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It isn’t everyone’s idea of a great way to spend the weekend. Definitely not for the city bred, disco and mall addict youth. A day’s exploration of one of the longest underground cave systems in the sub-continent, can put off even the most adventurous city dweller. Cold, clammy caves, deep under the earth’s surface, infested by bats and other nasty creatures of the night. Yes, all that, but there’s also a touch of adventure and the thrill of doing something different and exploring a new region. So, after a few arguments and counter-arguments we decided to hit the road again and visit Belum caves in Andhra Pradesh — India’s second longest underground cave system after the 21.5 km long Krem Um Lawan cave in Meghalaya.
We started off by a private 15-seater air-conditioned bus from Bangalore on a Friday morning. The bus raced along the highway through towns like Devanahalli, the proposed site for the Bangalore international airport. Then came Chikkaballapur and the border town Penukonda.
Amazingly, we could feel the weather change perceptibly as we approached the border that separates cool Karnataka from sultry Andhra Pradesh. The weather progressively became hotter after Penukonda. The roads were wider and smoother but we were perspiring inside the supposedly air-conditioned bus. The dry and deserted landscape made us feel as if we were on another planet and it was a great relief to see an occasional patch of grass.
Soon we arrived at Lepakshi and stopped to do a spot of temple tourism. The sprawling Veerabhadra temple, on a small hillock, has some of the best murals and stone sculptures of the Vijayanagar era. We took in the intricately carved monolithic idols of Ganesha and Shiva Linga inside the temple. The 30 ft tall Nandi statue nearby is another impressive sight.
From Lepakshi, we proceeded towards Belum and reached there in the late afternoon. Located in a limestone area in the Kolimigundla village, in the Kurnool district, Andhra Pradesh, the 3.5km long Belum Caves gets its name from the Sanskrit word Bilum (meaning cave). These underground caves, located amidst flat agricultural land, have three well-like cavities/sinkholes, of which the central one has been converted into the main entrance with a neat flight of steps for people to enter.
After buying the tickets (Rs.25 per head) a group of visitors lined up in front of the cave’s main entrance. Our guide, Srikanth took us down a concrete staircase into a sinkhole, about 30ft below ground level. If the outside was hot, inside it was like a furnace, despite the fresh air coming from blowers installed by the Andhra Pradesh Tourism Development Corporation (APTDC).
But we quickly forgot about the heat and found ourselves admiring the caves and its natural formations. The well-lit and neatly maintained passages have fountains with strategically placed lighting, which gives the natural formations an eerie glow and makes walking through the vast subterranean passages an exciting experience.
Marvelling at nature’s wonderful formations we quickly made our way through the different pathways in the cave. Srikanth
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