Travelogue

Bandipur - Wayanad

2010-12-27T13:06:00.003+05:30

My wife Prachi, our 1yr & 10months old son Adhit and I loaded ‘more than normally required luggage’ in our Hyundai Santro’s dickey and set off on 19 Nov 2010. This was a very different trip, unlike the earlier ones for various reasons – this is our first trip along with Adhit, this was the first trip for Prachi with my office colleagues and their families, this was our first fun trip in Santro. This was an official trip to celebrate the launch of Prysm’s first LPD video wall. After lot of planning and confusion to choose Ooty and Pondicherry as the location, the final unanimous decision was made to spend 2 days at Wayanad in God’s own country, Kerala with all employees and their family. We are 22 people in my office. Out of which some people opted to stay out of the trip and some preferred to come alone without family. So, with family we were about 30 people. The plan was to start from Bangalore on 19^th November night in bus, travel till Gundalpet where the forest road will be closed from 9 PM to 6 AM, wait in bus and continue the journey further and reach Wayanad on 20^th morning. Adhit and Prachi were not comfortable with this travel itinerary. We have not travelled in bus, previously with Adhit. Our earlier experiences in train and in car were disastrous. Also he was just learning to sleep without cradle. With these facts, I could prefer to go alone or to travel individually in car. We chose the second option. I was not alone. Sunay and Karthik also preferred to travel individually. Just the week before the travel, I had severe back ache, which I attributed to the relocation of the cot that I did during Diwali when my parents visited us. Hence I wished that someone joins me in car, so that the driving can be shared. Unfortunately, that did not happen. Prachi was very much worried as I had to drive 600Km on my own, when I was just recovering. She even thought of alternatives like hiring a driver. As I did not accept any alternative that she suggested, she had to comply with my proposal. The individual travel plan for 3 of our families was a little deviated from the original.

Getting into the groove

According to the plan, Karthik's family would join Sunay’s in their car from Mekri circle and join us near Vijaynagar Tollgate. Karthik’s family comprised of Karthik, his wife Padmasree and their 1-year old son Pradhyumn. Sunay’s family comprised of Sunay, his wife Vrushali, their 7 & 4 year old daughters Mihika and Ridhima. As planned, all of us got together near Veerabadra Theatre on Magadi Road at 10:15 AM and took the Nagarbhavi route to get to the Bangalore – Mysore highway near Bangalore University. Sunay’s Swift Desire was packed with 4 adults and 3 children. Till Nagarbhavi, Sunay followed me and from there till Mysore, we followed Sunay. In about an hour, after departing from Bangalore, Adhit slept on Prachi’s lap. It was surprising for us, but we were happy. Just before Ramanagaram, Karthik’s family shifted to our car. We were a little worried because Adhit might wake up, as the car’s rhythm was broken and due to noise. Handling him when he is cranky is too difficult and this crankiness in kids is infectious. But he was kind to us, by not waking up. After the shifting break, Sunay vroomed away, while we followed him slowly. Prachi now, got a companion to gossip. Our next break was after Maddur, when Padma wanted to change Pradhyum’s diaper. It turned out to be a good village-side stop over. Adhit and Pradhyum enjoyed the sight of some birds, paddy fields and cow, while I enjoyed the face wash from the little water drain for the paddy field and the fresh air. We took some photos. We people from the city, don’t get to see such green fields in our day to day life. Hence these fields, which looked not extraordinary, which looked very ordinary when compared to the ones, I had seen before 20 years, watered by Cauvery in Tiruchy and Tanjavur districts, had become photogenic. Oh, yeah! But there is a definitive change in the thought process. As a school boy when I saw those vast stretches of green paddy fields, my thought process gets ignited involuntarily to imagine as if they are big cushion beds, where we can jump and roll. It takes some conscious effort to convince the mind that for various different reasons that was not possible. And now, due to years of this suppressive training the mind has stopped such imaginative process and stays within the boundary laid out for its movement. This, I think, can be extended to various things in life, where we train our mind by introducing fear and restricting it to operate with a specific boundary. I am put to think in these lines because I am closely watching, our son ‘Adhit’ and the way he thinks or rather what I think as he thinks.

On the way to Mysore

Mysore

Sunay reached near Columbia Asia hospital, Mysore half an hour earlier than us. When we reached there, Sunay and Vrushali had pushed their seats back for a small nap.

Let me go back in time for a while. After we decided to travel alone and visit some other place in addition, we started to plan for the whole week. Major plan revolved around, where to stay. We searched for various home stays and hotels in Wayanad. KarthikBandipur, which seemed to be a good break point, close to Wayanad. Our search revealed that we should book the guest house in advance at The Forest department in Mysore. We called them before a week to understand the availability and whether we can book from Bangalore. We were informed that some minister is visiting on 19^th though it was not confirmed. They requested us to call again on 18^th. In between we made alternative arrangements by talking to some home stays at Wayanad. On 18^th we came to know that the minister’s visit is cancelled and the guest house is available. Also we got to see some pictures from websites which showed the guest house with different names. It didn’t look the way we had imagined. But one of our colleagues, Sujith said he had stayed there earlier and confirmed that they are decent, if not luxurious. Later we were informed that we can’t book from Bangalore. We need to visit their Mysore office in person. Karthik had a solution, and confirmed the booking was done. He had a friend of his in Mysore, who booked on behalf of us, with some trouble of visiting the office, unable to book initially and with Karthik talking to the officer through phone while on the way to Mysore, helped him book.

So, when we reached Columbia Asia hospital and Sunays had taken a nap. We decided to visit L&T, where Karthik’s friend was working. I was surprised to know that, because one of our friend who worked with me and Prachi, was also in L&T. As Karthik’s friend was not reachable through phone for a while, I called my friend Rama Raju and got to know the directions to reach. It was in an industrial area little far off from the city, nor on our way to Bandipur. With some struggle to find the route and wasting some precious time we reached L & T gates. The time was precious because there are forest safaris in Bandipur which start around 3:00PM and close by 5:00 PM, before which we had to reach. We met with Rama Raju for a short time, while he informed about his marriage on 20^th of February. Raju guided us about the route to take to reach Bandipur through the ring road and said there are no good restaurants in that route, when asked about food. In the meanwhile Karthik had collected the receipts from the forest department.

Bottleneck lunch at Mysore

While we were just leaving the industrial area, we saw to restaurants which looked decent and seemed to be the only source of food for those in that area who opted to eat out of the companies. Our decision to eat there turned out to be a real bottle neck for our plans. We ordered very simple phulka, rotis and some sabjis. This was served in installments. Serving rotis in installments can be acceptable, but they provided plates and spoons in installments. Along with food, one hour of our time was consumed, too. It was 3:30, when we departed after additional rest room break for ladies, diaper break for toddlers, refreshing beverage break for the kids and none for us. It was nearly impossible to reach Bandipur before 5:00 PM.

Towards Bandipur

Sunay with a hope to reach asap, pressed the accelerator, with me following him. On the outskirts of Mysore, there was a four road junction where Sunay a right turn, while everyone in my car was drowsy, while Adhit and Pradhyum had already slept. Just after few meters on that road, I suspected the route, as I saw kept seeing boards about resorts and directions to Nagerhole. Karthik called Sunay, when I told him my suspicion. Later, on enquiring a traffic constable who was nearby, we came to know we took the wrong diversion at the four roads. We again came back to the junction and corrected ourselves. Just when I was thinking that now we are all set and pressed the accelerator to the full throttle, I had a feeling of travelling in a running bullock cart on a metal road in the villages. That’s when Karthik told me that our joy ride on the highways is over and the road till Najangud, about 25 km is really bad, full of potholes with road here and there. It was a terrible ride, with maximum speed of not more than 25 km/hr. With kids sleeping in the car, I really had to go slow and take enough care not to bump too much. It brought in me the memory of Takeshi’s castle which is broadcasted in Pogo kid’s channel, in which the players have to cross a water body, with small stones placed in disorderly, some of which are unstable. The players have to take enough care to jump over these stone properly and avoid those unstable stones which will topple on stepping over them. Being the driver, I was doing the same job. Adding to this pain was the speed breakers along the route around Najangud. Not one or two, ten of them consecutively, every few meters were not speed breakers, but car breakers. We, rather I breathed a sigh of relief when we crossed Najangud, as everyone was asleep. From here the road was good, traffic-less and weather was turning pleasant as we were nearing the forest. We crossed Gundulpet and small town from where the road bifurcates. One to Wayanad and Calicut. Other to Bandipur, Mudumalai and Ooty. We took the Ooty route. We crossed the junction, not very noticeable, from where the road climbs up to Gopalswamybetta. In a short while, Bamboo shoots rising from both sides of the road and touching each other on top of the road indicated that we had entered the forest. After climbing a few bends, we were in the parking lot of Bandipur National Park, welcomed by lot of monkeys and some pigs. It was 6:00 PM and the sun was already out of sight, though not yet dark.

Bandipur

WoW!!! What a surprise. There were no shops selling eatables and tea which is a common sight in any place in India, visited by a few hundred people every day. The forest administration has been strict which is good in a way. On the left side of the national highway passing through the national park connecting Mysore to Ooty, is the forest department office. There is a parking lot and some paid rest rooms, opposite the office building. Behind the office are some cottages. On enquiry at the office, we were told that there are no animals sighted that day and the trips are not run. But that office clerk gave an option to run another trip for us, if we were more than 20 people. We together with another group from Kerala, who were also interested, made up more than 20 people and the trip was fixed. Ticket cost per person was Rs.95.

Bandipur cottage information

Bandipur Safari

The trip is run with a mini-van. After everyone boarded the van, it entered the forest check-post opposite the office on the other side of the national highway. I always equate forest to the ever-green sholas. But this was not one of those kinds. It was dry deciduous forest and the only tree which comes to the notice effortlessly is bamboo. However deep we go, it is bamboo all around. It was not eery too. The only thing which I related to forest, before we could spot some animals, was the terrain on which the van was running. It was really bumpy. It was enhanced due to the condition of that van’s shock absorbers. In some time, we saw a lone deer with its cub, very deep in the dark. Then we saw some wild boars, herd of spotted deer. I was disappointed as we could not spot any elephants. It was already dark when we were dropped at the office.

Gaur during safari @ Bandipur

Spotted deer during jungle safari @ Bandipur

We approached the office for our stay. We did all the formality at the office and we were escorted by a peon to our cottage. It was located inside the forest area itself in a little open space, populated only with eucalyptus trees. There are some 20 of them scattered across that area. Each cottage is divided into two separate rooms with individual toilet & baths and a common verandah. We enquired the peon regarding food and milk for children. It was a necessity. But now it was very important because, if there are no means we need to travel to the nearby village which was Gundulpet and should return before 9:00PM, because the road towards Bandipur on Ooty route and the Wayanad route are closed for the safety of animals. Peon showed a building in that dim light and mentioned that food is served there for the inmates of these cottages. We wanted to have a look at it. So, leaving our cars we walked along with the peon to the canteen. There was no lighting, except in the cottages. The only light outside the building was near the canteen. While walking down we saw some deer grazing around that area. The people there in the office and others should have been harmless in the past, wiping out the fear in those creatures. We had a look at the canteen were food was being prepared for that night, ordered for some coffees. Ridhima and Mihika too were very happy to see some rabbits in the canteen, which later turned out to be a point of attraction for Adhit too.

Govt. Cottage @ Bandipur

View of western ghats (Nilgiris) from the cottage

After coffee we went to cottage, unloaded the luggage and refreshed ourselves for a little while before dinner. The room was not luxurious and old, built in the 60’s. Having the first look I was worried about bed bugs and the toilet, from my earlier experiences in such places. To my surprise, the toilet was very neat with western commode. Though the whole night went by sleepless for a different reason, there were no bed bugs. After we dumped our entire luggage inside the room, I felt like my headache and neck pain had really increased in severity. I have noticed it happening always. That’s when you feel that this mind and body are so well netted together. Till a logical break point is reached the mind keeps control over the body pain and then its body over the mind. I was prepared for such occurrence of headache. I applied the axe oil which I had carried anticipating the pain and started spreading the fragrance all around me. I wanted to lie down for a while, when Prachi was in a hurry to feed Adhit and put him to sleep, as today was way too deviating from his food and sleep routine. He had just had few biscuits after his noon meal. Otherwise our man has milk, some fruits like apple or banana in addition to the biscuits. I agreed with Prachi so that he does not grow cranky.

Dinner and close of Day1

Everyone was ready when we came out of the cottage. It was a buffet, arranged in a big hall surrounded by windows through we just took the pleasure of seeing nothing in the dark. The children were the happiest. All four of them were running around in their own world. While one was busy with the tap, other was busy with the holes in the wall, the other with the rabbits. In the meanwhile, Prachi managed to get some chapatti for Adhit before the food was served for others. In some time, the table was populated with food comprising Chapatti, green gram sabji, rice, sambar, rasam, curd and papad. It was a very nice in that weather. Rain which started during dinner enhanced the ambiance with its poppy noise on the roof and chill wind. After dinner, we had to wait for a while for the rain to stop. Deciding that rain will not completely stop Prachi, I and Karthik along with Adhit and Pradhyum paced towards the cottage in the drizzle.

I entered the room thinking of having a nice sleep which will relax my neck pain and headache. I could not predict the nightmare that was awaiting us. It started just after we closed the door. Adhit was not ready to accept the place. So far he should he imagined it as a temporary location. The moment we closed the door, he started to become cranky and insisted to open the door and go in the car. We thought when we settle down in the room, he will understand and be OK. That worked in the reverse. When we got on to the bed and took him for changing his dress, he started crying. He kept crying and asking us to open the door and take him to the car. It increased exponentially as he felt drowsy too. Before a few days he was used to sleep in cradle. Now we were in the process of telling stories and singing lullabies to make him asleep. Now he was not ready come on to the bed. Earlier one day, when we were making him unlearn the habit of cradle, after weeping for lot of time, he slept on my shoulder. Though I was not in mood to handle him due to my pain, I had to put him to sleep, if we had to sleep. So, I tried the same tactic. I lifted him, made him lean over my shoulder and strolled across the room, with no hint of luck. After some time, Prachi took turn in doing the same, while I slept. I was so fast asleep in a few moment, while Prachi continued it. Though he was put on bed after a long time of this exercise, Prachi had to repeat the same exercise repeatedly all through the night. I did not wake up till midnight to help her. From mid night, I joined in taking turns. Around 11:45 I heard the sound of an elephant’s trumpet, while doing the strolling exercise. I wanted to run out to the verandah and peep through the mesh to see if I can spot it. After 2’o clock Adhit and Prachi had slept well, though he kept waking up and sleeping to the tune of the lullaby. My headache became severe by 3:30 AM. I could not sleep anymore. I required the axe oil and a paracetamol. But I restricted myself to avoid making noise. At one point when it was unbearable, I searched my way to the torch first, then to the medicine box. After taking a paracetamol and applying axe oil, I went out to the verandah to get some fresh air, from where I never returned to bed till the next morning. I strolled for some time. Then sat down in the sofa there and started enjoying the chill of the night breeze and the stars which I could never spot more than a handful in Bangalore’s night sky. Though I kept hearing some animal noise, I could not spot anything around. By 5 AM, the power went off, immediately waking Adhit up. He, as if is fully awake was asking where is the light. While Prachi was trying to console him, I switched my torch light on and started showing it through the glass pane above the door. While doing so, I also managed to light up a candle. Thanks to the forest department - Each room was given some candles, a mosquito coil and a match box. Seeing light he slept again. By 5:30 it was dawning at the distant sky, while some officer starting jogging. I misinterpreted his footsteps to be some animal’s and was afraid for a very short while, before I saw him in the road close to the cottage. That’s how obsessed was I with the idea of being in the midst of a jungle. At 6, Sunay gave a call to Karthik and me, to wake us up. We were planning to leave by 6:30. Prachi and Adhit were sleeping well after the whole night’s drama (trauma), while Karthik & co was out with camera taking pictures of the mountains around; Sunay & co was taking pictures as well as listening to some music from their car stereo. Some person who was on the way to the canteen warned them in the name of that officer who was jogging and asked to turn of the music. It seemed that our family would be the reason for the delay, as Adhit was still sleeping, Prachi just woke up and we had so many luggage to dump into the car again. While Prachi was brushing, I packed all the things and started dumping. With all this sound, Adhit was undisturbed. So, Prachi was reluctant to take him to the car while he was asleep. She was afraid that he might wake up. While Prachi was packing Adhit’s bed sheet and others, due to my compulsion, I poured some water to clean the windscreen of the car. It was clogged with moisture due to chill weather and mist in the morning. Even when it was time to start Adhit was still not awake. Karthik’s family got in with Sunay and signaled the start. Now Prachi had no other go than to take Adhit. We informed the peon and said bye to the forest that hosted us for a night. Adhit woke up very fresh while on the way to Gundulpet.

