Dynamic Equilibrium

Travel Photography Tips and Ideas

noreply@blogger.com (mainak) — Tue, 30 Jun 2020 05:44:00 +0000

1. Set your camera to shoot in burst mode

Setting your camera to "burst" mode means that several shots will be taken with a single click of the shutter. This is especially helpful when you’re trying to take an action shot, like a whale breaching the water’s surface.

Also, burst mode is a good idea when handing your camera to a stranger to take your photo. You will get several to choose from, instead of just one where you’re blinking and someone is photo-bombing in the background. I always have my camera set in burst mode so we can choose our favourite photo from a series.

2. Unfocused/Blurry

Another easy method and very beautiful at night when you have colourful lights around you. On a DSLR you just have to set your lens to manual and unfocus. On your point and shoot camera, you can focus on a subject near you and then, while still holding your finger on the release button, move to the scene you want and take the picture.

3. Switch up your perspective.
Looking up — or down — can change the way you see things.

4. Add instant film.
This photo-in-a-photo idea is the fastest way to make your shot one-of-a-kind. Bring along your Fujifilm INSTAX Mini 70 (it's got a selfie mode and a selfie mirror, so it's perfect for groups and solo travel) and get creative. Juxtapose day and night scenes, or go black and white against color. Diehard iPhone photographers can do it, too: capture, edit and print pics straight from your smartphone with Fujifilm's INSTAX Share app.

5. Selfie

Some love them, some hate them, but you have to admit that you have tried it at least once. An inexpensive way to improve your selfie skills would be to get a Selfie Stick. It is optional but could improve how much you can fit in your photographs.

6. Photo Editing

You took a beautiful picture but it’s still missing that last spark that would make it amazing. You can do this by using effects. There are many ways to do this, either on your phone with apps like Snapseed or online on a website specialised in editing pictures.

7. Night photography takes patience and planning

Night photography can be super fun, but it takes a while to get the techniques down. (I'm still working on it.) Have patience, and you will improve.

Also, it takes some thought and research. You can't just expect to step outside on any night and get great night shots. You need to plan around the moon and the constellation paths and weather.

For example, when we were in Arches National Park, it just happened to be the one day of the month where the Milky Way would pass through Delicate Arch, creating a view that is famously photographed. We were there just out of luck, but many other photographers had planned their trip around this photograph.

Tip: One way to track this is by downloading SkyView app, which will tell you the exact time and course of the constellations, and will show you the chances of clouds obscuring your path.

8. Don’t be afraid of a little rain (or clouds!)

Cloudy days can sometimes be disappointing when you’re on vacation, but they often make for the most interesting photos. Clouds soften the sun’s light, acting like a natural light box, and make it possible for you to get great shots even in the peak of the afternoon. They can also create a cool, moody effect and can make your pictures more interesting than if you have a clear blue sky.

Much the same, many people get nervous to take their camera out in the rain. But rainy shots can be super interesting.

Try these ideas to get a fun, rainy day shot:

Take a photo of people walking in the street with colorful umbrellas.
Get a close up shot of droplets on a window, blurring the city lights in the background.
Zoom in and get a close up of the rain droplets on flowers or another interesting surface.

Road Trips in UAE

noreply@blogger.com (mainak) — Tue, 02 Jun 2020 12:18:00 +0000

Here are some of the best road trips in UAE:

1.Abu Dhabi to Bateen Liwa.

How far? The journey is only 230km, but after two-and-a-half hours of driving you’ll go from the opulence of Abu Dhabi to feeling like you’re on a different planet. No wonder this area was used as a setting for Star Wars: The Force Awakens.
The highlights Once you get near Liwa you’re entering Rub Al Khali, known as the Empty Quarter: a huge expanse of desert that’s twice the size of Norway. If you fancy some adventure, head to the Moreeb Dune and climb to its 300m summit.

But before you hit the road in UAE, make sure to get a DRIVING LICENSE.

