I am behind. Waaaaay behind in all my computerised dealings - finally having caught up with Mangalore, I now realise I missed out on another important city, Mysore. Well, I sorta missed out - I missed all the important stuff anyway, fom your point of view so now, I am playing catch-up. Get ready.... -

Temples in Hampi, rocks in Hampi, many more and other things from, surprise surprise, Hampi. Here are many of the best:

The walled palace of siome queen or other (it was such a long time ago, sorry..) but please, notice the detail on the wall carvings - these are some of the best in all of India:

The Underwater Palace - the whole centre of this thing is flooded. VERY Indiana Jones

Direct links to some more pictures of the place; (clicky for biggy images):

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These things are wonderful - stonework guttering in the shape of Elephant's trunks - not to let the blood flow out, gore fans, but simply as guttering because water was used in many offerings at these temples.
Okay sometimes it may have been blood too, but it sure scrubbed up nice, huh? -

Great carvings - direct link so as not to bore too many of you:

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This iron platework was preserved and restored from a temple in the same underground complex. Worth a big picture, I reckon:

Pillars from the same place:

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The lovely history of the Mahabharata only joking - Greek stuff is far worse and the Mayans - phew. They had some anger issues no doubt about it. Anyway, here's a nice man being killed with an arrow, all in charming stone relief:

Now it is hard to grasp the scale of this, but this, this is an entire city, or at least the stonewallings that formed the foundations. And this is just the shot from one angle standing in the middle:

Here's another looking in a slightly different direction - this place was, as you can see, pretty huge:

Outside the archeology museum in Hampi (they just about allowed to photograph outside):

A temple of some kind. I can't remember for beans, to tell you the truth. Looks nice though:

he ueen's bath - no much to look at from out here:

Inside though it's pretty groovy:

And, some things from a place called King's Balance, if memory serves correctly:

Bunch of rock things linked through to the images to save your page loading times, that you may, or may not, find of any interest. I took 'em all for a reason though so, you never know:

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A temple on HemeKuta Hill:

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Hindus believe that if you touch the statue, the Earthly image, of a deity then thatr deities powers, prowess and favour will be bestowed upon you. I love to embrace the cultures of the world's peoples but if I want to go and grope a statue of Tony Robbins or Robin Williams then I have no illusions that I'm gonna get successful or funny. I'd just do it for ther sheer perverted pleasure of it all lol

Photos from inside the archeological museum - photos definitely prohibited but, as you can see, a little sleight of camera plus knowuing where the security office window is can work wonders:

Those last two are of a scale model of Hampi - and you can't even see that damn Virupakshur temple the place is so huge. 240 square kilometres of boulders, bouldered hills, hills of boulders and all manner of round-shaped rocks all piled up on one another.
I personally like the legend of Hanuman - that he, the monkey god of profound physical strength - had a bit of a neighbourly tiff with the other gods and they all legged it down to their fortress in Hampi, tens of thousands of years back in time. Hanuman, being the badass so-and-so he is then single-handedly took them all on in their stronghold around Hampi and the land of the ancient kings and, standing near the Himalayas he threw each and every massive boulder down on them and beat them into submission.

There is a place back up in the Himalayas where the scenery is quite similar - boulders and so forth - and story tells it that Hanuman went down to Hampi by which time many of the gods had fled back up home to the Himalayas, so just to make sure they got the message he chucked a shole shitload of stones back at them, whupping their arses once and for all and letting everyone know that he was THE man. Or rather, The Monkey. Either way - don't fuck with the Monkey God, especially when he's got rocks handy aboput the place.

