Respected Swamiji and all Vaisnavas,
Nityananda Gauranga Hare Krishna! One small correction. The inner parikrama path of Govardhana hill is 25 km and the outer path is 40 km -- not the 7km and 21 km as wrongly mentioned. Sorry for the error.
Srinath
Respected Swamiji and all Vaisnavas,
Nityananda Gauranga Hare Krishna! By accident,I did not give descriptions of the photos taken at Varsana. The first photo is the main palace of Maharaja Vrshabhanu on top of the hill. Actually that hill is Lord Brahma - who received Radharani's mercy. It is a long way to the top.
The second photo is a Tulasi tree in the courtyard. The sand again is exactly like Gopichandana.
The main temple in the palace is dedicated to Radharani. Krishna's temple is on the other side of the hill for which we must walk about half a mile to the other side. No cameras allowed. This is a shot of the Varsana palace from the other side of the hill.
If we travel by car, it takes one and a half hours to reach Radha and Syama Kundas. From there atleast a quarter of an hour to Govardhana. From there to go round Govardhana fully takes about half an hour. To reach Varsana from Govardhana took us all afternoon on the road and we reached there by evening. By the time we reached Nandagaon it was almost night. From there we directly left for New Delhi. The road from there to the highway is full of cracks, bumps and potholes. It took us more than an hour to reach the highway and back to Delhi. So even by car, it takes a very long time to travel.
So we must all marvel at how Rupa Gosvami and all other Vraja devotees used to go from the Radha Damodara temple to Radha Kunda, Syama Kunda, Govardhana parikrama (they would offer dandavats with every step) and back, chant a lakh of names daily and write all their scriptures. Jay!
Respected Swamiji and all Vaisnavas,
Nityananda Gauranga Hare Krishna! From the main highway one can turn into Mathura and then proceed to Vrindavana or one can go directly to Vrindavana as it comes up earlier before Mathura. The road to Vrindavana is directly connected to the main national highway and to reach there is only a matter of a few hours from New Delhi. This road is Bhaktivedanta Swami Marg which is the road leading to Vrindavana. The ISKCON Vrindavana temple is along this road. On the other side of the place where the road joins the highway is another road going in the opposite direction. That road goes straight to Radha Kunda, Syama Kunda and Govardhana Hill. From Govardhana Hill there are two roads one road for the shorter inner parikrama path and another for the longer outer parikrama path (40 km) as far as I heard from my friends. We ourselves used the shorter 25 km path. Another road from Govardhana goes to Varsana, which continues beyond to Nandagaon. From there the road goes on till it rejoins the highway further north. Turning onto the highway, one can take a U - turn and travel for some time and come back to the Vrindavana road at the place mentioned above (read the second line) or proceed straight ahead along the highway to return to New Delhi. I say this because that was the way we travelled when we visited there. My memory isn't fully accurate, so please forgive me for my mistakes.
I almost forgot about this. I have enclosed 2 maps, one for full Vraja Parikrama and and one for Govardhana Parikrama. The map also includes the outer and inner parikrama paths for the whole of Vraja.
I will be happy if anyone can please tell us the proper way to go around Vrindavana Dhama, just as there is a parikrama procedure for Navadvipa.
Aspiring to be your servant,
Srinath
Respected Swamiji and all Vaisnavas,
Nityananda! Gauranga! Hare Krishna!
Jaya Visnupada Srila Prabhupada!
Jaya Visnupada Swami Gaurangpada!
All glories to the guru parampara!
All glories to the Vaisnavas!
With your mercy and kind permission I continue with my Vrindavana trip.
The deity of Radha Gopinatha (blurred though, please forgive me)
Beautiful picture of Sri Krishna Caitanya Mahaprabhu!
Beautiful Radha Krishna (similar to the deity in my house). Now that I think of it, I feel the Lord in my house was accompanying me all the way!
Radha Gopinatha Mandir
What follows next is a series of Murals on the Gaudiya Matha (?) temple at Imli Tala depicting the pastimes of Lord Caitanya Mahaprabhu. Absolutely fantastic! But I am sorry that the order is all mixed up
Before Prakasananda Sarasvati and thousands of other mayawadi Sannyasis in Varanasi
Making the wild animals dance in ecstasy in the forests.
