If you thought Goa is all about beaches, you are wrong! Goa has something for all types of people. If you are the kind who wants to just laze around doing nothing, Goa is the place for you. If you want to party hard and rock the night, Goa is the place for you. If you are a fan of old Portuguese forts, Goa is the place for you. If you are a religious person, and want to do church-hopping Goa is the place to be! We decided on a mixture of these. We started our Day 2 with a visit to the famous churches of Goa. Click here for our Day 1 in the dream called Goa.

Dancing in the beach shack

To visit these churches, you will have to travel a good 30 kilometers from the Calangute area. We had our hired bikes and started out, braving the scorching sun, which grew hotter and hotter as the day progressed. The Old Goa, where these churches are located, is a small town, but with magnificient and imposing churches. The churches remind you of the glory of the past history – the Portuguese history.

Mammoth structures with impeccable architecture and soul-binding divinity – these churches will never fail to excite any person inclined to buildings. The only thing you will have to be careful and protective about, is the heat of the morning, which could easily make you tired walking around these huge structures. The long and stunning hallways of these churches leave one wondering how they were built in the first place, centuries back! We spent all the time in the morning watching the churches, and had lunch at a small restaurant in Old Goa. As would always be the case, we ate fish, fish and more fish. The fish never fails to amaze in Goa, which is another of the reasons why we felt so bad leaving the paradise.

Returning from our trip to the churches, we had very little strength left in us for the day. We had earlier planned to visit the Vagator beach, about which we had heard a lot, but on the last moment, decided against it. We took bath in the Calangute beach till we were tired, and till we had enough and more of the beach. It was an exciting experience. The waves are a bit strong towards the Baga beach, but it is not a subject of worry, since there are umpteen people in these beaches, and the Lifeguard is always there to help you in case there should be any problem.

Dil Chahata Hai fort

The evening was again time for a sumptuous beach dinner of chicken, prawns and fishes, not to mention the bottles of beers that went in. There was a live karaoke party in the restaurant (beach shack) and we were listening to all kinds of songs we had never heard till then. Buffalo soldier… song was the best of the lot – with a cheerful old guy singing, and he was indeed very good. People (read gals) in the restaurants also were excited by the song. There is no limit for excitement in Goa. They came towards our shack and started dancing alongside, adding to the mood of revelry. We enjoyed the whole of the night and went home tired and exhausted well after midnight, and again had a dreamy sleep. I had given instructions to everyone to be ready for the next day’s adventures at Vagator, and not to delay the start at any cost.

We greeted our last day in Goa, again with lot of expectations. I just changed my mind, and decided that we will ride to Arambol beach rather than Vagator, and visit the Vagator beach if we had enough time while returning from Arambol. The ride to Arambol was quite long. May be it is around a 35 kms from Calangute. But, the beach is well worth the travel. We rode and rode and rode and finally came to the spectacular beach called Arambol. It was paradise on earth.

Bikini babes and stunning damsels marked the Arambol beach. We had never seen so many hot ladies in bikinis, that we soon decided to ditch any other plan for the day, and just remain in the Arambol beach, and that was not a bad plan at all. One remarkable thing about Arambol beach is, the waters are so shallow that you can go quite a distance into the sea, and still the water remains at waist level. The waves are not too strong at all, and it would be a completely enjoyable experience. To spice up things, a great looking female and a guy got into water, and all our eyes lit up, and we wondered – Is this India…? We enjoyed our bath in the waters for another 2 hours or so. Time flew by, and we never wanted to leave, but we had to, since it was our last day, and we had to board our train late that night.

Actually, there is a small fresh water lake near the Arambol beach, which is a nice place to take bath in… but we had to walk quite a distance (about 2 kms) to reach this. It would have been a nice walk skirting the beach, and the place was at a visible distance only, but again as we had to leave that day, we decided to reserve the lake for our next trip. We took more eyefuls of the bikini babes, and had lunch again at a nice beach side restaurant at Arambol beach. Chickens, fishes and prawns again. On our way back, we saw that almost the whole of our day had been spent in Arambol alone, and no one regretted it. It was the best of the beaches. Not too crowdy, shallow enough, white and clear sand, and to top it all, bikini babes. A nice way to end our trip.

We came back to our room in Calangute, took a short nap, then woke up, bade farewell to our nice host, and started back to Panjim. Rahul bought some wine to be taken back to friends. We also bought a special cake called Bebinca, which Rahul said would taste great. But I warn you, it tasted just like normal halwa, and was grossly overpriced. So, beware.

