The Andaman Trip – Conclusion

Tags

andaman, corbyn's cove, havelock, jolly buoy, port blair, wandoor

First 2 parts here and here.

3rd day of the trip was upon us. After yet another early morning rendezvous with the rising sun, the party was having a lazy breakfast. We had started getting a hang of the tidal situation and so we were giving the ocean its own space and time to reach our beach head while we enjoyed varied styles of eggs, toasts, and tea. As is fairly well know around here, it would be a gross understatement, if I called Rathore a tea connoisseur. Rathore has what we call kaato-to-chai-nikelgi syndrome. So the morning as well as multitude of other rounds of tea drinking had to be absolutely spot on. The script went horribly wrong with the very first cup though. The problem, as Rathore dissected was the absence of real milk. They were using powdered milk. Additionally, the tea was atleast 2 boils short of the optimum. Whatever that means. So all said and done, Rathore was going to be deprived of his quality life blood for the entire stay. Needless to stay, that didn’t deter him from downing atleast a good 4 cups a day, dragging yours truly along for the tea parties, every time.

Today was an easy day, even by vacation standards. After the over enthusiasm that had been shown in our kayak+snorkel trip the prior day, today was decided as the day of doing nothing. That meant turning into dariyai ghodas and jump into the ocean two feet first. The whole day was spent in a daze of frolicking in the ocean, drying up on the hammocks in the cool sea breeze and such like. Evening we took a rickety rickshaw ride to one of the best beaches in south-east asia, Radhanagar beach. We got a little late and almost missed the sunset. I made up for the delay by clicking pictures, non stop, of the almost setting sun. And as a bonus, a full moon. A third consecutive day of full moon that is. The beach is a huge c-shaped expanse of white sand framed by the forest at three sides and the ocean on the fourth. Government has taken special care here, not allowing plastic, coconut shells and other assorted crap on the beach. By the time we came back it was pitch dark. The auto driver who ferried us back gave us tales of his upbringing here on Havelock. Short story, his net worth was more than all four of us combined and he was fairly happy in running that rickshaw to occupy himself in his free time. Where was my grandfather when people were being relocated to Andaman by the government?

It was anniversary night for Rathore and he was carved up for a lavish dinner treat. This time we walked into another so-called trip advisor top eating places, called Full Moon cafe, part of the dive india resort. The food was delicious and varied from the middle eastern , to italian, to american and what not. Best part, it was cheap. When we had initially done the budgeting for the whole trip we had kept a decent amount of 1K per head per day for food. And here we were gobbling up copious amounts of food at half or even quarter that rate. Needless to say we saved a virtual bundle on food throughout the 9 days. Day 4, we decided to come out of our shells to do some “activity”. Snorkelling was the activity of choice. This time it was a trip to Elephant beach, boasting of not one but two coral reefs oozing with sea life. I, with a minor trekking experience under my belt was egging everyone to hike our way to the beach. All such thoughts were summarily dismissed when we were informed that we had to walk through mangroves on the hike. Our fear for mangroves has already been chronicled somewhere earlier. So no hike. Instead, took a 1 and a half hour boat ride to reach elephant beach. My snorkel equipment suddenly decided to play rough and in the process I gulped down a few gallons of sea water. Not to be deterred, I kept at it off and on and still managed to catch a good amount of fishes and other assorted sea creatures frolicking. Rathore snorkelled the crap out of the place. So much so, he had to be literally dragged out of the ocean and on to the last boat. Andaman, and Havelock to be specific is a divers paradise. Infact our resort, Barefoot scuba, is known for its awesome dive programs. Why aren’t there any stories of us diving then, you may ask. And I would respond by saying we are too cool for diving. The truth is, all for us kinda chickened out on the whole thought of not being able to breathe with our nose and being a good 50ft underwater if he still decide to do so. With promises of doing it the next time, the idea of diving was summarily shelved, sine die. Day 5 was a carbon copy of day 3, in terms of not doing anything. And just like that, the last night of our stay on Havelock was upon us. I finally managed to click a customary star trail snap for the trip. We were scheduled on a 9 Am ferry back to Port Blair for Friday the 10th, our 6th day. After another round of skirmish with our luggage, we finally settled into the belly of the ship. Over the entire stay here, all four of us had decided to make a conscious effort in not using our cellphones. And barring the anniversary day when Rathore and Reedhima were manning their cellphones for wishes for a few hours, we kept at it. It was a very liberating experience. There were no watches as well, so more often than not we had no handle on the exact time of the day. It was island time all day long.

We reached Port Blair at around noon and were chaperoned to our stay for the next 2 nights, Megapode Nest Resort . This resort too was beautifully located on a hill overlooking the azure blue ocean. Ransacked the local tourist office to decide on things to do over the next 2 days in Port Blair. The food money that we had saved over the last few days was gonna come handy here for splurging on private taxis and suchlike. For the evening, we zeroed in on Corbyn’s cove & the light and sound show at Cellular Jail which we had missed on day 1. Not to sound too harsh, but Corbyn’s cove turned out to be a sorry excuse for a beach as compared to anything we had seen earlier on Havelock. After a round of disappointing nariyal paani, we headed to the Cellular jail for the famous light & sound show there. The setup was nice, and it was a packed house. But the overall show left something wanting. It was low on light effects and the material for the sound part was begging for a re-write. Rathore has promised to offer his services for the re-write part to the concerned authorities. So in the not so near future, you might still be experiencing this tepid show, all thanks to the (non) effort on the part of my dear friend Rathore.

We were not yet done with our appetite for snorkelling though, so the last and final day was to be spent at Jolly Buoy. And the whole Jolly Buoy excursion was almost scratched off, thanks to our tour organiser at The Megapode. We were supposed to board the first ferry out from Wandoor jetty to Jolly Buoy, spend a couple of hours there and be back to our resort by 3ish. Thanks to some under hand dealings, we were still standing on terra firma when all 3 of the 8 o’clock ferries shuttled out of the jetty one by one. Our driver cum chaperone, still feigning confidence that he would get us on the last 8 AM boat. Our hope slowly turned to dust as the clock struck 9 and then 9.30. After multiple rounds of yelling on the driver in person and his boss on the phone, we were put on the 10 Am ferry. Me and rathore were almost convinced on ditching the whole plan and head back to the resort for a summary thrashing of the tour organiser. But the girls insisted on going and so we simmered till we boarded the boat. Jolly Buoy is a tiny island part of the Mahatma Gandhi Marine National Park. This place is full of mangroves and we were on a constant lookout for the famed salt water crocs to make an entry. But it was not be. After a super slow-motion ferry ride, we were deposited on tiny glass bottomed boats to finish the final few hundred meters of the shallow, gaping at the beautiful view below our bottoms. More frolicking in the ocean followed. Snorkelling was bypassed in favour of another glass bottomed boat ride before being deposited back on the ferry and further on to jetty at Wandoor. With no further plans, we headed back to our resort, finally buying a pack of cards for the last and only night remaining. After a refreshing nap in the evening and some more yelling on the tour organiser, we settled down in wrap up mode.

The 2 million photos that I had clicked over the past 7 days were passed on to Rathore. Money exchanged hands as we settled the tour accounts, with the feeling of smugness all around on being way under budget. And it was finally curtains on 7 or so days well spent while we played cards into the wee hours of the last night on the islands.

Next morning, we boarded our respective flights. Me and Neha still had a whole day of Journey left, first from Port Blair to Chennai and then a Shatabdi ride from Chennai to Bangalore finally reaching home at almost 11 PM on sunday.

The last 8 days were a blur of ocean blue and too much inaction. Our burnt skin shimmering as a badge of honour to a time well spent, in spellbinding surroundings and great company.

The Andaman Trip – Part II

Tags

andaman, barefoot, havelock, travelogue

First part here.

