Badami was the capital of the early Chalukyas who ruled much of Karnataka in the 6th - 8th centuries. It is a beautiful city positioned at the entrance of a narrow valley between two rocky hills. Badami is famous for its four cave temples - all hewn out of sand stone on the rock face of a hill. The cave temples are situated adjacent to the Bhutanatha tank around which are found Nagamma, Siva & Vishnu shrines. The cave temples are in 4 levels connected by a flight of stairs.

Badami is one of the popular tourist destinations in Karnataka. The ancient caves and temples of Badami are famous for their historical importance. Besides these one must visit the Vishnu and Nataraja cave temples, the Archaeological museum and the Jain temple. There are four sets of caves. The oldest, Cave 1, has stunning carvings of Shiva in his Nataraja avatar, dancing the apocalyptic tandava. There are also carvings of the god in the Ardhanarishvara form where he is depicted as half man-half woman, the woman half representing his wife Parvati. Yet another carving is of Harihara, the right half of this figure depicts Shiva - the Destroyer and the left, Vishnu - the Preserver. Caves 2 and 3 are dedicated entirely to Vishnu, whereas Cave 4 is has an image of the Jain tirthankara, Adinath. Other sites of note are the 5th century Agastyatirtha Tank, the fort and the Bhutanath temples. The local archaeological museum has some fine specimens of carvings from the area including a collection of Lajja-Gauri images. The museum is open from 10 am to 5 pm every day except Friday.

There are buses to Badami from Bijapur, Bangalore, Hubli, Gadag and Ilkal. The trains that arrive at the small Badami station are all II-class passenger trains. There are railway services from Gadag from where you can get a connection to the bigger cities of Hospet and Hubli, and from Bijapur, which is on the Mumbai - Secuderabad - Chennai main line.

Indiaholidaytravel.com provides information on Badami and different tourist places around Karnataka.