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Okay this one is for archeologists and weapons specialists.geeks only: I snuck some shots of the stuff on display around the Elephant stables near Royal Centre about 4km from Hampi. The photos are blurry but there were guards all around; the finds are fascinating though. There is a kind of push dagger or arm dagger I've never seen before, although there other specimens in Mangalore.
Images linked because I know only a few of you actually give a damn about this stuff There are some knives from the 15th Century as well, and swords from the pre Vishayanagar empire that no doubt inspired and were responsible for the cavalry sabres used by Prussian, Napoleonic and British cavalry for the next 300 years. Personally I find it fascinating, but hye, colour me geeky -

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Okay, back outaide the museum I was able to take the camera out of my shirt pocket and get siome proper shots. It amazed me that some of the best sculpture was on open and extremely public display in the rather overly public gardens, free for children to stick gum on, draw all over (which I saw some of them doing) and dogs to do what they do best up against. But, hey-ho; at least we got the pictures:

There's that Virupakshur temple again:

eah, another temple. Click it if you want it, people:

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This is rather good - Jain temples, the Fourth and most easily forgotten religion in India but actually the third largest, bigger than Christianity despite the best efforts of the missionaries. Hinduism and Islam take 1st and 2nd places, in case you were wondering - Jain architecture started early with thousands of bsic cuboidal stone pillared temples, but progressed to an alm,ost oriental style around the 13th or 14th Century, if memory serves correctly. Anyway here are a few of the later examples - pretty strikingly different from the Hindu styles:

This is aty least a blend, if not an entirely Hindu structure - often the Islamic and Hindu styles cross ver so much it's hard to see what is what, this, well, this just looks pretty, dom't it? :

I thought this was kind of nice, whether you agree or not I couldn't say!

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Classic Jain temples:

From HemaKuta hill, Virupakshur temple to left, main climbing mountain over the river and far away, to right. Early and basic ain temples centre and bottom - a whole history lesson in one photo - cunning eh?

There are LOADS of rocks balanced like this and worse. One shove and it seems they would go over. They don't though, I tried; of course I did! -

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Cute little monkey in cute little tree - guard your valuables though, the76y know exactly wehat you need and aren't afraid to pinch it!

Cute monkey again - see above...

I think this was actually the smaller of the two Gopurams - gateway towers - of the Virupakshur complex. Still, pretty badass -

And here is the info board for Hemakuta hill - maybe worth a read? maybe:

And two of said Shaiva (temples dedicated to Shiva) temples on the Hemakuta hill area;

And a bunch more stuff linked directly because, by now, you may just be sick of all thes bloody temples. After Hampi, I am pretty much all templed out, but here they are just for you, just in case you ain't sick of 'em yet:

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This was worth a big picture though:

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Did you already see me with monkeys? I can't remember. The photo order of all this is confusing as hell - here y'are again just in case. Should I maske one of the my FaceBook proflie picture do you think? -

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The view from the Hanuman temple. Simply outstanding:

The gong pillar atop the Hanuman temple - like an armilarry sphere, almost:

Okay - you have GOT to click this one for the bigger view, it is something amazing. Really:

Wildly huge views of Hampi from the top of the temple hill. Click for biggy if you want some lovely scenery shots! -

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Okay these two are pretty damned amazing as well:

A rock. And a tree. Nothing special to see here folks, just a rock and a tree. Nicely framed though, I thought:

That river again - note the level of the water THIS time:

I stopped this poor guy, made hi drag his cattle and plow out of the field, took a couple of photos and literally ran away. I'm guessing he's used to gettign a little baksheesh for this sort of thing judguing by the speed with which he dragged his rig out of the firld and onto the road, but, frankly, at that time I was a little fed up with what amounted to one huge, conspiratorial tourist trap.
I see now whay they HAVE to do this, harvest time is the only time they have any money and capitalising on that is what keeps them going - and alive - in the monsoon.

Still, I snapped and ran, in the best traditions of the evil paparazzi
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Okay, I went to a temple; I couln't tell you which one now for love, toffe or beans; but I saw this on the wall and, well, I think it speaks volumes about the culture and religion. Not that I'm suggesting they are a bloodthirtsy lot, but really, is it necessary to be quite so graphic, in a place of holy worship? -

Okay, quickly now because it's a Sunday and I'm keeping these poor people at work!

The Queens temple in Anegondi, a few kilometres from Hampi. Sadly now in ruins and painted abou a thousand times, but originally over 600 years old:

And finally, this is something very very cool - an Elephant cart, pulled by ceremonial elephants during festivals, its wheels are armed with blades and the whole is adorned with garlands of flowers, blossoms, and lithe young women Sweet

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Anyway taht's enough for now - hopefully I'll find another 'net cafe across the street.

Ciao!!