Chikmagalur beckons

Mostly famous for its coffee (for the uninitiated, Cafe Coffee day, the famous and ubiquitous chain of coffee bars all over India is from Chikmagalur) and the Bhadra wildlife reserve, Chikmagalur (260 kms from Bangalore) was our destination for 6,7,8 and 9th of this month. I had heard of  a resort nearby (which we figured later that it was not so nearby afterall) which had a couple of treehouses for its guests. Wow! I’ve always wanted to stay in one. So off we went. Nice long drive with a lot of scenic places on the way. This place is about 50 kms from Chikmagalur and it has bad roads leading to it. So we took a good 1.5 hours from Chikmagalur to reach the destination. But it was quite worth it! The place was in the middle of nowhere…surrounded by the forests (Muthodi and Bhadra). It was actually a coffee estate amidst which they have built a huge resort. Thankfully it’s not very commercial and still retains an old world charm. The best part was when we landed there we were the only guests in the resort! Not that it would have mattered since the tree house was a little away from the cottages and I’d doubt anyone would have even heard us there (and vice versa) had we been screaming for help!!

God’s own country

Always brings to mind a houseboat ambling along in pristine backwaters. But wait, there is more to Kerala than only backwaters. There’s Wayanad. One of the most gifted districts of Kerala. Beautiful mountains, green tea estates and nice weather. We were in Wayanad for 3 nights during the Diwali festival last month. The big difference this time was that we did not have any bookings. It’s a 3 hour journey from Mysore (about 2.5 hrs form Blore to Mysore). We left rather late that morning (we got up late ‘coz we’d slept late and had to pack in the monrning!) and took some leisurely breaks on the way. That’s the best part, enjoying the journey as much as the destination. What’s the point of driving when you don’t stop to spot birds on the way, take some pictures of the lush green paddy fields, drink tender coconut from the roadside seller…

 We finally reached Wayanad (Muthunga wild life santuary, which is an extension of Bandipur). Stopped at Sultan Bathery to check on some hotels, no availability. Then we went to Kalpetta (the district hq of Wayanad) and looked around…most hotels booked…which was actually good fo rus, ‘coz we were not too interested in staying at an ordinary hotel. We asked around for home stays, check out a few and didn’t like them, they were just an extension of a hotel. Wayanad is filled with homestays. In fact every house turns into a homestay if required. It’s not an exclusive home-in-an-estate concept anymore. Houses on bustling main roads are homestays!! Thankfully for us, a friend with us knew Malayalam and he spoke to a couple of guys we me and found a decent homestay for the night. We’d pretty much neared the end of the day by then and we all just wanted to crash out. The place was quite reasonable, clean and food was good. This was further from Kalpetta in a town called Meppady.

The perfect post-monsoon getaway

The weekend of Aug 23, 24 and 25. Thanks to my uncle’s suggestion and help (he always has the perfect place to send us to…and most of my travel would have been to some tried and tested places if not for him!), we were to go to Nittur, a taluk in Shimoga district of Karnataka which is about 375 kms from Bangalore. Perfect for the long drive we’d been looking for. So off we went on a dark, sleepy Saturday morning in our friend’s car. We were 5 of us on this trip including our friend’s 21 month old son. Stopping in the famous town near Tumkur for the famed ‘tatte idli’ (‘idli’ the size of a plate is what it literally means!) breakfast, we drove on without a break until Shimoga where we had to stop for a snack break. After that, we had no choice but to take very regular pit stops ‘coz the landscape around us was so stunning. Deep greens on the trees, the bright light green carpet of grass with cows grazing, the majestic mountains around, the overflowing rivers and streams and the wonderful breeze wafting in which thankfully prevented us from using the AC. I’m just so fed of breathing conditioned air all most of the time…it’s absolutely refreshing to take in pure, fresh air!

