King during 7th Century) More...

12:20 pm: From Namakkal drove to Musiri (298 kms - 1:30 pm). From Musiri I took the bridge across River Cauvery to Kulithalai, as I was suggested that the road/traffic via Kulithalai is better compared to the Musiri-Trichy road.

2:10 pm: Destination Trichy...

Ucchi Pillayar Temple (Rock-temple)

From Trichy we hired a Toyota-Qualis, as we had to accommodate more passengers... The Trichy-Madurai road is being widened and one can expect a cool-ride very soon in this sector!

From Trichy we went to Madurai, Meenakshi Amman Temple and had a good darshan of the goddess...

Though I have visited the temple so many times earlier, this time I could see the closing ceremonies... Especially God Sundareshwara travelling in a "Pallakku" back home!

From Madurai we travelled through Thirumangalam, Krishnapuram etc., and reached Kutralam (Courtalam) at about 1:30 am...

Kutralam has ample lodges and "Illams" with decent rooms at decent prices...You can pick and choose from the wide range of lodging options and we settled down for a good sleep, after planning for the morning bath at the Main Falls! When we actually planned for the Kutralam trip, I was informed through various sources that the weather was dry and the falls had little water to bath. Expecting a huge crowd and long waiting hours...we went to the Main Water fall the next morning, to see the falls at its best - lotz and lotz of water due to overnight rains! Wow....what a beautiful sight!

Kutralam Main Falls (August 13, 2006)

It certainly was a feast to eyes to watch the gift of mother-nature. Why and how the droplets falling on the peaks of mountains gets collected, saved and presented to us? Most of the visitors to Kutralam opt for Oil-massage (Malish) charged at Rs. 30/-per head. Police announcements all-over cautioned about chain-snatchers, warned drunken not to enter the bathing area...And there was a Police-control room very close to the water fall to monitor and control the crowd. Without them it may not be possible for everyone traveling from far-off places to enjoy the experience of taking bath in Kutralam!

After introducing the water-fall bath to my Kidz for the first time in their life, we visited the Kutralla Nathar temple, famous Shiva shrine.

The next thing to do naturally was to head to a hotel (called "Mess") nearby the temple for delicious South-indian "Idly, Vada, Dosa"...You have variety of options to choose your dosa...Podi dosa, Podi Uthappam, Malli uthappam, Onion Utapam, Pattani uthapam, coconut uthapam....Wow, no Pizzas can compete with our taste!!!

Menu card....No Menu Board at Saraswathy Mess, Kutralam

We then went to Tenkasi, about 5 kms from Kutralam. Kasi Vishwanatha temple is one of the oldest with beautiful, magnificant GOPURAM standing tall proudly...announcing the greatness of ancient Tamil architects!

Tenkasi Viswanatha Temple

We then went to Papanasm water fall took bath again and returned back to Kutralam for shopping time....

Varam tharum Vinayagar pond....Azhvarkurichi

Next day morning we went to Aintharuvi (Five-falls)...Due to overnight drizzle the water flow was very good and hence we enjoyed the great bathing experience...

Ayyanar Saastha Temple @ Five-falls

After 2 days of marathon water-fall visits and baths we started our journey back to Trichy...

On the way we visited Srivilliputhur temple...(left pic)

Next day we came back to Bangalore via the same Musiri-Namakkal-Salem-Dharmapuri-Krishnagiri-Hosur route.

Srirangam temple rajagopuram (pic on right) from Trichy-Kulithalai road

At Dharmapuri this time we tried Hotel Sriramas and found it excellent! Parotta was simply superb!

There is a Monkey hub near Krishnagiri....where the lorry, bus and other visitors/travellers offer food to Monkeys as they are considered Avtars of Hanuman! We too stopped over....