Temples in India

I believe one could spend a lifetime traveling back and forth to India and never see all the temples that are there. I am sure that is an exaggeration, but maybe not. I was fortunate enough to see 3 lovely temples and one statue. I could post pictures of them, but I feel that my iPhone pictures and ones taken with my camera would never do the temples justice.
The Bhogandishwara Temple:
This was the first temple that I visited. Gayatri and her cousin Anand took us to this temple. It was our first view of small villages on our way to this temple. It was not too hot, but the stone still burned my feet quite a bit. You need to leave early in the morning to visit temples in the hot months. Shoes are not allowed inside, but you can wear slippers or socks. I never saw anyone wearing slippers, but there were plenty wearing socks. The entrance was a square that was surrounded by open covered buildings. I would have loved to been there at that time to witness the shop owners and what they sold. I am also wondering if people brought live animals in there like cows or sheep ? I suppose I will have to buy a book about them to find out.
The Second entrance to this temple was quiet and peaceful. It was where all the rituals were performed. They still are today, but it was a Sunday and generally people do not worship at temples.
Several of the temples we visited had many buildings on the inside and lots of carvings on the outside. The carvings were amazing. They had pictures of the Hindu Gods and stories about them. They also had carvings of animals such as peacocks, horses and elephants. My favorite God ? Well, I don't have one. There are 303 million Gods/Deities in the Hindu religon, but I do find Ganesha to be cute.

He is a very popular deity in India.

Shiva his wife Parvati and Ganesha

Here is a definition from Wikipedia:
 the Lord of Obstacles, both of a material and spiritual order.^[84]He is popularly worshipped as a remover of obstacles, though traditionally he also places obstacles in the path of those who need to be checked. Paul Courtright says that "his task in the divine scheme of things, his dharma, is to place and remove obstacles. It is his particular territory, the reason for his creation."^[85]
Ganesha is part man and part elephant. There are two stories how he became this way. 
This is also taken from Wikipedia : 
Puranic myths provide many explanations for how he got his elephant head.^[43] One of his popular forms, Heramba-Ganapati, has five elephant heads, and other less-common variations in the number of heads are known.^[44] While some texts say that Ganesha was born with an elephant head, he acquires the head later in most stories .^[45] The most recurrent motif in these stories is that Ganesha was created by Parvati using clay to protect her and Shiva beheaded him when Ganesha came between Shiva and Parvati. Shiva then replaced Ganesha's original head with that of an elephant.^[46] Details of the battle and where the replacement head came from vary from source to source.^[47][48] Another story says that Ganesha was created directly by Shiva's laughter. Because Shiva considered Ganesha too alluring, he gave him the head of an elephant and a protruding belly.^[49]
The other temples and statue I was able to visit:

Chennakesava temple at Belur:

 

Halebidu: I loved this temple for its lush and green surroundings. There were people having picnics on the lawns and taking naps. It had a lot of places where the temple had been attacked by Sultan Soldiers, but never the less a very beautiful temple.  

The statue : Shravanabelagola
None of the photos do this statue justice. It is truly magnificent ! The stone on this statue is so clean and white you can't imagine how old it could possibly be. He is very well taken care of by the Jain Priests. In the building behind him you can walk through and see statues of other deities. Actually, I am not sure what they were, but again very beautiful statues. It was 600+ steps in the hot sun up to see him and down as well and so worth it. I understood that monks might climb it twice a day in bare feet. The buildings surrounding this great statue are beautiful as well. If I am able to, I would love to return there in 2018 to watch the Mahamastakbhisheka. Oh, and about the statue being naked. There are two parts of the Jain religion. Priests wear white in one religion and priests are naked in the other. The priest that I saw was clothed.
Again from Wikipedia:

The 57-feet tall monolithic statue of Gommateshvara is located on Vindyagiri Hill.^[2] It is considered to be the world's largest monolithic stone statue. The base of the statue has an inscriptions in Kannada as well as the oldest evidence of written Marathi, i.e. devnagari script, dating from 981 AD. The inscription praises the king who funded the effort and his general, Chavundaraya, who erected the statue for his mother. Every twelve years, thousands of devotees congregate here to perform the Mahamastakabhisheka, a spectacular ceremony in which the statue is covered with milk, curds, ghee, saffron and gold coins.^[3] The next Mahamastakabhisheka will be held in 2018.