Two Beers and a Pretzel

Hampi, India seems like a miniature version of Siam Reap, Cambodia.

Everywhere you turn there’s a temple or palace ruin from the Vijayanagar Empire in the 1300-1500’s.  The whole area is a UNESCO World Heritage Site.  The most significant differences from Angkor Wat are that 1 ) you get to stay right next to the ruins, and 2) the landscape would be surreal even without the ruins.  The whole area is dominated by large hills of crumbled and weathered boulders.

The only way to describe it is to imagine a giant child was playing with these rocks, scooping them in his hands and stacking them into small mountains.

Although there is also a nice temple in town…

There are also lots of people treating the “white guy” like a rock star…  everyone wants to take a picture with you.

Even with the bizarre landscape and the active temple, the ruins dominate your time…

The royal bath in the palace complex…

…click the 180 degree panorama of inside the massive palace complex for a bigger version…

However cool that is, UNESCO did me one better with scrollable 360 degree views of all the major monuments…

http://www.world-heritage-tour.org/asia/south-asia/india/hampi/map.html

The royal elephant stable…

The Lotus Mahal…

After a sleeper train back to Bangalore, I piked up my Olympus uTough 8000 from the repair center.  I didn’t have a copy of my receipt to take advantage of the warranty, so the repair bill was a whopping $30 USD.  I love this country…