The resort that we had booked on Havelock is called Barefoot Scuba. Its a cheaper cousin of the more famed and luxurious barefoot resort on the same island. Our booking included pick up and drop off to and from Port Blair airport, to and fro ferry tickets to havelock, pickup and drop off to the havelock jetty from the resort, complimentary 100 rs breakfast credit everyday for each individual and stay for 4 night and 5 days. We had booked a duplex sea facing cottage and a tent. The stay luxury was thanks to a friend of Rathore’s who decided to cancel and left us with the extra accommodation. So when we finally dragged our luggage up the super narrow stairs of the ship and out on the jetty at 4.30 PM, we had a jeep waiting to ferry us to our awesome abode for the next few days. The moment we could extricate ourselves from our luggage, we headed straight for the beach. A vast expanse of varied shade of the ocean blues and soft sand beneath our feet greeted us with open arms. And at that very moment I knew, that even if we don’t see a single other thing in the next 5 days, it was gonna be a great vacation.

Me and Rathore did a tour of the booze scene and generally scoped out the area to identify places to see and things to do while the girls did whatever hell girls do. Our beach was facing east, so there was no sunset to admire and I made a mental note to catch at least one sunset while I was here. (My love for sunsets has been chronicled here and here). But I had easy access to the sunrises all week-long and that was good enough. And like I said before, it was still gonna be an awesome vacation. After a bit lazing around and a sumptuous dinner of fish, fish and more fish, we turned in early for the night. It was gonna be a musical chair of sorts on who gets to sleep in the sea view cottage. The first night it was the girls. The early nights was going to be a regular fixture throughout the trip. The sea, effectively, is kinda out-of-bounds after dark and there is no nightlife so to say on Havelock.

While I have mentioned out-of-bound areas, let me digress into the perils, perceived or real, that we were facing here on the islands. Salt water crocodiles, el primo, insects of varied size and shape, fishes ranging from sharks to even cute little nemos, the fear of drowning and claustrophobia under-water while being an expert swimmer, over enthusiasm in boldly going where no man has gone before, in the sea and on land and mangroves for the fear of, you guessed it right, crocs again. I would refrain from disclosing the source for each of these life-threatning situations, and the judgement on real vs perceived, lest it leads to some embarrassing moments for all parties involved. They know who they are.

Getting back to the narrative, another routine feature, atleast for me, was early mornings. And early here means, dark outside early. Reason, the aformentioned sunrises and the urge for me to capture that one sunrise in my camera which earns me enough money to retire on one of these islands. I dedicated a good 5 mornings in this quest of mine. Needless to say, the quest continues. I cajoled neha and Rathore into getting up early atleast for the first morning. A strange sight awaited me though, as I made my way to the beach that first morning. The ocean which was lapping at our feet last evening was a good 100 meters back exposing a vast expanse of scattered rocks, small puddles of salt water and a vast stretch of walkable beach of sort. I was immediately reminded of tales of the receding sea which preceded the Indian Ocean Tsunami of 2004. I shook my head from side to side to clear out such rogue thoughts before setting up my tripod and clicking away to my heart’s content. The receding sea it turns out is due to the severe tidal activity that these areas experience. The water had already started its unstoppable march towards the shore by the time we finished our breakfast. While the sea water was doing its job of reaching us, we booked ourselves on an afternoon kayak+snorkel trip to the lighthouse on one of the edges of Havelock. In lieu of the afternoon snorkel trip we picked up our gear early and made merry of it over the next few hours before lunch. The non-swimmer that Rathore is,he was apprehensive at first. A few pro tips from your truly and he had taken like fish to the sea. Over the next few days, more often than not, he was found floating on the surface of the water, belly up, ears underwater, eyes closed and looking extremely blissful.

The different shades of water and the prior knowledge of the shallowness of the general area allowed us to venture deep into the sea while still being able to walk in chest high water if the need be. We 3 snorkeled to our hearts content, while Neha decided to save her energy for the actual snorkel trip later in the day. Afternoon saw us jetty bound to kayak our way out to the lighthouse. To the girls utter disbelief, the kayaks were all single seaters. Which meant they would have to pedal their own kayaks to and from the lighthouse instead of bossing us guys around to be faster and yelling to watch the direction of the kayak in a twin while doing little or no pedaling of their own. I was happy and concerned. Happy for the freedom I would have in pedaling this way and that without being yelled at. Concerned looking at the puny arms of my dear wife who already looked exhausted from just hauling her kayak into the water. As a precaution I asked our guide to keep some rope lest Neha decides to take it easy, and I would still be able to tow her back. We were provided a bottle of water and a packet of biscuits each and off we went into the open ocean water. Once on the water, Neha started looking at ease. She was slow but comfortable. I brought up the rear of our little armada of 5 kayaks boldly going where atleast a few hundred people have gone before. We play it safe that way. It took us a good hour to reach the lighthouse where we parked our kayaks on a pebble and rock strewn beach. Rathore, the fish that he had become, went straight for the snorkelling. The rest followed suit. In our morning snorkel excursions on the beach, we had come across a few fishes, hidden amongst the rocks, dead coral and underwater shrubbery. But that, in no way, compared to what we were about to witness now. Just a few meters off the beach the bottom of the sea disappeared into an explosion of colour, both in the form of fishes and corals.

The idea of snorkelling is a simultaneously terrifying yet exciting prospect. The ability to breath under water opens up a new and vast set of possibilities in terms of observing the underwater world. While the same ability to breath under water only using a tube stuck out of your mouth while your nose is effectively in a vacuum, conjures up thoughts that nightmares are made of. I have had the opportunity to experience both sides of this astounding activity earlier when me and Neha snorkeled in the middle of a rough ocean in our prior travels. This time it was easy pease. The water was calm and the view underwater spell binding. I literally swam through a school of green-blue fish while looking at scores of corals in varied colors, sea cucumbers, fishes of varying colour and sizes from miniature to fairly huge, sea urchins and multitude of creatures I couldn’t even recognize. The guide called us back a little too early for our journey back to the jetty. The sun was setting and it would get dark fairly quickly. Snorkelling is a singularly divine experience once you can look past the fears. Your head is under water while a life jacket keeps your body right at the water surface. You put your hands behind your back like you are taking a stroll in the park, except the park is an open ocean and instead of watching sweaty out-of shape bodies flapping their way around the jogging track you see millions and millions of sea creatures doing what sea creatures do. Instead of the chaotic noises of children playing you hear only the sound of your breathing, whisssh-whooosh and feel a calm descend upon you.

The return kayak ride was far more exciting, leaving us wanting more of the same. Neha took an early lead reaching almost the half way mark with the guide before taking it easy all the way back to the jetty. That allowed the rest of us to set our own pace in catching up with the front of the pack. At one point, I pulled in my pedal and had a couple of biscuits and a swig of water in the middle of the ocean, perched in a plastic raft with deep water bellow my bottom, while the sun set behind us in a canopy of trees. Profound experience!

Chatted up our guide to know a little bit about the place in general and his lifestyle in particular. Interesting conversation. We proceeded to purchase our booze quota for the week from the only liquor shop on the whole of havelock island while waiting for a rick to take us back to our resort. The fish food mania had already started to wane, much to the delight of the only vegetarian in our group, Rathore. Gave him ample opportunity to mock the non-vegetarian credentials of the rest of us. So dinner was simple vegetarian food and early lights out followed. It was the turn of Rathore family to occupy the coveted sea view cottage.

The next few days on Havelock to follow including a dual snorkelling trip…

The Andaman Trip – Part 1

Tags

andaman, havelock, nicobar, travelogue

Its been a good 2 weeks since I have returned from the islands, Andaman & Nicobar islands that is. And it has taken almost that long for my body to shrug out of the general lethargy that this relaxing trip had cast on me. Now that I am out of the stupor, invigorated in no small measure by the trip photos that I posted on facebook today, it feels like the perfect time to look back and chronicle the shit out of this thing.

