Lord of the Seven hills

HI,
This weekend, I along with few of my friends had visited Tirupati - The place where Lord Vishnu resides . Here goes my experience on our visit to the 'Vaikuntha' .
All Thanks should go to Bhaskar who had planned and booked the tickets for us. Thanks to his contacts there, we had an easy Darshan and stay also.
Our trip was scheduled on 7th January. We were actually four of us(Me,Prakhyat,Sravan,Bhaskar) till three of Prakhyat's colleagues joined in(Harish,Vishnu and Raveendra). We started at 7:30 on a cool Saturday morning from Majestic . It was a KSRTC Volvo(A.C) bus , and believe me it was more than comfortable, added to it were the roads which I can say were simply superb (After Bangalore city limits offcourse). They were playing Rajkumar and Ambika starrer 'Chalisuva Modagalu' on the bus . I blamed myself for having not seen the movie before, after watching it. It was a nice movie, especially the song 'Jenina Holeyo' .
We reached Tirupati at around 1:00( I dont exactly remember the timings ,only the duration -adjust maadi) . Plan was to tread the path to the feet of the lord , on foot . We took Autos to the place ,where the footpath to the temple on the hill starts . We had some snacks and juices ,thinking that a lunch will be too heavy. We were right!! ..We started off at the base at around 2:15 after offering pooja at the temples there. The huge Gopuram invited us . Since then it was all haldi-Kumkum laced steps and the town of tirupati below, slowly getting tinier. We could hear every one of us breathing heavily, which we are not used to. I was sweating!! Yes after a long time my sweat glands were like yippiee!! . An observant Bhaskar said to Sravan "Andaru baga rubbtunnaru!"(Every one is breathing heavily) . It was after 1 hour of climbing approximately, we reached another point where there is another Gopuram. We stopped there and took a look back at the Tirupati town ,which at this height was visible in its wholeness. "It is quite a big town!!" ,I uttered . From here its an easy road, said someone . Huh!! felt Relieved . After some distance there was a heaven or it appeared to us - A line of tapris . The scent of hot mirchi bajji and the sound of hot Dosas being poured was inviting us(oops! I'm hungry now!) . We were hungry n tired n thirsty . We started off with idlis, everyone preferring to keep the intake within limits. But the taste was awesome and we had Prakhyat . It was tempting - so one more round, and Dosas, and mirchi bajjis after a 'no-no oily food' session . There goes sravan with Lemon Soda,"Man its nice!!" - OK one Lemon Soda each. It was one real filling session we were happy, Burrrppp!!! .But Prakhyat was not showing signs of stopping!! :-).
From here our second session of climbing started . The tiredness was gone by this time and we were up on our feet . Here on there was no 60 degree climbing except for some distance in between . We did dig into some chats and lemon sodas along the way . Probably we took too many breaks in between, and our projected time reaching Tirumala was getting further away. In between we have to walk along the road. We had some very nice points offering the breathtaking views of the scenery around. We took some snaps there and proceeded. Finally after 4 and a half hours of marathon walking we reached Tirumala. By this time our bare feet were crying for attention and legs on the verge of getting cramped . The main purpose was still to be served.
Tirumala is a very clean and cool town. It was 6:30 in the evening and the fog was slowly starting to settle on the town. From here it was all Bhaskar, who contacted the people, got the bookings done and got the rooms. Our darshan was to be at 8:30 . We settled into the rooms and took bath in cold water which we were apprehensive about, and were fearing that it might freeze our nerves and tear our skins. Thankfully nothing happened. We had to wait for sometime before we got into the queue. It was getting cold. Bhaskar's acquaintance made us through the gate and soon we were into the queue. It was moving pretty fast and before I could sense the might and the energy of the temple's stone walls we were near the Lord. Cheers of "Venktaramana Govinda... Gooovindaaa!!" were everywhere. As I approached the inside of the Garbhagudi, I could sense that fearlessness and the energy within me . I didn't know when it took my senses into its embrace. Before the beautifully decorated lord Vishnu, I felt for one moment , " I'm blessed!!" . It was truly an overwhelming and enlightening experience. It was like I am a nobody, just a mere lump of flesh before the glory of the lord. We came out , drenched in happiness. All the tiredness had disappeared, not surprisingly after the Darshan. We decided to have the prasadam and made ourselves into the spacious dining hall. It was a truly satisfying meal and we happily came out of the temple. Every person gets 2 free Laddoos with one Darshan ticket. After collecting the Laddoos we decided to do some shopping. Our legs were reminding us to wrap it up and go back to our rooms. But we overcame the pain to help ourselves with some memorabilia and called it a day.
Next morning we decided to visit some of the other places nearby. We came out and found that fog had embraced the whole of Tirumala. It was a beautiful sight to see the white mist kissing the roads and trees and the headlights emerging from the thick fog. It was a perfect winter morning . Bhaskar and Sravan went to the Laddoo counter and got some extra Laddoos. We got into the local bus and made it to Papanashanam . Here fresh water from the reservoirs above in the hills seeps out of the stone walls . It is believed that this holy water will cleanse you off all your sins. We headed back and on the way did some shopping for idols and other items. Harish, Vishnu and Ravi hadn't booked their tickets and had to rush. Luckily we got a bus headed for Bangalore which was about to leave in another 20mins. We rushed to the rooms and redistributed the extra Laddoos and the packed their bags. We thanked each other for such a nice company and promised to keep in touch .The bus was ready and they headed for Bangalore . We came back and prepared to make a move. We had plans to visit Kanipakam, half an hour from Tirupati town which has the temple of Padmavati-Lord Venkateshwara's wife. But Bhaskar had to get room deposits reimbursed. We had to roam around the whole of Tirumala for almost an hour to find the counter where we had to get the reimbursements. Unluckily that counter guy had gone for the lunch and we had to wait in the queue. By the time things got settled and we came to the bus stand, it was already late and there was little chance that we would have made it before 5:00 to catch the bus back home, after visiting Kanipakam. We came down to Tirupati and had a nice Andhra lunch at a nice hotel. It was exactly the time and we got into the bus back to Bangalore. Memories still lingering and a tremendous satisfaction after our dream to visit Tirupati came true ,which was due for the past one year. I thank each one of us who was part of this journey . Hope we will have such trips every now and then. Thank you...