2. Al Ain to Ras al Khaimah.
How far? At 230km, you can do this drive in a day but be sure to make lots of stops. Just head north to Dubai and then keep going – if you get to Oman you’ve gone too far.
The highlights With the nearby Hajar Mountains, gorgeous beaches, twisting mangrove swamps, and even the Khatt thermal springs, it’s fair to say that Ras al Khaimah has something for everyone.
Make sure you Visit Al Jazirah Al Hamra, just south of Ras. It’s a perfectly preserved ghost town that’s been abandoned since the 1960s and a refreshing antidote to Abu Dhabi and Dubai’s glittering skyscrapers.

3. Dubai to Fujairah, plus the Al Bidya Mosque.
How far? Dubai to Fujairah is only 120km, while Al Bidya is another 20km from Fujairah.
The highlights The Al Bidya Mosque, one of the oldest in the region, dates back to the 15th century and is a must-see if you’re anywhere near Fujairah. While you’re there, just another 10-minute drive up the road is Al Aqah Beach, famous for Snoopy Island (it resembles the cartoon dog) and a great place for snorkelling.
Make sure you Check out Fujairah Fort, among the oldest in the whole UAE, plus Al Bithnah Fort if you have time (it’s a few kilometres outside of the town).

Awesome road trips

noreply@blogger.com (mainak) — Thu, 28 May 2020 11:09:00 +0000

There is nothing quite like a great road trip. Loading up the vehicle with gear, food and drinks, and good friends, and setting out on an adventure remains one of the best ways to explore the world. Sometimes you know exactly where you’re going and you just want to enjoy the journey, and at other times you just know where you want to eventually end up and how you get there is secondary. Either way, a road trip remains one of the most enjoyable ways to travel, particularly if you’re not in any kind of hurry.

It seems our friend over at National Geographic feel the same. They’ve just put out a list of ten of the best road trips in the world, taking travelers to some unique and exotic locations, while sending them on an amazing adventure at the same time. Some of the routes that earned a spot on the Nat Geo countdown include a road through the Andes Mountains in Chile and Argentina, a classic drive through the Shenandoah Mountains of the Eastern U.S., and a ride along the notorious “Death Road” in Bolivia. The other road trips are equally enthralling, but I’ll leave them to you to discover for yourself.

Here are some of the best ones that we have done:

Best Weekend Road Trips from Goa (INDIA)
Weekend Road Trips from London
Top 11 Weekend Road Trips from Delhi
Beppu-Nagasaki Road Trip: exploring north Kyushu (JAPAN)
Delhi-Leh Road Trip: my EPIC journey of getting LEH’d (INDIA)
5 Gorgeous roads to ride in India

Part of the fun of this list is the diversity of locations and roads to explore. There really is something for everyone here, as I wouldn’t necessarily expect that most road trippers heading to the Shenandoah Mountains would feel equally at home on the Death Road. Still, we can all admire the scenery that comes along with any great road trip, and half the fun of such a journey is the camaraderie we have with those we are sharing a vehicle with.

Check out the full list here and start making your plans for an autumn road trip. Anyone of these journeys would make for an amazing experience in the weeks ahead.

Shooting Fireworks!!

noreply@blogger.com (mainak) — Sat, 26 Oct 2013 12:09:00 +0000

Fireworks

Fireworks are probably one of those few things that people enjoy irrespective of their age and interests! Staying in Japan, a country that literally “celebrates” fireworks, I learnt a lot of tips-and-tricks about the art of photographing Fireworks. Most of my learning has been through this one mantra – “SHOOT – REVIEW – ADJUST –REPEAT” !!

Epilogue:

In India, we have an entire festival dedicated to illumination and fireworks, DIWALI -- the festival of lights.. But while I was in India, neither did I own a DSLR, nor was I much interested in clicking fireworks, as, like most other kids, I was more inclined towards bursting crackers rather than capturing them.

Although Japan doesn't have a festival dedicated to fireworks, nor is the-common-man is allowed to burst fire-crackers. But, on the contrary, around the end of summer, there are big firework shows (花火大会) in almost every important city of this country. During my 4 year stay, I had visited many of them (in different cities). Although I had heard that Osaka's firework-show is one of the best in Japan, personally, I found the one in Oita (a small city in the Kyushu island) to be much better.