Towards Wayanad

Our next stop was Gundulpet for tea. The forest was beautiful to look at in the morning. I would have loved not to drive and engulf the sight as much as possible. I was feeling good and relieved from headache. At Gundulpet, the town was just waking up, while we stopped by a tea shop, where few other tea shops were crowded with Sabarimala tourists. We had tea / coffee or milk, filled the children’s bottle with milk for the way forward, distributed some biscuits among kids. I started having the hint of neck pain again. So I gulped another paracetamol, while I came to know from Sunay that he has moov (a pain balm). I think all drivers have such problems and remedies. Thanks to Sunay – I applied it all around my neck.

The journey started again. Our next stop was Wayanad. The road was entirely traffic-free and we could zoom past the initial stretch very quickly till we entered the forest. After that though the traffic was less, the road was intermittently bad and unpredictable. This forest was the continuation of Bandipur on the other side. After some distance through the forest, we could see that on the left was bamboo tress, well differentiated from the valley on the right with evergreen trees and a stream down the valley. On the way Prachi noticed some peacocks on the roadside, where we stopped to get down and show Adhit. It is actually not allowed to stop the vehicles inside the forest roads. After a while we stopped for a while to show Adhit, some monkeys. On the way, after seeing some animals, Prachi was telling me that she was really afraid with the way Adhit was crying last night. She feared some animals might come hearing his sound. Bollywood has had lot of impact.

Wayanad

Enjoying the beautiful roadside, trees, valleys and stream, we reached Sultan Bathery very quickly. We did not stop anywhere, until we reached Kalpetta. Oh yeah! Most people think Wayanad is a place, like I used to think before this trip. Wayanad is not a place. It is a district, comprising of many places, interesting for those who live in the concrete forests. To visit each place mentioned interesting in the website, you should travel a sizable distance like 25 to 40Km. Sultan Bathery is one such place which is the entry point to Wayanad in Gundulpet route. Next is Kalpetta. We stopped at Kalpetta, which seemed bigger than Sultan Bathery, to get some idlis for the kids. It was just a quick break. We continued further to Vythiri were we would join with other colleagues from our office. Vythiri is another place in Wayanad. Adhit just had a few pieces of idli, which did look good too. We fed him with some more biscuits, after which he informed us that nature was calling. Prachi asked him to wait for a while. I was surprised that he could control himself. He did not tell again. On the way further, Sunay stopped his car as Padmashree had nausea and vomiting, a common sight in the hill routes. We called them from our car to inquire if she requires medicine for nausea, which we had. As they said no, we continued further and reached Vythiri. We were to stay at a resort called Vythiri Village. It was inside a small lane on the national highway number 212, easily noticeable with the sign board. It was 9 AM when we reached.

Vythiri Village Reception

Reception at Vythiri Village

View of the room @ Vythiri Village

As we entered, Raju and Prashanth who were already ready for the day received us. This is not the same Raju, I mentioned earlier whom we met at Mysore. This is Varadha Raju, Vice President of Indian operations. After some and pleasantries, Raju informed us that the program starts at 10, which meant we should get ready and finish the breakfast before that. Prachi was not happy with the plan and felt there is no time at all and everything was in hurry. She was already unhappy that we rushed today morning, not allowing Adhit to sleep. I consoled her that when we are in a group it’s better to stick to the plan and not affect others. The rooms allotted to us was a little far from the reception. Resort people transported our luggage and took us in a separate cab. Adhit who was very cheerful all the way, started his last night protest again as soon as we entered the room. He did not even come inside. He stood near the closed door and kept asking us to take him to the car. We kept diverting his attention with different things. While I opened the window there was a pleasant surprise. There was a thicket of trees just adjacent to the window, separated only by a narrow stream. He was engrossed into this new sight of dark green thick forest. We had been telling him for the last whole week that we are going to Wayanad, which is a jungle. So, when I said it was a jungle he was absorbing everything around him. In the meanwhile, Prachi had prepared his potty seat and called him. He had another protest waiting for us, after finishing his nature calls. He was not ready to bath in a new place and there were no buckets and tumblers with which he used to play while bathing at home. We engaged him with talks and the new shower and got him bathed. It was getting late for achieving Raju’s target time. But we both rushed and managed to get on time for the breakfast.

A portion of Vythiri Village seen from top

Breakfast and OBL

When we entered the breakfast hall, all my colleagues with their families were there. We introduced each other family when we met. People were happy to see Adhit, whom they had just conceived in their thought with what I explain of him. Same was the case with me, when I looked to other’s family. Initially, Prachi fed Adhit, while I talked to friends and continued to eat. The breakfast was awesome. It had a lot of variety – fruits, cereals, toast, egg, idli, dosa, poori, puttu with their respective side dishes, milk etc..,. When Prachi had done with feeding and started to have, Raju came to our table and informed that we will start the program in a few minutes. I know it was not going great for Prachi. Though she was upset, she managed. After she quickly finished her breakfast, we went along with others to the first floor where the program was to start. Everyone was just sitting and gossiping, as some of our other colleagues were to join us, which irritated Prachi who kept rushing up the whole morning. Later when everyone was present, Raju initiated the program. We are going to spend the whole day as Outward Bound Learning, conducted by trainer from outside organization, which is very famous in Bangalore. I guessed it was not going to be any special, which was proven right when the trainer said ‘Good Morning’ and kept repeating it, till the crowd could bark at him saying ‘Good Morning’. I don’t know whether this ritual needs to be performed before any such program like time management, presentation skills, team building and other soft skills. Let me not go in detail about this program and my critic about it in this travelogue. The program lasted till afternoon, within which Adhit had slept on Prachi’s lap, when we were doing some task outside the hall. When it was time for lunch, I offered to take care of Adhit and asked Prachi to have the privilege of eating first, due to the breakfast disaster. She agreed, as I took him on my shoulder and roamed around the garden. When she was half way through, our little master woke up and we joined her. It was my turn now to feed him.

Tea estates on the way

Banasura Sagar Dam

Way to Banasura sagar dam

After lunch, it was time for outing. Our plan was to visit Banasura sagar dam and Pookot Lake. We reached Banasura dam after a drive of 45mins. The drive was beautiful amongst tea gardens and water embankments. A time was set to return back before entering the dam. This is one of the India’s largest earthen dams.

Information board @ Banasura sagar dam

View of the catchment area

Few people decided to stay back in the bus, while some of us entered the dam after purchasing the ticket. Later, when we realized it was quite a long walk and climb of about a kilometer that we would reach the top of the embankment, it was about to rain heavily. Venky decided to get back from halfway and was convincing some of us. We are one among the few convinced as we did not have rain protection and Adhit was with us. When we were on the way back, it started pouring. I made Adhit sit on my shoulders and started running towards the ticket counter where some stalls were put up. We took shelter in one of those until the rain stopped and returned to the bus and waited for the rest to return. When others returned it was decided to be late and we had to attend another session of the OBL program in the evening. So the lake visit was cancelled and return journey started to the resort. On the way back Prachi took lot of efforts to make him sleep by telling Ramayana. It did not work until we were just before the resort. As he was sleeping when we reached, Prachi made him lie down in the back seat of our car which was parked in front of the reception. Other people went to their rooms for a short refreshing break and attended another session of the program before we dispersed for the dinner and for the day. We had a sumptuous dinner, while Raju discussed with us about how the program was arranged and other things. Some people went to the Spa, while others went to the indoor games area. After dinner, we also visited the play area where I played a game of table tennis, while Prachi tried her hands in some weight reduction equipment and Adhit was running around trying his hand in carom board.

Close of Day2

Around 9 PM we returned to the room, while people were still continuing to play, booze or gossip. Our nightmare was about to start in a few minutes when we will enter the room. Adhit started crying again and didn’t want to be in that room. But we were blessed with a TV and more than that it was Big Boss that was broadcasted that time. Adhit was familiar with this word Big Boss. So he was getting pulled by that. Yet he was not ready come on to the bed. He kept standing for a long time watching TV. Prachi acted as if she is sleeping and actually slept. Then I pulled him over and gave the remote control to play with. He kept changing the channels and watching TV and naturally slept without much effort. I just had to move him around to the right position. But it was already midnight, when this happened.

Fun time @ resort

Next morning, some people went for a trek, while we preferred to get up late. I had got an appointment at the Spa and Prachi wanted to go for the gym. I and Venky went to the Spa for a massage. The massage was a good experience. I was massaged by a person named Pradeesh. He looked young, but he was about 8 year experienced. He had done diploma in this at Calicut, and worked for different hotels and resorts in different places in India like Mumbai and Gandhinagar. The massage was very relaxing and lasted for an hour. I wished it went on for more time. I was asked to wait for an hour for the oil to be absorbed into the body. I used this waiting time for completing my breakfast. Prachi and Adhit had got ready, completed their breakfast and were playing in the garden. Adhit was very attracted towards the small bridge in front of the reception and kept crossing it. We all went back to room; I took bath and went for swimming.

Swimming pool @ Vythiri Village

Karthik, Sunay, Vrushali, Ridhima and Mihika were in the pool supported by Padmashree and Pradhyum from outside. I went into the pool and planning to take Adhit inside. Prachi was also tempted seeing others in the pool. As I took Adhit inside, she also joined me with no separate swim wear. Water was very chill. Adhit was crying initially very much out of fear and as I took him around a few times and Mihika played with him, he was getting consoled. Prachi showed that she was unhappy with what I am doing, as she kept instructing me that Adhit is drinking water, the water is chill and others. After sometime as Adhit was shivering very much, I wrapped him around with a towel and asked Prachi to take him back to room, while I continued for some more time. After the pool we went to the gym where Prachi did some work out or rather tried to work out while I was playing table tennis with Anand Budni. In some time as Prashanth told it was time to pack up, we went back to the room packed our luggage handed it over to the resort guys to be transported to the reception. When some people went in cab to the reception, Venkat, his son Pranav, Anand, Mahesh and I preferred to walk back. On the way back we noticed the tree houses carefully to know that they were not real tree houses. They were concrete pillars, designed and painted like trees. Those tree houses in the pictures of the resort’s website are also not true. For those who prefer tree house, please choose the right ones, when you end up paying more for those.

Illusive tree house @ Vythiri Village

Bye to Wayanad

After lunch as everyone boarded the bus, we said bye to them and said bye to the resort as our car moved in the direction of Bangalore. On the way back, just where the lane touches the highway, there was a handicraft shop, where all women spent some time. Prachi purchased some different flavored tea leaves which turned out real bad when we used it. I filled my tank with petrol which was cheaper compared to Bangalore, before getting out of Wayanad. Adhit had slept well as soon as we left the resort. After coming out of the forest, we took a break reaching the plains, having some tea. It was a typical village evening, when all animal herds were returning back to their house after grazing – cows, sheeps, goats etc..,. Children had fun watching them. From there Karthik’s family shifted to our car, from Sunay’s. Our next stop was at Mysore for a short while, when Karthik got some bananas for Pradhyum and Adhit. The highway between Mysore and Bangalore was like Brigade road, as it was Sunday evening. Added to the traffic were the unpredictable speed breakers with no markers. We had to be careful not to jam on the car in the front when he breaks suddenly and should indicate our sudden braking to the car behind us. It was a difficult drive. We stopped at Kamat Lokruchi just before Ramnagaram town for dinner. We had north Karnataka style full meals. From there we separated. Sunay agreed to drop Karthik and left soon, while we spend some time at the wooden toy shop. We explained Adhit that we would like to give him some toy as he had been very cooperative all through the trip. Seemed to have understood, he was happy choosing the toy. He was not able to funnel down to one. So, we purchased a train made of wood and started our last leg of the trip. This was the most difficult stretch as it happens to be in any race, walk, pilgrimage etc. Here it was a different difficulty. Adhit and Prachi and slept, while tried to keep myself awake. I was very drowsy and was driving slowly. We reached home at 11PM, while Sunay was just about to reach Karthik’s place to drop him.

It turned out to be a good break for us, after about 3 years. Our last trip was to Madurai, Rameshwaram and Kanyakumari in 2007, before Prachi was carrying this little guy around whom or because of whom this entire trip had to be tweaked and made flexible. Though we did not see more than one place in Wayanad, it was a very happy trip, due to our stay in the jungle of Bandipur and a good resort with the thicket of forest cover with good amenities. The only disappointment of the trip was that I could not see at least one elephant in the jungle, let alone tigers.

Places to Stay:

Bandipur:

1. Government guest house – Need prior booking to be done at Mysore at,

The Chief Conservator of Forests (Project Tiger),

Aranya Bhavan, Ashokapuram,

Mysore – 570008

Phone: 0821-2480902

2. Jungle lodges and Resorts Ltd
http://www.junglelodges.com/index.php/resorts/bandipur.html

Wayanad:

1. Vythiri Village - http://www.vythirivillage.com/
     NH-212, Near Vythiri Town, Vythiri P.O
     Wayanad – 673 576, Kerala
     PH: +91 4936 256 716 / 717 / 718 /719
     Fax: +91 4936 256 720

2. Home stay - http://thefourseasonswayanad.com/index.html
    Mahathma Nagar, Market Road
    Kalpetta - 673121
    Wayanad, Kerala
    Telephone : + 91 4936 203654
    Mobile : +91 9961757331

3. Apart from this there are lot of resorts and home stays and so many web pages referring those. One of them is - http://wayanadhomestays.com/index.htm

Distances:

Bangalore to Mysore – 140 Km

Mysore to Nanjangud – 23 Km

Nanjangud to Gundulpet – 35 Km

Gundulpet to Sulthan Bathery – 55 Km

Sulthan Bathery to Kalpetta – 25 Km

Kalpetta to Vythiri – 15 Km

Gundulpet to Bandipur – 30 Km

Some notes:

1. 1. There are no good restaurants between Mysore and Wayanad / Bandipur.

2. 2. The last fuel station is at Gundulpet before entering the forest. The next is at Wayanad only, roughly after 60 Km.

3. 3. If you happen to cross Gundulpet – Wayanad route in the evening, there are some good roadside shops selling fresh, farm grown vegetables at cheap price.

4. 4. Forest safari timings at Bandipur – 6:30 to 9:00 AM & 4:00 to 6:00 PM

5. 5. Forest check posts are closed at 9:00 PM after Gundulpet towards Ooty and Wayanad.

6. 6. Please keep anticipating speed breakers on the very nice highway between Bangalore and Mysore.

7. 7. In the same way, please anticipate potholes in the hairpin bends.

And that's dessert!!!

P.S: Thanks to my colleagues for sharing the photos.

Bangalore – Pune - Mumbai in Train

2008-07-21T14:57:00.004+05:30

Prachi and I took the Udhyan Express from Bangalore to Mumbai at 8:10 PM at Bangalore Central. The next morning when we got up, we were in Andhra Pradesh. Little later we were in Karnataka, then again AP and from Solapur we were into Shivaji Maharaj’s bastion – Maharastra. But all through the day, the sights were too harsh for my eyes and in turn, my mind. I mean, there was no greenery, dry stretches of uncultivable lands, few patches of cultivable but non cultivated black soils and not even dry shrubs with few green leaves. The entire route had very few towns and the places which I felt can be called as towns had very few concrete storied buildings and very little development in terms of the nomenclature. The only exception was, Solapur. I doubt if it is due to nature of the land and natural resource. My doubt was affirmed by “Kendriya Vidhyalaya” at Solapur. This school just adjacent to the railway track had a decent garden, totally green. I see two ways of interpreting this. Either the farmers are not as resourceful and financially strong as the school management to cultivate in this land or the land is actually not fertile, but the school managed to replace a part of it for the purpose of garden. The OR part of the above statement is not feasible to be done at a large scale for cultivation. There are various ways of countering the first issue, which I assume that the government and NGOs in this region are working at.

In addition to this unpleasant reality, the train did not have pantry car, which otherwise would have been a source to pass time. The lunch had to be ordered from outside. Order for lunch is taken after Solapur and a mediocre meal is served at Khurdwadi at a cost of Rs. 32. After lunch we had a small nap in railway language which lasted for 2 hours. Very tasty and large groundnuts waked me up at Pune station.

