Places to visit at Nandi Hills – A weekend ride (10+ spots)

Hi friends and subscribers, Warm wishes to all Places to visit at Nandi Hills. That’s what we are discussing here. It’s been several months that I have posted something. And that’s mainly because of my laziness, lol. So, thought of coming up with something very interesting. Hence this post.

I’m super excited to write this post.It’s not a technical one, it’s our travel experience that we had. We went for a weekend trip on the first week of May and I would like to share it with you all. Yes, a weekend trip to Nandi Hills.

Nandi Hills is a hill fortress in Karnataka. It’s about 62KM away from Bangalore. We planned to stay there for a night as we need to see both sunset and sunrise! So, we all were set for our hill top journey on our Bullet 

The prime consideration in the journey goes to our 3 year old, Aishu who haven’t travelled this much distance in two wheeler. Best places to visit at Nandi Hills.

So, we planned to take breaks in between our journey so that she’ll be refreshed and considered to feed her with some snacks and so on. The main aim of Arun and I, was to see the sunrise as this was heard as a fabulous one from our friends who already had been there. The aim of Aishu was to play in sliding toys and swings (God knows, if it’s there).

Yeah, let’s our start our journey to Nandi Hills. We started our journey around 10.30AM.

Places to visit at Nandi Hills, Karnataka

Amruth Sarovara

Nellikai Basavanna

River source of Palar

Yoga Nandeeswara Swamy Temple

Sunset

Hangout @ Nandi

Sunrise

Nehru Nilaya

Tippu’s Lodge

Parks

Tippu’s drop

Grapes farm

Way to Nandi hills.

On the way to Nandi Hills, we can see both Eucallyptus trees and Gulmohar trees on both the sides of the road. The scenic view of Gulmohar trees are extremely attractive <3 We reached by there around 1PM as we had taken few breaks in our journey. In between the journey, Aishu kept asking about the sliding toys and swings and she asked whether that would be bigger than the toys in Koramangala park, where we used to go in all weekends.

We already booked our room in Mount Palazoo and the room was all set when we reached there. It was a medium range room and Aishu was pleased with the playing area that they have. Oh, thank God for this! Else, she won’t have a good mood for the rest of our journey.

After having a yummy Hyderabadi biriyani we spent some time in the playing area of the Hotel with Aishu. We have also taken some photos in that garden which gives a scenic beauty.

Then we started our ride to Nandi around 3PM. On the way to hills, we could see many people selling grapes. We decided to buy it for sure on the next day. As two wheeler are not allowed to the hill top, we parked our bullet in the parking area and grabbed our entry passes. There’re auto rickshaws available for those who doesn’t want to walk. We preferred walking as we would like to explore it. Except two wheeler all other vehicles are allowed to the hill top.

There’s main road for vehicles and steps are built for others.

Let’s Explore Nandi. I try to explain:

Nandi hills timings, places to visit in Nandi hills, about Nandi Hills Tourism, Nandi Hills, Bangalore, Tourist Place in Bangalore. Let’s start the places to visit at Nandi Hills.

1. Amruth Sarovara

It’s a lake built in a square shape. It was built in the year of 1936. This resembles the pond that we see in the evergreen Malayalam film “Kalapani”. Unfortunately, it’s not permitted to enter inside as the gates are closed to the pond. There’re lot of tortoises and fishes in it, along with the chirping of birds will surely make us pleasant 

From Amruth Sarovara, we started walking to the deep forest. On the way to the hill top, through the forest beware of chameleons. There may be snakes too, but we didn’t see any but we wished to see. Also, there’re a lot of Monkeys. The “photographer” (Arun) is always behind monkeys as he loved to take their pics, lol.

2. Nellikai Basavanna

This is very important for the list places to visit at Nandi Hills. It’s the idol of a bull which measures 10 feet long and 6 feet height, which is carved in Chola’s style. It is said that it have almost 1300 years of old, which is from Chola’s period. There’s a Nellikai Tree (Indian Gooseberry) in front of the basavanna and hence the name.

