The Stony Fort

Who guessed it right? Let me know in the comments.
Well! I am giving you all an insight about our Chitradurga. We all know that the moment we say Chitradurga, we all remember a song from the movie "Nagarahavu". Yes, It is about the fort.

Friday, 8.30 in the morning (we are known to leave at least one hour late than planned 😃), we started the voyage from home after dropping our children to school.
This time, the adventure over here is, we travelled in our bullet rather than car. Approximately 215 km from Bengaluru to Chitradurga. After biking to Mysore 10 years back, this was my second biking trip, I was bit tensed as it was a sudden decision taken by Mahesh. But he comforted me right from the start till we returned home.

We had a first break in Kyathsandra to have a plate of thatte idli and coffee, and headed straight in the highway. Well-maintained highway and the cool air made the journey very smooth.
In between on the highway, we had tender coconut to not get the energy drained off.
We reached Chitradurga and headed towards the stony fort at 1.15 P.M. I would recommend to see the fort with a guide as they share many information. But do have good negotiation with them for the price.

The fort is wide spread with the area of 36 km and has taken more than 200 years for the full built.
After the fall of Vijaynagara dynasty, Chitradurga was on its own. But, Hyder Ali always had an eye on this stony fort. He was successful to capture this fort in his third attempt.
Yes he made three attempts to capture this fort. In his first attempt, he tried from the front gate, and was unsuccessful because of tight security.(The fort has more than seven gates.)

In his second attempt, he tried from the small opening that was heading directly to the fort. The small opening was a secret passage used by the Chitradurga ruler to get the daily groceries from the farmers.

 Hyder Ali was unsuccessful in this attempt because of a brave women "Obavva".
A short write-up about her and the successful win of Chitradurga is " Obavva is a wife of a guard who was appointed to alert the fort in case of any unusual instances or activity.
One day as usual she called her husband for lunch, and found that there was no drinking water. She served him and went to get the drinking water. While returning she found the Hyder Ali's soldier entering the fort through the small opening.
To not to disturb the husband who was having the food, she took up the wooden log (in kannada it is known as Onakke, used for pounding paddy grains) and was all set to destroy the enemy troop.
She stood near the opening to hit the soldiers, the moment they came out of the opening one-by-one. Dragged the dead body all the way to the place where it is not visible for the next person who is coming out of the opening.
On finishing the lunch, her husband came in search for her and found her hitting the Hyder Ali soldiers with onnakke and was shocked to see the dead bodies piled up in a corner. As per the guide, she had killed 39 of them, and one got escaped as he entered the fort before she noticed.
On seeing this, her husband alerted all of the soldiers. In the mean time, here the guy who had escaped killed Obavva by attacking her from the back. In this way she made the second attempt of Hyder Ali unsuccessful. From that time onwards, that small opeing is known by her name as "Obavvana Kindi".

Hyder Ali successfuly captured the fort in the next attempt with the help of soldiers who betrayed the Chitradurga ruler. They opened the back gate of the fort and allowed the Hyder Ali's soldiers to enter the fort.
Let me share one more interesting fact of Chitradurga. Has anybody thought why this place is known as Chitradurga. Stop rolling your eyes and read further 👀
Chitra means an art, durga means a hill. The rocks over here is in different art shapes, if observed correctly. Hence this place is known as Chitradurga.

Elephant shaped rock

Rabbit shaped rock

Shanku (corner stone) shaped rock

Snake shaped rock, it is an exercise for your eyes to search in these many rocks.

Feet shaped rock
Oh yeah! this reminds me one more history related to this place. It is believed that
Hidimba, a 12-feet tall demon who was killed by Bheema was living in this place with his sister Hidimbi. 

The guide also shared the information on how they were storing oil and ghee for daily usage and for long term storage of weapons.

The wonderful design of the gate guard's place. This place is designed to have a fantastic acoustic phenomena. If the guardian speaks or sleeps then the snoring sound or whispering is echoed. Also, this place is used to do the fitness test for the guards. The guards are supposed to fit inside that place and their feet has to touch the ground. Well! that's my guardian sitting over there in the photo, and he passed the test too 👍.

They even had the rain water harvesting with the drinking water facility done at that time, which still feeds the whole Chitradurga. They had two ponds known as Akka and Thangi KoLa, named after the two wives of Madakarinayaka, the last Chitradurga ruler.

The cutting edge technology was followed by them using which they used to cut the huge rocks to build the fort.

This is built in remembrance of the animals that were died in the war.

Hmm... as usual I got lost myself with the hystory and significance of the place. On visiting the fort, we left the fort at 3.30 P.M to have very light lunch in the Chitradurga city. We started our journey back to home at 4.30 P.M and reached home by 9.30 P.M. We took a break in between on the way after Tumkur in the hotel Kamat for a cup of coffee.

The historical biking trip ended with the wonderful memory of the long lasting fort and the cool healthy air which I am really missing in my lovely city, Bengaluru.

This snap is my favourite, Isn't it the stunning place!

 

I, U, and We

I found a good reason to write the blog after a year. Wow! we have stepped into the 13th year of our wedding aniversary.
Yes, we have completed twelve years of togetherness.

It's been twelve years since I and u became we.
From the day one, you have always been with me to make everything achieve as us.
We together enjoy every moment of our life as god has planned for us.

Your love towards me is still the same as I still feel the same warmth in your touch.

You are the reason of my smile everyday.
You being behind me makes me feel more courageous to go ahead and challenge the world.
You being in front of us always gives me an immense happiness, as you make us to feel comfortable in all aspects.
You being with me gives me an immense strength to play many other roles.

I keep admiring the way you spend time with our children, the way you take care of them, and the patience that you have towards them.

I feel so proud when I look back to see the way we have travelled so far in our life and achieved many milestones of our life, which have led as a benchmark to the couple who follow us.

Yes! A wonderful journey of togetherness so far with more happiness, challenges, comfortness, and excitement.

Thanks for the importance that you always give me as it is important for our healthy relationship.

Let's keep rocking my soulmate!