My Life On Two Wheels: Lepakshi - A Historical and Archaeological place

When: 1st July 2012.
Destination: Lepakshi, AndhraPradesh
How and who all are: Myself and Avinash on Apache-180 RTR
Odometer reading: 300Kms.
Route Map: Bangalore - Hebbal - Hyd highway(NH-7) - Hindupur - Lepakshi - Bangalore.

Short n Sweet description about trip:
                                "Lepakshi" is an incredible temple with superb carvings and fascinating history. The temple is known for its paintings of the Vijayanagara period which are named after the temple, as Lepakshi Paintings.The main features of the temple complex of Lepakshi are the Moolasthamba, Nandi Monolith, the Natya Mantapa, the Seven Headed Serpent, the Asampoorna (incomplete) Kalyana Mantapa, and the Latha Mantapa. Each feature being unique, has a different story to tell and true to its name.

Travelogue:

   Lepakshi is one of the place in my must visit list for quite a long time. But somehow I didn't get chance to visit it. I read about the place during my childhood, but never visited it. Oneday photos from my colleague on his Facebook wall changed my feeling and made me to visit the place very next weekend itself :). His photography in some pictures were enhanced so much that I felt they lost their natural colors. So, I decided to go and check out on my own and also I want to improve my photography skills as I was a beginner in photography. Places like Lepakshi, Belur, Halebeed are always best places to enhance photography skills. :)

          As it is just 150Kms far from Bangalore, Me and My friend Avinash decided to cover it in a single day. In b'lre it was raining heavily during July month. Luckily there was no rain on the day we planned. In-fact it was bit sunny. So as per planned we started from Electronic city, Bangalore @ 6AM. Since it was morning we didn't find much traffic on silkboard - Hebbal road. After crossing Hebbal we reached B'lre-Hyd highway. Ride on highways are always smooth. But soon we got boared with straight roads and also we have started feeling hungry. We stopped at Kamat-uppachaar and had nice breakfast. Within next 1Hr we have entered into Andhra pradesh. Soon we reached Hidupur and in another 15mins reached Lepakshi. by 10'o clock we were in Lepakshi :)

Majestic entrance of the temple

We could spot Nandi carving while entering into the Lepakshi itself. We thought of visiting temple first,so directly headed to the main temple.

We started roaming around the temple and taking snaps. Luckily we found one guy explaining history of the temple. Avinash went and joined with him and I started using my photographic skills to capture the beauty of Temple.

Later Avinash explained me everything about the temple history and architecture.

Lepakshi- the name itself has a wonderful story. While Ravana was taking away Sita, an eagle by name "Jatayu" tried to stop him. During the fight, Ravana cut one of its wings and the bird fell in this place. Later, when Rama came in search of Sita, he saw this bird and said "le, pakshi" (which means "get up, bird"). Hence the name Lepakshi.

Virupanna, a chieftrainer under the Vijayanagara king Achyutaraya constructed this temple. The main intention behind building this temple was Shiva's marriage with Parvati. The sculptures and paintings on the ceilings depict various events of marriage.
Most of the paintings on the ceilings were still clear.

Row of pillars with carvings on it

Hanging pillar , The Seven Headed Serpent, Ganapathi Sculpture, Mantapa and so on.. each and every corner of temple was historical. The story which connects all and gives a life to temple was simply marvellous.. To be frank "There is no great story writer than Vyasamaharshi for his Mahabaratha and Valmeeki for his Ramayana". I never believe these stories, but I like the way these writers created characters, relationships among them, used places of India to link to the characters which inturn given good importance to the places in history(like Ayodhya, Badrachalam in Andhra Pradesh, Rameshwaram in Tamilnadu, Lepakshi in AP, Dwaraka etc....)

one of the carvings on one of the pillar

The 'Asampoorna Kalyana Mantapa' has a very interesting story behind its incompleteness. The reason is attributed to Virupanna, who was the treasurer incharge of all the financial aspects of the kingdom. A few ministers and their sub-ordinates who were against Virupanna, falsely accused him of atrocities not committed by him. On listening to all these, and presuming them to be true, the king also suspected Virupanna of the same and decided to punish him. It was ordered that Virupanna's eyes should be plucked off. On hearing the king's verdict, Virupanna was shattered. He knew that he would never betray his king. He was true to his conscience and very firm about not committing any sin. Hence, as a sign of devotion, Virupanna himself plucked off his eyes and offered them to his king The blood stains on one of the side walls, and the mark left on one of the walls while he threw his eyes off against the wall is presumed to be linked to this story of Virupanna. The false accusations on Virupanna of not having taken permission from the king for building the Kalyana Mantapa and spending money unnecessarily, and the subsequent acts lead to the incompleteness of this Kalyana Mantapa.

Asampoorna Kalyana Mantapa View

Pillars of Kalyana Mantapa

Though the Mantapa is incomplete, it looks grand and one can only wonder how it would look if it would be complete. The Mantapa was being built for the celebration of the marriage of Lord Shiva and Goddess Parvathi. A huge pillar depicting the same, with the priest blessing them, welcomes us as at the side entrance of the Mantapa.

Priests at the entrance of Mantapa

God and Goddess who all are attended marriage of Shive and Parvarhi

On one the entrance pillars, there is a carving of two monkeys, which is the skill and intelligence of the sculptor,made to look like four monkeys. Also, there is a carving of a cow, with one body and three heads, which actually depicts that there are three cows in three different forms

Carving of Cow with three heads.

seven-hooded coiled serpent

The story behind carving of "seven-hooded coiled serpent which has a lingam in black stone in the hollow of the coils" was very interesting.

another view of seven-hooded coiled serpent

Apart from these there were so many sculptures which are far away from our imagination. How those guys were able to carve!! this was the only thought I was having in my mind when I was leaving Lepakshi.
Lepakshi...it had shown me beauty of historical place.

Ended our trip by visiting Nandhi statue. As it was getting dark, without wasting time we started to B'lre, on the way stopped at Kamat-upachaar once again and had sncaks(Hot Mirchi Bajji) and coffee.
By 10'o clock we have reached room in Electronic city - Bangalore.

A few more clicks from my side "in which I tried my level best to show you the beauty which I have seen in Lepakshi...!!"