Dwaraka Trip: Nageshwara Jyotirlinga and Bet Dwaraka (Chapter 4 of 5)

Dwaraka Trip: Nageshwara Jyotirlinga and Bet Dwaraka
(Chapter 4 of 5) 

A fun-filled trip of guessing games, anecdotes, and what have you, came to a grinding halt when our Innova stopped at the hotel we had booked. The “Mumbai' group, consisting of Ashutosh, Ruchi, their two charming daughters, and Ashu's mother, landed at the same second thanks to Siva and Ashu's spacecraft-docking-precision coordination.

The meeting of the two groups was no less joyous than Ram-Bharat milap, making onlookers guess we were meeting after ages. Siva was happy having met his marathon-, badminton-, cricket-, and man-for-all-seasons friend Ashu; Prashanti, of Ruchi; and the entire group welcoming the addition of a third front, of kids, to the senior and middle-aged teams`.

We arrived long before our check-in time. Nonetheless, as one experiences in hotels in small towns and cities, the management made temporary arrangements for us to freshen up before we could undertake the visit for which the group had come all the way – the Dwarakadeesh temple.

Name any place, and chances are Dr Murali Krishna has a contact person. And so he had one in Dwaraka too, as in Jamnagar. He had telephoned his friend in advance to depute a reliable priest who combined the qualities of knowledge of the sthala puran and not relieve us of our pockets in toto.

Soft-spoken, mild mannered, the young priest, in his early thirties, negotiated us gently through the crowd at the Dwaraka temple, explaining at each point its importance.

Dwaraka is one of the seven holy places in India, along with Kashi, Mathura, Puri, Kanchi, Avantika, and Ayodhya. It is one of the char dhams that Adi Sankaracharya established: Jyotirmath, Dwaraka, Puri and Sringeri.

We had the best possible darshan of Dwarakadeesh for more minutes than we could hope for, thanks to the priest's deft handling. The highlight of his briefing was that we had entered through the Moksha dwar and exited through the Swarg dwar although ideally one should have done the other way round.

Siva picked one of the professional photographers hanging around. He took a group photo with the temple as the background. For a change everyone felt happy at his/her pose.

Back to hotel, the driver confided in us that our hotel might not be the best in comforts, but matchless in food. It was evident, for we had to take our turn, but it was worth waiting for. We ordered Punjabi thali, and the appetite pepped up the taste.

We then left for Nageshwara temple about which I gave an account in my last post, out of turn, thanks to a mix up in the route.

Our next destination was Bet Dwaraka. It is a tiny island the top of which houses the abode of Sri Krishna. One has to sail by boat for about twenty-five minutes. The boats were run by private bodies and hence until the boat was full – or, rather overfull – the anchor won't be released. Consequently we felt insecure both when we stepped into it which was shaky, and while sailing through to the destination jam-packed, literally breathing on the next person's shoulders. As you came out of it, you felt you had been granted a fresh lease of life.

At Bet Dwaraka one could safely vouch for the historical calculation that Mahabharata took place about 5200 years ago. The near-ruins of the structures suggested that. Even carbon dating places their age at 4000 years, we learnt. All through the time we were in Bet Dwarka we felt we were living in that era, passing through the small lanes, cows claiming equal rights, waylaying our paths, and the inhabitants donning clothes a la BR Chopra's Mahabharat.

The next day we set about for Somnath temple (to be continued...).

A fun-filled trip of guessing games, anecdotes, and what have you, came to a grinding halt when our Innova stopped at the hotel we had booked. The “Mumbai' group, consisting of Ashutosh, Ruchi, their two charming daughters, and Ashu's mother, landed at the same second thanks to Siva and Ashu's spacecraft-docking-precision coordination.

The meeting of the two groups was no less joyous than Ram-Bharat milap, making onlookers guess we were meeting after ages. Siva was happy having met his marathon-, badminton-, cricket-, and man-for-all-seasons friend Ashu; Prashanti, of Ruchi; and the entire group welcoming the addition of a third front, of kids, to the senior and middle-aged teams.

We arrived long before our check-in time. Nonetheless, as one experiences in hotels in small towns and cities, the management made temporary arrangements for us to freshen up before we could undertake the visit for which the group had come all the way – the Dwarakadeesh temple.

Name any place, and chances are Dr Murali Krishna has a contact person. And so he had one in Dwaraka too, as in Jamnagar. He had telephoned his friend in advance to depute a reliable priest who combined the qualities of knowledge of the sthala puran and not relieve us of our pockets in toto.

Soft-spoken, mild mannered, the young priest, in his early thirties, negotiated us gently through the crowd at the Dwaraka temple, explaining at each point its importance.

Dwaraka is one of the seven holy places in India, along with Kashi, Mathura, Puri, Kanchi, Avantika, and Ayodhya. It is one of the char dhams that Adi Sankaracharya established: Jyotirmath, Dwaraka, Puri and Sringeri.

We had the best possible darshan of Dwarakadeesh for more minutes than we could hope for, thanks to the priest's deft handling. The highlight of his briefing was that we had entered through the Moksha dwar and exited through the Swarg dwar although ideally one should have done the other way round.

Siva picked one of the professional photographers hanging around. He took a group photo with the temple as the background. For a change everyone felt happy at his/her pose.

Back to hotel, the driver confided in us that our hotel might not be the best in comforts, but matchless in food. It was evident, for we had to take our turn, but it was worth waiting for. We ordered Punjabi thali, and the appetite pepped up the taste.

We then left for Nageshwara temple about which I gave an account in my last post, out of turn, thanks to a mix up in the route.

Our next destination was Bet Dwaraka. It is a tiny island the top of which houses the abode of Sri Krishna. One has to sail by boat for about twenty-five minutes. The boats were run by private bodies and hence until the boat was full – or, rather overfull – the anchor won't be released. Consequently we felt insecure both when we stepped into it which was shaky, and while sailing through to the destination jam-packed, literally breathing on the next person's shoulders. As you came out of it, you felt you had been granted a fresh lease of life.

At Bet Dwaraka one could safely vouch for the historical calculation that Mahabharata took place about 5200 years ago. The near-ruins of the structures suggested that. Even carbon dating places their age at 4000 years, we learnt. All through the time we were in Bet Dwarka we felt we were living in that era, passing through the small lanes, cows claiming equal rights, waylaying our paths, and the inhabitants donning clothes a la BR Chopra's Mahabharat.

The next day we set about for Somnath temple (to be continued...).