Leg 1 - Chitradurga Fort and drive to Anegundi

Our first stop was at the Gayathri dam, as we started post noon from Bangalore and reaching Vani Vilas before closure was not possible. We still made the best use of our time at this dam as sunset view was breathtaking...

What was surprising is the secure gates around the dam, though Google said otherwise about the safety of the dam

Next we proceeded to Chittradurga fort, a true wonder in architecture. It is unbelievable that such heavy stones were used to build, but easy to see why it took Hyder Ali multiple attempts across 3 decades to conquer!

Chalukyas built this strong fort which has various names such as stone, steel, seven rounds to indicate that it is impregnable 

These stone forts had indications like this single fish to denote the way, and double fish to denote the presence of water - well, pond, etc

Inside one of the first entrances we saw this game drawn on stone for the security guards to spend time.

These are the footprints of the ruler's family deity and it was a ritual to get Her blessings before going to war..

A beautiful view of the fort, not just was it impregnable... but also unclimbable, we could only take pictures from a distance. One of these temples are believed to house the Hidimba asura's teeth, and the famous gatotkacha (Bhima's son) was born here!

Midway to the top, we found this beautiful pillar - acc. to our guide this served a dual purpose of lighting lamps and climbing to the top

Shocking to see how these stones have been scultped this way, even today it remains a mystery on how this was achieved without any machinery

Finally a picture of this beautiful parrot, matching its green with the fauna on the fort - both having made these ruins of the fort their home :)