A picnic lunch

We were bored of doing the same old things over a weekend. So after speaking to a few friends, one of them not only gave us this idea and but also accompanied us. We went on one of those sprightly Sundays (the last Sunday of June actually, 29th). No rain that morning (yay!)  to have a picnic at Narayanagiri betta. This was on the outskirts of Bangalore, a left turn deviation on Mysore road (to be precise, it’s about 3 kms  or so from Eagleton resort). We found the place easily enough. (Really, is it actually possible to get lost anywhere near Bangalore?). Speaking to a couple of villagers, we came to know that there were 2-3 routes to take to the top of the hillock. One was to trek it up and the other was to hike through the fields, reach the newly built steps, climb them and reach the top. Last suggestion was to go behind the hillock where the car could be parked right by the hillock and take the steep rough steps path. We chose the first one (naturally!). Parked the car at a distance (we anyway couldn’t drive it beyond that point, there was no mud road also). Got the backpack out (it had our yummy picnic lunch packets) and started to hike through the fields. Spotted a few birds (bee-eaters, doves, vultures) on the way.

view

  As we approached the base of the hillock, we heard someone shouting to us.

An outing with birds!

A weekend gone wrong finally turned out not so wrong, in fact turned out quite right! We had a holiday on May 1 (Labour Day). It was a Thursday. So we’d decided to take Friday off to give us a 4-day weekend. All was planned. We were to go on a camping trip to a place near Shimoga. All of us were quite excited. On Wednesday evening, hubby darling announces that trip needs to be cancelled, ‘coz he has some very urgent work on Friday. I was totally dismayed and disappointed. So were the others (4 of our friends were joining us on this). I was also quite angry though I knew it wasn’t really his fault. Well, guess things like this do happen. It’s just awful when you’ve been looking forward to something and it doesn’t work out. So on Thursday I just got wasted…went out, did a long pending three hour book browsing and buying. It felt great. Then to feel even better, we went out for dinner and generally had a good time. Friday, to the surprise of my colleagues, I landed in office!! Anyway Saturday dawned…and hubby darling suggested we go to Mysore. We’d been thinking about doing some bird photography at some lakes in Mysore. This, we’d been promising ourselves from the time we’d got ourselves a new 70 – 300 lens for our camera. So armed with all the gear, we went to Mysore. Our first jaunt was Kukkarahalli kere (kere = lake ).

Agumbe – Kota

The weekend of 5,6,7th April was a long one thanks to Ugadi, our new year. We decided to utilize the holiday and go out of town. What better way to celebrate the new year, than seeing a new place?  For lack of time and abundance of laziness, the place we came up with was Agumbe. We’d go there, trek to a few waterfalls, see a couple of places nearby and come back. We reckoned since it was summer, we’d be saved from the leeches to an extent. Agumbe for the uninitiated, is gets the country’s 2nd highest rainfall (after Cherapunji).
 Our alarm didn’t go off on 5th morning (or maybe it did and we just didn’t hear it!), so by the time we started it was already 6 AM. Target was to leave at 5 sharp to avoid Tumkur Road traffic. Anyway we were 6 of us and a 16 month old. On Tumkur Road, I realised, I’d forgotten my camera bag. This was a hige disappointment. People made digs at me through out the entire trip for this. In that hurry to get out of the house, I forgot to pick up the packed camera bag .Another thing that kinda upset us was the fact that we couldn’t take our car this time ‘coz the windshield had to be replaced. Thanks to the out-of-the-blue hailstone rain that Blore received a few weeks back, a tree branch fell on the car and cracked the windshield Well, these things do happen I suppose, but of course we didn’t let it spoil the trip for us. 