This one was a long time in making. In fact so long ago did we book our travel arrangements that the islands shifted a few meters away from mainland India during that time. This was going to be a leisure vacation. Like there is any other kind and as if I have done anything apart from lazing in any of the prior ones. But for tags sake, this was leisure. The plan was to start on Friday night from Bangalore’s Yeshwantpur railway station on an overnight train to Chennailand. Partake in some site seeing around Chennai on Saturday and fly out to Port Blair in the wee hours on Sunday morning. Here, Mr Rathore & his lovely bride of one year were to join me and my lovely wife of 5 years to proceed to the time of our lives in all of 6 days. I will get to the return plans in the course of this narration.

Lets rewind back now to Yeshwantpur railway station on the night of Feb 3rd. It had been long since I had taken a train journey. All recent journeys have either been on the road or through the air, all thanks to yours truly’s love for driving and time constraints respectively. So both me & Neha were a little giddy with excitement. Neha more so. Infact so much more that she was taking pictures of the train, like a bloody firangi. Dear lady, its the Chennai express, not the bullet train said I, while promptly posing for dreamy snaps in front of our bogey. We finally settled down into our 2 respective upper berths and were fast asleep even before the train pulled out of the station. Morning greeted us with the musty smell of fish being unloaded from the train and the Chennai central station in all its morning glory. We headed straight for our hotel in a pre-paid rick. The joy was shortlived though as the rickshaw driver promptly lost his way just before the hotel. Neha flexed her tamil muscles and asked around for directions to passer bys, wielding her right fist with the thumb up, full tambi style. I was proud to the point of tears. Checkin accomplished, we decided to continue where we left off on our beauty sleep from the train. It helped that our room was completely devoid of any natural light. It was pitch black in our room at 9 AM in the morning when my body finally deciphered that something was not quiet right here. Shook Neha out of her slumber and headed for the complimentary breakfast spread. After hogging on copious amounts of idli, dosa, chutney and most importantly sambhar, we discussed our plans for the day over a cup of filter coffee. The plan was to skip Chennai and head out to Mahabalipuram or Mamallapuram, as it is now called, and if time permits come back to one of the multitude of malls doting Chennai. A full day cab was hired and we were hurtling towards the east coast road by noon in the cool confines of our wheels. After shelling atleast a few gazillion rupees on toll, the driver veered off the ECR towards the town of Mahabalipuram. A few entry tickets later, we found ourselves in the presence of some beautiful rock carvings besides the sea. The sea was summarily ignored for now, smug in the knowledge that we would be living and breathing nothing but that over the next 6 days. The whole mahabalipuram temple complex is a World Heritage Site, meaning its a little more cleaner and well maintained than any other random temples and architectural ruins. A little bit of history of the place here. My camera shutter was firing all cylinders trying to capture all possible nooks and crevices of the long lost artist’s vision in soft sandstone. A small incident just outside the shore temple, reminded me of the touristification of the whole place. We were having some coconut water and I took out my camera to click a photograph of the coconut vendor in action. I was promptly informed that it would be 20rs a snap. I eased the finger on my shutter release button and drank my coconut water in utter silence stealing glances with my wife.

After the shore temple and the pancha rathas it all started to look the same though. Beautiful , but repetitive, so we decided to pass on Arjuna’s Penance and headed back to Chennai after a short stop at another roadside monolith called Tiger Cave. Rest of the ride was spent snoozing in the backseat after directing the driver to one of the umpteen malls in Chennai. This one, Chennai central, had a rooftop eating area with views of the Chepauk, marina beach and the rest of the sprawling city of Chennai. Hogged down some random McD burgers in the cool rooftop breeze before heading back to the hotel. Dinner was early and simple. The airport drop early next morning was complimentary with our hotel stay and we decided to call it an early night in anticipation of the awesomeness of the next few days.

The 2 and half hour flight to Port Blair on Sunday, the 5th of February, was uneventful until we were almost above Andamans when the azure blue of the sea started to get punctuated with blobs of green islands. We were finally there. Walked into a tiny military turned to civilian airport terminal and secured our luggage. It was now time to wait for the remaining tour party, namely Rathore and his better half, to arrive. There was nothing outside the gates so we decide to wait out the next 2 hours or so in the baggage claim area. Parked ourselves on the only seating inside and before any security guard could kick us out, I was snoring my way to glory. Opened my eyes, a good hour and a half later, to the sight of a landing plane, which on further enquiry was confirmed as the flight from Delhi. Rathore’s flight. After the customary welcome hugs and snarkycomments on the amount of luggage being carried by both parties, we were packed into a white ambassador to be deposited in a waiting area before our 2 and a half hour ferry ride, at 2 PM, to Havelock Island. It was only 10.30 AM right now, so we decided to satiate our hungry stomachs before taking a stab at visiting the cellular jail. The females were already starting to grumble about the length of our stay in Port Blair, no thanks to the hype being doled out by our airport chaperon. The familiar cries of “you didn’t research enough and we are now going to stay too long at the wrong place” were ringing in my ears while I was gulping down mini-idlis by the dozen at Annapurna, one of the top rated eating place in Port Blair. With express instructions to return back by 12.15 , 12.30 & 12.45, hailed in a couple of ricks for a 20rs ride to cellular jail and immediately felt something was amiss when we saw the deserted look worn by the place. Rathore’s manhoos kismat had decided to make a comeback in my life. The damn place was closed for the day, thanks to some hi-fi navy exercise called Milan. Lingering around for a few minutes while we decided on our alternate PoA, we saw a Kurta clad gentleman and summarily overdressed female enter the cellular jail complex through a side gate. On further enquiry with the guard at the gate it was ascertained that the gentleman was an MP from who-knows-where and so he had to be accommodated. Damn the bureaucracy! We registered our discontent in no small words and after the softening blow got down to diplomacy and plight of the common man against THE SYSTEM. The guard, finally gave into our bullshit and asked us to come back after the gentleman and lady had left, lest the highbrow MP gets all flustered if we commoners get the same treatment as him. Giddy from the triumph of our negotiating skills, we headed towards the sea and, as it turned out, to the only decent nariyal paani experience of the whole trip. Once the MP was gone, we were let-in to a tourist free, and infact devoid of any other human beings, jail complex. We ransacked the place taking silly pictures of us behind bars and shit like that. There was some soul searching as well, as each one of us was somberly reminded of the price of freedom we were enjoying today. A price paid by the inmates of this very jail. After a very satisfying personal tour of the jail we were more than happy to reward the guard for his good deed. A shock awaited us as he summarily refused to accept any money from us for the favour. There are still some decent people out there. Next stop was the Port Blair jetty to catch our ferry to Havelock. The sun was breathing fire over our heads adding to the woes of the wait for the ferry. After a little confusion as to which ship we were supposed to climb on, we found ourselves labouring our super heavy, unfit to use anywhere but the airport, luggage through the very narrow galleys of the ship. I instantly proclaimed my love for haversacks and pledged to acquire one for any future trips while evil eyeing the nimble foreigners who were comfortably carrying their luggage on their back and cake walking into the belly of the ship.

Our journey to Havelock and the next 5 days there to follow..

Mukurti Trek – last act

Tags

Hiking, Mukurti

The first 2 parts here and here, in that order.

The next morning came in lazily. We had no big mountains to climb today, so everyone was taking it a tad easy. Some further hiking stories were exchanged in front of the still burning fire and over piping hot coffee and tea. My feet were like 2 massive rocks from all the antics of yesterday. I could move, albeit very slowly, with a painful grimace on my face. Multiple rounds of a very elaborate and heavy breakfast later, everyone was packed up and ready to leave. But before we could reach back to Ooty in our bumbling jeep ride, there was a minor matter of a 2 hour trek to be taken care of. I was trying to play down the idea of any kind of walking in my own mind. I just couldn’t imagine myself taking even baby steps let alone a full 2 hour hike. I was searching for similar signs of denial from the others, but couldn’t catch even a hint of fatigue on anyones face or manners.

