Maheshwar – TRAVELTRUNK.NET

Oh East is east and west is west and never the twain….could be the title of the man and my travel proposals. Substitute the directions but the template remains steadfastly firm. (I know I have taken the lines totally out of context but you get the idea.) I proposed tigers and the jungle at Pench. The man, a boat ride to the center of the universe with floating candles on the Narmada. The tiger would have to wait! A morning after our sun chasing drive to Jam Darwaza we found ourselves on the same road again, this time down the forested ghats, over murmuring streams, meeting our Gadaria friends camped in a cotton field on our way to Maheshwar via Mandaleshwar.

Another highway not to miss goes through –Dras – Highway through Heaven

Ahilya Fort

We treated ourselves to some understated luxury this time, as we checked into Ahilya Fort (More on it another time) the palace quarters of the Holkars now converted into a heritage boutique hotel where, apart from the royal family, you can nod to the memories of past guests like Mick Jagger, Demi Moore…. Maheshwar has only two thermostat settings – hot and hotter, and since I have only made day trips, no prizes for guessing the readings at all the visits. So after checking in and lunching on a superb four course meal accompanied by chilled champagne, we crash out in the ‘Nagada room’ done in the cooling shades of white and ice blue, which offers not just privacy but the most surreal sunrise view..

A great place to stay In the Pink City is – Dera Jaipur: A Homestay for Stellar Style and Exceptional Experiences

Narmada and Maheshwar

Maheshwar maybe synonymous with the gossamer fabric but its history and story are totally entwined with the river it embraces. Maheshwar means abode of Mahesh an epithet for Shiva and Narmada, according to some tales, is his daughter. Shivlings are not only to be found in the numerous temples dotting the fabled ghats here but they seem to randomly and organically sprout. The river produces the banalingas, cylindrical stones revered as a manifestation of Shiva. The ancient Narmada is considered so sacred that even Ganga purifies herself by taking a dip in her.

Discover another river and hair-raising adventures in – Barot -And the Serendipitous Catch in the Uhl River

Baneshwar

On a boat rowing to the center of the earth

Early evening sees us heading past the Ahilyeshwar and Vithoji temples, which are looking like they are getting gargantuan acupuncture treatments covered as they are in scaffolding, down the ghats onto a red hand-painted boat for a ride with a tea hamper, being rowed to the center of the universe. The silence of the river broken only by the rhythmic sound of the oars. As we approach the 9^th century black stoned Baneshwar temple in the middle of the river, we see a Nandi sitting in veneration at the entrance in stark colour contrast to the rest of the temple. The white lilies adorning the vermilion smeared lingam grow on an outcrop behind the temple itself, barely skimming the surface of the river. The temple is considered the center of the universe and is in line from the North Star to the center of the earth. The diminutive temple may not hold a torch in terms of architectural beauty to the massive Ahilyeshwar temple on the shore but it has survived many a dip in the raging river during countless monsoons. As the sun calls it a day the bells clang in the temples at the twenty eight ghats on the river front full of devotees and locals now, praying, bathing, congregating, feeding the fish, contemplating the world. We row back after an altogether brief halt and from our boat put down tea-lights in leaf bowls in the river, the current making us part ways and we see them going where the river deigns to take them, into the sunset, while we sip our tea and lounge on the big boat. Mysticism meets romance, not for the first time.

Tiny tealight travellers on a mighty river (Picture credit ASR)

Where piety meets pomp is – An Ode to Ancient Life in Stone- The UNESCO World Heritage Site of Ajanta & Ellora

Sunrise

In the night we ask what can we do early in the morning? Watch the sunrise, we are told. From where? From your bed! Okay then… I’m all for such doable suggestions! We rise before the sun and from our balcony see youngsters already trying to find the perfect spot to have a photo shoot near the temples below! Insta is not just a carrot. It’s a whole carrot cake! But we have a vantage point and witness the sun unfurl a molten gold bridge across the river to reach the temple on the ghat. It starts as a watery orange path and soon firms into a fiery golden one before breaking into melted pools at the end of this spectacular show.