Brahmagiri trek

Yeah I know this post has taken it’s own sweet time to materialize. I’ve had some hectic weeks in between, so…

Friday (22nd Feb08) morning dawned bright. But we (the husband and I) woke up late! And it was a hectic scramble to get to office and then come back home by noon ‘coz we were supposed to meet the rest of the group in Kanteerva indoor stadium and then start off on our jouney to Coorg, the Brahmagiri range in particular where we would be trekking. Phew! that was a busy morning with Murphy’s laws working against us.  Anyway, we made it to the stadium 20 mins late and thnakfully we were not the only ones who were late. This particular trip, I was a lil apprehensive. All these years, I’ve either gone out with family and friends. Going with an unknown set of people was a first. But I consoled myself saying, even if I didn’t get along with anyone else, hubby darling is there to take the brunt anyway!! Hehe, the leeway one can take with family is enormous . After brief introductions to everyone, and loading the backpacks onto the tempo, we started off…not too much conversation happened until we stopped at the Coffee Day before Maddur. A highly over rated place. Give me my filter coffee for 10 Rs anyday. It’s not about money, it’s about the taste and value for money. 55 Rs (plus tax) for a Latte?? Gimme a break. (this calls for a separate post by itself, so I’ll stop here on this and continue with the trip). This break actually got all the 10 of us to talk a bit on varied topics…an we went back into the tempo and got going. Nothing eventful until we reached Srimangala, after crossing Gonikoppa. Quite close to Srimangala and Irpu falls, was the place we’d stay the night. A homestay. As expected of a homestay, this place is the home of a Coorgi family. Very hospitable and very nice. After a sumptuous dinner and conversation, we all finally hit the bed (after a small round of deciding who shares which room and who takes the mattress on the floor) around 11pm (that was late considering we had to wake up at 6.30 the next morning, but the conversation was flowing freely We spoke about the one thing we all had in common (though in different degrees): Bangalore. All of us were residents of Bangalore. So we debated and spoke about the infrastructure, the IT companies, the auto-wallahs, the weather, the pubs, the people and what not. Nothing like a common city to bring people together, no?

Red Hills

The pristine part of the Nilgiris. I’m not sure why it’s called Red Hills. Rumour has it that it was in honour of a British colonel’s town, who lived here. This place is the perfect getaway for a vacation literally in the lap of nature. Surronded by seven lakes and the majestic Nilgiris (or the blue mountains), it’s a sight for sore eyes. Add to it, miles and miles of verdant tea estates. Typical mountain flowers all around in such different hues. Really makes you wonder how He created this! Ideal place to spot a lot of bird life too.

 There’s only one place you can stay in. A 125 year old British bungalow.

The magic of Coorg

I had a very relaxed long weekend (Sept 30th to Oct 2nd 2007). Went to Coorg, again (no, I can never tire of it!). The first day we were at my native village near Kushanalgar (read about that here). Once we left the village, we headed towards Somwarpet, another town. The drive was great! Long winding curves, surronding mountains and forests, just the sounds of water and chirping birds. Hardly any vehicles on the road! We stopped quite frequently to drink in the sights around. A long way from the awfully polluted cityscape, eh?  We even found an unused golf course on a hillock that had some fantastic views all around!! From Somwarpet (after dumping our luggage in a hotel), we went to the first unexplored waterfall in a village called Malhalli. Since the last 2 kms of the road had literally gotten swept away during the heavy monsoon this year, we had to park the car right there and trek up the remaining distance. As you are trekking up and almost reach the edge, you can hear roars of the Kumaradhara river and get a brilliant glimpse of the waterfall. It was not very clear due to the mist covering it. After waiting for a while, the mist cleared and we could see how glorious the waterfall was!

The Queen of hill stations

Or the princess (I’m not sure whether they call it princess or queen ‘coz I saw it being referred to by both names!) of hill stations, Kodaikanal was our choice of a 4 day much needed break from the hectic city life. Kodai is about 600 kms from Bangalore. We took the overnight bus and reached in the morning at about 10 AM in the Kodai town.  A lot of people had warned us saying the weather might be bad (since most of South India then was under the grip of heavy rains), you’re going for 4 days, and if it pours, you have no choice but to stay cooped up inside! Thankfully for us, all 4 days (in mid-August 2007) had lovely pleasant weather, got a little cold in the mornings and late evenings. The place where we stayed overlooked the star shaped Kodai lake and all the mountains all around. One problem with Kodai is that, during the on-season time, it gets terribly clogged with tourists. Now, that is something you’d want to avoid. Without crowd, Kodai is a delight.