From Pune, unexpectedly our journey doubled to be a picnic in the ghats. This was the first time we were traveling in this region in day light. It was a pleasant, enjoyable evening. The entire region was green. It did not just have plants and trees, but there was a green coating spread over the entire land contributed by the grass that were sprout due to monsoonal showers. There were a few hillocks at the periphery of the city, which can serve as nice places for amateur trekking. The sun was just setting, while the shower commenced. It turned out to be a real jaunt for us with my mobile camera becoming operational, not knowing that this was just a preview of the full length movie that had to come further down the track.

The real movie was screened as we entered the ghat regions of Lonavala. My god! I swear I had never been on such a rail trip. It was ‘All ideal’ trip that I had made so far in my life – Right place at right time of the day at right season. Is this what Robert Schuler claims – Right people meet right things at right time. As the ghat section started, there were big, green-clad mountains on one side and valley on the other. The mountain rock and springs running down the valley were at touchable distance from the train, demanding my mobile to be taken out quite often. A beautiful arch of seven colors intruded into the serenity of the mountains. At a few places, these mountains were crowned with elegant bungalows and guest houses. Added to the grandeur were young kids returning from their schools with parents and in groups at various locations down the slope and waiting for the train. One more attraction on this route was numerous tunnels along the route from Lonavala to Mumbai. All this charm lasted till we entered the periphery of Mumbai, from where we could easily infer the density of population, shabbiness and fast pace unique to Mumbai.

Thank God! We were made to travel in sleeper class, which assisted us in getting close to nature and capture it in my mobile. Actually I had an III AC ticket booked in Ajmer Express, which would have taken me to this region around late evening. This ticket was in Pooled Quota Waiting List. Till the date of travel it was not confirmed, due to which we were compelled to travel with the alternate tickets which we had booked in Udhyan express. Though we were cursing earlier, we were able to appreciate the implication of the whole episode only after we crossed Pune.

Trip to Bhavani, Pariyur and Kodiveri

2008-05-01T10:24:00.004+05:30

Erode

This time it was a different and little more versatile group. I along with Prachi and my friends had been to Erode for spending the weekend and also for my friends to visit our newly built house. We reached Erode on Saturday noon. We had a real Tamil tasting lunch prepared by my mom, which is quite different from the ones available in Bangalore restaurants. Everyone had a small nap before going on a shopping spree in the evening. Jayakumar was excited to find very cheap textile items which are required for their newly built house at Chemmanvizhai, a beautiful, picturesque and green village near Nagercoil. Manikandan could not enjoy the shopping in its entirety, as he had to resolve some official problem at his workplace through phone all the evening. While shopping, we had an opportunity to come 2 temple car processions, which are hardly seen in a city like Bangalore. Our day ended with a spicy and delicious dinner at Uma mess. Uma mess is a small eat out place which I had frequently visited with my school friends. Now I visited with other friends after almost 11 years. The place had changed. It was made little big. Other than that everything was same – the taste, the people (Sudhakar, Prabhu and his father). We had Parotta, Muttai Veechu, Sada Veechu, Dosai, Omlet, Nattu Kozhli fry. Then we walked some 2 km to reach my house, before gulping few glasses of butter milk and going to bed.

Next morning, we three along with Hema, played Badminton for quite some time in the open space in front of my house. Not to say, we were drenched with sweat. Then we got ready for a day’s trip which had planned the earlier evening. We had a very delicious breakfast with Idiyappam and Dosai, which I ate like my only meal of the day.

Bhavani
After the breakfast, my friends Jayakumar, Manikandan, my sister Hema, Prachi and I set out in our Bolero to Bhavani. We reached Bhavani with in 30 minutes of our departure. This is called a sangam in this region, which is actually a Triveni Sangam. This place is a confluence of River Kaveri and River Bhavani. It is also believed that another divine river, which I remember as Amutha merges from below the ground. Unexpected to the size of the town, the parking fee was Rs.30. River Kaveri, where people normally take the holy dip had very less water compared to Bhavani. We did not take bath considering the quality of water and the time constraint. But we immersed our feet and sprinkled some water on our head. The temple seems to have been renovated recently, as it displayed clean walls, pillars and statues. It was quite crowded near the garba griha. Jay, Saks (that’s how Manikandan is called) and I decided to stand in the queue for darshan, while Prachi and Hema decided to wait outside. After we three had worshipped, we were on the way to our car, while we saw a temple elephant. It was not tied to anything. It was totally free, with a mahout sitting nearby. Prachi wanted to get blessed by an elephant, which she never had experienced in her life. But she had to build up her courage by seeing some small kids doing it, before getting blessed.

Pariyur
From Bhavani, we set off to Pariyur a small village 4 km away from Gobichettipalayam. This region along with Pollachi and its surroundings are very famous in Tamil film industry, due to their greenery and vast stretches of agricultural fields with canals. It took us less than an hour to reach this place. There are 2 temples at this place. Usually they are closed from 12 noon to 4 PM. We reached at 11:45. We had to cross a stretch of tarred road, bare footed, from parking to the entrance of the temple, which was heated by the midday sun. Prachi struggled as she was not experienced with such heroics earlier. Though the village was not as green as it used to be in other seasons, the canal at the back of the temple was full with water. We inquired a person there, whether we can bath there. He said in affirmative. He also said that the water was recently released from dam and hence has foul odor and snakes. We had also witnessed 3 snakes in a short time. Hence we decided not to bath here. Inside the temple, in front of the deity there was a lengthy pit, used for “Thee Midhithal”. This is a ritual or a ceremony during festival times in this part of the region, where the devotees run on lighter coal. I explained to Prachi about this ritual, which she could not believe.

After buying some prashad, we visited the other temple just in the vicinity of the first temple. This temple is totally made of white marbles. We relaxed in the courtyard of this temple for a while. We purchased some raw mangoes from an old lady, who had made a small table her shop below a shady tree. We had a few of them and packed some to bring home.

Kodiveri
From Pariyur we set off to Kodiveri, through Gobi (as Gobichettipalayam is shortly called). We munched some parotta, tomato rice, and tasty curd rice as lunch at Gobi. Kodiveri is around 10 km from Gobi. Kodiveri is a check dam built on River Bhavani. Sun was scorching when we reached this place. The first thing we did was to hire a traditional boat called Parisal, made of thatched bamboo coated with tar. They charged Rs.20 per head for a trip in the embankment area. Everyone, except Jay was afraid to some extent, as we don’t know swimming. A very old man with estimated age of 65+ was guiding the boat. Saks was asking all sorts of questions like are there crocodiles in the water, what will happen if the oar falls into water and so. Except for the weather it was so enjoyable. During the final leg of the trip, the old man took us near the place from where the water falls down. Oh god! That was so fearful, except for Jai. Hema even was getting ready to jump out of the boat, keeping her bags down, in case the boat is going to fall down J

Then we went down the fall, to take bath. Hema did not bring clothes thinking that there would not be place to change over. But she was tempted to bath after seeing the place. Fortunate enough were we, that there was a ladies toilet which was dually used for dressing too. After some confusion Hema and Prachi decided to take bath and changed their dress, while we did it in open. First, Hema and Prachi took bath, while we watched over to the things standing in the hot sun. The only bad experience of the trip was to stand in the hot sun. There were no trees or shades near the bathing place. It would be suggestible to take umbrella in summer. Jai, I pity you because of the condition of your hair (I doubt, do you have it). After Hema and Prachi came out, rather made to come out, we enjoyed getting into deep. I would not have dared to go there if Jai was not there. It had right amount of water. Earlier when I had been, it used to have large amount of water and it used to be fierce. Now, though it was fierce, it was limited. It had massaged our back, free of charge. The other major problem earlier was it was very slippery, due to which many people had been engulfed by the river. Now they had provided metal rods for assistance. It was a memorable moment. Later, we gave the girls some more time to bath again in the shallow waters.

On the way back, we ate all country stuffs, which recalled our childhood like Fresh palm (Nongu), maize (Solla karuthu), Green Pea masala (Pattani) and Coconut palm (Ilani). When everyone enjoyed with all this, Jai was deprived of fish, the specialty at Kodiveri, due to lack of company. To prevent boredom on the way back, we were playing dumb charads, while Jai was feeling very shy to act.

To Bangalore
After returning, Jai and Saks again started playing badminton, I while was not ready to get more tired. We had a solid dinner (as it is called colloquially, which means heavy) of Karadosai and Thengai Chuttney. Jai and I swallowed 7 of those, later filled our stomach with some more buttermilk. Saks seems to have been concerned about his behavior restricting to a little food every time. Everyone was sleepy even before boarding the bus to Bangalore. Departing at 11 in the night, we reached Bangalore at 6 in the morning.

All through the trip, I observed Jai as a father figure buying things for others, taking care of others and so. He purchased ice cream for Saks to eat, Corn for Hema and Nongu for me and himself. Hope he becomes a father soon.

Tips:

Erode to Gobi – 35 KM

Gobi to Kodiveri – 11 KM

Erode to Bhavani ~ 20KM

Umbrella – a must at Kodiveri

Gobi – last place to find decent restaurants or Hotels.

Trip to Nandi Hills

2008-04-13T07:08:00.016+05:30

Prachi wanted to take a break from her hectic official travel and visit a hill station near Bangalore. We were planning to visit Hill stations in the western ghats like coorg and Kemmanagundi. We had also planned for a trip to Udupi, Malpe, St. Marys Island, Bekkal fort and Kemmanagundi, with the help of one of my colleagues Manjunath, who is from this region of Karnataka. For different reasons we had to give up that trip, some being the weather was not enjoyable which I heard from my friend Manikandan who visited Coorg last week, and it was becoming a 3 day trip. As this trip had to be given up, Prachi was interested and insisting to go to Nandi hills, as she was in vacation last week. Due to my neck pain, the only possibility to go there was with a tour operator, which I was not interested as I wanted to drive. I had to convince her to postpone the plan. It worked out this week.
Prachi and I, set out yesterday morning, well before dawn at 4:30 AM, with a plan to see the sun rising from the mountain tops. I prepared the routes to reach Mekri circle, with the help of Sudeep the previous night. The route from Hebbal to Nandi hills were available in wikitravel. It was a very cold morning of a hot summer day. We were right on track, as Sudeep suggested till we reached the underpass at Frazer town. From here we had to take Nandidurg road. But we were stranded and roaming around various roads at Frazer town, with a hope of reaching Mekri circle somehow. To my surprise there were a lot of people in that area considering the time of the day. One gentleman guided us properly to reach Mekri circle. After having lost some 20 precious minutes (It was precious for some reasons that would come later), we were again on track.
It was a straight highway from Mekri circle. The only traffic consisted of trucks. It was very hard to drive with our dim headlight. Till some distance from Hebbal, the road construction was going on at few places. From Yelahanka, the six lane road was straight with no traffic. We were missing our Yamaha libero with which biked to Pondicherry from Chennai, a 160 Km stretch along the coastline. Though we wanted to go fast, our kinetic was not made for racing. So, we had to stick to 50Km/hr limit. After the air force base station, it was little misty and chill. I could feel that Prachi was shivering in cold, but would not dare to say that, as she refused to take her jacket even after my request. I offered my jacket which she refused, saying it was not that cold. But she revealed the truth after we reached the hill top and said that she was praying God to bring the sun earlier, hahaha.
On the way there were a lot of industries along this route. We also had a chance to see the pathetically bifurcating road, rather a metal road that would take to Bangalore International Airport. There were construction of huge flyovers, which I assume would be the feed for BIAL. But as of now, I wondered how could they claim that it was ready to use and was supposed to start its operation from 1st of this month. Thank God, the central government committee which inspected it had postponed the inauguration.
As we proceeded, we took a break near a Jain temple on a little hillock on the highway and took some snaps. From here on I told Prachi to look for a advertisement board for the Mount view resort, where we had to turn left, as instructed by Wiki. Just few hundred meters from this Jain temple, there was a road to our left with few advertisement boards. As we were just missing that road and proceeded on the highway, Prachi noticed that Mount view resorts board, which was hided by other boards and totally colorless to catch the attention. I would say we were fortunate. We took that turn. Now we were very close to Nandi hills. But it was getting bright too, indicating that we had to race with the sun to see him rise from the mountain. While on the way, unfortunately he won the race and showed his amber face from in between the rocky mountains. Though we lost, it was a beautiful sight, which we halted to capture in our cameras. This road too, was very good. I loved driving so far.
There were 2 roads which we can take, where this road ended. There was a direction board in Kannada, which we could not read. We took the right one, which seemed to used more. After 5 or 6 Km, we realized that we were descending the hill. We stopped to inquire the route with an old lady. She could not speak any other language than Kannada. I could not make her understand what we wanted. From her actions, I understood that we were on a wrong route. We turned back and while on the way, we inquired a milk man and again with a young man waiting in front of a tea shop. They guided us properly, that we should have taken to road towards the left at the junction. Just as we entered the road from the junction, there was this resort, not so big. We continued our way in between the eucalyptus farms to reach the diversion marked by a Nandi, from where the mountain route starts. It was a 8 Km stretch. It was not a treacherous route, as found in the ghats. Just before reaching the top, there are a few bends, otherwise a very simple route. But the sun was beaming into my eyes, making it difficult to drive.
A fort entrance welcomed us, indicating that we had reached the top, though not the peak. It was 4850 feet above sea level. We parked our bike there, got tickets and were wondering how to proceed. It was an open area with few monkeys, shops, but not sign boards. As it was early, there were no people from whom we can infer the direction to move ahead. We just climbed the stairs in front and entered a gate in front. It was a Harry Potter experience. There lied a whole new world full of greenery, big trees, hill style tiled house. We started moving around, taking snaps, after which we came to know that the entire region is kind of a fort and the visitors have total freedom to move around. Prachi was so excited, jumping and singing, becoming a kid. There was an amazingly clear tank called Amruta Sarovar. Just a few distance from this tank was a map of this region, which we glanced for a while and started to walk towards Tipu's fall. This is claimed to be a place where Tipu used to execute his criminals. On way to this rock dropping into a steep cliff, there were large stretches of grass, which we used for some of our photo session. We sat at the edge of the cliff for a while, planning to have some snacks, which did not materialize due to the dogs that were encircling us.
Then we moved in the direction of the temple at the peak. We had a few snaps of the temple, though we did not get inside, as I assumed that there would not be any architectural significance. By now, Prachi's Gujju character, which I relate to 'food-o-philia', manifested itself. Complementing her character was the restaurant at the top called "Hotel Ranjita". It served bread-omelet, bread butter toast, maggi noodles and cup noodles. I had bread omelet, she had a toast and then we shared a plate of noodles. There was another restaurant with bar, which seemed better but not open at that time. We continued our strolling, after sipping (I mean it) a tender coconut. There was a little girl named Pavitra who was taking charge of a shop selling, tender coconut and cucumbers. After ordering for 2 tender coconuts, I asked if she could open the coconut with the machete she was having. With a smile, she continued. It was actually tough for her. I went ahead to help her, which she rejected. But at the end I had to get my hands dirty. The hole for the straw was not enough big, so we had use all our energy to drink. While we were drinking, she was using the catapult to threaten the monkeys. All the shop keepers had catapult to get rid of the monkeys.
We also had a chance to visit a beautiful guest house called " Gandhi Nilaya". We entered this prohibited V.I.P guest house, thinking that it was an ashram. Then the guy named Muniraju who was taking care, welcomed us inside to have a look and said that it was under maintenance. It was so lavish inside. To stay here permission from vidhan soudha is required. There was a very well maintained Garden inside the campus, from where the villages at the foot hills where clearly visible. Thanking him by taking a snap of him, for which he posed religiously we were on our way again. We sat on one of the many benches found across the entire region and relaxed. I would say Prachi really relaxed by singing her currently favorite song, "Tujhe dekh dekh sona" repetitively, which I had to bare. Then we climbed a few steps to have a look of another guest house called "Nehru Nilaya", which was still more magnificent from outside than the previous one. It had some very rare, unseen and beautiful flowers in its surrounding.
From here, we descended the hill towards the entrance of the forts. We took a small hilly route in between the trees to substitute the pleasure of trekking. The entire route had a small coin like structure, scattered all over. Another leach like structure lying around. Later we came to know that this leach like structure encloses numerous of those coin like seeds. Then we came across a small natural tank besides a rock, covered by thick shade of the trees. This scenery evoked the interest of video shooting in me, which was probably due to influence of watching the National Geographic and The Discovery Channel. After taking a small video, which eventually came good with sounds of birds and insects, we went to visit the Tipu's Palace. This was not palatial as the name suggests. It was a small house where Tipu had stayed during his visits.
We ended our journey into this fortified kingdom, came out to the reality, which welcome us with the arrival of a BMTC bus with loads of people. We had some bottled drink and started our journey down hill, while we noticed that we were running out of petrol. Though I know it was risky, I switched of the ignition of the bike and started to descend. On the way we bought some grapes, which seems to be the specialty of the region, from one of the many sellers who are periodically placed on the sides of the road. When we reached the highway, we were little hopeful that we would have enough petrol to reach the nearby petrol station. We were wrong at our guess. The bike started choking when I slowed down at a speed breaking. I made it run till it can. Finally when it stopped, I could see a HP board at a distance. I made the choke on, so that it could run a little more distance. We were really fortunate to find a Petrol station, which was a desperate need of the hour. Then we continued our journey happily till Yelahanka, from where another misery struck us, which we are used to, "Traffic Jam". We had our lunch at Hotel Ramanas in Cunningham Road, then proceeded home. It took us 1.5 hour to reach Bangalore from Nandi hills, while it took more than an hour to reach our home from Cunningham road.
It was a very nice trip. At the end of the day we had covered 190 Km, on our little kinetic. Cheers!!!