Explore the colours of a great river in – Chushul -Chumathang – Hello Indus & Iridescent Colours!

Lingarchan

A thousand lingams come to life everyday

Later in the morning we join the priests keeping up a centuries old, unbroken ritual that in a way symbolizes the cycle of life here. The Lingarchan puja was started by Ahilya Bai on a much larger scale and although the number of people performing it has dwindled those who do it, do it with feel. Practiced hands move deftly to shape mud into tiny lingams which are put into notches on wooden boards worn at the edges by the water seeping in. The notches themselves are in a Shivling pattern. Sitting in a room next to Ahilya wada we work in companionable silence and once the boards are full, after a brief ceremony, they are taken to the river and the earth once again meets the water, one enriching the other.

Find Madhya Pradesh’s other cultural gem in- Part Two – The Old Gold in Outstanding Orchha

The timings of this ceremony change with the seasons so we’ve had to abandon our very English breakfast to attend it. As we come back to the table to finish it, Pugsy, one of the denizens, approves of the breakfast kept warm for us from below the table. Going by his size he has many breakfasts in a day. The fountain in the courtyard, fashioned from a massive old copper container, gurgles. It’s the only time we hear the river water in Maheshwar. A town and a river patiently, like they have all the time in the world, revealing their stories which run so deep, they can’t be told in one sitting.

Read about another place nearby seeped in history in – Mandu and Maheshwar in the Monsoon Mist

Fact File –

Maheshwar is about 2 hours from Indore.

Ahilya Fort at Maheshwar is an exclusive heritage property and slightly expensive.

The Lingarchan ceremony happens everyday in a room at the Ahilya Wada around 8:30AM but the time varies with the seasons.

India’s large heart – Madhya Pradesh, even after being cut down to size, still occupies a chunk smack in the middle of the country. That large heart can beat wildly like Pench or as peacefully as Orchha. Mandu and Maheshwar straddle a state of being somewhere in between. They make for excellent long weekend getaways when the monsoons revive the natural beauty to emerald green and make the Narmada flow full and deep.

Discover the emerald Betwa and Orchha in- Part One- On the Wild Side of Outstanding Orchha

Mandu – Tales of Mahals, Mausoleums & a Man-eater

The first of many trips one has made to Mandu was way back in the 80’s with three generations of the clan, like one mini Mughal army on the move, in a rickety jeep over a rutted road. The last visit was over a newly laid road good enough even for a Nano, part of a mini cavalcade now, to cater for another generation added to the expanding Mughal army! Two of my most abiding memories of that first trip were – at a waterfall overlooking a gorge being told the tale of a young trapeze artist promised a chunk of the kingdom if she managed to cross the gorge on a tightrope. As she neared the end, success nearly at her feet, the girl and the rope were cut down to size. The other, coming to know that a man-eater had just been caught at the Tarapur Darwaza the day before our arrival. It freaked me out so much that I imagined tigers outside the high vaulted airy room where we were putting up at the Taveli Mahal. (Which now houses the museum at the entrance of the Jahaz Mahal complex.) It made me oblivious to the setting of our accommodation which overlooked a lotus covered tank or the beauty around, cloaked in a misty veil much like the poetic romance of Baz Bahadur and Rani Roopmati, the chief protagonists of an abiding love story, who were proceeded and followed by others in the chequered history of a citadel said to be the largest in India.

A young Baobab gives company to an old monument

As one approaches Mandu, situated on an outcrop of the Malwa plateau, there are massive Baobab trees or ‘Khurasani Imlis’, as they are also called, maybe as a testimony to their winding journey from Africa to here, dotting the landscape. The road goes onto a narrow natural bridge before going through the first of three consecutive gates or Darwazas in a tight curve – Alamgiri, Bhangi (Yeah, sounds so politically incorrect now, but as per some stories in honour of the people proceeding an army heading out to battle.) and Delhi Darwaza, which should have made Mandu invincible but clearly didn’t, given the number of times it changed hands.

