Trip to ‘City of Palaces’……..

------Dechamma B.C

Before sharing my pleasant experience of the trip, I would like to thank my dear friend  Ashish who inspired me to keep my work of writing articles alive……..Thanks buddy for that….

I know it’s been quite long since I haven’t written an article…. I think this one’s worth waiting for………

         This article speaks about my experience or say our experience of going to Mysore or ‘City of Palaces’ like I would call it. On 2 June 2012 we (Bunch of 5 friends) were all set to explore the city of palaces….We got ready around 6.30 in the morning and were fully packed with curiosity of exploration….psst..i know that’s not enough, but we had plans of eating our breakfast on the way :P:P.  we freshened ourselves  and hurried to our rendezvous .Initially 4 of us started from a point with the intention to pick up the other friend from the person’s house, likewise commenced our tremendously interesting journey…..you will get to know more about it as you keep going…

        Two of our friends knew how to drive a car (actually 3..that’s me ;)) ..I was in no condition to drive as I had not touched a vehicle for 6 long months….wasn’t feeling that confident about it  also)as the protocol goes—‘a backup is always good’ there were 2 of them who knew to drive..so let’s come back to our story….we reached our friend’s place finally after encountering several traffic signal and negotiating several turns and curves along with potholes in narrow lanes .After picking up our friend we headed towards the outskirts of the city with no one onboard actually knowing the way out, but relying on just a piece of software called GPS……( What would we do without it :P:P…..)….I think, it was a blessing at the moment…as we started relying on it after we realized that we were commuting on a wrong route.

         At this moment something funny happened…..one of our friends who was driving the vehicle was a apprentice  then, because of which we were a bit scared to sit in the vehicle due to strife going in our brains about the novice’s flight ,though he was a good defensive driver. We were sitting like living dead, holding our breath…Someone at that moment realized that we to supposed to take a U-turn..wherein the driver was driving straight…suddenly all of us started shouting …some of us said ‘u-turn’ and some of us ’left –turn’ leaving the driver confused and stopping the vehicle in the middle of the road….next a phase of silence for a minute and then a decision was made to take a U-turn from the person who was taking care of directions from the GPS. Finally after a lot of hocus-pocus we reached the NH to Mysore.

          Pleasant weather accompanied by cool breeze with music in the air was a perfect combination with smooth roads of highway. Boulder started rumbling in our stomach alerting us that it was time we filled our stomachs….the time was somewhere around 10.00 a.m. We stopped in a hotel along the highway called ‘Kamath’….we had a very heavy breakfast…..mostly brunch I can say...we spent a lot of time here and it was around 11.30a.m-12.00p.m by the time we left.

Breakfast at 'Kamath'

           We reached Srirangapatna around 1.00 p.m as one of our friends wanted to go to a temple there…..till then I never knew about it…it was a pretty old temple with exquisite architecture of Shikara style… we spent some time there and set off…on our way, one of our friends told us about the existence of Tippu Sultan’s ruined fort somewhere around there….and we set off trying to explore the place…but did not get to see much of it as it was “Ruined”.

Temple at Srirangapatna

    We then resumed our journey to Mysore with the thought of seeing more beautiful places. Around 2 we reached Mysore and we headed straight to St Philomena’s church. It is one of the Gothic marvel and a very old church. I was dumbstruck looking at the building. It is a beauty of times. We were allowed near the alter and we could see the body of the saint kept in the coffin…it was a kind of basement chamber … it reminded me of Sherlock Holmes movies :P:P….it was overall a new experience altogether….we took lot of snaps out there..A beauty which I can never forget till date… 

St Philomena's church

           After this we started off to Jagmohan palace…the place I admired the most. This palace belongs to the Rajas of Mysore which is now converted into a museum. The beauty of this museum is that it consists of paintings done by various artists, both British and Indian. It also consists of paintings of Raja Ravi Varma who was renowned for this life-like painting which he had learnt from his exposure to the west. After taking a stroll through the past in the museum we were immersed in a mode of ecstasy.

          Our silence was broken by the rumbling noises made by our tummy….by then it was 4 p.m. and still few places were remaining to be visited. So we made up minds to go and fill our stomachs first and then continue our journey. We approached a hotel, where lunch was over as we were very late. We had go to the ‘Modern Annapurna’ which is none other than Pizza Hut-Food anytime. We had a gala time over there.

After filling our stomachs we went to a place which is known to be the greatest marvel of Mysore, it is the beautiful Mysore Palace. It is just wow!! I get no other words more convincing than this .By the time we reached here it was already around 5.30 p.m. We roamed around the place till 7 p.m. We wanted to go to Nandi hills but dropped the idea due to time constraints as we had to return to Bangalore by the end of the day. With lot of memories to cherish we headed back to Bangalore.

Mysore Palace

                  It was getting dark as we headed our way back home galloping the highway. On our way, one of our friends suggested that we eat in a Dhaba on the roadside as the food would be very good. As we went further we happened to see a Dhaba and stopped by it to have our dinner. We went to the Dhaba and sat by a table outside…….but it looked quite unsafe and creepy …so we decided to leave the place and move on….hence we continued our drive. We finally landed in a restaurant which was secure and the food there tasted very good.

We reached home around 10.30 p.m. with memories of beauty, friendship, and togetherness and not to forget adventure…It was a memorable trip…..Miss you Guys….

‘All that Starts Well Ends Well’

Miss you Guys.............

Hey guys, if any of you are reading this article let me know if I have missed anything…..