Trip to Madurai - Rameshwaram - Kanyakumari

2008-02-12T23:10:00.019+05:30

Bangalore – Madurai:
My in-laws, my wife Prachi and I went for a pilgrimage, but not in its real sense, during this Christmas vacation. Our bus to Madurai was at 10.00 P.M. As always, being afraid of the Bangalore traffic, we reached Majestic, the bus station of Bangalore before an hour. There was little crowd compared to long weekends that I had seen earlier. Thanks to ‘id’ that fell a day earlier. My mother-in-law was shuttling along the platform to get some relief from her leg pain; my father-in-law was anxiously waiting for the bus, while Prachi and I were observing the crowd and chatting on undefined topics. “Airavat”, the KSRTC (Karnataka State Road Transport Corporation) bus in which we had to travel arrived at right time, but departed 15 minutes late, which is not considered late in Indian context. Three of us sat together in the last seat, leaving my father-in-law, two or three seats ahead. We were provided with a bottle of water and blanket. After 6 hours of travel, as well as sleep, bus halted for a short time, waking us up. Looking at the watch I assumed that we had reached Karur. But getting down I realized we had just reached Salem, some 2 hours short of Karur. I woke up at 6 A.M only to understand that we are so late by then. We were just traveling from Karur to Dindigul. As the day broke, I found that the road was under construction and only one side of it was being used, which required lot of maneuvering from the driver, and ultimately making our destination look far away than it was. The route of the entire trip provided opportunity to the driver to enhance their maneuvering skills. We reached Madurai at 10 A.M. Thanks to the nature. I wake up everyday only with nature’s call. It would have been so difficult, had nature called today. But, Prachi was in trouble to reach the hotel soon, hahaha. Contrary to our plan of taking a taxi to the hotel room, we took an auto-rickshaw as it was immediately available at no cheating (added bonus in unknown cities of Tamilnadu, where meter is not a norm). We reached “Madurai Residency” at 10.30 A.M. It looked decent from outside and at the reception. But the rooms were normal compared to the other rooms that we had stayed during the trip at lesser cost than this. After refreshing, we booked for a cab at the travel desk for our further travel and had our lunch. When it comes to dinning table, Prachi becomes a total south Indian. She had no problem eating total south Indian meal, even without a single roti, while her parents were having a hard time, all through the trip. During lunch we met my colleage Bhupesh and his wife, who was in the same hotel as part of their tour. They had already visite Rameshwaram the previous day. They had a similar agenda as ours, except that they planned to spend a day at Trivandrum.

Madurai:
After filling our stomach and relaxing for sometime, we set off for Madurai sight seeing. I doubt whether it can be called ‘sight seeing’, as it included only Thriumalai Nayakar Mahal and Meenakshi Amman temple. We avoided visit to Thirupparangkundram temple to save time. Thirumalai Nayakar Mahal was under renovation. This is not very old piece of work considering Indian history. Currently it is open all through the day without any break due to renovation work. The entrance fee per person is Rs.10 and additional fee for cameras as every other place. It is not a mahal as the name claims. It is a big arena surrounded by pillared pathways, beautiful arches and decorative roof. It borrows the style from Europe. This seems to be the hang-out place for the boys and girls of this area, more than a tourist place. The musical light show has been temporarily suspended due to the renovation work. It did not take more than half an hour to completely walk around this place. In added information on this place - This is place where the first song "Kehna hi kya" in hindi version or "Kannalane" in tamil version of the film "Bombay" was shot. After a little temptation of shopping handloom sarees, we boarded the taxi to reach Meenakshi Amman temple.

Normally, any temple in Tamilnadu is closed between 12 noon to 4 PM, offering the deity some time to nap. We entered the temple through the West entrance. This temple was also under renovation. As we passed through the security check, I observed a unique thing, which I had never seen earlier. During the security check, all tobacco stuff like gutkha were detached from their proud owners and collected at the gate, snatching any chance for these painters to show their modern ‘spit-art’ around the corners. As some more time was left for the temple opening, we went around the temple seeing the fenced music stones (which I had listened a long time back when I visited the temple with my father as a young kid), thousand pillar hall, museum and the black dhoti crowd (Sabarimala devotees). Museum was not lit properly, though it had very good collection of sculptures and paintings. If the thousand pillar hall was vacant it would have been magnificent to look at. Seeing few camels in the prahara, I wondered if the Hindu tradition of Tamilnadu had been modified to allow camel to accompany the lonely elephant. It was well past 4 o’clock when we completed the visit-ables around the prahara. Then we visited swami and amman sannidhi’s at a special cost, which allowed us to by-pass most of them in the normal queue. Even this special queue was packed so much that a young lady in front of us fainted in the crowd itself. We had been given less than 3 minutes to sit in front of the deity, where a person sung Thirvasagam beautifully invoking my memory of Panayapatti (my native) Shiva temple oduvar during festival times. Finally we visited the golden lotus pond (porthamarai kulam) and started towards the hotel, after having tender coconut from a muscle man. Museum has an entrance fee of Rs.10 per person and the special entrance queue has a fee of Rs.15 per person. Prachi was not happy as we had to leave the temple in 2 hours, while Bhupesh, who had visited the temple earlier that day, told us that it might take 3 hours. She suspected that there might be something, yet to see. But we, rather I was successful in persuading her. Immediately after reaching the hotel we checked out our rooms and continued our journey towards Tirunelveli which was our next halt.

Madurai – Tirunelveli:
We started from Madurai at 6.00 P.M. As soon as we started our driver confused us, rather confused Prachi saying that we could reach Cape in 5 hours and we will be able to see the sunrise which is claimed to be special there. I had seen sunrise here earlier. It was nothing special for me. It is as good as any sunrise in the east coast of India. Apart from sunrise, our driver might have had his own intentions in making us stay in Cape. As Prachi was desirous to see sunrise from the beginning, she got tempted and we called few hotels in Cape through driver’s reference. But finally we decided to stay at Tirunelveli itself, thinking on moral and comfort context. My father-in-law provided his thought during this confusion, which impacted me a lot. He said, if we cancel the current reservation done at Tirunelveli and stay somewhere in Cape, it is like betraying the Tirunelveli hotel. If we do this, this hotel management will loose trust on telephonic booking in future. Consoling Prachi that we will see sunrise at Rameshwaram, we continued with our planned itinerary.

Tirunelveli – night halt:
We finished our dinner at a highway hotel, which the driver claimed to be one of the good ones on the route, but which turned out to be the only one on the highway. There were a few ‘my’ kind of roadside hotels all through the route, which serve the speciality of this region, the parota, especially the Virudhunagar one. But I had to miss this opportunity due to my companions who would not like such hotels and its servings. My father would be the best company in such situation. We reached Tirunelveli around 10 PM. The hotel looked good from outside and it was no less inside. Though not luxurious, it was very decent. After having a very good sleep, we woke up at 6.30 AM the next morning. The restaurant attached with the hotel was very good and starts serving from early morning. We completed our regular south Indian breakfast of Idli, Dosai and Pongal at 7 o’clock.

Tirunelveli – Kanyakumari:
It was a very scenic route. The highway is under construction. If this work is done, it would be a great experience to travel this route. I never knew this region is so fertile. This region is depicted as one of the dry regions of Tamilnadu. Even the last time I was here before 10 years, it was so hot and dry. Probably, it is due to the winter and the cyclone that had hit these regions a day before. All through the travel, the Western Ghats was forming a backdrop. More to it was the wind mill fans that occupied the entire region around Kavalkinaru. The route from Tirunelveli to Kanyakumari is through a small town called Valliyur and a small but famous village called Mahendragiri, where ISRO has its Liquid Propulsion Research Center. Near Kavalkinaru, the highway bifurcates to Kanyakumari and Nagercoil. We stopped a few miles after Kavalkinaru to relish the beauty of thousands of huge fans in one sight. We took a 360 degree video too. Then we continued our travel to Kanykumari.

Kanyakumari:
We reached Cape around 9.30 AM. The tourist spots here are localized to the end of India. There is shore from where the ‘sangam’ of three seas can be distinguished, there is a memorial dedicated to Gandhi and 2 rock spots a little away from shore, which can be reached by a boat operated by a Tamilnadu government entity, “Poompuhar”. There was a big queue, mostly populated with Gujaratis and Iyappa devotees, which we had to pass through before boarding the boat that took us to Vivekananda rock. We spent enough time there, enjoying the nature, the colors of the sea, waves dashing the rocks and the beautiful breeze. Complementing the beauty was the drizzle, which just started. The meditation center, though not silent is a good place to feel the inner silence. We could spot a sparrow and capture it in our camera which is extinct in Bangalore. We had to get through a little longer queue, which had just grown in length due to the drizzles. Prachi and I went to have a look at Thiruvalluvar statue on the other rock, while my in-laws left to the main-land. I avoided climbing up the stairs to the statue, as I had to remove my shoes. When Prachi was persuading me to remove the shoes, Jayakumar called. He is more accustomed to these places, as his native place is near Nagercoil. I consulted whether we can visit any other place, as we had time. My idea was to visit Mathur Totti palam, which is supposed to be the Asia’s longest and tallest bridge. But he suggested traveling to Padmanabapuram rather than visiting Mathur.

Returning from rock spots, we went along the street bordered by shops, most of them selling sea shells or art paintings and reached the Kanyakumari temple. I had visited this temple earlier, which had nothing special of architectural value. I convinced Prachi and her mom to return from the entrance itself without entering the crowded garba-griha. On the way back, we entered a hotel, assuming that north India meals might be available. Except dosa and south Indian meal, nothing was available. One surprising sight on this entire street was small hotels at every 10m distance. Every hotel with no exception claim to serve all state food – Marathi, Gujarathi, UP, MP, Andra, Punjabi to name few. After having so called lunch, Prachi did some shopping, which she was insisting for. After the shopping Prachi along with her parents went to visit Gandhi Mantapam, while I called up the cab. On the way to Padmanabapuram, we visited the Vivekananda Nagar also.

Padmanabapuram:
My father-in-law was not very convinced to visit an extra place after Kanyakumari. He had set his mind to leave to Tuticorin. He had so many questions regarding the distance that we had to travel further. Though not explicit, it expressed his displeasure due to this extra spot on the agenda, which irritated me to the maximum. It was actually not an extra spot, rather a substitute for Susindram. Susindram is a beautiful, architecturally rich temple between Kanykumari and Nagercoil. We had to skip this temple as there was a function called Margazhli Darisanam, which had attracted a huge crowd. He is not made for travel. This is my conclusion, every time we travel together.

After a long traffic jam due to Susindram temple festival, we reached Padmanabapuram palace around 3 PM, through Thakalai. The region after Nagercoil was entirely fertile and had a Malayali aroma. People in this region are more comfortable with Malayalam than Tamil. The architecture is Kerala style, though these places are in Tamilnadu. Padmanabapuram palace is a kerala style palace, maintained by Kerala government. Prachi and I went around visiting the entire palace, while my in-laws rested in the cab. Prachi was very happy to visit this place. Even for me, this was the first visit to a Kerala style palace.

To Tuticorin:
We started from Padmanabapuram around 4.30 PM towards Tuticorin, where we had booked a hotel for night stay. We had so much of confusion regarding the route. Tuticorin can be reached through Thiruchendur or Tirunelveli. After a lot of discussion between me and the driver, we decided to take the Tirunelveli route, which was better though a little farther. During all this time my father in law was testing my patience with repeated questions on distances. From Tirunelveli, we mistakenly took the route to Thiruchendur. After traveling some 10 km, I doubted the route, as all the boards were showing distance to Thiruchendur, while none showed Tuticorin. I asked the driver to break for tea in a small village, where we found we were on a wrong route, after some consultation. The villagers suggested an interior metal road through some remote villages, which will take us very close to Tuticorin. We took the route, without knowing it was so badly damaged due to the cyclone. But to our surprise, we reached Tuticorin, just 45 minutes from there. I just could not believe that we were at Hotel Sugam, Tuticorin at 8:30 PM. We had a beautiful, big room and not to mention, a very good sleep after a day long travel.

Tuticorin to Rameshwaram:
I inquired the hotel reception about the shortest route to Rameshwaram from Tuticorin. They suggested that the shortest route is through a place called Vilathikulam, which is totally devastated due the current cyclone. So, we took the long route again through Aruppukottai, which is just 55 Km from Madurai. On the way we visited a small temple which had huge statues of Vishnu, Adishesh and Mariamman with bright attractive colours at Singalakarai. Before Aruppukottai, we took a state highway to our right which took us to National Highway 49, through Tiruchuli and Parthibanoor. The entire region was so dry with thorny deciduous forest with few huts and tiled houses here and there. Water was logged at some depressed places, due to cyclone. This is one of the driest and poorest districts of India. People in this region looked so poor from the outlook, but hard working. They was mostly harvesting millets which is a staple source of food this region who can’t afford rice all through the year. They were threshing (removing grains from the plant) pearl millet on the roads.

The next big town after Prathibanoor was Paramakudi. It was around 12:30 noon when we reached Paramakudi. Unfortunately, the tyre got punctured just as we entered Paramakudi. While our drive got it fixed, we had our lunch in the best hotel there, though not very decent. My in-laws had a very bad time, as nothing except typical south Indian meals was available, while Prachi and I relished.

Rameshwaram:
After fixing the tyre and finishing our lunch, we proceeded towards Rameshwaram through Ramanathapuram. White sand on both sides with palm trees all around indicated that we were approaching the shores. On a railway crossing we purchased “Panankezhangu” which is tender stem of Palm tree, grown especially for eating. Prachi and her parents were seeing this for the first time, while I took the pleasure of explaining how it is grown and eaten. Ramanathapuram district is one of the highest growers of Palm tree, where every part of this tree is used in some way of the other. The roofs of huts were made of palm leaves; the fence was made of palm stalk or petiole, palm fruit is eaten when it is ripe and before, the tender extract is used to make alcohol and sugar and more so. With all these narration, we reached the mandampam camp, which is the end point of Indian main land. From here Rameshwaram is connected by Pamban Bridge and a cantilever railbridge, which are both marvelous. We stopped over the bridge to have a look. It is so mammoth standing to tall over the sea. On one side it looks like a vacation place in Europe with so many fishing boats anchored near the shore. The shores are totally covered with Coconut palm.

Ramanathaswamy temple:
Our hotel at Rameshwaram was too good in the sense of its location. It was just adjacent to sea. We can directly dive into the water if we jump from first floor. After refreshing with tea and panankezhangu, we went to the temple. The temple was not very tidy as people walk wet, after taking bath in the 22 kunds or wells, which is considered divine. We didn’t take bath in these wells. We directly proceeded towards the deity for darshan. After darshan, we had a look at the 1000 pillar corridor, which is the longest temple corridor in world. It was magnificent, though not lit properly. After darshan, we visited Sri Ramakrishna Mutt and spent some time on the so called beach. Later in the evening, Prachi, her mom and I went shopping, leaving her father at Gujarathi samaj, where we planned to have our dinner. My mother in law bought some gifts for her friends and relatives, while Prachi bought some ornaments made of sea shells. On the way back, my father called with a trembling voice and gave the message of my grandfather’s demise. Not waiting for dinner at Gujarathi samaj, we finished our dinner at a hotel. I had to discontinue my trip and proceed for the funeral of my grandfather at a place which was 6 hour journey from Rameshwaram.

