Thursday, July 15, 2010

Krimchi

This was the last of our sojourn to Jammu, put a perfect icing on the cake.  A short detour of about 10 kms from the town of Udhampur brings us to Krimchi. That this temples had a Greek influence in the architecture made me eager to see this place and I should give the credit to my kid brother who influenced this visit not withstanding the fast approaching twilight.

At the village square, one need to take a deviation  and walk down this Path that lead to the Krimchi temples which are situated on the banks of river Burunala.

A good half a km walk in the wilderness, going up and down the hillock, This first sight of the temple Shikara burst opens. But its perched on a small hillock yet another climb to take to the isolated temple complex



Shikaras of the Krimchi temple complex.

If the palace of Virat was nearby at Aaknoor, can the palace of Kichaka be far behind ? Krimchi was purported to be founded by Raja Kichaka of Mahabarata times .
Said to bear close resembles to the ones at Bhuvaneshwar, I would say the shikaras at Aihole and Patadakal in Karnataka are similar.






 

All the material available on the Net talks of the Hellenic (Greek) Influence in the construction of these temples, but never mentions in what way. I may have to request fellow blogger from Greece Phivos Nicolaides to point out if he can spot  any influence.







Could it be the columns at the entrance. Are they similar to the columns of Parthenon?


Tuesday, July 6, 2010

Patnitop-The hill station enroute to Srinagar

If one finds travel to Srinagar a risky affair and yet wants to have a whiff of the valley then a alternative could be Patnitop or Patni Top-a beautiful hill top tourist spot located on the Udhampur - Srinagar route.
On cancellation of our helicopter service to the shrine at Vaisno devi due to bad weather (Lucky to get the tickets the next day), we took this journey to Patnitop from Katra, a journey in the lower Himalayan ranges with picture postcard images all along.

A better way explore and bask in the atmosphere here would be to spend at least a day at the many resorts in the the vicinity. On our short visit we could only enjoy the beautiful valley for some time in biting cold on a summer day.

The Winding road to the top

The Beautiful meadows with the tall Pine trees

Cute Little cottages painted green

Pani-puri  on the meadows