Belur - HaLebeedu sculptures revealed

Let me describe little about each of the sculptures I had a glimpse @ my Belur Trip last week with my mother. I thought of writing about each of the architectural pieces I had seen there, I am sure you would like them. First thing about this place, any historical place for that matter, HIRE a guide.

You can spend a life time, yet not realize some of the beauty, until someone details more on it. We would never have realized the intricate details in each of the architectural pieces, without this guy on the left.
Trained by KSTDC, there quite a few guys like him, knowing a lot. He took us all around the temple and revealed stories out of carvings made on simple stones. Below are a few of the amazing things:

A finely carved arch at the doorstep of the temple, containing a strange animal.
This animal has the trunk of an elephant, mouth of a crocodile, belly of a pig, feet of a lion, tail of peacock, ears of a monkey (if my memory goes right :-) ). It denotes the qualities of a good King: ability to digest anything (pig), hold a grip on to the empire (feet lion), have a charm (like peacock's tail), ability to swallow any kind of disaster (croc's mouth) etc.. I don't remember the exact things he told, but the arch looked amazing.

<<>ple which amazed me the most: around 600 odd elephants carved in stone, lining the temple, and NO TWO of them are alike !!!! In fact, if you would take each elephant in a video camera and flip the images together, you can see an elephant walking :-)
Equally nice was the one on the right: stone carvings resembling thread like structure. The pose of the statue is that of a player, tuning his instrument.
All these statues sit little high to observe closely. I would suggest you help yourself with a good zoom camera, like my Sony DSC-H2 did for me.

A step inside the temple, and you would be greeted with a majestic dome, with a stone cylinder hanging in the middle. This middle one acts as a keystone, the guide informed us, holding the entire structure !!! Magnificient were the carvings on this dome. Otherwise pitch dark, facility is made to see the dome using a strong lamp from below. >>

<< Make sure you watch the expressions of the elephants fighting with their trunks. :-)

Ganesha's vehicle, the mouse, getting pained under the weight, check it's opened mouth and the bulged ground below it's feet. >>

I might end up writing a much bigger essay on all this. Stopping now. Visit this place once, little different from regular outings to forests, trekking, falls etc. I am sure one would like it.

~signing off..
Sudhi