So, the gooseberry tree in front of the idol seemed to have many years of age! The idol is faced towards the Gooseberry tree. It’s seen that people have tied bangles in this tree.

We continued our walking through the forest as we can see steps built in pointing towards the hill top. So, we’re pretty sure we’ll reach there somehow. So, our next destination was the river origin for Palar.

3. River source of Palar

I have never seen a river source in my life. With a great intention and expectation in our mind, we walked to see the river origin of Palar. It was short and narrow steps downwards and we walked carefully to see the river source.

But, unfortunately we couldn’t see a drop of water  We could see a statue of a small bull and a locked door near by. It seems the river source is protected inside the locked gate.

With less dissapoinment, we continued our walking. We should be very careful, as we can see chameleons on the way and on the rocks.

4. Yoga Nandeeswara Swamy Temple

To the very top of the hill, we can see this temple. It’s also believed to be from Chola’s period. We can see different stone carvings in the temple. Near by this temple, we can see the sunrise view point.

Aishu is tired little bit and disapointed as she didn’t see her toys anywhere. On the hill top, there’s few hotels and roadside merchants. Yay!!! Aishu found her place  There were few tree houses and a sliding toy. Most of the tree houses are damaged and a warning is written there, not to climb on the tree houses as they’re in repair.

But most of the youngsters including us, are posing for their photographs  Aishu was happy by that time, as she played a lot in the sliding toy. As we found her mood was changing as she lost her sleep as part of her routine, we somehow managed her to take her to the room and we promised we’ll be coming the next day too so that she’d have enough time to play.

We started walking down the steps, on the way back there’s sunset point. We waited for few minutes to see the sunset. But, by that time Aishu started crying. Then we moved over and thought we’ll come the next day to see the sunrise. We started heading towards the room on our bullet and then noticed the sun is going to set. Yay, we could see the sunset now.

Now, it’s time to have dinner. But from where? Aishu was not okay with the lunch as she didn’t like so much spicy food so we thought of having dinner from outside. And we reached Hangout @ Nandi.

It’s an awesome place – the ambience that it have, is mind blowing!!! Also, amazing food at very reasonable price! They have mini soccer and few other games too. If you need to experience tents, it’s available there!! They have rooms for rent too!Anyone planning to stay for a night in Nandi, sure Hangout @ Nandi will be a most suited place.

So, everyone is tired and it’s time to rest. That was Day 1.

Day 2 — Aim: sunrise and other places to visit at Nandi Hills

To see the sunrise, we woke up early at 4 AM and started to the hills. But there’s a check post and it remains closed until 5.30 lol. We need to wait there for more than 1 hour with heavy block. Everyone were rushing when the check post opened. It was an awesome ride to the hills in the early morning with mist. Really loved it Yeah, we are there for sunrise!

5. Nehru Nilaya

On the very top of the hills, which is a public Guest house. It’s said that the SAARC summit of 1986 was held in this bangalow and hence renamed as Nehru Nilaya. There’s a statue of Nehru in front of the bungalow. In front of the bungalow, there’s a good garden with different varieties of flowers.

stepping down

6. Tippu’s Lodge

Tipus summer lodge is a small 2 storeyed building painted in deep pink and it can be found on the left side, as soon as you enter the main fort wall. It’s really a nice view from this building. This is the main part in our list, places to visit at Nandi Hills.

7. Parks

8. Tippu’s drop

Tipus Drop – A 600 m high cliff face where according to legend, condemned prisoners were pushed to their death.

Yeah, it’s pack-up time. We have vacated our rented room and reached Hangout @ Nandi for our yummy lunch. We have taken few pics of the tomato gardens which is behind the restaurant.

On both sides of the raod, we could see few people which includes mainly ladies and children selling grapes. We also bought grapes from them.

These are the main places to visit at Nandi Hills.

Do you know grape arbours near Nandi?

Yeah, there’s a lot of grape yards. We have taken a left turn from the main road and after few meters, we could see a lot of grape yards. It was simply superb to see the ripen grapes. We could see green grapes too. We also saw few mulberry plants too.

Back home!!