Fireworks photography: Camera Settings, Tips and Tripod

When it was the first time that I was going to shoot a complete fireworks show, I had done ~~some~~ a lot of background reading from the internet. I concluded that the location, timing and Tripod is of utmost importance. I mounted my camera on a sturdy tripod and positioned it so that the two-thirds of the frame was the sky, and the remaining one-third was the water, so as to try and capture the reflection.

Here are some of links that might be helpful:

1. Tips for Fireworks Photography
2. How to Photograph Fireworks
3. Fireworks Photography Camera Settings

Personal Experience:

Here are some important aspects I learnt about Capturing fireworks:
Ideally we want a long exposure anywhere between 1-30 seconds for a silky water effect. But, in events like these, there are too many fireworks fired in a relatively small interval of time, making some shots too bright as well as making the bursts in-decipherable from each other. I realized this in the first 10-15mins, and henceforth the max exposure I used was 5secs.
It’s better to disengage the auto-focus on your lens (manually set it to Infinity) and shoot in complete manual mode (at times using the "bulb mode" for random exposure). The problem with autofocus in these cases is that the camera will try to refocus after every single burst, thereby losing the "crisp-ness" of the snap.
And, now comes the "special three".

Strategy used to capture these: after the first burst, cover the lens with the black lens cap; move the camera a little bit, remove the cover just at the time of the next burst and so on. In this way, I was able to capture 3-4 bursts on the same pic without them overlapping on each-other!! :)

Equipment used:

Nikon D7000

Nikkor 18-200mm lens

Camera Settings:

ISO: 100

Aperture: f/11, f/14, f/16

Experiments with Splash!!

noreply@blogger.com (mainak) — Sat, 22 Jun 2013 10:31:00 +0000

Splash!!
It's a word that definitely excites many...so is the case with me...
My interest in photographing splashes developed around a year ago while going through a photography magazine. I found it pretty interesting! Unfortunately, in the magazine, only a couple of pics were given, not much info. :(
Curiosity increased, and obviously, I googled about it...
Here is a link that I found pretty helpful.

And then, during my stay at home this summer, I made an attempt to make my own splash photography album. And its was then that I learnt the most important thing about splash photography requirements --- Permission from mom!!
So, after a lot of 'patao'fication, she agreed to let me do my experiments in the varandah, that too only with water!
Once everything set and done, came the next important question --- what should I drop in the water to create the splash ???
The engineer in me woke up, and the answer was: nuts, bolts and washer!!

ISO: 320, Shutter-Speed: 1/640; f: f/4.8

and, at the end, I concluded that a washer (due to its annular geometry) is probably one of the best thing to create and capture both primary as well as secondary splash!!

ISO: 320, Shutter-Speed: 1/640; f: f/4.8

But, my thirst for splash photography wasn't quenched (in fact it still hasn't)... I wanted to capture a `coffee cookie splash` just like in the websites!!

But, instead of "coffee-cookie", I invented a more "desi" version of it --- `chai-biscuit splash` !!
(yup, I love tea, and Parle-G is my fav!)

ISO: 3200, Shutter-Speed: 1/500; f: f/4.2

These were taken in my dorm room in Oita (Japan)...and obviously, Permission from mom is not applicable here!! But, where to find a washer !!!!
Solution --- Trust me, an "apsara non dust eraser" (a nostalgic childhood tool) can be very handy at times.

and also an old cello-tape reel...!!

Some technical stuff:
1. If you carefully notice, some of the images above have lot of grains.. that's because I had to increase the ISO to compensate for the low light in my room. Hence its always advisable to try it at a place where you have abundance of light.

2. Its not only the main splash, or the Primary Splash, that is exciting, but the secondary splashes as well as the "after-math" looks pretty cool !!

That's all...! Enjoy!
Feel free to drop in your comments and suggestions.

Big Tip: always try with water first !

Disclaimer: I am definitely not a "pro" of splash photography...hence I am just sharing my experiments while trying to capture splashes... I also plan to do another session with liquid-liquid splashes. If you have liked this one, stay tuned for the next one! :)

Here goes some more pics:

Tokyo Kaleidoscope

noreply@blogger.com (mainak) — Sat, 03 Nov 2012 16:59:00 +0000

Hello friends..

