Made it to Mysore...a very pretty city. Saw the Maharaja's palace which was fantastic! Huge! Long halls, large court inside, detailed columns along the halls, colorful stained glass with pictures of peacocks, colorful paintings of Gods and Godesses on the ceilings, intricately carved rosewood doors, detailed silver and gold wall hangings...Kat said its the best palace she has seen so far in all of India. Was not able to take pictures inside though...they ran the place like a concentration camp. Had to go through a camera detector and police were everywhere! Pretty neat overall.

Took a very bumpy and eventful bus ride to Hassan where I am currently at. On the way one guy puked, a woman and her child got kicked off (which was disheartening because she looked frightened), and we sat in the back, where at one point, the bus hit a bump and flew us a couple feet in the air almost hitting the roof and crunching our backs!

The last couple of days we have been to see 1000 year old temples. Went to a very pretty and quiet (yes its true...quiet!) town called Sravanabelagola and climbed 615 stairs to the top of a large rock/mtn to a Jain temple. Inside, we saw a 17 storey monolith of a Monk who came to the town many many years ago. After we climbed another rock/mtn to see more Jain Temples...there were 14 of these inside a rock wall enclosed area.
Today we went to Halebid and Belur. Halebid's 1000 year old temple was so far the best. Intricate carved walls and cielings with birds chirping inside...took my breath away! Its amazing that some fellow(s) hundreds of years ago carved into the rock and created a beautiful structure. Belur's was great too, lots of tourists (Indian), and they wanted 10 rupees for me to take pictures, but I managed to dodge that (hee hee).
Tomorrow off to Madekeri...