I was still plotting my excuses for chickening out of the impending hike when the jeep stopped at the trail head in a cloud of red clay dust. On a whim, I stepped out of the jeep, strapped on my 15kgs, did some twisting and turning of the body before beginning the painful process of walking. to my surprise and pleasure, it kept getting easier with every step I took. We meandered through a shaded meadow besides a bubbling brook, to the first nominal climb of the day. And it still kept getting easier and easier. Bumbling over a crooked tree obstacle, began, as it turned out, the last sustained uphill of the hike. We were walking on a wide jeep trail in an almost single file. The sun’s slanting rays were fighting their way to the red clay ground creating a patchwork of light and dark spots. It was also illuminating the merry hikers in a golden glow. The whole scene somehow reminded me of victorious battle tested soldiers, frail but jubilant, trooping their way back to their respective bases. And while I was fantasizing all this war imagery, the trail decided to wrap itself up to a close. All the jungle walks were, sadly and suddenly, over. At least for this trip.

It was time now to leave all this pristine beauty behind and head back to our sad excuse for civilization. Reached the YWCA in Ooty to park our belongings till we boarded the Bangalore bound bus in the evening.

It was free time now in Ooty, but everyone decided to stick together for food and stuff. A few of us were pining for some cold beer. Not surprisingly we walked all over town and settled on a sidey looking bar to quench our thirst. A few more secrets and future plans spilled out over copious amounts of beer and biryani. A jolly good time was had, scaring away hapless fellow boozers and suchlike. And just like that it was time to board the bus and begin the night long journey to Bangalore.

And now comes the final act of the adventure. As I have mentioned before, a recent legislation has rendered the night passage, between the hours of 9 PM & 6 AM, through Bandipur and Madumulai forests obsolete. A fifteen minute delay at the very start of the bus ride led to some rash driving and a 9.02 PM arrival at the Bandipur gate. To add fuel to fire, our bus drivers opening gambit all but settled our fate for the night. He yelled at the forest guards, something amounting to you stupid drunkards open the damn gate, it’s still 7 minutes to 9, who at that very moment were already refusing entry to at least a couple of trucks and a swift ahead of us. A heated argument followed for the next hour and a half. It concluded with our driver quietly picking up an unused blanket from one of the seats and proceeding to go to sleep in the cavernous luggage compartments in the belly of the Volvo, without uttering a single word to any of the passengers. During the argument outside, the group inside had figured out that we were currently stuck in no-man’s land. Between the gates of 2 national parks separated by a distance of a few hundred meters and both closed to traffic after 9PM. So any attempt to hightailing back to an alternate route was out of question. We were bang in the middle of a fairly dense forest occupied by multitude of big cats, wild elephants and other animals of the wild variety. To add to the eery setting was the fact that our bus was parked right next to a river, a veritable epicenter of wildlife activity. I garnered enough courage to take a peak outside at the sterling, star-studded sky and relieve my bulging bladder. It was also cold as hell, with temperature dropping further as the night progressed. Finally, covered with a thin blanket, with some uncle chips and water in the stomach, I dozed off on the almost horizontal Volvo seat. Surprisingly, my eyes opened a good 7 hours later to a foggy forest with no sensation in my uncovered feet below the knee. They were frozen solid. I managed to move them enough to get out of the bus, shivering uncontrollably. I was back in bone chilling cold and thoroughly enjoying it. As the clock finally stuck 6AM, the driver coolly got up from his comfy bed and put a brick to the accelerator pedal.

We only stopped for a very quick coffee and loo break at Mysore before hitting the dreaded Bangalore traffic at 10 reaching majestic at a respectable 11. Sharing a rick back to my apartment, I did the final half a kilometer on foot, with a fairly heavy haversack, to keep the walking spirit going. The adventure was ultimately over.

Epilogue:

It has been 3 days since my return now, and my body has finally started to realize the fast one that was pulled over its eyes. It is showing its displeasure by slowly disintegrating and settling back to its own lethargic and non-active ways.

Mukurti Trek – Part Duo

Tags

Hiking, Mukurti

The first part here.

Quiet a lot of the night was spent tossing and turning. Thanks, partly to the alien environment of a constricted sleeping bag and additionally to the anticipation or rather the trepidation of the mammoth task to be undertaken on the next day. Morning was early by any standards at 6.30AM. I was itching to step outside the warm confines of the hut into a winter wonderland sans the snow. The reservoir that we had visited last evening was, at this early hour, completely blanketed with a thick layer of fog, making the morning even more mystical. I was expressly denied from venturing down to the edge of the water alone, lest I become a morning snack for one of the curious felines who might be lingering around there.

I gaped on as the rising sun started burning through the early morning mist, like a beer froth being devoured by a thirsty mouth. Other folks were ambling up from their slumber as well. After multiple rounds of teas, coffees, maggi and eggs, everyone was geared up and raring to go for the long walk ahead.

Our guide, armed with a machete, initiated us through a small stream and some dense undergrowth towards the pinnacle of Mukurti. Initially, there was a lot of ducking down, climbing over and swaying left and right to dodge all the 3 dimensional obstacles being thrown at us by the jungle. I felt as if the jungle was giving me a sign by making it a tad more difficult to begin with, but I didn’t let that thought linger in my head for too long.I was trying to keep it simple. 1 step at a time. There was quiet a lot of downhill in the beginning and there was a little grumble in the troops of having to go uphill at this late point on our way back. Again, 1 step at a time. We passed through a patch of beautifully aligned pine trees, walking over multitude of pine cones and mushy dead leaves. The clean, eucalyptus scented air giving a sense of supreme well-being and the warming suns rays playing hide and seek among the tall trees. Every now and then, there was a clearing in the woods giving us a peek at the magnificent vistas just beyond the tree line. We kept stopping every now and then to wait for some member of the party to capture their photographic vision. At one bend on the left, I looked up to a vast expanse of green grasslands and azure blue skies spread across me, punctuated by the shimmering, serene waterline. It was the kind of view that great wallpapers are made of. It also gave us our first view at our goal, a towering knife-edged peak.

We had walked almost for an hour or so by now, the trail loosing and gaining altitude multiple times, and it had been deceptively easy for me till this point. My senses were highly tuned to any slight sign of pain in the varied muscle groups of my legs. But no signs of trouble yet. Absolutely zilch. I was walking as if I had just stepped off my bed, onto a freshly mowed grass lawn. I was still lugging around my 15 kgs worth of hi-tech equipment, but it wasn’t a dead weight till now. The cynic in me was not convinced. Somethings got to give, it said. I have absolutely no physical conditioning for this kind of prolonged physical activity. Just wait for the pain, my mind said. And so I kept waiting and kept walking up and down. Catching my breath, gulping down fresh water from the streams, munching on some fruit bars and dipping my feet in ice-cold water. I was doing surprisingly well, consistently walking with the leading pack of the group, looking up at the towering goal every now and then, watching it become bigger and bigger. That meant I was getting close. One final, long searing climb later, I found myself at the base camp. A vast plain grassy patch at the bottom of a jagged peak. I took a long swig from my water bottle and laid down in the grass to let the sun wash over my exhaustion. I was panting and sweating but the adrenaline rush was making it all feel rosy. The nice cool breeze over the warm sun was just an icing on the absolutely delicious visual vistas all around. I was happily munching on my veg cheese sandwich when came the bomb. We were supposed to still climb that jagged edge of almost vertical, tumbling rocks to reach the peak. Hot damn. I looked at the others incredulously, then looked at the peak, which by now was looking a thousand times larger and still growing, and looked back at the others. Whaaat!! There was no one there to look at. Everyone had already started to climb. Haven’t these folks had enough of climbing. I have come this far, what more do you want from me? But there was no one around to answer these silly questions of mine. My ego and peer pressure were now going to write checks that my body was not gonna be able to cash. I lost the dead weight, tightened my figurative belt and began the climb on all fours. After what seemed like hours I finally peeped up and there were no more rocks to climb. In fact there was nothing higher that me in the vicinity. I had arrived!! Some kind folks had the good sense of bringing a couple of cold budweisers to celebrate the achievement. I plunked my back side on the most comfy looking rock and popped one of the cans open.