This blog might not turn out to be a very informative one, as its primarily a collection of some snaps that I shot in my short stay in Tokyo...as you read below, you will find snaps of many beautiful places in Tokyo...thus, I call it to be a kaleidoscope of Tokyo, shot from the lens of an amateur photo enthusiast...

Its been exactly a month that I have been staying in Tokyo, yet i am already enveloped by its aura. This place has a charm of its own. Clean and broad streets, beautiful blue sky, colorful people, sparkling neon lights at night and some amazingly picturesque viewpoints.....!

Guys who are new in Tokyo, and are travel freaks like my friends and me, they can find this article handy to get started with roaming in and around this city. We were blessed with our seniors who guided us with the whereabouts of this metropolitan.

The Tokyo Tower...!

The reason I chose to start off with the Tokyo Tower is because one can see the entire city from this height. Although the Sky Tree is the tallest structure of Tokyo, the simple reason I chose this because I am yet to climb the Sky Tree [:-)]
The best time to climb this Tower is just before sun-set. Information about the entry fee and others can be found here.

These two snaps compare the Day View and the Night View of the Tokyo Tower.

The city as seen from the south side

The rainbow bridge

The two snaps above are of the city as seen from the main observatory.

Rikugien koen

This is a beautiful and serene park, at walking distance from the Komagome Station (yamanote line) . Like all other parks of this city, even this one is very well maintained.

peace...

Meiji Jingu

This is one of the oldest imperial shrines of Japan...the best part is that its very near to my present guest-house. Statistics say that on new-year day, approx 1 crore people assemble here to offer prayers.

The Gate (Toori in Japanese)

Odaiba Water front

This one is the most picturesque place I have visited in Tokyo so far.

Replica of the Statue of Liberty

Awesome buildings, along with the Sky Tree

Partial panoramic view from the Water-front.

Ueno Koen

Ueno has another beautiful and huge park...Apart from the colorful flowers and the serenity, there are various attractions inside the park like the "Nature and Science Museum", a small Jinja, a kids park, etc.

Shibuya

Shibuya is where I stay, and its also known as the heart of the modern Tokyo, as most of Tokyo's young population dwells here.

Lovely roads...

Streets of Shibuya....full of Fashion!!

A vista of trees, on the way to Yoyogi Park

Illuminated streets with Neon lights!

Around my office

Here are some lovely views from and around my office.

Night view from my office.

-------------------

Dedicated to the "four", for bearing with me always...!

the "four"

Love,
Pappa!

PS: please leave your comments, as I would love to incorporate them in my next post..
thank you! :-)

A mono-chromatic affair

noreply@blogger.com (mainak) — Wed, 29 Feb 2012 11:38:00 +0000

Hello!

Recently, I have found myself developing a love for mono-chromes, to be precise, black-and-white...I find my desktop has a black and white pic of Megan Fox, my gtalk picture i changed to a black-and-white leaf and a few more...one among them being -- I have even started plotting graphs only in one color (black) where as earlier i used to make color-full graphs...!!

Some people may suggest that I am "losing colors" from my life and that my life is becoming boring...but its nothing of that sort...contrary to it, I find my life more exciting than before...

Anyways, coming back to the point and justifying the title (of this post), although my love for mono-chromes is pretty recent, the seed to this was sown long back. and the person responsible for this is none other than one of my closest friend - Kaustav.

it was some fours-five years back,that one fine Saturday we went for an outing at and around the Victoria Memorial along with a few friends. Kaustav already owned a Nikon digi-cam for quite sometime and I was pretty new to digital photography. Just like majority of digi-cams, his cam had a "grayscale" mode. Using it, he snapped a frame of the Victoria Memorial which is, according to me, one of the best pics (in grayscale) taken by any of my friends. And hence the event is still sketched prominently in my memory. Although i am mentioning only about one event, there have been numerous such episodes where in Kaustav's black-and-whites have mesmerized me, most of them clicked with his phone,s camera.

Victoria Memorial ~ by Kaustav Niyogi.

