From the easy going, laid-back, no-horns Andaman Islands we landed at Chennai aka Madras straight into the hustle and bustle of the city, prepared to spend half a day there until our night train to Hyderabad. Although Chennai has one or two places of interest to see we decided to pass and instead spend our time in Express Avenue shopping mall, where other than window-shopping we basically just walked around aimlessly stopping to eat junk food at several different places. After eating all day we decided to go eat some more (well I wanted to) specifically tomato soup and a tasty masala dosa at Hotel Saravana Bhavan, a popular national chain of vegetarian restaurants, before boarding our 14-hour train to Hyderabad, the capital Andhra Pardesh.
We arrived at Hyderabad in the morning and after settling in our hotel we went out to see what the city has to offer, which we soon found out wasn't much. Still, Golconda Fort is impressive though a little run-down, and the Charminar monument and mosque is nice and also worth visiting as it has become an iconic landmark of Hyderabad, but it is enough to see it from the outside (we don't recommend paying the 100 Rs entrance fee to climb inside). After visiting the two major attractions in Hyderabad we stopped at Mocha cafe to relax a bit and drink good coffee surrounded by a hip young local crowd who as it seems come there mostly to smoke hooka (sheesha). After that we decided to go to Prasads Multiplex cinema to watch the Bollywood movie Dolly ki Doli which turned out to be quite a disappointment for us so we treated ourselves to another movie, this time the Hollywood film Interstellar, which was screening in the Imax theater and was great. Hyderabad is world famous for its mutton biriyani but, as I am a vegan and Maya is kind of a vegetarian we decided to skip it.
We arrived at Hyderabad in the morning and after settling in our hotel we went out to see what the city has to offer, which we soon found out wasn't much. Still, Golconda Fort is impressive though a little run-down, and the Charminar monument and mosque is nice and also worth visiting as it has become an iconic landmark of Hyderabad, but it is enough to see it from the outside (we don't recommend paying the 100 Rs entrance fee to climb inside). After visiting the two major attractions in Hyderabad we stopped at Mocha cafe to relax a bit and drink good coffee surrounded by a hip young local crowd who as it seems come there mostly to smoke hooka (sheesha). After that we decided to go to Prasads Multiplex cinema to watch the Bollywood movie Dolly ki Doli which turned out to be quite a disappointment for us so we treated ourselves to another movie, this time the Hollywood film Interstellar, which was screening in the Imax theater and was great. Hyderabad is world famous for its mutton biriyani but, as I am a vegan and Maya is kind of a vegetarian we decided to skip it.
From Hyderabad we continued to the city of Vijayawada where we couldn't find a budget guesthouses (the few places that were cheap didn't have license to host foreigners!?!?) and the cheapest we found was hotel Golden way (1800 Rs per night including breakfast, after some bargaining!), where we got a nice clean a/c room with an extremely comfortable bed and a proper hot shower, but still it was way over budget for us. After enduring the blow of paying that amount for a night we went to see some nice rock-cut architecture at the nearby Undavalli Caves (entry fee 100 Rs), originally constructed as a Buddhist monastery and showing some Buddhist art work along with Hindu symbols. We later enjoyed strolling through the super-religious Kanka Durga temple along with many devout pilgrims where we got some unusual blessings from the local priests, including having rice scattered over us and being hit over the head with some kind of plant.
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After reading a caption in the "Book" (lonely plant) that its title is "off the beaten track" we decided to check out the small village of Maredumilli, hoping it will be worth the 12 hour ride in local buses and an overnight in the city Rajahmundry.
We arrived to Vanavihari guesthouse, a project of community based eco- tourism sponsored by the forest department, and paid 750Rs for the "deluxe" room that included a missing (broken) sink. The following morning we set out to explore the local sights, excited for the promised "nature circuit" said to include 2 waterfalls, a coffee plantation, a medicinal garden and more. We finished the half day tour a bit disappointed, as the waterfalls were mediocre at best and it wasn't exactly the nature experience we were looking for, and we realized that you need to be a botanical expert or an avid bird watcher to really enjoy the place. Food-wise, the village is famous for its bamboo chicken dish but as in Hyderabad we again had to pass because of our veggie life style.
We arrived to Vanavihari guesthouse, a project of community based eco- tourism sponsored by the forest department, and paid 750Rs for the "deluxe" room that included a missing (broken) sink. The following morning we set out to explore the local sights, excited for the promised "nature circuit" said to include 2 waterfalls, a coffee plantation, a medicinal garden and more. We finished the half day tour a bit disappointed, as the waterfalls were mediocre at best and it wasn't exactly the nature experience we were looking for, and we realized that you need to be a botanical expert or an avid bird watcher to really enjoy the place. Food-wise, the village is famous for its bamboo chicken dish but as in Hyderabad we again had to pass because of our veggie life style.
Our next destination was the city of Visakhapatnam commonly known as "Vizag" on the eastern coast. We stayed at the simple Hotel Akshaya (1050 Rs) and had one of the best thalis in India with a large variety of delicious veg curries (125-175 Rs) at the Dharani veg restaurant inside Daspalla Hotel. We visited the Simhachalam Temple set upon a hill outside of the city (no photos allowed) where we observed a special ceremony where couples were symbolically bound with a string to a pillar inside the temple (we tried to look up the meaning of this ceremony with no success). We took a short day trip to the lovely Buddhist twin hills of Bojjannakonda and Lingalakonda in the village of Sankaram (45 km from Vizag) covered with many gompas and stupas and exhibiting the beautiful history of Buddhism in Andhra Pradesh.
We concluded our short-but-sweet visit to Andhra Pradesh and headed to the "soul of India" Odisha or its commonly used older name Orissa, passing through the beautiful Araku valley on our train ride up north.
You were right: there was not too much to see inside the fort. I wasted my 100.- Rupies and was quite disappointed. But the views from the ramparts were nice enough; have a look at some old snaps at Matt at Hyderabad. - Cheers, Matt.
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