Unplanned trip to Mantralaya

We went on a one day trip to Mantralaya. It was totally unplanned. My husband M is like this. He loves to travel and is always ready to go. I often tell him, you are always with one leg set outside the house on the weekends. He gets so restless when he has to sit at home on the weekend. So Mantralaya happened this way. My mom and grand mom joined us. Three + two = five of us set off on Saturday, the 3^rd Dec.

We had no tickets with us. It was a similar situation on 17^th Oct, when we went to Tirupati. It was 10 in the night and we were in Majestic with no ticket. Then for some reason, my husband assumed Mantralaya bus was Tirupati’s and he got in, while outside I stood wondering what he was doing? Then we got a comfortable bus to Tirupati. So, we assumed there would be many Volvo buses to Mantralaya (wrong assumption), as is the case for Tirupati. We luckily got a bus and some manageably comfortable seats. The conductor and driver were good and my husband got into a good conversation with them and was thrilled to know that the bus had actually come to Bangalore from Chintamani (his home town). We reached Mantralaya, had a wonderful and quick darshan. You would not believe me; Manchamma Devi’s darshan took longer. We filled our eyes with the wonderful sight of Guru Rayaru. I feel the Brindavana he is in, oozes out grace and kindness. I am still in that state of peace. We were tired of the night journey, so we went to the room and got some sleep after having had ”anna prasadam” from the temple.

After having slept well, we started off to Panchamukhi Anjaneya temple. That was pure fun. We went in a coracle (Teppa in Kannada), then waded through knee height water to reach the autos/cars standing on the other side of the Tungabhadra bank, hired a sumo to get to the temple. We got a nice and pleasing darshan of the god. Here we saw some rocks, which were supposedly used by Hanuman as a pillow and a bed. It was exciting to listen to these stories and imagine Hanuman having slept on that very rock. And yes, do you know that Hanuman never went to Vaikunta along with Sri Hari? Hanuman said that if Sri Hari promises him that he would continue to be Lord Rama and if Vaikunta is going to be filled with Rama Nama, he would accompany him. But when Hanuman learnt that would not happen, he said, he will continue to stay on earth and be present where ever there is Rama Nama. This temple also houses the sandals of Sri Hanuman. I just get carried away with such stories and I feel very excited seeing these things and listening to these stories.

So, after the Panchamukhi visit, we did some shopping on the streets of Mantralaya, we rushed to the room and packed and left to catch the bus. We were back in Bangalore at 5 AM on Monday morning. The unplanned trip happened to be exciting, fun and safe. Sometimes, unplanned trips offer an excitement for there are a lot of unknowns involved. But, I know it’s not always advisable and I am also not too “for” it.

However, I leave you all with this quote.

"Twenty years from now you will be more disappointed by the things that you didn't do than by the ones you did do. So throw off the bowlines. Sail away from the safe harbor. Catch the trade winds in your sails. Explore. Dream. Discover." - Mark Twain