Now, fortunately or unfortunately (I am yet to figure out), my Nikon P3 (a point-&-shoot digi-cam gifted by my dad) doesn't have any color-modes. Neither "grayscale" nor "sepia". (But i still love my cam because of its lens - crystal clear!!). Every-time i feel i have taken a nice shot, I look at the pic for a second trying to figure out how it will look in grayshades. Its not necessary that every pic will look good (if not better) in gray-shades because colors have their own harmony. but the beauty and dept of certain objects, scenes and frames increases manifold in a mono-chrome.

"When you photograph people in color you photograph their clothes. But when you photograph people in Black and White, you photograph their souls!" ~ Ted Grant

Constrained by the fact that there were no "color modes" in my cam, made me learn quite a few ways of converting a colored photo to black-and-white using Adobe Photoshop. I began by using the "desaturate" option, which reduces the saturation of the primary colors to zero. But soon realized that the dis-advantage of the feature is that it creates a flat result and it doesn't capitalize on the differences of the individual colors in the image. It works well on certain images, but others can fail to make a good impact. Unsatisfied by the "desaturate" option, i searched the web for better ways and learnt about the "Color Lab mode". This process tends to produce a result with lighter and more open tones, so it is well-suited to underexposed shots. Of course, the results will depend on the source image. When the Color Lab Mode works, it works well and can often eliminate noise that might show up using other methods. Although I was pretty happy with the "Color Lab mode", but wasn't completely satisfied as i thought that something better can be achieved and hence i didn't stop searching. Very recently, about five months ago, I learnt two more ways of converting to a mono-chrome, both of them being my personal favorites. One is the "Channel Mixer" option and the other one is the "Calculations" option. The channel mixer lets me choose the equivalent of going back in time and choosing the colored filters used over the lens for the original photography. This is why it's more flexible to shoot in color and convert later. The "Calculations" option gives you lots of choices to experiment with. Play around to your heart's content.

Reflections of the four beautiful years of my life.

Heritage Institute of Technology, Kolkata.

This was taken at Heritage, my btech college. The building on the right is the one where we used to have the maximum number of classes. Even today, whenever I see this, nostalgia grips me...

Re-incarnation

The Taj Palace Hotel, Mumbai.

it takes two to "tango" ;-)

Kwality Walls Swirls, Outram Ghat, Kolkata.

The Fighter

Chatrapati Shivaji Maharaj. Gateway of India, Mumbai.

A good-bye kiss!

Outram Ghat, Kolkata.

Everyday, when the sun sets at Outram Ghat, it gifts a scenically picturesque view of the Vidyasagar Setu (aka Hoogly bridge). Although the red-orange sky looks beautiful, I feel it appeals more in black-and-white.

dwarpaal

Victoria Memorial, Kolkata.

Unstoppable

Kiliyur Falls, Yercaud.

Hooghly Imambara

Hoogly, West Bengal.

This is the famous Hooghly Imambara, built by Haji Mohammed Mohasin in 1841 and completed in 1861.

[FYI -- this Imambara houses the world's largest clock (I bet you didn't knew this!).]

Photographing the Photographer

Pondicherry.

This is Kaustav, trying to capture another of his nice shots. I have always liked the way he positions himself and the cam so as to get that perfect angle.

Swagatam

Gateway of India, Mumbai.

The Gateway of India is one such monument which nearly all of us might have seen, but most of us wont recognize this part of the monument. This one is the side-view!

Unconditional Love..

Dhamakhali, West Bengal.

Shelter - everyone needs it

Cauvery Hostel, IIT Madras.

This is the First pic that I converted to Black-and-white. The moment I had taken the pic, I had decided its gotta be in gray-shades.

Something to ponder about:

Why are we so captivated by a striking monochrome image?

Well, if we think of color as recording a scene, we could say that black and white interprets it. A color photo (no matter how bad), easily appeals because that's the way we view our environment. Since black and white is an interpretation of a scene, rather than a record of what we truly visualize, it's up to the photographer's skill (or your own) to create an image that uses texture, tone and composition. These are important elements in a color photograph, but in black and white they are essential.

"A black and white photo can be one of the most evocative ways of presenting an image." ~ source

Why Black and White?