Rest of the Trip:
The next morning, though not very enthusiastic, Prachi accompanied her parents managing with her Tamil. They had a visit to the shore to see how the sunrises, which they missed at Kanykumari. Then they visited Dhanushkodi, which I m yet to see. The last time I went we did not go till Dhanushkodi. Dhanushkodi is around 20 km from Rameshwaram. Till some distance the normal vehicles are allowed. Later on sands, only the four wheel drive jeeps are allowed. These jeeps take the tourist to the end of India, Dhanushkodi. Srilanka is just around 15 km from here. This place is totally devastated and buried in sand, except a few building which remains. There are some fishermen families that live there. Prachi had purchased some sea shells from the kids who were selling them at cheap cost compared to the cost quoted at the shops around the temple at Rameshwaram.

After Dhanushkodi, they returned back to Madurai and took the same flight in which Bhupesh’s (my colleague) family flew to Bangalore.

Places to stay:
Madurai:

Madurai Residency, 14-15 West Marret Street, Madurai – 625 001

Ph: +91 452 2343140, 2343141, 2343142, 2343143, 2343144

http://www.madurairesidency.com/

There are some good hotels along the same street.
Tirunelveli:

Sri Janakiram Hotels, 30, Madurai Road, Near Nellai Junction, Tirunelveli – 627 001

Ph: +91 462 2331941, 2331942, 2331943

Rameshwaram:

Hotel Sri Saravana, 19A, South Car Street, Rameshwaram – 623 526

Ph: +91 4573 223367

(This hotel does not have a restaurant attached)

Tuticorin:

Hotel Sugam, 207, V.E. Road, Tuticorin – 628 003

ph: +91 461 2328172, 2328272, 2328372, 2328472, 2328572

Distances:

Madurai - Tirunelveli : ~160 KM

Tirunelveli – Kanyakumari : ~80KM

Kanykumari – Nagercoil : 18 KM

Tirunelveli – Tuticorin : ~50 KM

Tuticorin – Arupukkottai : 80

Aruppukkottai – Rameshwaram : ~120

Trip to Kolkata

2007-08-28T11:40:00.000+05:30

Yeshwantpur – Howrah:

My wife Prachi, my sister Hema and I started our journey to east of India on December 24th evening, for which the planning and preparations began a month ago. Though Yeshwantpur Howrah express was scheduled at 7.30 PM, we reached Yeshwantpur station an hour earlier due to trafficophobia that we developed after coming to Bangalore. We waited in the first class waiting room which was packed with passengers and their piled up luggage. The special odour (from the toilet) unique to the Indian Railways was preparing its passengers for their journey ahead.

We boarded the train as soon as it came, at 7.00 PM. It was entirely packed. The unreserved compartments were overflowing with passengers due to vacation. Most of them were labours from Orissa and West Bengal, traveling to their native. Our co-passengers were a very old couple who needed assistance even to get up, accompanied by their not very helpful son in his middle ages. The old man looked very confident, kind and had good command in English. As soon as the train started its journey, we started playing dumb charades on Hema’s request. It was a good fun with Prachi’s lack of knowledge in Tamil films and Hema’s lack of knowledge in Hindi films. After an hour, we un-wrapped the aloo paratha and had our dinner. I was quite amazed with the eating habit of the old couple. They had poori sabzi, which is the most staple food of Bengal. Immediately after dinner, each of them had a big share of sweet. This happened after each meal. This was quite surprising for me after seeing a lot of old people who restrict themselves from taking sweets either due to diabetes or fear of diabetes. Even they did not restrict themselves from having non vegetarian food served in train. Only after reaching Kolkata I came to know that chicken, fish and egg constitute a major part of the diet. Everyone went to sleep around 9.30 P.M, with the son of the old couple and I reading book till 10.30 P.M.

Next morning started very early at 6.30 AM, in terms of rail passengers. All of us were engrossed with some book or newspaper. The entire day was spent with book, playing cards, chess or some activity like charades, getting down at major railway stations and having timely food which we had got packed from home. Our food consisted of thepla and poori. A glimpse of Bengali intelligence was displayed in the train itself. Another co-passenger of ours’, a lady nearing her 50’s, very silent all the time was knitting some woolen clothing till she slept in the night. The next morning I saw her solving suduko in the newspaper. Earlier I had not seen such kind of women solving Suduko in South India.

Train was late by an hour when it reached Vishakapatnam. It had a long break here allowing me to walk down the platform to give a look to the unreserved compartment. Surprise, pity and sympathy filled my heart. It was really in-human conditions in which the people were packed and still people from this station were boarding. Majority of the passengers in these compartments were labors who had to travel long distance, who cannot plan their travel in advance, who were poor to afford even the sleeper class ticket. Rest of them were short distance travelers who wanted to travel faster at less price and who did not mind of the discomfort for some hours. I wonder whether there can be any solution to this problem, like increasing the number of unreserved compartments. I also came to know that the Indian Railways with an attitude to serve this chunk of people had begun a new train called “garib rath” in the Bihar route which is ‘supposed’ to have cheaper fares. This train in itself is a different story.

The interesting part of today’s travel was the rail bridge over River Godavari in the state of Andra Pradesh. This is the lengthiest bridge and the widest river I had ever seen in India. It spans around 2.75 KM wide. As I understand, the bridges are built in the place where width of the river is narrow, compared to other places. So, imagine how wide this river is. It looked massive like a sea or a strait.

I got up at 5.30A.M, next morning, completed my morning duties, waked up my partners. We were ready to get down in another half an hour. The first place that we planned to visit in Bengal was Santiniketan. We were planning to take santiniketan express which was at 10.10 AM. But the previous night we decided not to waste 3.5 hours at Howrah station, instead to take a bus to santiniketan. As it was getting late than 6.30 AM and by seeing people not getting ready, I came to know that the train was late. Train was at Kharagpur station at 7 AM, where I had the first glance of Bengal in my life. It was a cold morning. Lot of chaiwala selling tea in mud cups for Rs.2.00. We were discussing that the train would atleast reach by 9.00 AM, and we would have 1 hour to catch the next train. Train was entirely late to reach Howrah at 9.45 AM.

Howrah – Bolpur:
We were confused whether to go for Santiniketan express or not, as we had no booking for it, we were new to the place, we didn’t know where to book tickets. But thank god! I had a vague idea of the station premises as I had discussed about the station premises and places to stay, with my Colleague Amitava Mukherjee who hails from Kolkata. We carried our big luggage and ran to the current reservation counter, only to know that the booking for that train is not done there. The officer there was so kind to give us wrong information that the booking is done in second floor. I, leaving the other two ran to the second floor, where I was told that the train was about to leave and the booking can be done in the old station. There are two stations Old and New, one beside the other separated by Yatri Nivas. The long distance expresses trains towards south runs from New Howrah. The local trains and expresses to north run from Old Howrah. There are 2 current reservation counters, one just outside the Old Howrah station and other inside New Howrah station at the entrance. We had to run along the crowded path to reach Old Howrah station to see a queue in the unreserved ticket booking counter. Our dilemma still grew seeing the crowd. I gave a try running to the current reservation counter just outside the station. There was also an enough lengthy queue. I came back, stood in the unreserved counter to book. It was all a gamble to catch the train. The moment I got the ticket, our sprint started towards platform number 9, which is the usual place for Santiniketan express. Thank God! We finally did catch the train. My partners, being ladies, were comfortably seated in the unreserved ladies compartment. Though I was standing, I was comfortable than my fellow Indians who travelled in the unreserved compartment from Bangalore to Howrah. I was standing till Bardhaman, a small station where many people alighted.

As I had to skip breakfast, I had some groundnut and tea sold by vendors. The land was totally dry on both sides of the track. There were no agricultural lands or any vegetation. Very little greenery could be seen all through the path. Herds of cattle found completing the remaining green for their half stomach meal. But I saw a lot of small water bodies at regular intervals. I think either the land should be very poor in nutrition or people should be lazy or poor to do agriculture or might be due to harsh winter. As I was contemplating on all this, the train stopped at a very small station with no amenities and did not leave for a long time. I got down to know that the rail track ahead was blocked by supporters of Mamta Banerjee who was on 22nd day of fasting protesting against the forceful acquisition of farm lands at Singur by West Bengal government for Tata’s small car project. The train which was supposed to reach Bolpur, which is the nearest railhead for Santiniketan, at 12.30 noon, reached at 2.00 PM. Our plans were a flop due to this delay. We planned to visit the Rabindra Bhavan, a museum on Rabindranath Tagore on the day we reach there. We planned two days in Santiniketan. We reached on Tuesday. Wednesday was official holiday at Santiniketan. So, we had to miss our visit to RabindraBhavan.

Other attraction all through this journey (also during our stay in the east) was the Bhel-Puri kind of stuff that was sold by many many vendors and eaten by huge population. We came to know that this is Jal-Muri. From my basic Bengali knowledge that I got from my Bengali room partner, Pranay, Muri means Pori or Murmure or mamra. The vendors have specially designed equipment, in which they carry all the raw materials that are required, a container to mix, a cash box and a dirty towel. This entire equipment is made portable, which is hung around the vendor’s neck. This goes at a very cheap rate of Rs.5 per cup. The cup is also specially made in paper. I think this is a very well run small scale industry of West Bengal, helping a lot of families in their daily living.

Bolpur Station:
As soon as the train reached Bolpur station, thousands of people thrown themselves into the train in a desperate move to get seat, without allowing the passengers to get down. There were few brawls which were not very rare scenes for Indian travelers. Prachi and Hema got down with great struggle as they carried our entire luggage. As there was Poush mela, one of the very important events of this place which hosted people from all over the world, going on, there were few foreign travellers with children too. They were all shocked by the crowd they saw.

Bolpur – Santiniketan:
As we came out of the station, there were hundreds of rickshaw-walas thronged upon us to get hired. Normally as per Indians standards, the rickshaws or the taxis inside airport or railway station cheat and charge heavily thinking that the person would be a novice to the place. It’s always better to hire a taxi or rickshaw outside the premises. So, following the Indian norms we came out of the station rejecting a lot of offers. It was really a crowded place. We didn’t get any rickshaw outside the station. I was very irritated with the train journey that we had with lot of struggles and delay. This was growing my frustration, standing in the crowd and waiting for rickshaws. In the mean while Prachi took the initiative and enquired a police constable about reaching Hotel Camelia, where we had booked room for our stay. We felt so lucky when he showed us a pick up van from the hotel coming towards us. We boarded the so called van and reached the hotel along with another old couple. We had to convince ourselves that the van was comparatively good than other vehicles we saw.

Hotel Camelia:
Hotel Camelia is very far from the ViswaBharathi university campus, with reference to the scale of the village. But it is only less than 4 KM from the Village centre. We freshened ourselves with the little hot water that was provided in 2 separate buckets. Hot water is only available during morning. We went to have lunch that had been ordered from the room earlier. We had a very good lunch. Restaurant became the major attraction for us, even though there were no special vegetarian cuisines. The food was delicious. The breakfast was complementary. Even though, the hotel was little costly and far from village centre, it had good facilities which were unusable at that time like swimming pool and Pool table.

Public transport:
We left the hotel around 4.30 PM and went to the Poush Mela that was going on. The cycle-rickshaws are the popular mode of public transport, which were quite costly. They charge almost Rs.10 per KM and allow only 2 people in one rickshaw. So, we had to hire 2 rickshaws always when we had to go somewhere.

Poush Mela:
Poush mela is the year end celebration which is a famous event in the calendar of Santiniketan. Viswa Bharati’s contribution is for the first three days. Later it is run only with the stalls, without any programmes. We went during the tail end. Even then it was a different experience for people like us, who don’t have the opportunity to see this kind of melas in the villages. It was organized in the huge area called mela ground in the university campus.

It was 5.00 PM when we reached the mela ground. But it looked as if it was already 7.00. It becomes dark very early in the evening, in this part of India. This had always been a wonder for me. Yet I have not got a satisfying answer that could explain why different parts of the world have different day time. It was a very traditional mela. The emphasis was on art. There were a lot of display of hand crafts, sand stone work, paintings, clay work and wood work. There was also a large portion devoted to jute. Most of the displays were creative. I think the university had improved the creativity of the entire region. Even tough we had a wish to buy most of them, we restricted ourselves thinking about the scale of our house, where they may turn out to be a burden after few months and will be filled with dust, which can no more turn on the ambience.

No mela is considered complete without fun and food. This was no exception. A huge area was allocated for fun which had many kinds of rides. Please don’t go back to your young day and imagine the ride that you sat on or wanted to sit. I was surprised to see all modern rides which consume huge current. This was the brightest area of the mela too. Food stalls were all through the mela, not segregated into a separate section. We had pani poori called Gol-Gappe in this part of India. Though we wanted to have
varieties, we had no space to stack up in the stomach. There were a lot of sweets and special cuisines that could be found in this part of India.

Santiniketan:
Next morning we had a relishing breakfast with toast, boiled eggs, corn flakes and milk. We set out to explore rest of Santiniketan. After lot of confusion on the way, we decided to catch the Santiniketan express at 1.10 PM. Prachi and Hema returned back to Hotel to pack and check out, while I went to the reservation counter at the university campus to book tickets for return journey. We were afraid of the crowd which we found yesterday, fighting to get a seat in un-reserved compartment. I was beaten by the surprise that all the offices including the reservation counter are officially not working on Wednesdays. We had no other option other than travel by unreserved compartment. While waiting for my companions, I went to a book stall near the railway reservation counter to get a tourist guide which would help us explore the place. I got an English book explaining all the places and a Bengali book with a map.

After my companions arrived, we started walking down with help of map. We felt it would be tough to cover the entire campus before noon. My partners suggested taking a rickshaw, which I was not happy with. While discussing these, Hema spotted an auto-rickshaw which was a rare mode of transport in that village. We signed a deal with him that he would take us to all tourist locations in the campus, drop us at each place and wait for us to take us to other place. This worked out very cheap compared to cycle rickshaw. We had to pay him Rs.125. The rickshaw driver turned out very good that he became a guide and explained about each place, took us to hostels and labs. We went around Kala Bhavan, Sangeet Bhavan, Painting school, Chattim Tala, the classrooms without rooms (these were the only thing I knew before I visited this place), Upsana Griha, Tin Pahar and more. I m not explaining each as there are enough information available in the internet. We had a chance to talk to a student from Kerala learning art here. He claims this is the best school for art in India. It is supposed to be. The place and people are filled with creativity beyond imagination. Hema, being in class eleven was getting confused whether to study art which she is very good at or to study science which she has developed interest from discussing with my father, me and my friend Shankar. I understood that she was calming herself saying that science would be her profession and art would be her hobby.

We were unfortunate to miss many places like museum and library due to Wednesday holiday. At the end of the trip we set another deal with the auto rickshaw driver to take us to the Hotel, wait for sometime and drop us down at the Bolpur station for and additional Rs.75, which was another profitable deal. After settling the bill, we started immediately for Bolpur. Our misfortune still continued. The auto got punctured on the way. The auto driver got the help of few people near by and immediately replaced the tyre. One good fortune in between the misfortune was that there was a spare wheel (called stepney in India). We paid his bill and hurried to ticket booking counter to find a long queue. While Prachi stood in the queue, I called up Hotel Sana in Kolkata, where we had our booking to confirm our arrival. Booking the ticket, we ran towards the unreserved compartment. My partners boarded the ladies compartment. This time they were not lucky to get a seat. I stood near the door and toilet all through the travel of two and half hours. We reached Kolkata around 3.45 PM.

Arrival at Kolkata:
As soon as we came out of the station, we had a chance to see the Kolkata that we had heard of always. Hundreds of men and women marching from the ferry ghat to the station with red flags, depicting that it is a communist state. We were little tensed as we were new to the place and worried about our stay. Refraining from getting cheated by taxi drivers, I stood in the pre-paid taxi queue. Hotel Sana, which was supposed to be in the S.N. Banerjee road, was on a small, nasty road which bifurcates from S.N. Banerjee road. It did not seem to be a hotel. It was an old building. Mentioning it to be an old building would not be a unique identification, because 80% of the building in this city was old. As we entered the hotel, it seemed to be a residential building. Few children were playing cricket in the left over space in the parking area. The hotel was in the 2nd floor. The reception in less than 100 Sq.ft had a very nominal look. It did not give me a good impression. The room was very small like an air-conditioned godown. None of us liked the room and the Hotel entirely. It was not at all suitable for families. There was a theatre in front of the hotel, which screens adult movies.