We had some fruit juice near the station, and then boarded our train to Bangalore. It was one of my best journeys. All of our hearts were refusing to wake up from the dream called Goa… All we were discussing was about when we would make our next trip to Goa…

Vinoth is getting married, and I am moving to my own house in Bangalore… Balayya has shifted to Banashankari. So, practically we are all heading in different directions. But we have decided to come together (at least the bachelors) in December of 2009 to make our next week-long trip to the dream called Goa. Let us see if we make it to our dreams…

Click here for our Day 1 in the dream called Goa.

I had been interested in photography ever since my school days, though I could never afford myself a camera. Thanks to my dad, I got to handle some simple old cameras, which helped me learn the basics of photography and framing. Though I was too clumsy when in school, soon I learned to make nice photos, and could take shots better than my friends in college.

My dad was a photo enthusiast too. He was a talented artist also. I got inspired by his photographs, and that is what essentially dragged me into photography. My dad got himself an old Yashica film SLR camera with advanced settings when I was in school (I seriously don’t remember the name of the camera. He got a used one for Rs.8000, an was proud of his prized possession). He never allowed me to use the camera. I used to covet his possession, and got to lay hands on it on a special day at school when I could take it to a school function. I took some nice pictures with lot of enthusiasm, hoping to see colorful images in print. But when I returned the camera to my dad, he found out that I had somehow mishandled the camera, and there was a battery leak, which led the camera into serious malfunctions. Also the pictures I shot never came out. Since then, I had to abandon my interests, and be happy posing for photographs, but not take them, until after college, when I started working and could afford a camera.

When I worked for Digibee in Chennai, I got myself a Nikon Coolpix L3 and shot day and night. I got a name as a decent photographer (using a point and shoot) among my friends. (Some sample here). It was all in framing the photograph, and the angles you use, since the point and shoot will take care of everything else. You had very little to control. However there was a problem in low light shooting with the Nikon. The images used to be dangerously blurred, and using flash was a disaster in it.

In September 2007, I moved to Bangalore to join ARM, when I sold my Nikon to get myself a new Canon Powershot A430, which was still a point and shoot (I still did not know much about the SLRs. Also, SLRs were beyond my reach). I started using the new Canon everywhere in Bangalore, which was much better than the old Nikon, and I could take better shots with this.

It was then that I got a chance to see some of Arun Anna’s shots in Flickr. They looked very impressive. I was inquisitive and found out that he shoots using his Canon Powershot S3, which is a advanced point and shoot. When I talked to him, I got more interested in pursuing photography. Now, I could also afford an SLR, so, I started searching over to get myself an advanced point and shoot, or an SLR. One fine day, I decided to go and buy an SLR, no matter what.

That is how I landed on the Nikon D80, which I purchased in June 2008. Since then, I have shot a lot of photographs using my terrific equipment. Though I got only the 18-135mm kit lens along with the camera, it has been of immense help in getting myself acquainted with the tricks of exposure and framing till now.

Going forward, I look to get more involved in street photography, and if possible, some wildlife expeditions with good lenses. But for now, I am still a learner in the big world of photography. Take a look at some of my shots here.

It was me behind the driver’s wheel, and three of my friends – Karthik, Vinoth and Rahul, in my Santro, we started the one-day trip to visit Somnathpura, Talakad and Shivanasamudram. The planner in me had made all plans previously. We would head straight to Somnathpura, from there, would take the road to Talakad and finally reach Shivanasamudram so that we have all time left to enjoy in the falls.

We left our house in Koramangala at 6.30 in the morning,

and in an hour, we were on the Mysore road leading to Somnathpura. We were hungry by the time we reached Maddur, and had our breakfast in a small roadside hotel.

Just after Maddur, we took the left which goes to Malavalli. The road is good till Malavalli, and from Malavalli, we took a right to Bannur. The road to Bannur was virtually non-existant, and more so as we neared our destination. An SUV would have been ideal under these road conditions, however, my Santro was good enough for me to negotiate the stones and pits that call themselves roads.

In fact, from Malavalli you could head to Shivanasamudram if you plan to go there straight.

But our plan was to finish the far-away places first (also considering the roads).

