Ajanta Ellora

Travel Date : September first week. 

Few weeks ago we visited majestic World Heritage site of Ajanta and Ellora caves. Ajanta and Ellora are located near historic city of Aurangabad. Ajanta is 100KM from Aurangabad and Ellora is 30KM from Aurangabad. So,we decided to stay in Aurangabad. There are many good hotels in Aurangabad. 

There are many ways to reach Aurangabad from Bangalore. You can take bus/train/flight/cab. We took flight from Bangalore to Pune and hired a cab for 2 nights to visit Ajanta Ellora from Pune. 

We boarded early morning flight from Bangalore and reached Pune at 7:00 in the morning, cab was waiting at the airport and we started our journey to Aurangabad from Pune at 7:30. It is around 4-5 hours journey (depends on traffic and car's speed). Our driver was driving at good speed and we reached Aurangabad around noon. There are many good restaurants on the way, we stopped at Smile Stone restaurant. Smile Stone is clean and food is also good but little bit costly.  

We decided to go Ellora directly before checking in to hotel. We reached Ellora at around 1:15 PM. We spend 2 hours 30 min to cover Ellora caves and then we headed to hotel and spend rest of the day relaxing in room. 

Ellora Caves

Ellora caves are symbol of harmony between Hinduism/Jainism/Buddhism in historic times. They were built during 6^th and 9^th century and carved out of the mountains . These caves seems like endless effort of many generations and unbelievable carvings on the mountains.

There are many caves with very big and wonderful stone carving of different deities and symbols like shivling. I would categories these caves in 3 groups. 

1. Most of the caves are small with only 3-4 rooms and in each room there is 1 or 2 big stone carved with statues of deities. Each of these caves can be covered in 3 to 5 min each. The carvings are not only on the pillars or on the walls , but similar and beautiful work can be found in ceilings as well.
2. Kailash cave is the most beautiful cave(as per me) ,carved out of single gigantic stone. The foundation of the cave has elephants and Lions, as if they are holding the whole structure on their shoulders. It has historic 100's of feet tall pillars, with beautiful carvings on them. In one part of the Kailash cave you can find major episodes of Ramyana and Mahabharta carved on the wall. These carving will make you believe that how skill full those people would have been( considering the time when they don’t have any technology to ease the work) and what hard work they have done to give importance to the minute details of all the characters of Ramayana and Mahabharta like their sitting postures , battle scene ,chariot and its wheels etc. You need at least 1 hour 30 minutes to fully cover these caves.



Kailash Cave



Hindu Mythology carved on rock

3. Buddhist caves. They are multistory caves and with each story having many rooms and there is statue of meditating Buddha in each room. Most of these rooms are kind of similar but many are not same. There is a small water fall across these caves. You need at least 1 hour to cover these caves fully.

Buddhist Caves

Next day we started for Ajanta at 8:30 am. We reached Ajanta Caves by 11:30 am. We spent around 2 hours 30 min for covering Ajanta caves. Then we return back to Aurangabad.

Ajanta Caves

AJANTA is world's greatest historical monument recognized by UNESCO. These caves were built in 2^nd century and were discovered in 1819.It is said that a British soldier was out on a hunt and while following a tiger he happened to discovered these caves. In one of the cave you can find the signature of that soldier as well.

As you enter the way to Ajanta cave from a distance it seems like small 2 story rooms are carved on the mountain which is surrounded by lush green forest .But as you move forward you will found the beauty and unbelievable masterpiece.

View of caves

Ajanta has 30 caves and most of the caves has the beautiful and magnificent paintings. These paintings and caves tell the story of Buddha’s journey from birth till he attained Nirvana. Cave numbers 9, 10, 19, 26 and 29 are most important.

Paintings as well as carvings on the caves are very important and you definitely need a guide who can explain secrets behind those paintings. These are colorful paintings, for few paintings special color was imported from Persia, as it is said that those perfect blue colors were available only in Persia and now, after hundreds of years, paintings has retained that glowing colors .Few colors where made by mixing the local flora and fauna .Different paintings of Buddha has different –different meditation postures and they are never repeated.

There are many beautiful things to observe in these paintings. Ladies in the paintings are wearing beaded jewelry and when light falls on those jewelry it appears somebody has put that over the paintings. It’s a kind of modern day 3D magic.

Cave 26 is called the parinirvana  cave and must visit cave, which depicts the beautiful carvings of Buddha showing the nirvana state and many beautiful stories of his disciples . And once again do hire a guide.

24 feet Buddha carved on single rock. 

There are endless stories so much of information to share , but it is always better to give picture to words and as it is said a picture is worth thousand words, so do visit have, a look at the marvelous and not explainable  work or mankind .

After returning to Aurangabad we visited Bibi ka muqbara and pawchakki on the same day, there is very little to see in both bibi ka maqbara and almost nothing to see in pawchakii, I think bibi ka maqbara also known as little Taj Mehal is only good for taking pictures and not worth visiting.

Next day we started at around 12, visited Aurangzeb fort, spent around 1 hour to cover fort, there are many historical canons and other old stone carved statues in Aurangzeb's fort, stone carved statues are dated around 2000 years old. It’s a good visit if you have time, then we came back to Pune to catch our flight back to Bangalore.

Notes: GUIDE IS MUST. If you really want to enjoy the piece of art and one of the most amazing work of human race. 

You must carry a good torch. There is no light inside the caves except sun light, so depending on which time of the day you are visiting the caves some walls and carving will be in dark.