Pachhmarhi - The Tallest Queen Of Satpura - II
- Publishing Date: 26-May-2018
- Category: Adventure
- Starting Date: 01-Oct-2014
- No of Days: 2 Days
- Location: Pachmarhi, Madhya Pradesh, India
To read the same blog in Hindi, go to setting gear showing on the right hand side and change the language selection to Hindi.
To read the first part of this blog click here.
The next day's journey was to start from 10 am, so we got ready at 9 o'clock and got out of the hotel to explore some local food in breakfast, poha was served on one shop so we stopped there.In Madhya Pradesh, if poha is announced as national food, there will be no surprise, here there are many places where your will get poha 24 hours in a day. We ordered 2 plates of poha and tea for us and got a place to sit there, Shiva and Akansha were also heading towards this shop in search of breakfast, for them 2 plates of poha and tea came and they join us and we did chitchat on so many random topics. About 15 minutes left to 10 o'clock, we had to move to our hotel because the car will take us from our hotel for today's journey. Our car came soon after we reached the hotel, it was Qualis instead of Gypsy, because today we did not have to go to the more uncharged places, and incidentally, Shiva and Akankha were also in present in the same vehicle.
Today's first point was "Jata Shankar Caves", it is a natural cave or a group of caves, it is an important place for those who worship Shiva. Inside the cave there is a big shivling and this shivling is made naturally. According to mythological stories, this is the place where Shiva hidden himself to save himself from the Bhasmasur.
There is a structure made of rocks naturally, which looks like a hundred-headed serpent Sheshnag. The rocks of this cave look like Lord Shiva's clothed hair. Due to the specific shape of the rocks (clothed hair of shiv), it was named Jata Shankar.
Amazing view
Me and Neha
By coming to this place you will feel as if you have come from the Prathvilok (man's land) to Shivlok (Shivji's land), the caves will now surprise you in the midst of the stones of the gigantic stones, and among them Shivaling itself seems a miracle. There are also some water capsules in the caves, from which water keeps flowing.
Wherever there are the temples of Shiva in Pachmarhi, there will be large trident seen, which were offered by peoples. There was a bit dark in some caves, it's a great place to worship Shiva. After spending some time here, we walked to see our next destination "Gupt Mahadev".
Gupt mahadev mandir
The Gupt Mahadev is a very ancient temple situated in the midst of dense forests, you have to walk some distance to reach the temple. If you come here on some holiday, then you will have to wait for your turn to arrive in a longer line. This is because the entrance of the cave in which the temple is situated is so narrow that you cannot go straight inside, have to go in through diagonally.The space inside the cave is like only 12 to 15 people can stand together so people are sent inside the temple in a group and when the people come out, the next group goes inside.
Inside the temple, there is a shivling and some space is managed where the priest of the temple sit and do the daily worship. The cave is deep enough, so to remove the darkness some bulbs are installed and some exhaust fans are also there to maintain the air circulation inside the cave. After coming out from here, we sat and wait for the other members of the group, by talking with some people, we came to know about the "Chauragarh Mandir". Which is a Shiva temple situated on a mountain, the way to go there start from this point, which is about 3 kilometers away from here, the whole path passes through the forest and the mountains, it is like a trek for the strollers.
I wanted to go here but our plan of today is already fixed and it will take almost full day to go and come back and we don't have that extra day, so from here, we apologize to Shivji for not coming to the temple and started walking towards or vehicle.
Our next stop was Pachmarhi's most prominent, "Jatashankar Mahadev" temple, located here, Mahadev cave, according to ancient legends, Shiva had taken refuge here for the last time, because of the fear of Bhashmasur, then Lord Vishnu had finished the Bhashmaasur by keeping the form of Mohini. There is a Shivling in the middle of the cave, which is natural, here you can also find the Giant Trident.
Inside view of cave. Pic courtesy google
In addition to the Mahadev cave, here are some small caves in which some temple are there. Overall, this place was worth spending some time with ease, so we stayed there for half an hour. There is a lot of panic of Monkeys in overall Pachmarhi, and this place is like a charm for them.
When I was leaving the temple, I saw a man sitting with a telescope, which was showing the "Chauragadh Mahadev" temple with telescopes, I immediately took advantage of it, the Chauragarh Mahadev Temple is a very beautiful temple, since it is situated on the mountain, its boundary wall was made with small trident, but from where so many trident come from?
Pic courtesy: google
The answer is, when the desire of a devotee is fulfilled, he/she goes on the temple and offered a trident, so many tridents are offered here every year, using them the boundary wall is made. It's a kind of unique concept.
From here we reached the place where our car was parked, the next point on which we stopped was an echo point, surrounded by lush greenery, the beauty of this place would be worth seeing during rainy season, here we took some pictures which will remain with us in the form of memories. From here the view of the Chauragarh temple was very beautiful, I took some photo of the same by using the zoom feature.
Chauragarh magadev mandir
We move forward and reached a very beautiful temple whose name was "Amba Mai", it was a very beautiful temple built between the forest. Tiredness of the day's journey was finished in the atmosphere of this temple in a while.
Amba mai temple. Pic courtesy: google
Pic courtesy: google
A group of devotees were busy in Kirtan, we also sat down there, prasad (halwa made of semolina and ghee) came in a while, these offerings were like nectar stuff for me, I still remember the taste of it.
After spending some time here, we walked towards the return of the city, it was around 4:30 o'clock now, after reaching the city the group will go to one more point, but we have to leave as our returning train was on 8 o'clock from Pipariya. Driver dropped us at our hotel, I paid the remaining amount to the driver and we did a final bye bye to every member of that vehicle and exchanged the contact number with Shiva, I hope we will meet again, or maybe some of them will read my blog in the future.
After reaching the hotel, we took some rest and after clearing the account here we did the check-out and moved towards the market. We want take some memorable things from here. After finishing the shopping, we ate food at the place where we ate yesterday and we were free at around 6 o'clock, we have lot of time, so we decided to took bus instead of taxi to reach Pipariya, and it's a very reasonable deal for us, as taxi will cost Rs. 500 for two and buses will cost Rs. 120 for two of us :)
Bus took an hour to drop us at railway station and we are one hour advance to the train timing, so we utilize this time by sitting on a tea shop and having 2 rounds of tea and doing some random chitchat. We reached the platform 10 minute before the train scheduled time, and the train arrives and we took our seats and started resting. From here we were carrying a suitcase full of memories, which will remind us of this place. And somewhere inside me a song was playing "Safarnama sawaalon ka..."
Note: Pachmarhi is the only hill station of Madhya Pradesh, but please do not compare this place with the hill station of Himachal and Uttarakhand, as these places are very close to the Himalaya and because of that there is a huge difference in the atmoshphere of both these places. But there is no doubt that this is a great place for strolling.
Happy traveling
Fir milege kahi kisi roj ghumte firte
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