We reached Somnathpura at around 10 am. From the outside it looks like a well maintained garden. But behind the compound walls is a magnificient temple that strikes you with the intricateness that is the cherised wealth of Karnataka. A Hoyasala temple, this is constructed on a raised platform, and the temple is actually star shaped.There are rows of sharp carvings made on the temple walls. Keeping up with the history of the Hoyasalas, the temple is made of Soapstone, and the typical intricate Hoyasala

carvings found in places such as Belur, Halebeedu and Amrithapura can be found here too. Each suclpture narrates a story and architecture enthusiasts would want to take all their time in exploring just the outer wall of the temple.

One sad part is that the faces of the figurines in the temple walls have been disfigured by the Muslim invaders, and part by the British, that most of the sculptures have a broken or part-broken head.

The interiors of the temple, again, has the typical smoothly carved pillars with detailed work on the ceilings. In fact, going by the looks of it, this temple is architecturally superior to the Belur and Halebeedu temples. It has three gopurams standing on a star shaped pedestal, which

in itself is a postcard picture moment. But I have no clue why the temple and the road to the temple have been neglected by the Government. The temple is just 25 kms from the sandal city of Mysore. The nearest town is T.Narsipur. Somnathpura would be a non-to-be-missed site in the Mysore-Srirangapatna circuit if it is promoted by the Government. Visit my album on Somnathpura

The road alongside the temple leads straight to our next destination – Talakad. Much has been told about this buried-in-the-sand temple around the web. You can find them here, and here.

The main Mahavishnu temple was a sight to watch, and the ASI is actually numbering the rocks there so that the remaining parts of the temple could be restored.

One interesting part of our visit to Talakad was this old lady called Mariamma. When we

landed in Talakad, a lot of guides swarmed around us telling us about this place. But was made it clear that we need no guide, because I had read enough about this place

already on the web. So, we first headed straight to the Cauvery which flows nearby, and took a small ride in the coracle.

These are similar to the ‘parisals’ found in Hogenakkal. After we finished our stint with the river, and had a sumptuous meal in a roadside stall, did we meet this interesting person, Mariamma.

As we headed back towards the forest to see the temples, this lady started accompanying us telling us the route. My friend started telling her we don’t need a guide, and I thought it is ok to have one. The way through the trees were confusing, and a guide would ease our search, I thought. So, we took Mariamma as our guide.

She has a punchline. “My name is Mariamma. What is your name?”, which she kept saying whenever she got a chance. Also she said, “Nanage ella gothhu”, meaning I know everything. She actually took my friends digital camera and took our shots. She gave names to the four of us. One was Salman Khan, one, Darshan, one was Upendra and the other, ‘Mungaru picture Ganesa’. We enjoyed her ramblings. She kept calling us Ganesaa, Uppi… follow me!, and it was real fun listening to her.

She said all trees around were cashewnut trees, and they would yield the fruit in November. Also, she was quite pious, and kept telling to fold our hands and chant the name of Shiva. “Shiva antha kai mugkoli…”.

I found Mariamma so interesting a personality, that I beleived somebody should definitely have come across her. I googled on the phrase “My name is Mariamma”, and to my surprise, got an account about her on the web, here.

We saw all the temples of Talakad. The main Mahavishnu temple is the most impressive, and the tales about Talakad are equally interesting too. We left Talakad around 2.30pm, and started for our next destination, Shivanasamudram. Visit my album on Talakad here.

Shivanasamudram, also called “Bluff” by the locals, has two falls, Gaganachukki and Bharachukki. I had learnt that Gaganachukki gives a good view, whereas, Bharachukki is where we could take a bath.

So, we tripped and bounced on so-called roads and reached Shivanasamudram, where we decided to go to Bharachukki first.

Bharachukki was a breath-taking beauty. Streams of water flowed exquisitely into the valley below and it was a sight to watch. We had to take a flight of steps to reach the foot of the falls. A bunch of people were trying to cross the stream there to reach under the falls, whereas another set were taking the parisal ride, which was here too. We soon crossed the stream and were right under the falls.

I had not known that there is such a beautiful falls near Bangalore and made a mental note to return whenever time gives way. We took bath in the lovely falls for more that two hours. We were so thrilled by the gush of water, that we decided to spend as much time as available at Bharachukki itself, and just give Gaganachukki a view. But by the time we finished

all the bathing and merry-making, it was around 6, and it was starting to get dark. Visit my album on Bharachukki here.

We headed straight to Malavalli from there, took the road to Maddur, and to Bangalore along the Mysore road, carrying along with us truckloads of pleasant memories about the temples, falls, and of course, the ever enthusiastic, Mariamma.