Hyderabad to Warangal on bike

On 11^th January, 2014, at 7:15 am we started from Kondapur, Hyderabad towards Warangal. The distance is of nearly 175 km and planned to reach in three and a half hours. Two riders, one back pack and the bike started the journey. This is our first long distance journey on bike together and we are not going in group, so was little bit worried and highly excited.

We took the road suggested by Google map, from Kondapur to Uppal through city roads and then took the Hyderabad – Warangal highway. Initial few kms from Uppal are so crowded that we thought we are not in a highway and took a wrong road (and as you know, mobile GPS doesn’t work when you need it most), but latter part of the road is better and going forward it was great. A big section of the road is a tolled road (free for us though as we are on bike), and the bike reached more than 100km/hr there. Just a note to those who says Avenger becomes unstable after 100km/hr, it’s not, it’s smooth and bold as always. My wife was not encouraging this speed, but was not discouraging too. We both were helmets while riding, though they don’t really work at 100km/hr.

We took few snaps in some stops and had breakfast at one of the locality on the way. It was nearly 85 km more to reach the Warangal town after we crossed the ‘Welcome to Warangal district’ arch. This town is a union of Kazipet, Hanamkonda and Warangal towns. Our first destination was hotel Ashoka. We reached their nearly at 11:45am. It’s a nice hotel with decent reception, parking lot and a big size room. Nothing much great to mention about the hotel, and nothing as such bad too. We got fresh and took food in the hotel restaurant downstairs. Though the restaurant is little costly than look like but the food was good (actually I liked it but my wife didn’t). And now our sightseeing starts.

I generally do some homework before visiting a place, and this time was not an exception too. I had my list of places to visit ranked by the importance and vicinity. This time I send so much time in map of Warangal sightseeing that I hardly used rout finder while travelling. But you know what, Google sometime shows you roads from the backside of a building, and that what it did in case of Thousand pillar temple. We took a narrow ‘gali’ from its back side and reached the temple though its main gate was just on the main road. Though neither of us is a believer, but we like visiting temples, mostly the old once.

This temple was made during Kakatiya dynasty nearly 900yrs ago. It is a running temple and little bit crowded. A ‘kirtan’ was going on there and looked like some VIP was visiting too. 

The temple is completely made of stone. The pillars and beams are made of stones and joint by ‘T’-joints. The sculptures inside and outside the temple is great. This actually doesn’t have thousand pillars. The walls are curved like multiple pillars. The big circular pillars inside the temple are made of dark green marbles (so dark that it looks black if not in sunlight). One part of the temple was under renovation. We spend more than one hour there before we start searching for Siddeshwara Temple and Padmakshi temple.

Google map was wrong this time too, though we reached the places asking local people. Siddeshwara temple is an isolated small and newly made temple. We didn’t feel to go inside and start searching for Padmakshi temple. This one was placed on top of a hilly area. Again, this one too wasn’t much great but couldn’t resist myself from trying to climb the hilly road (may be 50m max) by my bike. We haven’t entered the temple though.

Our next destination was Warangal fort. To reach this place we had to cross complete Warangal town and lost the road one more times by Google. I should really say, Google map is never this much bad, but either due to the slow network or the improper GPS, in this tour it was really misleading us multiple times. 

Anyways, coming back to the fort topic, it is not really a fort. Though it has a high fort boundary for that area, but most inside area is residential. There are two main locations to see in this fort area. 

One was a garden with scattered leftovers of fort from that time and most importantly, four entry gates. Though it might not be a fort but the sculptures on the left over was real good. The entry gates are the most important monuments of this place and you can see same looking gates in any important building in Warangal. The other was a big hall room called some mahal, really nothing to see though.

Our next destination was Kakatiya Musical Garden Kakatiya Rock Garden. We were not able to find the Rock garden but found the musical one. Why musical? Because it has a musical fountain. Other than that, there was nothing much musical and I was real disappointed because of the expectation I had by the ‘musical’ word.

The day ends with 200+ km bike ride in a day and a great dinner with kebabs from a roadside shop. This was our highest ride in a day up to that point and no doubt it was tiring but (in a strange way) with no back pain which I was kind of expecting as most part of the day we were on bike.

Next day started with a fresh morning but with a failed sunrise seeing try. I generally try to find a sunrise point in every place I travel, but here was none (as far I got). After getting ready and taking a road side breakfast we started for our last destination, Bhadrakali temple. This one too is a running temple and moderately crowded. It hardly had any historical significance but was a nice place (mostly the lake side part) to spend some time.

At nearly 10:30am we started back towards Hyderabad. Took hardly one or two breaks and reached nearly by 1:30pm. It was 377kms in two day for us. We were tired, but more than that was excited to search for new place to go by bike.

