Stone Marvels Trail to Belur, Halebid & Shravanabelagola

What's Included?

• Private car & fuel
• Services of a tour guide
• Meals (B,L,D on Day 1 & B,L on Day 2)
• Stay for one night on twin sharing basis
• Guide charges at Belur, Halebid & Shravanabelagola

Stone Marvels Trail is a 2 day guided experiential tour from Bangalore to the Hoysala wonders of Belur, Halebid&Shravanabelagola;. Key highlights include a guided tour of Chennakesava temple of Belur, Hoysalesvara and Shantalesvara of Halebid and climbing the worlds largest monolith statue of Gomateswara at Shravanabelagola. This is a private tour and anall inclusive trip where we take care of transport, stay, all meals, activities and the services of a full-time tour guide

Price

• Rs 7500 per person(minimum 2 people)
• Rs 5000 per person if 4 people or more

Day 1

At 7 am we start towards our destination, Belur, the ancient capital of Hoyasala Empire, located 220 KMs from Bangalore. The drive will take 4hrs and we will reach Belur by noon including a breakfast break along the way. After check-in at our accommodation, Lunch will be served. We depart at 2pm towards the famed Chennakesava temple of Belur which took over a 100 years to build. The next couple of hours will be spent inside this temple complex. Some of the highlights of this temple are the intricate carvings of animals and dancers on the walls of the temple. Episodes from epics like Ramayana and Mahabharata have been carved out of stone. The main hall has sculptures that are fantastic in terms if the intricacy of the carvings. The bracelets on the arms of one of the dancer statues can be moved up and down. The headdress of another dancer statue has a moveable ring! Another noteworthy characteristic of sculptures in Belur is that sculptures at Belur is that they are signed off by the respective sculptors like in a painting, often as a boastful epithet.

We ride next to Halebid, the old capital of the Hoyasalaempire. Located 16 Kms from Belur, there are 3 major highlights of Halebid. We spend a couple of hours in the 2 magnificent temples inside the complex dedicated to Hoysalesvara and Shantalesvara. The other sculpture of interest is a giant statue of Nandi the holy Bull of Lord Shiva which took 86 years to build. Of interest would be to note the veins depicted gracefully on the face. We end the tour of Halebid with a visit to the Archaeological museum which showcases a variety of Hoyasala style sculptures.Around 7pm we ride back from Halebid to our hotel.

Day 2

After breakfast we checkout and take our Bullets again to ride 80 KMs to a quaint town located between 2 hills and called Shravanabelagola. The world’s largest monolith statue beckons us here. The 58 feet tall statue nestled on a 470 feet hill is of Gomateswara the son of the first Jain TirtankaraVrishaba Deva. There is a flight of 600 steps to climb. The climb would take an hour. The view from the top makes the climb worth it.

After lunch we ride back towards Bangalore. We would cover 145 Kms in the last leg of this tour. The tour ends around 5pm after we reach Bangalore.

Exclusions

• Personal expenses such as laundry, telephone calls, tips & gratuity, mineral water, soft & hard drinks
• Travel insurance
• Anything not mentioned in Inclusions

Cancellation

• Until 10 days prior to departure: 50% of tour cost
• 11-20 days prior to departure: 40%
• 21-30 days prior to departure: 30%
• More than 30 days prior to departure: 20%