Vegetarianism in Kolkata:
Everyone was hungry and Hema was tired out of hunger. We had seen a big restaurant on the way to the hotel. We decided to go there and continue with the rest of the activities. Unfortunately, the restaurant turned out to be non-vegetarian. There was a road-side dosawala, where my partners didn’t want to eat. We landed up in a small but good looking restaurant, only to find that it only looks good. We realized that finding vegetarian restaurant in Kolkata is a tough task.

Desperate search for better hotel:
After filling the stomach, we decided not to continue our stay in this hotel. We walked a few minutes to find another hotel on the same road, looking quite good. But as we entered and saw the rooms, we understood that this is a similar hotel. This is when the preparation and planning that were made before the trip helped us. Prachi had made note of all the hotels that she came across while searching on the internet. We called up Hotel Broadway, which we were to book before booking Hotel Sana. They said they don’t have and immediate vacancy. But a room is getting vacated in the night. We decided to visit the hotel once before we land up there with all luggage. We struggled to reach the place as we were not aware of the public transport system. Taxis and Rickshaws were not ready to take us there. With the help of a shop keeper, we came to know that the distance to that place is very less and taxis won’t take us there. Hence we had to walk down in a congested street looking like a bazaar of smuggled goods, to reach the hotel. While walking down, I got a lot of offers to buy blue films. Hotel Broadway didn’t allow us to look into a room, but confirmed that we will get the room by 9 o’clock. We left the place immediately. My partners were not ready to walk back through that road again. While we were struggling to get a taxi, Prachi came out with an idea of hiring a taxi for a round trip. We made a deal with a Taxi driver for round trip. We went back to Hotel Sana, informed that we are checking out, packed our things and settled the bill of Rs.770 just for 3 hours and dropped down at Hotel Boadway in the same taxi. The hotel management was so kind to provide us a single room with common toilet, till the double room gets vacated. We waited here till 9 PM. We went down to have dinner and found that the restaurant was more a bar than restaurant. So, we returned back to our room and completed our dinner in the room. We were given a double room around 10 PM.

The room was really really big, old fashioned, with old black coloured wooden funitures and old flush mechanism in toilet, with good service. This is comparable to Hotel Dasaprakash in South India in all terms. All this good service and this big room comes at a nominal tariff of Rs.650. Finally, I felt some relief of staying in a decent place. This half a day in Kolkata was a very bad and terrifying experience.

Dawn of Day1 in Kolkata:
The next morning we got up early as per our plans. Deciding to have breakfast outside, we set out to visit places around 8.30 AM. As the first task we decided to visit the West Bengal Tourism office at B.B.D Bag which was at a walk-able distance from Hotel Broadway. We had a tough fight in reaching the place as we did not know the exact door number and address. On the way we realized that 8.30 AM is considered to be early morning here. Some were brushing, some waking up, some preparing rotis and kilos of potato either for their self or for selling, washing the taxis and some sitting near the fire. Every activity was on the road. I believed that these activities at this time of the day could be seen in interior or hilly regions of India. But it was shocking to see in a capital city. Kolkata seems to be a lazy city in comparison to Mumbai or Chennai. There were no shops or activity around 8.30 AM. My wife and sister were uncomfortable to walk in the pedestrian platform with all the activities going all along and everyone starring at them. It seems either the women here are orthodox, not going to work or the sex ratio is poor.

West Bengal Tourism:
Finally, when we found the WBTDC office, we were surprised to know the package tours that they operated and especially the rates that were offered. We went in search of Sunderban trip, which was available for minimum of 1 night and 2 days. There were some specific dates on which these are conducted. According to the hand out given to me, December is the month with more trips to Sunderban. As we could not afford our time for the Sunderban trip, we settled to take up a one day sight seeing trip around Kolkata. But we were told that the tickets can be booked only between 10 AM and 4 PM. We had planned to visit Dakshineshwar, Sharda Mutt and Ramakrishan Mutt. We had to make changes to today’s schedule to come back here and book tickets.

Dakshineshwar and Sharda Mutt:
After un-succeeding search for some restaurants to have breakfast, we took a metro from Chandni Chowk metro station which was just opposite to our hotel. The metro rail is as good as the U-Bahn that I was used to in Frankfurt. It looked to be a different world entirely in the underground, segregating itself from that crowded, congested and polluted place lying above. It’s computerized ticketing, automatic ticket checking, the platform, the train, interior of the train, announcement system and everything else we saw was totally amazing. But yes, there is a difference between Kolkata metro and U-Bahn, which I should not forget to mention. That is the crowd. We were just squeezed during commutation.
We got down at Shyaam Bazar to take a taxi to Dakshineshwar. As we were so hungry, we continued our search for restaurant. I was loosing patience in this long search just to eat, when there was lot of road-side vendors, where my partners didn’t want to eat. Finally, I and Hema took a glass of juice, and Prachi gulped a cup of tea in no time. While Prachi proceeded with another cup of tea to the surprise of the vendor, I munched some samosas. We got some biscuit packets for Hema. One thing to be admitted is that everything is comparatively cheap in Kolkata. A cup of tea (including the mud cup) costs Rs.1.50, one samosa cost Rs.2.

We took a taxi to Dakshineshwar, as we were advised to do by the Hotel receptionist. But we landed in Dakshineshwar when the meter ticked Rs.150. We didn’t quite expect it. It seemed that we got wrong information from the hotel desk. We had only a 500 Rupee note and a little over 100 rupees in change. I roamed around the nearby hotels, riskshaw-walas and shops atleast for quarter of an hour, to get smaller denomination of Rs.500 to pay the taxi. I came back dejected, only to send my wife who successfully got a litre of drinking water, to make smaller fractions of Rs.500. After paying the charge, we were shocked to see the queue which wound like a snake. As the major reason of our morning trip was Sharda mutt, we decided to proceed without making darshan.

Prachi guided us to Sharda Mutt, with her small left over memories. We sat in a rickshaw and went through small galis. I was not allowed to enter the mutt. I sat near the gate where few other male members of some other families were also waiting. After sometime, Prachi and Hema and took me inside to visit the temple alone, from where I could have a glance of River Hooghly which bounds the mutt on one side. Prachi and Hema came out with prashad after the darshan of mataji.

At this juncture we were so confused of how to proceed further. We had to return to book tickets for the day trip conducted by West Bengal tourism. At the same time Belur Ramakrishna Mutt was nearer to Sharda Mutt. We skipped Ramakrishna Mutt and returned by the same route at the same expense, but enjoying the real density in Kolkata Metro.

Booking in Vein:
I was not feeling well, as the frequent visitor of mine was with me, “migraine”. It was so severe due to the hassle we had in the morning, that I just wanted to avoid going out in traffic. I went back to the room alone, while Prachi and Hema went to book tickets for the next day’s Kolkata Darshan trip. After returning they told me that they had hired a hand pulled rickshaw. Even tough I feel pity about this situation of a man pulling another man just to fill his and his dependent’s stomach; I felt I had missed the experience of sitting on the cart over 5ft height. The sad part of this struggling day was that we had no luck to get tickets for Kolkata Darshan. All tickets were booked.

We had a very simple Bengali lunch with Dal and Chawal. I had seen my Bengali friend Pranay Nath relishing Chawal only with Dal and green chilli. Prachi being Gujarathi, preferred aloo parata to rice. We had a small discussion of what to do further before I had a deep sleep while my companions had a nap.

Evening walk:
To have a break from my migraine, we set out for a walk around the near by places in the evening. We went to the nearby ATM to withdraw some cash for the next 2 days, before we sat for browsing in the nearby (1Km) internet café to confirm our return train timing. The train timings of the Indian Railways had just got changed. Then we rambled around Ganesh Chandra Avenue, Bentinck Street and Jawaharlal Nehru Road. Sparing me, my companions had the Bengali roadside delicacies golgappe and jal muri. On the way back, our two day search came to an end. We found a decent South Indian vegetarian restaurant, “Hotel Kamal” on Bentinck Street. Prachi was the happiest person to have found this. We had a staple South Indian dinner (yes as always, cheap). We bought two stress balls at cheap rates (Rs.10) during our shopping.

Dawn of Day2 in Kolkata:
Getting up early, we left the hotel, walked down the G.C.Avenue in the pleasant morning weather to book the tickets for next day’s Kolkata Darshan. We were quick to reach the Howrah station after booking, to catch a sub-urban train to Belur Math. We had a bit of confusion in finding the ticket counter. Having traveled in sub-urban trains of Mumbai and Chennai, we had an impression of having separate ticket counters for sub-urban trains and local / express intercity trains. To our surprise, we had to get the sub-urban tickets from the unreserved counter for intercity trains. Even the sub-urban trains and intercity expresses shared few of the platforms in the old Howrah station. We had to wait for more than 30 minutes to still wait more. Sub-urban trains to Belur Math are not frequent. Instead of waiting more and affecting our further plans, we took a pre-paid taxi and reached Sri Ramakrishna Mutt in time, as planned. For the visitors, the taxi drivers outside the Howrah station may turn out very expensive. We were asked Rs.180 for the trip to Belur Math, while we paid Rs.110 for the pre-paid taxi.

Belur Math:
Ramakrishna Mutt is a lovely tourist place more than a mutt, which is visited everyday by more than hundreds of tourist from all over the country. The location, on the banks of River Hooghly beautified the place both scenically and religiously. This being one of the prime mutts in the country did not provide me enough silence and peace to meditate for a few minutes. I enjoyed our time in the museum with Prachi, who had better information on this cult more than what we had. Mandir and Museum are open till 11.30 A.M. Book shop is open till 12.00 Noon. We had a quick religious dip in the river, which is nothing more than dipping the feet and showering few drops on the head. As soon as I saw the river, there was a flash of the picture of the crystal clear River Ganges at Haridwar, where I and my father had the same religious dip before 4 years. River Ganges, the divinest of the river flowing in this country is polluted so much that it is so turbid like drainage at this place, where it is going to lose its magnificent individuality and mix into the macrocosm of Bay of Bengal.

Belur Math to Howrah Station:
From 12 noon till 6 in the evening, there were no trains from Belur Math station to Howrah station and the station looks deserted except for a few stray dogs and few youngsters. With sheer interest we boarded a city bus to reach Howrah station. The ticket fare was Rs.6.00. More than the ticket fare, the ticket was interesting. It was a waste paper, meaning it had some prints in it which were not relevant to the ticket. It was of very small size compared to the tickets in other places of India. It clearly gave an indication that it is being reused. I had to turn the ticket few times, either side, to understand the amount printed on the ticket. Should I infer anything about the theory of communism? I m still not clearly answered!!! We had to stand all the way, while the bus fled along the small, dense galis of north Kolkata. I had a chance to have a look at the normal public, closely. There were few young girls around 12 years of age sitting near me, who to my astonishment were gesturing notoriously mature by rubbing gutkha, chewing and spitting it as and when the bus stopped. All of us were totally hungry, as we skipped our morning breakfast. Hema could not stop herself from opening a packet of biscuit and munching some while standing in the bus itself.

National Library:
As soon as we dropped in the bus station which is adjacent to the Howrah station, we rushed to Restaurant Comesum at the entrance of New Howrah station, which we had noticed on the very first day while we were on the way to Santiniketan. It was fully crowded, where my companions had to stand and eat un-willingly, as their legs were paining. But these are un-avoidable in travel.

After a nominal lunch, we took a taxi to the national library at Alipore. We went through the new bridge paying a toll of Rs.10. For the first time during our stay, we saw some decent areas, while we traversed through the A.N.C Bose Road. The library is located in a very vast campus. The old and the new library building are so elevated to give a majestic look. We had to get permission right from the security as we were not members of the library. After entering, we talked to the chief librarian to get permission to browse through the catalogue. Catalogue itself is a huge collection. Citizens of Kolkata are so gifted to have such a library.

College Street:
We took a taxi to reach College Street cutting across the heavy traffic, not as though in Bangalore where we live. College Street is a hamlet of small cottage book shops, which sell old and few new books. This is one of the most visited and a well known place among the educational but not necessarily intelligent community. The shops were separated according to the subjects of the books sold by them. It would be a waste to roam around without knowing what to buy, as every shop-keeper would literally pull you. Moreover searching without a subject title would be tougher. Most of the books were related to study in colleges and universities. I purchased few books on history, while Hema bought some for her school and Prachi bought the controversial book of Taslima Nasreen. Yeah! Everything was at a very cheap price.

New Market:
Travel with girl companions and without shopping is mere unpleasant. Of course for them! I did not want them to take an unpleasant memory with them. We went to the new market near Esplanade in the evening. This is a shopping area, with a whole lot of shops mostly related to cloth under one roof. We purchased few sarees, dress materials and an artful leather hand bag. On the way back to our hotel, we purchased around 50 rosagullas in three mud pots, from the very famous K. C. Das at Esplanade. We had our dinner at the same South Indian Hotel Kamal. But this time we had Punjabi food which was also decent.

Dawn of Day4 in Kolkata:
We vacated the room early in the morning. Every servant in the hotel, from room boy(s) to lift operator were behind us for tip. Even after paying enough of tip, the hotel was affordable when compared to other hotels of its kind. We boarded the bus for Kolkata Darshan, along with our entire luggage, to the surprise of other passengers. It was little bit of discomfort for us to sit with luggage squeezed in the leg space. We started our journey at 9.00 A.M, the so called 8.30 A.M in India.

Belur Math and Dakshineshwar:
Most of the public buildings / places like Raj Bhavan, Eden Gardens, Writer’s building and High Court were shown from the bus. Few of the passengers got restless and inquired whether all places shall be shown from the bus or shall we get time to go around. Our next stop was Belur Math, which we had visited yesterday. From here we were taken to Dakshineshwar via a bridge over river Hooghly, loaded with heavy traffic. We had to waste an hour sitting in the bus due to traffic. There was a huge crowd of devotees at the Kali temple at Dakshineshwar, as it was a Saturday of Poush Mahina. We fortunately got a glance of the goddess.

Jain temple and Kolkata Panorama:
Our next stop was Jain Temple, which was closed as we were little late due to the traffic jam and delay caused by few fellow passengers at Dakshineshwar. We had to enjoy it from outside the main gate. This is one of the best places that we saw during this entire travel. But this does not seem to be a famous tourist attraction. We were taken next to Kolkata Panorama. It is a kind of museum which displays the proud facts of Kolkata and Bengal. It displays the contribution of Bengal to the Indian Freedom Struggle, Indian art and Film industry.

St. Pauls Cathedral and Nethaji Bhavan:
We were given a break of 45 minutes near Esplanade for Lunch. We had a stomach filling but not very delicious lunch at Krishna Vilas in Jawaharlal Nehru Road. Finishing our lunch, we visited St. Pauls Cathedral. It was a good construction from inside. But we were not given enough time as we had few more interesting places to be seen. From here, we went to Nethaji Bhavan, which is the place where where Nethaji Subhash Chandra Bose lived. This is now made into a museum displaying Nethaji’s artifacts. This part of Kolkata, which is the geographical south of the city, seems too posh compared to other parts.

Kalighat:
At last we were taken to the religiously and etymologically famous place, “The Kalighat”, the abode of “Kali – The Fierce Hindu Goddess”. On the way we were shown Victoria Memorial. We could not go inside as it was nearing the closure time. Few passengers got down here itself to get a closer look of Victoria Memorial.

Kalighat was a very nasty and crowded place, where every other pujari lures to get his pocket filled by doing some pooja or at least by taking the devotee inside the shrine by-passing the snake wound queue. After suffocating stand in the queue for few minutes, we reached the place from where the deity was supposed to be seen. With so many crowds of pujaris in the garba-griha like structure, nothing except the color of their attire in the mist of smoke was seen. I was dejected as I was not able to see the depiction of Fierce Kali in Kalighat, which is synonymous to fear. Even my mother and grand-mother told us not to go to Kalighat, especially because Hema might get frightened.

Return to Bangalore:
As it was getting late and dark, we informed the guide that we are leaving by our own. As we started walking out of the shrine the power went off, which is not a very infrequent scenario in India. We got very nervous as it was so crowded and we were to find our way to the bus in the dark. But I would attribute this nervousness to the hype of fearsome facts narrated with Kalighat. After some confusion about the roads, we finally reached the bus, where our luggage were stationed. Dragging our luggage, we walked a few distance, from where we got a taxi which took us to Howrah station, quite far way.

