Have you ever seen a monument so mesmerizing, that it made you forget any history it has had or future it may have? All you could do is be mesmerized by its beauty. Badami gave me such a monument and an unforgettable experience. And before you read remaining blog, Badami in Sanskrit and Hindi means “of almond color.”
Our last destination was Badami. The only thing I knew about Badami was that it has caves dating back to the 7th-8th century. When we reached the location at 6:30 AM, Rohit (our tour organizer) said that we would see the fort first and then the caves. Honestly, I was disappointed, because I wanted to watch the caves. Maybe because it was the main attraction of Badami (or I thought so). And what felt more disappointing was that those caves were in front of me.
But as we entered the fort, and I saw the color and texture of all the rocks that formed the Badami Fort, I knew I was miserably wrong. I had never seen the name describing a place so well. Maybe the color name was tossed just to describe that place. A monument that was royal in its color as it was in its structure. The specialty of Badami Fort is that the fort is built without cutting any major rocks, making way through rocks, and building the stairs and everything needed by shaping those rocks.
As we had reached the fort base around 6:40 AM and since it was a winter morning, we had our chance of making the trip complete with a sunrise. We picked our spot and after a few seconds someone pointed out that there is a higher ground, from where we could get a better view. So we rushed to that point. We covered almost half a kilometer in 5-7 minutes to reach there. And hence while climbing, I was not able to pay attention to all the wonderful details, but I notice enough things to know that, I might have found the place I would never get tired of visiting.
When the sun was stretching its arms, we finally started to look around us and marveled at the color shades it showed us.
What made it even more special, that we had the fort for ourselves. It was too early in the morning hence no one was there. We watched the marvelous union of sun and Badami color and enjoyed the place with good music and some dancing. I had forgotten that there are any caves to watch and did not want to leave the place.
But eventually we came to the caves and we were looking at the Badami Fort from opposite direction and it was sun-kissed in every manner. I guess this is what people call falling in love over and over again.
Well from the above picture you can guess, the caves and the fort is separated by Agastya lake, named after a Rushi who lived there and it even has a Bhootnath temple by the lake and everything is built in Badami Rock. The caves were good. You can check its history on google. But I liked the fort better.
The last spot for the day was Bhootnath temple. Though India has temples in each and every ally, Bhootnath Temples are rare. Plus the site where it is located made it special. One has to watch the whole site once in a lifetime.
This trip of mine with my two best friends was a search for something unnamed. We all are looking for different things that will set our soul free. And we spend the lifetime searching for the things our soul wants. I think travel makes it a little bit easier for us. It gives new things to try, new people, to meet, new food to eat, and most importantly, something new to feel. Each place leaves a different impression on our soul and our mind. It is for us to discover, which of the above will set our soul on fire and burn it until it is freed.
A Heart-felt world 