Best Places to Visit in Karnataka

Hampi Ruins

A UNESCO World Heritage site consisting of the ruins of the Vijayanagara Empire.

Mysore Palace

The official residence of the Wadiyar dynasty and the seat of the Kingdom of Mysore.

Chamundeshwari Temple, Chamundi Hills

The fourth peetha of the Ashtadasha — Sati's hair fell here — atop the 1,062 m Chamundi Hills overlooking Mysore. The 12th-century Hoysala-era temple is the kuladevata of the Wadiyar royal family and is reached either by 1,008 ancient stone steps or by a winding 13 km road from the city centre.

Coorg (Madikeri)

The Scotland of India — mist-wrapped coffee estates, cardamom forests and the indigenous Kodava warrior culture in the Western Ghats at 1,200 m.

Bengaluru (Lalbagh & Cubbon Park)

The Garden City — a cosmopolitan metropolis of 13 million built around two Tipu-era parks, 50 tech campuses, and India's densest concentration of microbreweries. 900 metres of altitude make it the only major Indian city where you can wear a sweater in summer.

Gokarna

A five-beach horseshoe on the north Karnataka coast where sadhus and surfers share the same shoreline — a thousand-year-old Shiva pilgrimage town whose crescent coves (Gokarna, Kudle, Om, Half-Moon, Paradise) became the subcontinent's quiet alternative to Goa for travellers who want sand without dance-floors.

Hampi: Walking Through the Ruins of the Last Great Hindu Empire

Coorg: Inside Karnataka's Coffee Country and the Last Warrior Clan

Ajanta & Ellora: The Cave Art That Predates the Renaissance by a Millennium

Madurai’s Meenakshi Temple: 33,000 Sculptures and 2,500 Years of Dravidian Devotion

Tirupati: The World's Richest Temple and the 30 Million Pilgrims Who Climb to Its Gates

Cherrapunji: The Wettest Place on Earth and Its Living Root Bridges