Here are a few of their reasons for getting a little obsessed with Black and White. These I found on the internet and I have grouped them accordingly:

Versatility

“..this format suits almost any type of photography. Portraits, landscapes, urban landscapes, architecture. Not only that, it’s a medium that adapts really well to all lighting situations. Whereas color photography often works best on sunny days or in brightly lit studios – low light just makes a black and white image moody.."

No Distractions

“We find that colors can be terribly distracting in some images and can take the focus away from your subject. In portrait work, we find that taking the color out of an image lets the subject speak for themselves. Its raw, it’s stripped back, it’s honest and it allows you to show the true person.”

Variety

“I find the creative process with black and white images is so… artistic. It’s like molding clay – you can shape it into a myriad of shapes. Black and White images can be strong, high contrast and powerful – or they can be so soft, gentle and subtle.”

Subtlety of Tones (Personal)

Personally, I love the subtlety of tones that black and white images deliver. Today's world often boasts about how many millions of colors a screen is able to produce – I love that in ‘Mono-Chrome’ there is so much variety of what can be achieved in a photo. Black and White sounds so boring – but the fact is that there are so many shades in between. The challenge is to bring them all out in an image!

An analogy:

Very similar to why people love analog dials on the watches which are centuries old when there too cool digital ones available.

Dedicated to Kaustav Niyogi. (not only for the above mentioned inspiration, but also because it was he (along with Maharshi) who instigated me to start writing a blog and sharing how I look at the world through my lens.

PostScript: very soon I will be posting another article about my experiences (in details) while post-processing an image to black-and-white. Meanwhile I would request all my readers to indicate which of the above pics you liked the most and the reason behind it, by adding a comment below. I thank you in advance for reading and commenting.

YERCAUD -- Ooty of the Poor...!!

noreply@blogger.com (mainak) — Thu, 16 Feb 2012 10:24:00 +0000

Hello friends,

This page is not about the Geographical and other details about Yercaud, this is about our trip to this lovely hill station of Tamil Nadu.

FYI: While planning for the tour, I found the wiki-tarvel page and the official web-page of Yercaud pretty handy to decide about the routes and other details.

So, now lets begin our journey. On a Wednesday (3rd Aug, 2011), five friends (including me), pissed off with their suffocating load of their PG course at IITM, decided to visit a hill-station during the coming weekend...!! The first thought that came to our mind was Ooty and Kodaikanal. But after goin thru their respective web pages, we concluded that it would be a pretty long and expensive trip. And, time is a luxury that we cant afford..! Hence, one of us, Tej, came up with Yercaud. :-)

After goin thru the above mentioned web-pages, we found out that dis place is not very far (from Chennai) and thus we can actually try something that all of us wanted to do from a long time -- hiring a car without a driver and driving on our own...!!! :-)

The next two days were spent making the necessary arrangements, including hiring an Indica V2 from Smile Cars. At this time, I would like to introduce all of us -- Tej (our expert driver), TinTin (our navigator wid a new Nokia C7), Sachin (most enthusiastic abt any tour, but slept the entire journey), Gunju (our reserve navigator, coz we were sure dat our primary navigator wud fail ;-)) and me (reserve driver and main photographer).

We started our journey on 6th Aug at 4am! Yes, at 4am!! Its was going to be a perfect road-trip as none of us had any idea abt the road and the highways, and hence we were completely relying on GPS.

The journey started beautifully wid TinTin's GPS navigating our way. But suddenly, near a place called Chengalpettu, the NokiaC7 started betraying us...where-ever we headed, the voice from the GPS (a lady wid a sexy voice) said "turn left in 300m" or "follow the course of the road!!" Dis is wen our reserve navigator came of use and after that its was Google-Maps all the way!

Lost...!! {somewhere near Chengalpettu @ 4:45am!!}

During the course of our journey, we stopped a couple of times, once for capturing the break of dawn and the next time for peth-pooja. When we had completed nearly three quarters of our journey, Tej decided to take some rest and I took over on the driver's seat; only till we reached the foot-hills, after which Tej again took over.


Good Morning!

DayBerak @ NH-45

NH-45 !!
the view was 1000 times more spectacular at nite...

Snacking Time

Hair-Pin bend

does dis one need any caption?? ;-)

Although I haven't been to either Ooty or Kodaikanal but, from what I have heard, this place is of no less in beauty and serenity...it was then that I realized why its called Ooty of the poor..!