It all went downhill from here on. Literally. There had been a stream crossing, on our way up, where one could dip their feet in the ice-cold water and I set my sights on it. I was going to race myself down there. It was going to be easy. Just downhill. Someone forgot to mention that to my quads (I googled the crap out to find this name. They are the muscles right above your knee and I didn’t know they existed before). By the time I was half way down to the stream, they were screaming for mercy. The cold water dip was rapidly turning from a luxury into a necessity. This time, I put mind over body and hoodwinked the quads by some good old-fashioned baiting. In all these mind games, I still found the time to be wary of a lurking tiger family, which was known to haunt this area, in the tall grasses around the narrow trail. Every corner, I prepared myself for an encounter with a big cat or two. I was devising strategies to utilize my not-so-sturdy tripod as a shield while I tickle the tigers underbelly till he goes all ROFL. No tiger was forthcoming though, and slowly but surely I heard the sound of gurgling water grow stronger and stronger till I was virtually walking in it. I wasted no time in losing my shoes and other assorted paraphernalia that I was lugging around and jumped into the water 2 feet at a time. A bone chilling cold ran down my spine and through the quads. A good 15 minutes later, the first of the remaining party turned up on the other side of the gurgling stream. Few minutes later we were off again. These guys were relentless. By now, the camera on its side strap on my shoulder had started getting heavier and heavier with every step. We kept going up and down, crossing streams and narrow trails. I kept twisting my back and shoulders this way and that, trying to prevent the cramps. Finally it was time for the uphill obstacle course of ducking, climbing and generally moving from side to side to dodge the hanging branches and shrubbery. I kept my head down and soldiered on and by the time I tilted my head up to assess how much further I had to go, it was already over. The green and brown cottage was inviting me with open arms and I gladly obliged running into its embrace. My quads were killing me, I was sitting in a contorted mushroom shape to avoid my back from cramping, but I had finally done it. Yeah for me!

A hot shower, some ginger biscuits, tea and few chilli bhajjis later, everyone was ready to curl up around the fire and relax. A bottle of Signature had already been jugadofied and it was promptly poured down the respective faces. The rest of evening and late night was again spent in some good-natured mutual ribbing, food and general debates on undebatable topics like Enfield vs rest of the bikes, et al.

Another night in the jungle was coming to a happy conclusion and I had lived to tell the tale.

The final act to follow..

Mukurti Trek – Part Uno

Tags

Hiking, Mukurti, Ooty

Like all good travel stories, this too begins with a bunch of miscues. Last minute up turning of the fully packed and ready haversack, a pair of forgotten sunglasses which are efficiently secured by the lady of the house and a stalled rickshaw at 10.30 in the night on a ghostly Indira Nagar 12th main.

It is the story of a journey to the 2nd highest peak in South India, Mukurti (yes no “h”), deep in the jungles of the Nilgiri Biosphere Reserve . The journey of a slightly out-of-shape (my very personal opinion which everyone I know violently differs on), self confessed lazy bum to conquer this 8000+ ft behemoth on his own two feet. Yes you read it write. I went hiking up a mountain. The kind of mountain that gives you a creak in the neck even if you just try to locate its top. The whole trip was organized by the super nice people at getoffyourass for the extended christmas weekend of 23rd, 24th and 25th December. 2 nights in the stunningly beautiful Nilgiri wildlife societie’s fishing hut, 2 nights on the bus while on our way back and forth to Ooty and 3 days of hiking on the jungle paths.

Now the question is, why would I, of all the people, like to voluntarily put myself through this much physical effort? Well, what can I tell you. I surprise myself sometimes.

Just a disclaimer, I am not going to name names here. If the people who were involved in this adventure ever happen to stumble on this piece of literary genius on the internets they will easily be able to identify themselves and I hope will take my words with a pinch of salt.

I was still dazed at my own audacity when I reached the Shanti Nagar bus stand at 10.45 on the night of 22nd. Hooking up with our chaperon, the initial conversation with him was of no help at all to my shaky nerves. My eyes were already hunting for other characters of this drama. Folks whom I could compare and share my complete in experience with. The troupe that finally boarded the bus at 11.15 consisted of 9 strangers, acquaintances and relatives ready to slum it out together in the jungle over the next 3 or so days and nights. And like they say, I declare the games open.

The journey to Ooty was uneventful, except for the fact that the bus had to wait outside the entry to Bandipur National Park for a good 2 hours before the clock struck 6 AM. Apparently, the forest department only allows 2 state corporation buses across the national park in the night, between the hours of 9 PM and 6 AM. As luck would have it, we were the 3rd bus of the night.

This minor yet vital piece of information was to play a colossal role in the last act of this adventure. But about that later.

We reached Ooty at around 9 in the morning after going through the rolling tea gardens and beautiful hair pin bends of the nilgiri ghats with me passing in and out of my sleep induced stupor. Were greeted at the bus stand with 2 jeeps and the closing characters of this 11 piece puzzle. After freshening up at a lodge the troupe headed out for breakfast and I promptly stuffed my face with some delicious idly-sambhar and coffee. Some amber elixir was also acquired to partake in some after-hike festivities. Ooty like any other place in TN is littered with these government controlled tasmac stores, from where, people like me stumble in and out at all hours of the day. Armed to the teeth with food and liquor, everyone boarded the jeeps to “head into the jungle”. First stop, around 7 kms from our final destination, the fishing hut, was reached after an hour or so of bumpy ride and pleasant conversations in the jeep. The first hike was upon me. Thankfully I didn’t have to carry the whole 200kgs of my haversack, but I wasn’t gonna be outdone by this convenience. I armed myself with the newly acquired water bottle and floppy hat, a wind breaker , my D90 with the ubiquitous and super heavy 18-250 lens and the bane of my existence, my tripod to add atleast a good 15 kgs to my already healthy yet super athletic frame. This 15 kgs or so was a constant companion of mine in all the subsequent hikes as well, give and take a few kgs of body fat that I lost over the millions of kms of walking that I did on those hikes. But I digress. First photo opportunity was a dam. I promptly dropped the lens hood over the first ledge that I leaned over to celebrate the occasion. Not to be deterred by this set back I proceeded to click some pictures of the area surrounding the dam, only to be reprimanded and reminded by the forest guard of the mediocrity of my photography prowess and also of the fact that it was illegal to take photographs of public structures like the dam, so badly. I tucked in my camera, upped my chin and proceeded to head in to the jungle for some contemplation.

A couple of hours later my eyes were greeted by the site of an idyllic little hut plucked right out of a picture perfect frame. Its light green walls and mud coloured slanted roof blending in with the thick green and red of the jungle, while still standing out for its quaintness. Out tireless guide presented us with a jolting yet super refreshing cup of piping hot rasam as soon as our tired back sides touched the soft grass of the clearing in the jungle. This was followed by some mammoth hogging of rice-sambhar-rasam-anda bhurji & papad. Stomachs full we hiked down to the local watering hole. Much to my dismay, it wasn’t a bar in the middle of nowhere, but a real water body where the masters and citizens of the jungle are known to spend their evenings downing some H2O.