Hyderabad to Bidar on bike

On 8th Feb, 2014, we started from Kondapur, Hyderabad at 9 am on our bike towards Bidar, Karnataka. The distance is nearly 120km and targeted to arrive within two and a half hour. The rout is pretty straight forward. Take the Hyderabad – Mumbai highway, go nearly 100 km and take right just after Zaheerabad, go nearly 20 km more and you are at Bidar. Most part of the road is good and some part is okay. We haven’t faced any bad road though. The landscape is good in few parts of the road. We liked the scenery on the road between Zaheerabad and Bidar most. It was a combination of pitch black road, red dry soil and a feet tall white grasses. No as such difficulty to reach the place, we didn't even take a break other than a photo shooting one. We reached nearly at 11:45 am.

Fortunately or unfortunately, Bidar is not a tourist place. So if you are habituated with a tourist friendly environment, don’t expect that here. The most named hotels also don’t have a guarded parking lot. We first arrived at Hotel Mayura (just opp. to bus stand). The guy in the reception was disturbed when we asked whether they have a parking place in which the bike will be safe at night. He replied, 'aisa to koi nehi puchhta, sab samne eisehi rakh dete hai' ('no one asks this, everyone just parks in front of the hotel') and the open parking in front of the hotel was saying 'Parking at your risk' in big red letters. So, with no other way, we left for searching another hotel. The next known name to me was Hotel Sapna International, which was nearby (by Google map) but not visually prominent as it is in a busy building filled with different type of shops. This hotel too doesn't have a parking but we were given a parking at the opposite hotel's parking lot. The reception was decent and the rooms looked clean and okay.

As i said, Bidar is not a tourist place, though the food was real tasty, don't expect decency in restaurants and hygiene is not a word in their dictionary. Even local people were giving a strange look at us. Anyways, we had our lunch and started for our tour.

The first destination was Bidar Fort. We didn't expect much from it but even in the first look it gave a good feel. The high long wall of the fort, a wide trench away from the road, is prominent with its royal and stubborn structure. The entrance is the best part of it. Narrow road goes inside the fort within the high walls and huge gates. From a concept of fort, this is nothing new, but is certainly the one we liked most. Some song sequence shooting of local movie or something was going on a section on the entrance, but it didn't block the road. The maintained portion of the fort contains Solah Khamba Mosque and a museum, containing some locks and guns from that time, nothing much interesting though. There are other parts of the fort which is not as such maintained but open to roam around, was having a huge area guarded by fort walls, Rangin Mahal and few other places (not as such named). Rangin Mahal is no more ‘rangin’ (colored) and just the left over part of it. We roamed around here and there for some time and took some photos. In a sunny day this fort can certainly give some good pics. Map says Bahmani Tombs is there in that compound but we were not able to find it out. Though nothing specific to see, but still the old historic feel was there and we liked it.

Our next destination was Khwaja Mahmud Gawan Madrasa. Somehow Google wasn't able to find it out on the map, so we took help from passerby and reached this place. It was a residential madrasa made more than 500yrs ago. Again, nothing much left but we liked the front view as few of the works on the walls with blue things (don’t know what are those) still left.

Rest of the places we visited were Chaubara, which is a clock on a brick made tower and Gurudwara Nanak Jhira Sahib, which is a gurudwara little far from the town. There is another place we visited which i would suggest anyone not to go (even if someone is ready to pay some bucks for it) and this place was Narasimha Zarna - Cave Temple. This is a cave temple where you can go through a cave with muddy (and don’t know what else) water up to your chest and do a ‘darsan’. We certainly didn't do it but even the outside on the temple itself was so disgusting with open dress changing place for men and women that we left the place within minutes from arrival. We visited some Bidriware (a famous Indian metal handicraft originated from Bidar) shops too to purchase some mementos.

So, we thought we are done with our tour and ready to head back for Hyderabad next morning, but an interesting (rather irritating) story was still waiting for us and that was, the bugs in the hotel room. The hotel room was actually full of small cockroaches and bugs in the bed which we discovered in the middle of the night after the bugs started their dinner with us. When we reported it to the hotel reception, it looked like this didn't surprise them. Fortunately there were other room available and more fortunately what was not having bugs, so we changed the room.

With the experience of last night, we planned to leave the hotel as soon as possible in the morning, so left the hotel and started for Hyderabad at nearly 10 am. As it takes less time while coming back than while going, we reached Hyderabad nearly at 12:30 pm.

Again, though there was nothing much to see and had some bad experience, we over all enjoyed the trip. After all, we 2 were on 2 – wheeler.

Warming up the engine

Why this blog?

I started this blog to share (rather capture) the travel experience we, me and my wife had and going to have while travelling on our bike.

This is my first blog so, plz don't expect a expert version... ;)

Short details of 'we'

Both of us love travelling, mostly when its on our Black Beast. Harley Davidson is a dream for Indian middle class, so keeping that dream as dream, we purchased Avenger 220. Don't know how God feels riding His bike (as said by its tag line 'feel like god'), but i feel great riding my own. Every weekend we try to go around somewhere (in Hyderabad). Some times we go little bit far too.