Slaughter of the Bhattatharis and rescuing Kala Krishnadasa
Showing his Sat-Buja form to Sarvabhauma Bhattacharya
Taking sannyasa from Kesava Bharati
Convincing Chand Kazi
Forgiving Jagai-Madhai. Sorry, but Mahaprabhu is holding the Sudarshana Chakra which is missing in the picture.
Receiving Diksha from Sri Isvara Puri
Marriage with Srimati Visnupriya Devi
Taking Sridhara's fruits
Defeating Kesava Kasmiri, the digvijaya
Childhood mischevious pastimes
The Gaudiya Math Deities -- very blurred sorry
The passing of Haridasa Thakura
Water Pastimes in Puri
Panihati Festival
Rupa Gosvami meets the Lord
Rediscovery of Radha and Syama Kundas
21 hour Mahaprakasha Lila
Sanatana Gosvami meets the Lord
Dancing at the Ratha Yatra in Puri (sorry , blurred)
Rasa Lila, The deities, the pastime where Mahaprabhu jumps into the sea and found by a fisherman and also a photo of Bhaktisiddhanta Sarasvati in the right background (blurred slightly)
The Imli Tala, tree under which Mahaprabhu sat. It is more than 5000 years old but is eternally fresh as new!
Whew! That is a lot of photos! Thank you all for your patience! More to come in subsequent posts.
Aspiring to be your servant
Srinath
Respected Swamiji and all Vaisnavas,
Nityananda! Gauranga! Hare Krishna!
Jaya Visnupada Srila Prabhupada!
Jaya Visnupada Swami Gaurangpada!
All glories to the guru parampara!
All glories to the Vaisnavas!
I will continue to post pictures of my Vrindavana yatra last year. This part includes Radha Kunda, Syama Kunda and Govardhana Hill. I am sorry as I was unaware of all the samadhis near the 2 kundas. We had no one to guide us and our trip was cut short as well. This was actually our last day of the trip. If I am fortunate to go there once more, I will try to make a more extensive coverage.
To the external eye and for the sake of providing some information to those who go to Vrindavana, Radha Kunda and Syama Kunda are 21 km away from Vrindavana and the Yamuna. Varsana (place of Radharani's father, King Vrshabhanu) and Nandagaon (place of Nanda Maharaja) (next post) are another 21 km and 28 km respectively away along the road. That is a very great distance.
Some materialists ask (I have been asked before....) that how can we give empirical evidence to show that Lord Krishna and his devotees enact superhuman pastimes. The distance scale mentioned above means that is up and down distance of a 100 km or more if we see that Lord Krishna and all his associates would go to Govardhana, the Yamuna, then back again, then enact their other lilas at Radha Kunda, Syama Kunda, in the 12 forests, etc..etc.. coming from Varsana and Nandagaon If we consider that in Krsna's pastimes, all the lilas occurred daily across such huge distance scales, that itself is enough to convince any materialist that this is clearly divine. No ordinary man can walk distances so far up and down every day. Of course, the devotees know the truth and don't need these explanations. But this paragraph was for others. The Gosvamis used to circumbulate Govardhana thrice daily and see the length of their parikrama path!
Mathura - Vrindavana = 7-8 km
Vrindavana - Radha Syama Kunda = 21 km
Radha Syama Kunda - Govardhana = 6 km
Govardhana Parikrama = 1 round = 7 km (shorter path)
Govardhana Parikrama = 1 round = 22 km (Full distance, longer path)
Govardhana to Varsana = 21 km
Varsana to Nandagaon = 7 km
Govardhana to Nandagaon (direct) = 21 km
The locals say that Govardhana is at the centre of Vraja Dhama being equally located (21 km) from Vrindavana, Varsana and Nandagaon.
Radha Kunda
Radha Kunda
Syama Kunda
Radha Kunda
Radha Kunda
Syama Kunda
Govardhana Sila - made of stones from Govardhana
I am not aware of the names or significance of these holy places in the next few photos. If anyone knows their names and importance, please tell me. Looks like some repair work is going on here
The temple at Govardhana. Govardhana hill starts right opposite to this temple. From the other side of the road to be precise! This temple is a few km away from Radha Syama Kundas.
Govardhana parikrama (We did it by car, so please excuse us)
End of parikrama, back at the temple next to Govardhana
Start of Govardhana Hill. To mundane eyes it grows smaller by the volume of a seasame seed daily and it was a lot taller (2 km high) when Lord Krishna was there. At its highest, today it is only 70-80 ft high.
Thank you for your patience.
Aspiring to be your servant,
Srinath