With a vengeance, I set up my tripod and started the patient waiting game of capturing a feline encounter. Ended up capturing just a couple of birds and a bunch of social animals goofing around. It was getting chilly and we headed up to our quaint little abode for the night. It was just 5.30 PM when we got back to our cottage. It was decided that the perfect cure for the chill in the air was some chilli bhajji, some peanut masala and the main course whiskey! To our delight there was a cozy little fireplace which by now was crackling with a warm fire. The next few hours were blissfully spent in drinking copious amounts of booze fuelled by formal introductions, food, interesting stories and some good-natured leg pulling. It was really heartening to see a group of almost strangers bond so quickly. I also managed to capture a fairly satisfactory star-trails shot while participating in this jolly good time. The first time that I stepped out in the dark and tilted my head up to the sky, I was greeted with a spellbinding sight of waves and waves of stars, winking and twinkling at me. Us city dwellers are sadly denied of this singularly profound experience, thanks to the mammoth artificial light pollution spewed by the workings of an urban setting. The good times finally gave way to 10 sleeping bags spread around the life saving fire-place. It was 9 PM. Thats what the jungle does to you.

I contemplated on the goings on of the day wrapped in my sleeping bag, my legs strategically pointed towards the fireplace. I had surprisingly survived all the walking over the day, free of any aches and pains and was actually looking forward to the day long siege on Mukurti peak the next day. It’s a different story that I was high and booze tends to distort once sense of wellbeing and confidence. To heck with it, bring on Mukurti.

To be continued..

The parikrama & KK addition

Tags

concert, india music week, KK, parikrama

Every now and then I tend to do things impromptu and more often than not, they turn out extremely enjoyable for me. This is one such tale.

With a multitude of music related events happening all over India, like the NH7 weekender et all, I was kinda bummed that I couldn’t attend any of them. My dear friend Rathore was enthralling us with his presence for the whole week including a leading sunday and a trailing saturday. So unlimited fun was to be partaken in. Fun here stands for guzzling down of copious amounts of alcohol, playing poker with  50 Rs buy-ins while guzzling the said liquor and general bakar on topics ranging from the intellectually stimulating to rabid gossip on the state of affairs in the Big Boss household, again guzzling , you guessed it right, ungodly quantities of the bitter nectar. Kindly note that all the aforementioned “fun” falls squarely in the sitting-and-doing-nothing category. Nothing to do with music.

Things took a dramatic turn friday morning, when wifey dear happened to chance on an advertisement in the local newspaper informing us of a maiden event called as the India Music Week. A Pan-India musical extravaganza consisting of multitude of live music events in Mumbai, Delhi and our lovely Bangalore. There website was promptly ravaged for Bangalore specific events. We whittled it down to 2. One at our personal favourite Herbs and Spices, Indira Nagar and the other one at Counter Culture in Whitefield. The first one was free, if you don’t consider the sticker shock of the food bill. Perfect for us cheapskates and über foodies. So friday night was penciled in our imaginary calendars. The other one was kind of a big deal. Parikrama and KK were to perform at Counter Culture on Saturday night starting at 8.30 PM. My love for parikrama has been duly captured here. To our pleasant surprise the tickets were available and pretty decently priced. It did us a world of good that the venue was right next to a swanky new mall that had caught the wifes attention. Having the high commands affirmative, I wasted no time in acquiring 5 tickets, roping in another couple-friends of ours.

Albeit good, the Friday event was nothing to write home about. Fairly routine live performance of popular covers, from the beatles to the eagles. But before we could attend the headlining event, there was a small matter of mall surfing to be taken care of. Taking cue from my very recent exploits at the Metallica concert, which may or may not be chronicled here, I was rooting to reach the venue as early as possible to grab strategic viewing locations. It turns out that my rooting was a little too good. So early were we at the venue that, they hadn’t even started entry. The deserted atmosphere outside the venue was a little unnerving too. It was P A R I K R A M A and KK and yet, it seems there were no takers for their music in the rock capital of India. Ok, I accept that KK is no iconic rockstar but Parikrama didn’t deserve this, come on!

After ultimately entering the venue at around 8 to the sounds of mic check, the first shock was the tiny size of the venue and the kicker was the emptiness of even that small a space. KK & Nitin Malik - the parikrama lead singer didn’t look happy either regarding the absence of connoisseurs. That was fairly evident in the subliminal hostile exchange between them and the sound guy, asking for an inverted V on the mic and shit like that.

My personal feelings were mixed. Here, not even 5 feet away from me was KK, making silly noises on the mic and Stud sherpa jamming out with his bassist on his gibson les paul. But I was also missing the feeling of harmony one gets by being way to close to fellow rockheads, headbanging their necks away. I dutifully started to drown my mixed feelings in the amber glow of Miller. I was not gonna complain.

The band gave ample evidence of their doubts when they took their own sweet time to appear back on stage after the mic check. Evidently the delay played out well as the venue started to fill up and by the time parikrama hit their first chord it was a full on mosh pit with me at the absolute front of the pulsating crowd. Parikrama’s rhythm guitarist, red fender in his hand and a marshall stack behind him was bang in front of me. The first power chord hit me like a tsunami of awesomeness. They didn’t look back after that, belting our their classics one after another. And ,after a bunch of songs, when the violinist hit the first notes for “but it rained”, it was almost orgasmic. The little swimming pool of 4 millers in my belly was definitely an added aphrodisiac. KK refrained from his usual numbers and instead belted out covers of multitude of artists including police, a medley of 2 GnR numbers and ultimately ‘nothing else matters’. The crowd went bonkers and I am absolutely certain we woke up a few bangaloreans with all the chorus singing. Finally he sang the only original of his set “pal”. Bheerrrrry naiceeee!! No encore was kind of a disappointment, but I was thoroughly enthralled with whatever I had heard. The aching neck and sore back next morning were lingering evidence of the immense pleasure that was derived on the previous night.

PS: I was later informed by my dear wife, who to her credit enjoyed herself thoroughly in spite of her Aurangzeb handicap, that I was the focus of some intense video recording. I attribute the spotlight to my spirited headbanging and air guitaring. The Wife summarily objects, attributing it to the T that I had put on. I will update this post with the link to the video, if I can find it, to settle the debate once and for all, otherwise, accepting defeat, will just post a snap of the T sans yours truly.

Pondi – part deux

Tags

auroville, matri mandir, pondicherry, puducherry, travelogue

Day 1 afternoon was upon us. First order of day was to hog. As I had already hidden the keys of the car for the day there was no question of heading out for lunch again. So the unimaginatively named resort restaurant, FUN, it was. Since we had come out of the air-conditioned confines of our maroon machine, the stifling heat and humidity was starting to get to us. Thankfully there were a bunch of stand fans strewn around the restaurant floor. The challenge was to grab a seat right next to one of these “providers-of-breeze”. Mind you, I haven’t used the word “cool” anywhere in the breeze part. This challenge was a recurring theme over the next few meal sessions, in fact throughout our stay there. I have a standard mechanism for places like these. I sweat so profusely that the waiters, out of pure pity and the fear of getting a case of acute dehydration on their hands, arrange for a source of breeze ASAP. Thanks to the cooker like heat, the wife refused to accept the existence of hot food of any kind and opted for a cold cucumber soup. Now thats an oxymoron you won’t here so often. But oxymorons or not, it was thoroughly refreshing. And so was the chilled beer.

The rest of the day was spent lazing in the pool, wading in the sea, another round of food & drinks in the backdrop of a live jugalbandi and other assorted stuff. The room or the house as the resort folks call it, where we were put up, was something like this.

There was a peripheral wall with a beautiful blue wooden door for access. Apart from that there were no other walls inside. Yes not even the loo & the shower. I will let the pictures do the talking and your imagination think up the possibilities.

I like to call myself an amateur photographer, or at least thats what I think when I lug around all the 10 kilos of photography equipment everywhere I go. This being the east coast, sunrise over the ocean was the subject of choice. That meant, getting up before the sun wakes up, setting up the tripod and staring at the horizon with blurry eyes.