A place for the harem to perhaps frolic in the Mahal

Post monsoon is a special time to visit this place when it is emerald green, the ponds and tanks are full and the low clouds drift lazily in the breeze. Walk, hire a cycle (They are easily available.) or drive slowly and explore the green vistas and monuments that dot this place. Start at the square that makes up the bustling centre, where the barest remains of the Asharfi Mahal and austere Jami Masjid face each other. Behind the masjid is Hoshang Shah’s tomb which is supposed to have provided the template for the Taj Mahal. A short distance away, on one axis are the prehistoric Lohani caves, a part of Burra or Old Mandu and on the other, the star attraction – The Jahaz Mahal complex. Jahaz Mahal straddles a small lake and a large tank, both now devoid of the massive lotuses I remember from the first trip. Legend has it that the “Ship Palace”,(A name, if you ask me, more because of the location between the water bodies than any great resemblance to any floating vessel I know of.) housed fifteen thousand women at one time as part of the harem and hats off to the architect that the ‘jahaz’ didn’t sink! The sloping walls lend Hindola Mahal it’s name which is behind the Jahaz Mahal, and that adjoins a beautifully restored step well – The Champa Baori.

Explore palaces in- Part Two – The Old Gold in Outstanding Orchha

Baz Bahadur Mahal gazes at Roopmati Pavilion

On the far end of Mandu is Baz Bahadur’s Palace and Rewa Kund. The Kund, for some, is as sacred as the Narmada river itself. At a height, further on, right at the edge of the plateau is Rani Roopmati’s pavilion. An airy structure with a covered water reservoir was made so that the queen could see and pray to her beloved river, which seems to have shifted course or the haze obscured it or maybe I just have bad eyesight because I saw no river down in the Nimar plains. Enroute to these, but off the road are many small monuments, alone or in clusters. At one monument we saw carved blocks used upside down denoting pillaged older buildings being the source of the monument’s material. At another, a grave seemed to have walked out of the tomb only to come to rest under a tree nearby. The Neelkanth temple with it’s small courtyard is a few steps down literally carved out from a cave on the slope of the plateau and is on the road to Tarapur Darwaza.

The same darwaza where the trap had been set for the man-eating leopard, (Definitely no tiger!) one woman-eating leopard to be exact, many eons back. Mandu teems with stories and legends, real and fanciful and the only wildlife I have ever sighted has been a massive hyena, probably having the last laugh at my flighty imagination.

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Weaving Sutras at Maheshwar

Maheshwar, home to the much in demand Maheshwari fabric woven there, is about an hour away from Mandu. A gentle winding road down the plateau brings us to the Nimar plains. Their blistering heat tempered by the rains right now. The faint outline of Roopmati’s pavilion is all that is visible of Mandu from below. At Maheshwar, narrow bylanes of a small town with a faintly mofussil feel, still lingering in the air, end at the Maheshwar fort. One part, which houses the private quarters of Ahilya Bai, the most famous of the Holkar rulers, has been converted into a boutique hotel by her descendants. A stone path takes us towards the ghats and we see the exquisitely carved stone spire of a temple but are just as soon distracted by the sounds of a hand loom on our left. Right there are weavers at work on the fabric so much ‘en vogue’ everywhere. The cloth & it’s colours beguiling us, we promise to come back for a more leisurely shopping experience at the end.

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A few steps down bring us to two stunningly carved stone temples facing each other. The Ayhileshwar temple is the bigger one on the right and it’s balustrades offer a beautiful view of the ghats below and the Narmada river beyond. The ghat steps with the fort as an Insta-worthy backdrop, are the piece de resistance and invite us to just sit and let the murmur of religious incantations here and there wash over us. We soak in the serenity of the sacred river, the raison d’être of this place which runs swift and deep, carrying boatloads of people, nearly submerging a temple on a tiny island nearby. A river sutra & tales of bygone queens seems to weave a common thread & bind these two historic towns at almost gazing distance of each other.

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Tag: Maheshwar

Mystic Maheshwar : At the Center of the Universe

Mandu and Maheshwar in the Monsoon Mist