I love Hyderabad!!!

On my recent visit to Hyderabad to attend my friend Chandrika's marriage, I visited Golconda fort. Here is my first travelogue about our visit on 05/06/10:

After a 12-hour journey starting on Friday by train from Bangalore to Kachiguda a group of 6 friends reached Hyderabad. As my friend's wedding was on Sunday, we were planning to visit Golconda fort for the evening light show on Saturday. After spending the morning in freshening up, we went to meet the bride's family. We started from their house around 2.30 after a yummy Andhra-style vegetarian lunch. Following an hour and half drive by cab from Dilsukh Nagar we reached Golconda.

At first look, the fort looked like a miniature stone castle out of a fairy tale. Though disappointed, we hired a guide to look around the fort. The fort was situated inside a stony wall of 7 km span. The trip covered 3 km of fort area lasting 1 hour 40 minutes. We went uphill through commons path to the highest point of Darbar hall, 500 odd feet high from the entrance and came downhill through "Shahi raah" aka the king's way.

The Golconda fort is a distinguishing example of stone architecture and sound engineering of the bygone era. The first example was the entrance of the fort. The entrance was hidden by a large stone wall, and above the entrance was a dome shaped structure with diamond-shaped edges inside. This diamond-cut caused sound to be reflected in such a way that if a sentry claps from here with a unique code suggesting the arrival of the friend or foe, the claps were resounded at the Darbar hall 500-feet high!

We confirmed this ourselves when we reached the top. Then on the way uphill, we saw the soldiers barracks, nagina bagh- the place Persian businessmen traded diamond and other stone jewellery with the begums of the fort, the minister's office, the three stone tanks which supplied water to the fort. It was surprising to hear that water was pumped to the lowest tank from the Durgamcheru lake situated some 10kms away.In those days, soldiers who were to be punished were sent to pump waters to the tanks. Pretty tiresome job!

After visiting Ramdas jail, and listening to his story briefly, we reached the highest point, the Darbar hall. An interesting piece of architecture was the natural airconditioner situated on the sides of the King's throne. The air conditioner was nothing but a tunnel leading from the back of the fort to the hall. At the back it was narrow, so that the wind entering in is forced to travel in a shorter path through the lime-coated walls of the tunnel which cools it and at the outlet near the throne, it comes out as a cold breeze :) Simple and cool eh??

Another interesting aspect was yet another dome-shaped structure at the Darbar. When the sentry at the entrance warns the courtiers of a incoming threat, the King's claps from under this very dome, which in turn echoes the same to the 7 sentry gates located throughout the fort walls of 7km. Hearing the claps, the sentries at these gates close their gates to prevent enemy's intrusion.

After clicking a few snaps at the top, we came down the "Shahi raah". There were close 370 odd steps to the bottom. The whole flight was steep and slippery. The guide explained that these steps were built purposefully short so that enemies can't run on foot or on horseback swiftly on them. The King and his begums used to be carried in Palanquin.  The Palanquin bearers were sturdy men who were selected based on their height to be either at the front of back of the Palanquin. Uphill, the shorter men used be in front and taller ones at the back so the Palanquin is held straight without tilting. At the junctions, the bearers were switched with men of appropriate height for the next flight of steps.

Our last stop before coming back to the entrance was the hall were hearing were held. The hall had a opening on the top were the King and Queen used to sit. An arch in front of the throne prevented people standing below to see the king and queen. The guide explained that trials of criminals were held here and such an arrangement to hide the royal couple was done to prevent any retribution by the convicted after hearing the penalty. The convict was supposed to stand below a dome-shaped structure which had a finer-diamond shaped cut walls in the interior. This caused even a slightest ruffle of the cloth to be echoed loudly thus warning the guards if the convict tries to attack anyone. We ruffled our dresses, tried cooing and confirmed that indeed it resounded :)

Also, there was a place in the king's palace where the words spoken in one corner of the walls was echoed on the diagonally-opposite corner. This was to avoid any kind of gossip or spies whispering about. Scary na?? I sure won't allow this facility in my office cubicle ;)

After the trip we attended the light show. The narration was cool as someone imitated the voice of an emperor who takes the visitors on stroll and explains them the history of the palace and its kings. The lighting was also good with songs and dialogues to match. But the show was an hour long which seemed to get draggy after initial 30 minutes due to the regular interruption in narration by a song or dialogue! But hey come on, we are used to watching 3-hour long movies in India with all its masaala and songs, so this wasn't so hard :P

Coming back we stopped in Mozamjahi market for having dinner at "Famous Ice creams" :D Yep each of us had at least two varieties of ice cream which served as our dinner for the day! And thus ended yet another memorable trip around Hyderabad....

Useful info: Based on my experience in last three successful trips to Hyderabad here is the list of Famous eatouts in Hyderabad where I tried and enjoyed the food and flavour of Andhra, the chicken curry,fry and egg at Southern spice(near Durgamcheru), Paradise hotel (Secunderabhad) biriyani and mughalai mutton curry, Chicken biriyani in Hyderabad house(there are lot of branches, I tried the one near Malakpet), Jain restaurant in Ramoji Film city, the lunch buffet was awesome with its variety of vegetarian food. HTH for any foodies going on a trip to Hyd!