Its a very small hill station but has a plethora of Resorts, Hotels and Lodges, which hints to the fact that tourism of this small hill station is not small anymore! The Yercaud Lake has acted as a center to this growing tourism, helping the township to thrive and prosper.

We had earlier thought of putting up at the TN Government Resort, but upon reaching there we found it was already full. Thanks to the overwhelming number of Hotels, we found a neat and clean place which offered us a four-bed room + an additional cot at Rs.2300 per day. We found it pretty reasonable, and thus threw ourselves on the bed..!! [FYI -- Don't get upset if you too face the same problem, just 5mins from the TN Government Resort there is a cluster of hotels and resorts of a varying tariff range. :-)]

The Hotel where we had put up

We finished our lunch and took rest for a couple of hours. Our plan was to visit Sri Raja Rajeswari Temple and Servarayan temple that evening itself. We didn't put many places on our itinenary for that evening because the Servarayan temple is the highest point of Yercaud and the roads joining the city and the temple didnt have street lights. So we had to come back early. While driving up from the Raja Rajeswari Temple to the Servarayan temple, we found that we were being enveloped by a thick cover of cloud. The air was getting colder and we could feel the chill in our nostrils. Although it was not a very good sign coz it would be very difficult to come down the hills on a wet road, all five of us were enjoying the gift that nature bestowed upon us. Scenically, it was picturesque!


The fog was slowly hugging the road. {View from the Raja Rajeswari Temple}

Completely Enveloped

We faced a shower of rain once we reached the topmost point. The timely rain made it even more enchanting. Trust me, the view, the chill, the weather and everything around was mesmerizing!!! Since it was inexplicable, I thought of capturing as much as i can through my lenses. :-)


Fresh droplets on the windscreen

The fog drifting away after the shower

...in a trance...

the view point @ Servarayan temple

Alone but strong!

Good Evening...

After coming down, we roamed the city for some time, trying to get a flavor of the culture. Although the weather in the city was not as cool, but we cud still feel the chill in the air. Garma-garam chilli pakoda and tea was all that we needed and a small road-side dhaba is a best place fot it..!! We enjoyed every bit of it, which was evident from the fact that we ordered 2-3 cups of tea each and 7-8 plates of pakoda in total...! ;-)

That night we had a simple dinner and returned to our hotel for a game of 29 (a cards game). Tej slept off early as he was pretty tired after all that driving and moreover we had plans of catching the sun-rise the next morning. Its quite obvious that we would miss the sun-rise as the game of 29 continued late, hence when we woke up it was already 8am! After a quick round of tea and some snacks, we left for the Killiyur Falls.

this clearly explains why we missed the sun-rise!!

None of us had any clue what nature had in store for us. The path to the main portion of the Falls had concrete or metal stairs, but, for about 20meters or so, it was a muddy path. Roots of thick-trunk trees served as holding-rails. Although it was a bit risky and hence most families stopped at that point, but what's adventure without risk..!! :-)

Rockkingly Adventurous!

The Kiliyur Falls

howz that...??

We then came back to our hotel, packed our luggage and checked-out from the hotel. The Yercaud Lake (aka Emerald Lake), Anna Park, Lady's Seat, Gent's Seat and Pagoda Point were next in our list. Dont get curious by those last three names, the Lady's Seat, Gent's Seat and Pagoda Point are the View-Points of this hill station. You will find a Telescope mounted at the Lady's seat for a panoramic view of the plains below.

Yercaud Lake

Love Birds @ Anna Park

Striking colors

View from the Pagoda Point

Lovely blue skyline from the Lady's seat

In all, it was an amazing tour not only because of the place and its natural beauty, but mainly due to the Company!!

Dedicated to:
Tejaswi Abburi (Tej) for his ultimate driving skills,
Maharshi Maitra (TinTin) for timely jokes to maintain the livelihood (and his C7),
Gunjan Kapadia (Gunju) for guiding us correctly to the place,
Sachin Karmakar for sleeping most of the time and saving us from us Pathetically poor jokes!

with love, Pappa!