We had enough time to relax and get refreshed in the waiting room on the second floor of Howrah station. We had a glimpse of Kolkata at night, taking few snaps of the Howrah bridge. Prachi and Hema had their dinner at Comesum, while I was made the watchdog for the luggage. I had to prefer railway caterer’s food to the Comesum’s delicacies. We had a tamil family settled in Mysore as our co-passengers with 3 kids of different age, which made the journey more interesting. As the next day passed by, Prachi and Hema were feeling un-comfortable health-wise. Prachi skipped her dinner, while I and Hema had the so called Vegetable Biriyani, only to find that Hema got sicker. She started vomiting and we had to end up with our own medication before sleep. Thankfully while Hema was getting worse, we reached Bangalore next morning.

Unfortunately, Hema had to skip her school for the next few days before getting well and travel back to Erode. I happily took the roshgollas for my office colleagues to relish and found that they were rotten. Sunay, my manager and Bhupesh could not restrain themselves from eating a little bit of it and confirming that it is not edible :)

Important Facts:

(*) Wednesday Holiday @ Santiniketan

(*) Pick up van for Hotel Cameliais available at Bolpur station

(*) Hotel Camelia is far from Viswa Bharathi Campus

(*) Few cheap hotels in Kolkata has Common toilet facility

(*) Frequent local trains not available to Belur math

(*) Belur and Belur Math are 2 different railway stations

(*) All express trains and south bound trains are from New howrah station

(*) All local trains and north bound trains are from Old Howrah station

(*) New Howrah station and old Howrah station are seperated by Yatri Nivas. They are not connected from inside

(*) Bus Station is adjacent to railway station

(*) Ferry ghat is opposite to station

(*) Pre-paid taxis are available in front of the station

(*) Hotel Broadway - http://business.vsnl.com/broadway

(*) Info on Santiniketan - http://www.wb.nic.in/westbg/shanti.html

(*) West Bengal Tourism - http://www.wbtourism.com

(*) Hotel Camellia, Pranthik, Santiniketan, Bolpur

Tel: 91-03463-54778/ 55044/ 55043 Fax: 91-03463-55044

Meanings of other language words used:
(*) Aloo Paratha - A special kind of roti made with potato stuffing.

(*) Roti - Indian bread made of wheat flour.

(*) Poori - Unleavened, deep fried indian bread.

(*) Sabzi - Side dish mostly made of potato as main ingredient, to be had with roti or poori.

(*) Thepla - A special Gujarati roti made of wheat flour and fenugreek leaves.

(*) Pori / Murmure / Mamra / Muri - Puffed rice, used as snacks in India.

(*) Bhelpuri / Jalmuri - Street snack mostly popular in north India, made of Puffed rice, chopped onion, tomato, small poori, chillis, sweet and savour sauce, corriander leaves. The composition and ingredients vary across the country.

(*) Poush - 9th month of Bengali calender.

(*) Mela - Gathering or Village fair.

(*) Rickshaw-wala - Person pulling or pedalling cycle rickshaw in the context of this text. It can also be a person driving auto-rickshaw.

(*) Pani-puri / Gol-gappe - A very famous street snack made of small puri filled boiled and salted potatos along with savour and sweet water made of tamarind and dates.

(*) Dosawala - Person who makes and sells dosa. Dosa is a south Indian stapple food made of rice batter.

(*) Bazaar - shopping place or a market, usually congested.

(*) Samosa - A cone shaped snack made of boiled and cooked potatoes covered by a layer of maida and fried in oil.

(*) Darshan - Literally means "To see". It is commonly used to refer the vision of God or the deity in temples.

(*) Gali - Very narrow street.

(*) Prashad - Food offered to God as per hindu tradition and consumed by the devotees after the prayer.

(*) Mataji - Literally it means mother. It is used to refer Cheif female saint in hindu religion.

(*) Chawal - Boiled rice. Stapple food of south India.

(*) Dal - Liquid side dish usually taken with Roti or Chawal, made of grams most often Bengal gram.

(*) Madir - Temple or Hindu's Worship place.

(*) Gutkha - Crushed betal nut with small amount of stimulant, which is highly addictive and a known cause of oral cancer.

(*) Pujari - A hindu priest in the temple who does religious rituals.

(*) Pooja - A hindu religous ritual.

(*) Garba-griha - The location in the temple where the statue of the deity is placed.

2006-10-06T08:09:00.000+05:30

Trip to Mysore, Shravanbelagola, Halebid and Belur:
(02, 03 Sept 2006)

Day 1
Departure from Bangalore
My wife Prachi, my in-laws and I, set of in a TATA Indica on a Saturday morning for a weekend trip to Mysore, Shravanbelagola, Halebid and Belur. Even though, my wife and I know that, the trip would not be as lively as our previous trips, where we were alone, we were enthusiastic. The reason I say ‘not lively’ is because of the generation gap between my in-laws and we both. We started of early in the morning at 6.15 AM to avoid traffic of Bangalore. I always like to sit in the front seat of the car, as I have the opportunity to view all the sides and I was fortunate this time also. I sat along side our driver Raju who happened to be our travel guide at few places.

As we were going through the roads of Jayanagar during that pleasant morning, guarded by dense, shady, old greens, sun trying to show its mighty presence in between these greens, I developed a suspicion whether Bangalore was so beautiful. We had to reject the beautiful sense of chillness touching our skins, the pleasant morning breeze soothing our nostrils and I particularly had to miss out the visual and mystical beauty (the window beside me was very scratchy), as my father-in-law asked the driver to switch on the air conditioner. Further as we traveled from Bhanshankari to Mysore road, we had a chance to appreciate that Bangalore is a mountainous terrain at a decent altitude (~900m).

4 lane (2+2) highway starts 20 Km from Bangalore. We were able to drive un-interrupted at a speed of 90 to 100 Km/Hr. Indian government had admirably focused in the development of transport infrastructure in this decade. Good work!

Breakfast
We had to break our journey for 45 minutes, just after Ramanagaram, as the hunger bell struck my stomach (my in-laws, rather Gujarathis are not used to have breakfast). It was a very decent, not very costly restaurant, Kamat Loka Ruchi. It has a very good environment in comparison to any restaurant on the highway. It had garden, thatched roofs, tiled roofs and all variants. As we were masticating the idli and ragi dosa, I understood that this restaurant should be famous among the frequent travelers on this highway. Before idli was served to us as per our order, we saw something cylindrical, wrapped in a leaf was being served to almost all the tables. We thought it was Puttu and were tempted to have that also. Later when Idli was served we came to know that the cylindrical stuff was Idli. The idli was a special delight there. I guess, they were wrapped in palm leaf and boiled. They were served along with the palm leaf itself. This satisfying breakfast was to be followed by the very boring medicine session. My wife and I were gulping down our regular ‘Siddha’ tablets for various complications we had. As we started further, people in the back seat started dreaming, but not as Dr. Abdul Kalam had defined. The next big town was Mandya. This seemed to be like a very busy agricultural and educational hub. Lot of schools and higher educational institutions bordered the highway on both sides.

Srirangapattinam
Our next break and our first place of visit as per our plan, came 15 Km before Mysore. A diversion to the left from the highway took us to Srirangapattinam. Srirangpattinam was the capital of the prodigious warrior of ancient Colonial India and the nightmare of British Empire, ‘The tiger of Mysore, Tipu Sultan’. This was a old, little village with the ruins of ancient pieces of architecture here and there. It brought me the memories of my native place, as this little village was analogous to the small chettinad villages.

Nimishambha Temple
There were many ruined, half-ruined living places and rose gardens along side of the small village road which took us to the Nimishambha temple. This was not in our trip chart. This was introduced into our trip route by our driver guide Raju. This temple was not architecturally famous. I believe it should be a famous religious place for people around this place. This temple lies on the shore of the river Cauvery. As my in-laws went to pray, we were enjoying this sight of the river, which is not possible in our day to day life. It was not a new sight to me, as I had been to many such places where a coconut and green fields sandwich the river. But Prachi was very much excited. She was full of kiddish joy, dipping her legs in the flow of water.

Sangam
From here, our guide suggested us to visit the ‘Sangam’, which was also not in our places to visit. This place was very calm when we went there. Three rivers, Cauvery north branch, south branch and Loka Pavani united here. Hence the place is called Sangam. As can be seen in any river bank, a Hindu pujari was conducting Tarpan, a Hindu ritual. There were small handmade canoes called “Parisal” in tamil, available for a trip at a nominal charge of Rs.20 per person. Prachi was so interested for a trip on the canoe, even I internally. But I refused, thinking of the fact that we should reach Chamundi hills before 1 O’Clock noon.

Gumbaz
On the way back, we halted to visit Gumbaz. This was the first place that we visited, as per our trip plan. Gumbaz was a place where Tipu, his parents and several others are sleeping eternally. Gumbaz was built by Tipu. It had the cenotaphs of Tipu’s father Hyder Ali, mother Fakr-Un-Nisa and Tipu after his death. Both sides of the pathway from the old fort type entrance to the Gumbaz were maintained with garden and lawn. In addition to the 3 cenotaphs of Tipu’s family inside the Gumbaz, lot of his close family members, ministers and other administrator’s tombs were lying around the Gumbaz. The buildings around the Gumbaz were under renovation during our visit. This was built in Islamic style, with few Urdu / Persian letters engraved at some places. The side doors to the Gumbaz had art made of elephant tusk, hence protected by glass. We were told that Tipu made this door with art made of precious gems. This door was no exception. These were also looted after Tipu’s defeat. These were again fabricated with elephant tusk, as we saw now, by ‘The king of Mysore’. The inner walls of the Gumbaz were painted with Tiger stripes, as Tipu liked Tiger and he himself was baptized ‘Mysore Tiger’. The corridor of the Gumbaz had 36 granite pillars; depicting a unique reason (I remember that Hyder Ali ruled the kingdom for 36 years).

(I was so happy to see that all the ancient places under archaeological department that we visited were properly maintained. It is worth for the entrance fee collected. I would like to appreciate the Indian Archeological Department).

Tipu’s Summer Palace
Our next break was at Tipu’s Summer Palace which was on the way from Gumbaz to the Bangalore – Mysore highway.

Why is it called Summer Palace? Did those days even had summer vacation.
It was also called “Dariya Daulat”, meaning wealth of the sea. Please help me to understand why this place was named so. This was built in commemoration of victory over British in 1784 AD. It had exhibits of pictures and information on Tipu, his family, his rule as a King and his fame as a warrior. It also housed the furniture, attire, coins, swords, pistols and revolvers used during his reign. In addition to all these were the most interesting wall paintings all around, depicting processions of mughal rulers and battlefield of a battle against British.

Sri Ranganathaswamy Temple
We expected that our next destination was Chamundi Hills in Mysore, when we started off from Daria Daulat. But our guide told us that we should visit Sri Ranganathaswamy temple. This is a Vishnu temple inside the destroyed fort of Tipu. According to me, this was a very normal Hindu temple which can be visited only for religious reasons and not as a travel spot, even though there were few foreign travelers. May be our guide suggested us to visit, thinking that this will be of interest to my in-laws. The weather being so hot than normal was not favoring us. By this time I started feeling tired. We had a tender coconut each, leaving my father-in-law. I always believe in having a tender coconut while traveling long distances in hot weather. The tender coconuts were cheaper than Banglore, costing Rs.8 each.

Chamundeswari Temple
We reached Chamundeshwari temple at the right time before closing. This was located in a small hill near Mysore. As our driver was experienced in these areas, we didn’t have much trouble reaching there. This was maintained as a plastic-free zone (All the shops sold wafers, gutkas all in plastic packs). A big statue of Rakshas (Hindi word for Devil) welcomed us at the entrance. I waited in the small shelter in front of the temple, to avoid removing my shoes, while my in-laws and wife went inside the temple to pray. From the 7 storied temple tower, I understood that this belonged to Hoysala’s period. This temple was of Godess Durga’s incarnation Chamundi to demolish the evil Mahishasura. On the way down the hill there was huge monolith statue of Nandi (Shiva’s bull as per Hindu Mythology).

Nap Time
The day was so hot, making us tired in half a day. As we got down the Chamundi hills, our search for Hotel Dasaprakash (793, Sardar Patel Road , Gandhi Square, Mysore - 570 001, Ph: 0821-2442444) where we had booked rooms for our stay, started. It was the right time to have lunch. As soon as we reached the hotel, we had our lunch. Lunch was not bad. The hotel was a decent and classical, even though not very impressive in modern terms. It was located in the heart of the city with immense free space for parking and greenery. It had very old buildings, but neatly maintained. The rooms were enough comfortable, with neat bedding, clean bath and toilet. We had a little nap till 3.30 PM.

Mysore Palace
We continued our trip after coffee at 4.00 PM. First, we went to the Mysore palace. This was built by Krishnraja Wodiyar in 1890’s, at a cost of 40 lakhs, taking 15 years. Ah!!! It was an architectural beauty, which aesthetically touches everyone’s heart at the first sight. There were a lot of shops and vendors welcoming at the entrance. A nominal entrance fee was collected which is worth to pay as a contribution to maintain such a mammoth, ancient beauty. We had no chance of capturing this place for future memories, as the camera was not allowed. From the entrance to exit, our eyes were wide open by the surprise provided by this splendor. I don’t find enough words to explain and even if I try, it would run to pages. There were paintings of the ancient days on the walls. The specialty that was found in one of the paintings was that, the bullock looks into the viewer from any side the viewer looks at. There were elephants and camels available to take the travelers for a ride around the palace. The entire palace was gorgeous.

Brindavan Garden
Our next stop was 15 kms from Mysore - Brindavan Gardens, one of the old gardens in India. An unbelievable incident happened on the way to the garden. In one of the main roads of around the palace, one traffic constable stopped us. We were afraid that we were losing time, because we were told that after 6 PM the entry to Brindavan Gardens is denied. I thought it is one of those normal checking to find some fault and earn few pennies, but I was astounded with the happening. The constable explained the driver and the inspector that, our cab crossed the yellow line in the middle of the road. The driver was saying that our cab didn’t cross and defending that there was no fault from his side. Immediately, the constable took the camcorder and shown us the picture of our cab crossing the yellow line and violating the traffic rules. It went on as usual, with driver justifying his act and all. Finally the police warned and let us free. But the camcorder part of the scene was something unexpected from the Indian traffic police, in Mysore.

We continued our travel, reaching Brindavan Gardens at the dusk. This garden lies adjacent to the Krishnaraja Sagar dam on river Cauvery. There was a huge crowd. The lighting of the garden begins normally at 7.00 PM and lasts till 8.55 PM. I understood that everyone at this point of time, didn’t want to go back without watching the beautiful lighting. Hence the traffic was one way. At the entrance was a tall guy, who seemed to earn his livelihood, using the gift of God (height), for posing with visitors. I had to attend my stomach’s call with something to munch, as I didn’t provide him with milk in the evening. We except my father-in-law, took Aloo vada and Bhel Puri. It was a normal garden alongside the dam (like the one in Mazhampuzha). I was not much interested while my wife was very much. I felt that the Lalbagh near my home (one of the big botanical gardens in India) was much better than this one. It had a big channel of water flowing from top of the garden with very colourful lighting. We climbed to the top. As my in-laws were waiting for the lighting, my wife and I went further up to see the magnificent dam and it catchment area. It had so much water like an ocean due to heavy rains last month. We came down rejoicing the colorful lighting.

As we were approaching the entrance, my wife wanted to go to the other side of the garden separated by a water channel. There were boat services and a kilometer wide bridge connecting the two gardens. Her father and I rejected the idea as it was already 8 PM, her parents were tired and it would take another hour for us to leave. She kept insisting strongly and finally was so disappointed to board the cab instead of boat. She was so silent to show her disagreement. But we had no reason to reject her idea except for time. Finally her father broke the ice on the way back, saying sorry and justified the act. I was looking for a good restaurant in the city to have dinner, as my wife was not satisfied with the lunch we had in the hotel where we stayed. But we didn’t come across any good one before we reached the hotel, disappointing my wife again. We wanted to have something different. So, in addition to the normal dosa, we ordered for a new dish “Guliyappa”. It took a long time to arrive. During the course of our dinner, we were discussing about our next day, rather my father-in-law was telling us how he wanted the next day to be. As it was getting late for our special dish to arrive, my in-laws took leave. Then my wife consoled me that her father was not like this before and it was due to age. Agreeing to that we completed the new dish, as the waiter explained us how to make the dish.