For the rest of the day, we had rented a 2 wheeler to go around the city of Pondicherry starting with Auroville. The 2 wheeler turned out be a glorified moped with limited maneuverability and a blazing top speed of 35 Kmph. Helmets are optional in Pondi, so the breeze while riding was most welcoming. Reached Auroville in good time only to discover that entry into Matri Mandir was closed for the day as well as the next. So we could take a longish walk to it, admire its beauty from a respectable distance and troop back. In the spirit of being touristy we followed the mulling crowds all the way up to Matri Mandir and back. Its an extremely beautiful and calm place, with its golden dome blazing in the sun, set atop brickwork in red surrounded by lush green lawns.

The rest of the Auroville, or atleast the part that was visible, mostly consisted of art shops of varying degree of luxury. Next stop on our itinerary for the day was the town of Pondi. The idea was roam around the town rest of the day and return back to the resort after a dinner at Satsanga, which is a very famous eating place in these parts. But good ideas always tend to wither under the stress of temperature and pressure. The long walk in Auroville had already used up whatever little water I can store in my body. The wife was no better. This time the air-cooled 2 wheeler ride didn’t help either. Somehow managed to reach the road next to the sea or Goubert Ave as it is officially called. Cooled off in the nice sea breeze and shade of Le Cafe. Although there was nothing decidedly french about the food we ate there, it was certainly delicious. Replenished and revitalized, decided to walk around the town. All interesting thoroughfares were steadfastly closed in lieu of it being a Sunday. It was a little surprising to see that a tourist heavy place like this had a sunday shutdown. Stumbled upon the Aurbindo Ashram, which turned out to be a bit of a disappointment containing only the samadhi and a bookstore. I don’t know what I was hoping to see but still. The wife was further morose by the aforementioned closed shops. The stifling heat coupled with the disappointment finally got to us. Cooled off again in an A/C cafe before heading back to the resort. It was just 4 in the afternoon. Resort pool was the logical conclusion and I promptly jumped in the deep end of it. The evening was spent taking another round of photographs on the beach and a game of table tennis.

The next day was our return journey and I had decided to try and leave Pondi by around 1 PM to reach Bangalore by around 7. A fair assumption for the 300 odd kms that we had to cover. But, there is always one, a goof up at checkout meant we could leave the resort only by 12 and the wife still had some shopping to finish off in Pondi. That meant another hour or so. We were still good and then came the clincher. It turned out that there was an alternate route to the hell that was NH-66. The resort folks even provided  a map and all. That meant we had to go to Pondi and come back the same route before commencing on the return leg. We ultimately left Pondi only around 1.30. Promptly filled up the maroon devil at the border of Pondi and TN. 7 Rs / litre is quiet a big difference to pass on even for a lazy bum like me. The filling part took unusually long and finally crossed the resort onto the ECR only by about 2. I put my head down and zipped on the beautiful ECR till finally heading left on to SH-58 towards Chengalpet & Kanchipuram and to eventually join the Bangalore – Chennai stretch of the NH-4. Drove through pouring rain for almost an hour before I reached NH-4. The real shock came when we came across the first board saying bangalore – 276 Kms on NH-4. This after driving almost 140 odd kms in 3 hours. So at around 5 in the evening, I was staring at at least 5 more hours of driving. Turning back was not an option so onward we went. The road, thankfully, was silky smooth and I consistently clocked above 100 kmph. Raced with a police bomb squad van for some time before see it disappear in my rear view. Nightfall was almost immediately followed by rain which persisted almost all the way up to bangalore. The incessant rain made the roads click and had to check my speed every now and then. I was overtaking heavy vehicles from left and right, basically anywhere I could find space. There is small ghat section around Krishnagiri and that was the worst. The heavy vehicles were literally crawling on the climb and I almost ended up leaving my axel in a ditch while overtaking one of these from the left. Finally found a mighty Volvo which I followed into Bangalore. Missed the Electronics City flyover and ended up under it. A few signals and finally reached back home at 10.30 PM. It took a good 8 and half hours for the return leg and my legs were killing me.

Happily pulled out the luggage from an almost mud colored maroon beast. It was the end of another journey and although Pondi as a place turned out to be a personal disappointment, the ensuing resort stay and drive had been thoroughly enjoyable.

Pondicherry – check!

Pondi or Puddu – you choose

Tags

pondicherry, puducherry, road rage, the dune, travelogue

Pondi or Puddu, both sound a little derogatory or kinda adult words don’t they? Surprisingly no one blinked twice before naming a place using the aforementioned words. And as someone famously said never judge a book by its cover et all, it’s not prudent to judge a place simple by what it is called.  In fact it is outright foolish.

But having said that, both me and my wife can’t stop giggling and turning our heads to check no else is around when we speak Pondi out loud. So I actually tried to get to the bottom of this etymological brain fart. Well it turns out Puducherry literally means “New Village” in the local vernacular. This from the mother of all things holy, “Wikipedia – Puducherry”. So that effectively establishes who the fool is here. Yes I am looking at you. Stop giggling already.
But I digress; this write-up is not about the history of the place or the etymology of its name.  It’s just an account of how we reached the place and what we did there. Some people like to call it a travelogue. I prefer the longish description I mentioned earlier.  The trip was planned for the Independence Day long weekend of 13th-14th-15th August. The wife had gotten bored of the rain and all the greenery that we had encountered over the last couple of trips. She wanted to stare at the ocean and frolic on the beaches that come with them. Pffft…women, I tell you. Also there were mentions of Parisian cafes and villas and such and the wife is a sucker for all things exotic. So Pondi it was. After the location comes the place of stay and nothing short of spectacular could match where we had stayed on our last trip. It was with a heavy heart and a lighter wallet, that I clicked the pay button on the reservation page of “The Dune Eco Resort”. The photos and descriptions on the resort website warranted a few ooh’s & aah’s from the wife. But I kept my skeptical face on. I know how quickly those ooh’s and aah’s turn into I told you so’s and “this place sucks”.  We were going to drive there so route maps needed to be researched. I tend to get paranoid if I don’t know the exact route I am going to take to reach a place. I hate the exercise of taking a wrong route and then hightailing back. That’s the reason why I don’t like to take detours on way as they fall in the category of the unknown and hence the paranoia.  Google maps on the phone is quiet the life savior though. So now, it is just a matter of taking a cursory look at the general direction we are going and the devilish details can be tackled en route.

This is the exact route I took courtesy a nifty little android app called My Track. It actually records a lot more information like average speed, average elevation and such. I will put it up here if I can figure out a way to do so.

The route itself is 312 kms door to door.  Customarily, Friday night was spent drinking and celebrating a dear friend’s last weekend in the city / country with us. Still, managed to head out of Bangalore via the magnificent Electronics City flyover at about quarter to 6 on 13th morning. That’s the only surefire way to beat the hell that is the traffic of Bangalore city.

Me and my wife have taken quiet a lot of road trips together, me being the perennial driver and she being the proverbial smartass. She has this habit of trying to find the fastest possible toll lane about 500 meters before the toll booths and at that point she would rapidly throw out syllables like left , right, 3rd lane, 1st lane etc., as her mind crunches the million different possibilities.  It is fascinating to hear but extremely difficult to follow. I finally latch on to the last syllable that registers in my puny brain and turn the wheels in that direction. And then when we are waiting in line for the 3 vehicles ahead of us to clear out the toll booth, she will throw that “I told you so” look as the lanes left and right of us are clearing up cars at the speed of light. At this point though, I can only shy away sheepishly pretending to finally be able to figure out what that right push button on my steering wheel does. Such is life.

