One would not expect to find a 900-year old temple in a non-descript village with a tongue twister name like Doddagaddavalli. Driving past gently undulating vistas sparingly dotted with stout trees and small irrigation ponds – they added a dash of beauty to the widespread vegetable fields – I suddenly encountered a colourful sign by the road that announced the presence of an ancient temple. Turning off the main road and going past a small village with its usual share of chickens and cows that blocked my way, I found myself gliding from the top of a mound, down an easy slope. At the base of the valley was a small black structure of stone, a temple with shrines rising up from all its corners, a saffron flags fluttering over one of those projections. Its location could not have been better, situated at the edge of the village overlooking a lake and visible from every crest of the wavy landscape that surrounded it.

The Lakshmidevi temple at Doddagaddavalli is just one of the thousands built by the Hoysala Kings who ruled a large part of South India for more than three hundred years. Returning here again a few weeks later with a small group of history-enthusiasts, I saw a few eyebrows going up in amazement when I casually mentioned that the Hoysala Kings built 1521 temples in 948 centres. It is not much, considering that it averages to about five temples every year during their long tenure of governance. But what is impressive is that 434 of these temples have survived even today, with the oldest of them built more than 1000-years ago, the most recent having survived no less than 600-years.

Thanks to this temple building spree, the land here is dotted with ancient temples in every shape, size and varying degree of craftsmanship. Some of these have intricate carvings in stone and some have simple plain walls. While a few of these temples are in various stages of dilapidation, a few more have gone through modernization by the pious villagers who have continued the tradition of regular worship in the temples. Many of them are now managed by Archaeological Survey of India. The temple at Doddagaddavalli appears to have weathered the years without having to go through much change from its original shape. Its walls and shrines appear in near perfect condition, probably not a lot different from the way it looked in the time of the Hoysalas.

Doddagaddavalli was the first stop in my journey of exploring the Hoysala Heritage. I had set out from Bangalore on a sunny April morning looking for these ancient structures in stone spread around the small town of Hassan.

Leaving in the wee hours of the morning, I drove past the city that seemed to be perennially under construction, thanks to its double digit growth rate that has refused to slow down in decades. Beyond the city were industrial areas that spewed their smelly chemical exhausts on every passer by. Further ahead was a highway that lost the charm of its open roads to a widening work.

It took me good two hours before I could breathe clean and dust free air in a clutter free environment. The next three hours of breezy driving took me past small villages, fields, lakes and vistas containing hills and greenery, before arriving at Doddagaddavalli.

The temple here is a simple structure when pitched against the better known heritage sites built by the Hoysalas. Its four sanctums, the inner hall and its walls are a lot simpler than what one would see in Belur and Halebeedu, the erstwhile capitals of the kingdom. It also deviates from the typical architecture of the temples in these parts, which are constructed within a star-shaped pedestal. However, Doddagaddavalli’s charm is not in its work of art, but its setting next to a lake in an undulating landscape, completely devoid of tourists who throng the better known temples nearby.

I was almost transposed to the era of Hoysalas as I watched the life along the lake – men washing bullocks and women washing clothes, no one in any sort of hurry. My interaction with Puttaswamy, the watchman of the temple confirms the slow pace of life here. Still in late twenties, he had moved on from a busy life as a plumber in Bangalore, and had decided to come here and take it easy.

The Lakshmidevi temple was built by a merchant in 1113AD. This was one of the earliest temples built by Hoysala Kings, just a few years before they began dominating the Deccan Plateau. In 1116AD, King Vishnuvardhana defeated the Chola generals in Talakadu (near current day Mysore), ending a hundred years of Chola occupation in the region. Following this victory and his subsequent conquests in the north, he encouraged movement of artisans into his kingdom and commissioned construction of some of the most elaborately carved temples ever to come up in these parts, perhaps anywhere in the world.

Walking around the Chennakeshava Temple in nearby Belur next morning, I was amazed at the attention to finer details that went into making every statue carved on the walls and pillars. I found here a statue of a danseuse whose bangles were chipped to rotate freely around her hands, a carving of Nandi barely larger than a chickpea and a pillar decorated with miniatures of gods and goddesses probably numbering more than a hundred. The base of the outer wall was made of layers of friezes. One of these layers contained 650 elephants – every one of them carved differently from other.

Well known among all the richly decorated sculptures in Belur are madanikas, bracket figures installed below the awnings. The sensuous damsels are depicted in various moods and activities, like Shukabhashini talking to a parrot and Darapana Sundari adoring her own figure looking into a mirror.

With carvings adorning every inch of the walls, pillars and roofing of the temple, it is no wonder that the sculptors took 103 years to complete its construction. But moving ahead into nearby Halebeedu, I was in for even more surprise. The twin temples of here are nearly twice as large as the one in Belur. It took nearly double the time to construct and hosts carvings that are no less intricate than the treasured beauties of Belur in their perfection.

Part 2 of the Hoysala trail takes you to Halebid or Dwarasamudra, Belavadi and Angadi , the origin of the Hoysala dynasty. For more details, log on to travelwise who conducts these tours