Visit to Shirdi and other temples-Part 2

Original photo of Shridi Saibaba

In my post titled Visit to 'Shirdi and other temples-Part 1' I covered the details of our visit to Shirdi on the first day of our visit. 
I give below the link :
http://anayang95.blogspot.in/2014/08/visit-to-shirdi-and-other-temples-part-1.html

This article covers the details of the places visited by us on the second day.

Renuka Devi's Temple: 

On the second day of our visit on 23.8.14  after taking breakfast in HOTEL KUBER INN in Shirdi, we proceeded to  the temple of Renuka Devi. Renuka Devi is mother of Parshuram, an incarnation of Vishnu. On the way to the temple, we saw Sugarcane fields on both sides of the road and there were many Sugar cane juice stalls. The bus stopped in front of a stall and we had fresh sugar cane juice.

Entrance of the temple

Renuka Devi

This temple is about 15 minutes away from Shani Shingnapur, and was built by a local saint. The main temple has an image of Renuka Mata, with walls and pillars made of glass. Hence this temple is also locally known as the Glass temple. 

Glass Temple

Under this temple is the sanctum  approachable by steps, where the original image of the goddess worshiped by the saint is placed. The temple is currently being renovated, and we were unable to see some other idols in the temple. There is also a Samadhi of the saint.

Shani Shingnapur:

Our next stop  Shani Shingnapur was 35 kms away from Ahmednagar city and the village is known for its popular temple of Shani, the Hindu god of the planet (graha) Saturn. Shingnapur is also famous for the fact that no house in the village has doors, only door frames. Despite this, no theft was reported in the village.Lord Shanishwara can be seen even today, in the open yard without any roof above.

Entrance to the temple

Lord Shanishwara's  idol (photo from Wikipedia)

Devotees returning from the temple 

We worshiped Shanishwara as per the rituals followed in the place. There was huge crowd in the temple, but we could manage to have the darshan of the deity peacefully. 

Dattatreya Temple,Devgad:

From Shingnapur we proceeded to Devgad  (70 kms from Ahmed Nagar) to visit  the temple of Dattatreya   Dattatreya is a Hindu deity encompassing the trinity of Brahma, Vishnu and Shiva. The temple is located in a huge complex encompassing temples of other deities.

Entrance of the temple

Idol of Dattatreya (Photo from Wikipedia)

It was very hot climate when we visited the temple and when we walked on the stones without chapels it was unbearably hot. Our coordinator told us to walk on the white  path(probably coated with special paint to absorb the heat) alongside the stones. 

Surprisingly it was not hot when we walked on the white path. A lot of development works are taking place around the temple.

Lunch in Ahmednagar:

Then we proceeded to Ahmednagar for taking lunch.  We reached  hotel YASH GRAND in Ahmed Nagar around 3 pm. 

We had very good buffet lunch in the hotel.We took photograph of the group in front of the hotel.

Mahaganapathy temple in RANJANGAON:

After taking lunch, we proceeded to Ranjangaon. The coordinator asked the group members to share their experiences,miracles etc with reference to Shirdi Sai baba. Some of the group members also sang prayers songs of Baba. Later some of the members also participated in games and singing songs. All of us enjoyed the proceedings.

As per original programme of the tour  Mahaganapathy temple was the first place to be visited. But due to lack of time due to the delay in reaching Pune and the rush to Shirdi to have special darshan of Baba , the visit was postponed to second day.We reached Mahaganapathy temple in Ranjangaon village which is 50 kms from Pune .

Ranjangaon Ganpati is one among the Ashtavinayaks, celebrating eight instances of legends related to Ganesha.Shiva is believed to have worshiped Ganesha before fighting the demon Tripurasura here. Constructed so that the rays of the Sun fall directly on the idol (during the southward movement of the sun).Temple facing east has huge & beautiful entrance gate. Idols of two door keepers namely Jay & vijay are present near the gateway.

The idol of Lord Ganesha is self created i.e. “Swayambhu”. The Ganesha Idol facing east is in a crossed legged sitting position with broad forehead & the trunk turned towards the left. Riddhi & Siddhi are on the both the sides of Mahaganapathy. There are big paintings  on the walls inside the temples about the legendary story of Mahaganapathy which was explained by our coordinator.

After leaving Ranjangaon, we reached Pune. We were informed that the Spicejet flight to Chennai was postponed to 10.30 pm. We checked in the Airport in time and reached Chennai around 12.30.

I take this opportunity to thank Mr.S.Ananthaseshan, Proprietor of Akshayam Travels and Coordinator of the tour who has organised the tour very well and the way in which he explained about the importance of every place visited by us and his motivational/inspiring  speech on better way of living.

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