On the way, I had a little altercation with a Wagon-R driver. In my attempt to avoid a dead dog, I twisted my steering a little too quickly to the right almost cutting off this Wagon- R. Mind you; this was all happening at a considerable speed, so obviously the other driver was pissed. Luckily for him and unluckily for me, there was a toll booth within a next kilometer or so and we had to stop. The Wagon-R promptly came in behind me in the toll lane and the driver got out giving me a piece of his mind. I won’t go into the banalities of the conversation that ensued, but it is safe to say both me and the other driver emerged victorious in our heads. Now that I have the advantage of hind sight, if the wagon-R driver is reading this by any chance, I would like to offer my apologies. I should probably have braked rather than swerving. Anyhow, from NH-7 we headed on to NH-66 at Krishnagiri. The next 100 kms or so were a lesson in speeding and breaking hard every 500 mts or so. Not that I have enough practice of that on the Bangalore roads. Speeding because the road would be all wide and smooth and braking hard because suddenly there would be a crater the size Mt. St. Helena gaping in front to devour you and your vehicle. After a few kms I just gave up on the speeding part, kept my eyes on the road for even bigger craters and my feet firmly planted on the brake and clutch for any eventuality. Here again the navigator that my wife is, was shouting instructions on choosing between the shallower of the gaping holes in front. Had a quick break for some much needed poori-sabzi and relieving ailing bladders. All in all we still made good time through the hell hole that was this part of NH-66. Just before Gingee, we saw these ruins on both our left and right. The car was promptly stopped on the roadside. I loaded up the camera and headed out. Though we couldn’t get inside or up, I made merry of whatever little was visible from the outside. Sure will be fun roaming around this place at the dead of the night.  First snap of this trip:

The wife later researched and found out that it is called the Gingee fort. Linking here to the customary Wikipedia entry.  While we were still on NH-66 the composition of the road turned on its head after the town of Tindivanam. The broad & divided 4 lane track here allowed me to clock the top speed of my “TO” leg. A respectable 128 kmph. By the time we were welcomed by the white washed “Puducherry” gateway it was almost 11.30 and the traffic had gotten worse. We had originally decided to do a flyby of the town before checking in, but one look at the swirling mass of humans that had descended on the streets and I was nudging the wife to find a quick exit out of the mayhem.  We still went all the way up to Mission Street, which we discovered later, before we took the left for ECR or the East Coast Road towards Chennai. It turned out that our resort was not in Puducherry at all as we saw the “Welcome to Tamil Nadu” signboard fly by us before we took a right into the resort approach road. As soon as we had checked in and while on the way to our room, caught a glimpse of the private beach and the infinity pool, the wife and I exchanged a glance that concluded my driving work for the day. First impressions of the resort and rest of the tale to follow. There are going to be stories about pool hogging, bucket loads of sweat and what not. And if THAT still doesn’t pique your interest, there are always some good old road rage stories!!

Story of wheels

Tags

audi a4, automobiles, hero hawk, hero puch shakti, hero ranger, thunderbird

As my shuttle bus was idling at a signal this morning, a silver Audi A4, quiet like my own, happened to cross the intersection and it got me thinking. How many and what kind of vehicles have I owned in my “not so long”  life?

I am only talking about the vehicles that I have individually owned, so that automatically throws out the tricycle I used to ride when I was about knee high, the parrot green bajaj super that my father used to own, the willis and mahindra jeeps that my father was provided from office and I used to drive, the bajaj splendor that my brother still owns, my friend and roommate Sambit’s Yamaha RX100 that I used to drive way more than he ever did and other assortment of vehicles that I have driven in college.

So whats’s left?

What’s left are 5 vehicles that I have grown up with and loved with all my heart.

This is circa 1992, my big brother used to own an Avon cycle and he was about to get a moped to commute to his tuitions and stuff. The obvious heir for the cycle was yours truly. I put my foot down and outright rejected it, calling it girly and all sorts of names a puny 10yr old could fathom. My eyes were set on a blood red Hero Ranger , which was quiet the rage at that point in time. My father succumbed to the pressure and I was the owner of my very first wheels. Obviously I was a very proud and doting owner. Its used to be washed and polished every sunday and if I wasn’t being scolded by the multitude of elders around me, I could be found on the seat of my ranger all day long.

Right around the time when I was driving my ranger to the ends of the world and back, I made fast friends with a fellow called Sunit. Now this guy used to own some snazzy wheels when it comes to the bicyle world of a 12yr old. He had one of those racing cycles, mac 5 or something (at least that’s what we used to call them), with the curved handle bars, the pencil thin tires and the gears. This was the time when Jo jeeta wohi Sikander was still fresh in our minds. The gears were what impressed me the most. For me they were like the 10th incarnation of Lord Vishnu. I was mesmerised by them. I didn’t miss a single chance to swap cycles with this dude and play with the gears to my hearts content. I was literally possessed by this enigma of a racing cycle. It was hardly 3 years since I had bought the ranger and I was already plotting to get my hands on one of them racing cycles. My father yet again succumbed to my manipulations and bought me my second pair of wheels. A Hero Hawk, the creme de la creme of racing cycles, 10 gears, removable pedals and kit bag , in short, the works. This one too was driven to the ends of the world and back, twice, by yours truly.

While people around me were upgrading to Hero Puchs and Lunas, trust me it was considered an upgrade at that time, I steadfastly refused to part with my Hero Hawk. This time my dad plotted and planned and I finally succumbed and I got the keys for my very own third set of wheels, a Hero Puch Shakti (3 gears). The gears are of significance here too. The bulk of mopeds around that time were autogears. This one had 3 manual gears, bajaj super style. This was a man’s moped. I still refused to part with my hero hawk and it was tended to regularly, albeit with a little subdued zeal.

Whenever N & Me talk about our childhood, I boast of being a martyr and having a frugal childhood without too many fancy toys and stuff as compared to her pampered upbringing. The above few paragraphs put a big  gaping hole in that big helium balloon of my martyrdom.

Anyhow, this is a logical end of an era when it comes to my vehicle ownership. The shakti will turn out be the last vehicle that my dad bought for me. There is still a lot of time ahead of me, but the chances that I will accept a gift in the form of a vehicle from my parents are slim to none.

I almost got a Hero Honda Splendor in my last semester at college in lieu of me cracking TCS and all, but that somehow never materialized. And thankfully so. Because after my 2 month initial training in Coimbatore with TCS, I went straight to Mumbai, the land of motorized chaos and perennial traffic jams. The next year or so were spent hanging on to dear life from the various forms of public transport offered by the great city of Mumbai. The BEST bus, the local train and the black & yellow rickshaws, to name a few.

Enter the Silver Thunderbird, the 350cc beast of a motorcycle from the esteemed stables of The Royal Enfield. I don’t remember the precise point that hooked me on to it, but I was hooked nonetheless. It cost me a small fortune to own but it was worth its weight in gold and some more. Its christening and later anniversaries have been fondly remembered here & here. Incidently, TCS decided to ship me overseas while I was still on my honeymoon with the Bird. It’s still standing safely in the confines of my parents place back home and now that I am going back, I fully intend to rekindle the fire in the Bird.

Moving on, my first couple of years in the US of A were spent mostly on rented vehicles of various sizes and shapes. I like cars and motorbikes as is evident , but I am no fanatic. I don’t tend to obsess over the horses & cyclinders of the engine and other such stuff. I keep it simple. I had first heard of Audi way way back when Ravi Shastri won one as the “man of the series” award in the Champion of Champions series in Australia. Not that I remember the series as I had just started crawling back then. But I somehow remember the brand of the car “Audi”. The dream of somehow owning one started looking really achievable once I saw the abundance of Audi’s in America. And so after another round of plotting and planning around N, I was the beaming owner of a Silver Audi A4 1.8T Quattro. And this one too like all my other vehicles was driven to the ends of the world and back in just under 3 years of my ownership. It has since been sold off pending my return to India.

And so goes the story of my 5 wheels..and counting!!