Day 2
Departure from Mysore
We had a good sleep the previous night due to lot of traveling. We had our breakfast in the same hotel, settled the expenditures and set off at 7.30 AM. Our next stop was very near by inside the city limits. My in-laws wished to visit Sri Ramakrishna Mutt, which we noticed yesterday on the way to Brindavan Gardens. Mutt was so beautiful, and filled with nature and peace in the early morning. After spending few minutes here, we set off again in the same direction as of Brindavan Gardens.

We took village roads as they are shorter. There were a lot of state transport buses with banners of Mrs. Sonia Gandhi and few state congress leaders running in the opposite direction. We were even put to think that entire state transport buses were diverted here. Later we came to know that there was a congress meeting in Bangalore that day attended by Mrs. Sonia Gandhi.

The roads were very poor at few places and worst after K R Nagar till Hampapura due to rain. Roads were under construction. After this was a good 2 lane highway. One thing that impressed me during this entire trip was the quality of roads. Except for few patches during this session the rest of the roads were so good that it was easy to travel at a speed of 100 Km/Hr. This was an impossible speed few years back on Indian roads. I m happy that India is developing, rather Indian roads are developing irrespective of the ruling party, especially after the last BJP rule when Golden Quadrilateral and other such express highway projects were initiated. Apart from the roads, almost the entire region was dry and barren, with less vegetation and poor development. For long stretches there were no big towns. I saw people still ploughing very small areas of their land manually, near Doranahalli. I wondered whether the development of this state is limited only to few places like Bangalore, Mangalore, Mysore, Hubli and Belgaum, concentrating a lot on IT centres, leaving rest of the state behind.

Sharavanbelagola
After our driver had his breakfast at Holenarisipura, we took a diversion to the right from the highway to Shravanbelagola. This was road was again a very poor village metal road, filled with agricultural lands and coconut farms on both sides. Betel trees were in abundance in this region which I used as a botanical sample to show my wife. There was no traffic at all, except for the share autos running between villages. After more than half and hour of travel on this road, we reached Bangalore – Mangalore national highway when I came to know that Sharavanbelagola was not anywhere in those village roads. From here we had to travel another 11 Km to reach the exact place. The roads and the place were well maintained with lot of sign boards on hotels and the monolithic statue. We got down just at the entrance of the hill. It was a steep rocky hill over which was a Jain temple with a huge monolithic statue of Lord Gomateshwara with a height of 18m. Footwear was not allowed on top of the hill. Sun was scorching as we reached this place. We got a pair of socks for my wife with which she can climb without getting her foot burnt. My in-laws denied not to come up, seeing the height of the hill. My mother-in-law was in dilemma, but decided to sit back. My wife and I started cimbing with enthusiasm which was lost after 200 steps. My wife as usual, didn’t have stamina and lost all her energy when 100 steps were left to be climbed. She sat in a shelter where many people were resting. I had to encourage her for at least 10 to 15 minutes to make her climb the rest of the hill. We faced the same situation when we climbed Gaumukh in Mount Abu, year back as a newly married couple. That scene was flashing in my mind. The top of the hill had a temple, with Lord Gomateshwara in nude standing posture, surrounded by 24 Thirtankaras. We were unable to appreciate this statue as it was covered by scaffolding and cleaning was in progress, leaving few parts of the statue exposed. My wife was telling me that, the Shiva statue in Bangalore (Airport road) was more beautiful than this. I had no chance of visiting that temple till then. Still I tried to convince her that this is a monolithic statue, where as that would have been made of brick and cement, which was much easier, compared to this. Even though I understood that the symmetry was to be appreciated in this piece of architecture, I was not entirely impressed by this ancient architecture.

We started to return back in the same route on our way to Belur and Halebid. We had our lunch at Channarayapatna in a restaurant which seemed to be the best in that small town. We had the so called north Indian meal in the so called air conditioned room without A/C.

Halebid
We reached Halebid via Hassan. Everyone in the car was fast asleep as soon as we set off from Channarayapatna except driver and me in the front. The hilly terrain landscape after Hassan, was so aesthetic. It was covered with green all over. The weather enhanced this beauty. We took a diversion from highway to a village road at Heggere. Halebid was a remote place 10Km from highway, where there was nothing except the monument. As soon as we reached Halebid, it started showering. My wife and my in-laws enjoyed the shower along with tea in a small mobile tea shop, while I had tender coconut. As we were approaching the entrance, the shower turned to be a heavy downpour. Our experience in Bangalore for the last 6 months, made us bring the umbrella with us. My in-laws protected them with that umbrella, while my wife and I enjoyed the touch of rain water. We continued further without caring much for the rain.

Halebid was once the capital city of Hoysalas. The temple monument here was a display of the Hoysala architecture. This was built in 12th and 13th century. The temple wall had miniature art sculptures of various things like dancing girls, Gods, Goddesses, war scenes, animals etc.., and similar work beautified the inner walls and roof tops. There were 2 garbhagrihas for Lord Shiva and 2 Nandis outside the shrine. Almost 80 percent of the sculptures on the outer wall were destroyed during the invasions. There were statues of Ganesha and Gomateshwara on the periphery. There was also a collection of statues, pictures and antiques on the side of the temple, which lies unnoticed by visitors.

Belur
It was already nearing dusk as we finished around Halebid. We were in hurry to reach Belur. In the next half an hour, we reached the Channakesava temple in Belur. Belur seemed to be a big town and gateway to the mountain towns in the Western Ghats.
Belur was a similar architectural work as Halebid displaying Hoysala style. This was a big Vishnu temple. It had a big courtyard in the front. There was a tall pillar (about 40 ft) just placed without cementing or any other holding structure. The art and sculptures were intact and un-destroyed, unlike Halebid. This was a superset of Hoysala art work. The garbhagriha and the platform on which garbhagriha was located, was star shaped. There were varieties of dancing girls with different outfits. Various avatars of Vishnu, Various mythical stories were explained by sculptures. Row of identical elephants was displayed all around the outer wall of the garbhagriha. Inside the temple were many different pillars. Each pillar amazed me, as they were grinded as if lathe were invented centuries back.

Both these places made us think that not only the architect of those days was skillful, but also the workforce. Each workman should have added value by his own, in addition to the ideas of the chief architect. The entire work is a proof of this fact. This is another architectural work of ancient India, to be seen by any traveler interested in art and architecture newly added to my list consisting of Avudaiyar Koil near Pudukkottai, Brihadeswara temple in Tanjore, Nataraja temple in Chidambaram, Temples in Kancheepuram and Kumbakkonam, Dilwara jain temple in Mount Abu, Moghul architectures in and around Delhi.

Return journey to Bangalore
We started around 6.30 PM from Belur. We had few snacks on the way, which we took along with us from home. Then, my wife and I were playing 20 questions to pass time. This is played like one person has to think of a person in mind. The other person asks 20 questions, while the first person only replies with ‘yes’ or ‘no’. After 20 questions, the other person should guess the name of the person. This was a great way of passing time till we broke our journey at 9 PM for dinner. Everyone was asleep after dinner till Bangalore. This part of the journey was at a little higher speed to reach Bangalore in time. We reached Bangalore at 11.30 PM. My in-laws were so tired that they slept immediately, while we spent few time in preparing for the next morning and slept.

We had a feeling of satisfaction that we were able to cover the entire route as we planned. The only thing we would like to do is to make a trip again to Halebid and Belur to visit the place leisurely, with guide assistance.

Note: Everything that is written above is from my perception of the things that I saw and need not necessarily agree with anyone else. The measurements are from various other sources and need not necessarily be true.

2006-08-18T12:56:00.000+05:30

Trip to Valparai:
My wife Prachi and I started by a private bus on Saturday afternoon 1.30 PM from Bangalore. As usual the traffic on the Electronics city road was moving at snails pace. This did not make any difference to us, as I was engrossed by “The Motorcycle Diaries” by Che Guevara and my wife was fast asleep. Reaching Hosur, when the bus started to run at more than its regular pace, the back tyre got punctured. It engulfed another one hour. I realized that few of the co-passengers were thanking God for this accident, as they got a break for nature’s call, after sitting 2 hours in the bitter chillness of the air conditioned bus. The driver had a good presence of mind to take diversion from the highway, NH47 and reached Dharmapuri through the village roads, with just half an hour delay. After a short bio/tea break at Salem, we proceeded further towards Coimbatore. Coimbatore, with its typical drizzle welcomed us at 10.30 PM. Getting down at Nanjappa road; we took an auto rickshaw to go to Ukkadam bus station. There are 3 bus stations in Coimbatore. The buses fleeing westward are available in Ukkadam, the buses towards Trichy, Karur flee from Singanallur, while the rest are available at Gandhipuram. A bus to Pollachi was waiting for us with a huge crowd. We started at 11.30 PM. Prachi was crushed like a luggage pack against the front windshield. I metamorphosed into a head rest for the drunken co-passenger. Even Pollachi welcomed us with drizzles at 12.30 mid night. These drizzles were nothing new to me, as I had relished such weather during my 4 years of Graduation.

We had already booked a room at Hotel Sakthi, which is ‘claimed’ to be the best hotel in Pollachi. At the reception, a shock was waiting for us. They said they can provide room only for one day. We took it lightly thinking of moving to some other hotel the next day. The room was not so bad, with so many exciting things. There was and antique metal bucket, no supply of hot water, malfunctioning heating rod, a TV with an impaired remote control tied to the wall in a measure to avoid theft. Tired out of 11 hour travel we lied on the bed and found that blanket is missing. Not wanting to disturb the house keeping guys, we slept without a blanket.

We had to attend a function and few social meetings on Sunday. To our surprise, we didn’t get accommodation in any hotel. Is Pollachi so busy with outsiders!!! I had a sprain in my neck that day. So, we made it an excuse to stay one more day at Hotel Sakthi. They were kind enough to consider my illness and extend our stay. But today we found another excitement, which disturbed ‘my’ sleep all through the night. Bed Bugs!

We woke up early on Monday morning and packed for Valparai. We boarded the cab at 8.00 AM, finishing our breakfast in Hotel Sakthi.

The weather was so excellent all through the route. I like to visit hill stations during rain. Rain is nothing new to the place. Valparai is called Cherrapunji of South. The road was so pleasant with coconut farms on both sides, running through villages with tamarind trees lining the sides of the road for first 20 Km till Aliyar. The sun was just peeping out. Beautiful sight of silvery falls on the mountain ranges reflecting the sun light. We filled fuel at a petrol pump 4 Km before Aliyar, near Kottur. This is the last fuel station on the plains. The next fuel station is at Valparai, only.

We were invited through the first forest check post at Aliyar. A fee of Rs.80 is being collected here, to visit tourist places like Balaji temple and Monkey falls. No fee is being collected for the vehicles going to Valparai.

Our next stop was at Monkey falls. We reached here at 8.30 AM. This is a small little waterfall. There were hardly 10 people in the falls as it was early for travelers. There was a heavy gush of water due to rain. It was a pleasant experience to bath both in rain and the falls, together.

We continued our trip further to Valparai, a distance of 45 Km. Valparai is a gorgeous hill station not known to many tourists, maintaining its originality intact. It is around 3500 feet above mean sea level. The route to Valparai with 40 hairpin bends consists of numerous eye-catching waterfalls all along the way. We gave a short break at Attakatti to have tea in a small Malayali Tea stall. Our driver had his break fast in a small hotel near the tea stall. Moving a kilometer further we saw an arch of the Kadamparai Power Station. We heard that this is a marvel in power generation. The entire power generation unit and the water tunnel feeding the power generation are underground. This is open only for visitors having permission from Inspector General of Police / Vigilance, Chennai. We could not enter this even though we wished to.

From here on, we got the feel of the forest. Covering the entire mountain range is the Indira Gandhi Wildlife Sanctuary. These sholas are beautiful food for eyes. This continues till the tea estates of Valparai begin to attract us more. 20 Km before Valparai the first tea estate “Waterfall estate” begins. From there on there are only the tea estates everywhere. Tea estates are another attraction of Valparai.

As we were ascending up the hill, fog started covering slowly. We were unable to see objects as close as 10 feet. It was becoming difficult to drive. We felt the necessity of fog lights. As we were enjoying this beauty, we suddenly noticed a statue which appeared to be an Englishman, standing un-cared on the side of the road. We stopped the cab to know about the statue. The statue was of “Carver Marsh”, an English man who founded this district.

After enjoying a while in the chill weather, without jacket and bare-footed we continued our journey. From this point, we started to descend the hill to reach Balaji temple, at 11.00 AM. We took a diversion 9 Km ahead of Valparai to reach Balaji temple. The vehicles are stopped well ahead of the temple near a private check post. Balaji temple is in Akkamalai, inside Periya Karumalai tea estate. This is a private property maintained by PK tea estates. We climbed the hill through the tea estate to reach the temple. We had a chance to quench our curiosity here. We tasted the tender tea leaves to recognize whether it tastes like tea. But no! It tasted like any other green leaf. Apart from our curiosity, the temple was clean, calm and peaceful. The main deity was Balaji, beautifully decorated. They maintain a garden and a small children’s park around the temple. This garden has wonderful collection of plants and flowers. There is a shop outside the temple where various kinds of tea are available. We purchased leaf tea. Believe me! They are so cheap. But we are not sure how good they. We are yet to taste!

We heard that this sanctuary is rich in its wildlife. Often there are chances to see animals like elephants, cheetah, porcupine and wild boar. We were very disappointed as we had not seen any till now. We assumed that they can only be seen during night. While returning from the Balaji temple, on the way to Valparai, we saw a lengthy, black snake crossing the road. It should be not less than 6 feet. We took break every now and then, whenever we came across a waterfall. Further down the hill, along side the road, we saw a deer. We were fascinated; as this was the first time we saw deer in the real forest. We stopped the car to get down. But the deer ran off so quick to notice. Then the driver told us that this is a special kind of goat called “Kaelai Aadu”. With this sight we were content about our trip. There were lots of Monkeys all through the route.

Again we gave a break at the 9th hairpin bend to take a look at the Aliyar catchment area. It is really amazing for people like me who had spent few years in Chennai. Surplus water!

Down the hill, we took a diversion opposite to Monkey falls, to reach Aadaliamman Koil. It is a small, un-noticed temple of a Goddess on the banks of Aliyar catchment. This can’t be reached by car. We stopped the car half way and started walking down the barren slope. We were little frightened about the wild animals, as we were all alone.

After visiting this temple, we started further to descend the hill entirely. As soon as the plain is reached, there is a beautiful ashram, “Arivu Thirukoil” or “Temple of Consciousness”. This is established by Yogiraj Vethathiri Maharishi, who is no more. We spent few time in going around thee ashram and buying few books, which were cheap but of huge value.

We finished our lunch in a small dhaba kind of hotel, which served a decent south Indian meal for Rs.15.

On the way to Pollachi, we stopped at Aliyar dam. There is a big park and a pathway above the dam to stroll around. Boating is also available. From here, we had a great, magnificent glimpse of the coconut farms stretching kilometers wide.

We reached our Hotel around 6 PM, only to pack our things for a struggled return journey to Bangalore.

It would not be ethical if I don’t mention a word about our cab driver Arumugam, who was so patient in explaining things wherever necessary and halting wherever we wanted. This was a beautiful one day’s trip to heart’s content.

Places to Stay:
Hotel Sakthi, Hotel Manis, Sitaram Lodge in Pollachi.
All costs nominal around Rs 300 to 500 for a Non A/C double room.

Travel Expenses:
Cab expense from Pollachi to Valparai (including return) – Rs.1500
Ticket for entering the Sanctuary area – Rs.80

Tips:
Fill fuel near Kottur which is the last fuel station on plains.

Get accessories like medical kit, film roll from Pollachi. I forgot to get Kodak AS400. I struggled to get it. I gave a try wherever I found a little big and decent shop all over the route. Finally, my cab driver called one of his friends who was coming up and asked to get one for me.

Plan properly and get the required permission to visit Kadamparai Power Station near Attakatti.

Plan to stay a night / travel in the night to see wildlife.

Travel lovers should plan for an adventurous trip to Athirampalli falls in Kerala, through Valparai, Sholaiyar through Chalakudi route. The route after sholaiyar is really rugged and covered by dense forests.