Bangalore Ooty Bike trip [ Nov 2007 ]

Same south indian thali, same work, travel the same road everyday, same traffic constable asking 300 every time, same salary every month(no change at all, change only in papers). What a boring life! Wanted to break from the day to day activities. Many thoughts what to do, where to go !! Juan my colleague often says about his Kodaikanal bike trip, I was impressed with that story. So decided to try one like that. How ??? I never liked going by bus, until its necessary. My splender+ odometer shows 4000+ kms, almost all free services are over. Its time to take that to the limits. I have a college mate in Kothagiri, so decided to go to Ooty and stay with him for couple of days. Googled for maps & road distance details, all are perfect, many blogs with enough road details and travel experiences. Some guys tried using Bajaj scooter :-) . But my only concern is to cross Bandipur forest, it is a Tiger reserve forest. If you are lucky(?) enough you might spot a Tiger.

I had an alternate plan going to Pachaimalai near Tiruchi, but due to the distance I doubted that will drag my plans to 1 or 2 days more. I was too semi-minded, thought too much about Tigers, they came in my dream too :-) But anyway made all purchases, serviced the vehicle, things are perfect! Went to bed around 11PM, hardly I could sleep, heart beats little higher then normal due to the fact that I had exited too much. Don't know when did I sleep, .. woke-up at 4, exactly at 4.45 I was on my Jet !! Zooooooom..... got the Banashankari road, on the way I found a guy on the road, stopped my vehicle and asked him to take a snap, I owed him one, with out his help I wouldn't be able to share this photo here !!

8.30 AM I was crossing Mysore, took the outer road, Got the Nanjangud route. Stopped for breakfast, time was around 11AM, luckily I got idlies & dosa left in that hotel. After 10 kms I can't see a good patch of road, full of potholes, some places there were no sign of existence of tar roads. But the air is too fresh, I don't much bother about my back bone, I hope it is strong enough to absorb this kind of shock ! I saw a lake and stopped a while for resting, took some snaps. Asked the locals about the distance where the Bandipur forest starts, it seems another 3 kms, the forest boundary starts. After 3kms I saw the board with Tiger picture, which says "No parking, no camping inside the Reserve". There were 100 monkeys gave me a warm welcome to the forest, now I am inside the forest. I saw a mini bus coming behind me, there is a hope now.
The forest is silent, so cool and ride was so pleasant, good roads inside added some more pleasure. Suddenly I saw an elephant on the road after 500 meters, I stopped my vehicle, waited for that to cross the road, it seems not moving anywhere. After 30 seconds though of going back some distance until it crosses the road. Luckily the mini bus was behind me, so just I followed it. That guy stopped the bus to show the elephant to the tourists, people inside were shouting a lot, don't know whether the elephant liked it or not :-) I felt I made a wrong decision following this bus, it would have been better if I cross the elephant quiet. I heard that Tuskers are very aggressive in nature.

Now I overtook the bus confidently. There were sign boards saying "speed limit 40kms", but due to the steep downs, vehicle is going freely until 70-75kms/hour. I rode with clutch, what a madness, if an elephant or deer comes in the middle you will not be able to stop!! I saw some spotted deer groups on the way as well as some bores(pigs). End of the forest there is a check-post, called Thallavadi, I am very much familiar with that name. When I was a kid in one of the tamil dailies named Dinamalar had an news about "Veerappan's hideout". Most of the time he seems fought against the police in this place. So a "War memorial" :-) Paid 5 rupees as an entry fees and proceeded towards Cudallore, stopped there, had some drinks. From this place you can choose Masinagui or the regular route to go to Ooty. Former is full of "Hair bin bends" as well only power steering vehicles can make the travel, also that will be closed at 6pm. But the other road is a great example for potholes, don't choose the second road if you are able to proceed through Masinagudi route. Also many people said you can spot Cheetah there, isn't it fascinating!!

After 15 bends, stopped for rest under a tree. Its a valley where there is a view point, you can see Bison's grassing if you are lucky enough. My bike engine was like a boiler, stopped there for 30 mins to cool it down. But it seems not getting cooled down, so started climbing up. I could not move to 3rd gear, all 25kms I was climbing like a snail, good experience. The wind was so chill, too much moisture in the air, I just removed my helmet to enjoy the fresh air. Road side mile stones have the details about how much height that place is from the MSL. Near Ooty roads are very bad, it might be due to the vehicle population. I did not stop in Ooty for any purpose, moved towards Kothagiri road. From Ooty to Kothagiri it is down hills, so cautious driving is needed. One place I could not control my bike and hit the side wall of the road which is nothing but a rock :-) Luckily brakes and tyres are in a good condition, so I avoided breaking my skull or ribs. Except that the drive was so enjoyable, local drivers are moving rash. I was careful enough avoide them. Reached safely to Kothagiri at 3PM.

Next day I went to Kodanad view point, on the way you will see dense tea plantation both the sides. Also you can see former TN chief minister Jayalalitha's estate in Kodanad. There are many hairpin bends on the way, this is one of the best scenic road then what you find it in Ooty. From view point you can see Chamrajnagar if the sky is clear with out much fog. It was a foggy day, so I could not make out much from view point. I tried the same place by next day with my friend and his gang. It was a sunny day and the sky was clear too. It was a fantastic view, we climbed down towards a waterfall which is under trees and not visible clearly from the view point. Had our lunch there and chatted for an hour. From top you will see a village called "Thengumarada" which is surrounded 3 sides by a river called "Mayar". Its a good trekking spot too, I saw it in some blogs. But we need DFO(North) permission to trek inside the forest. Kept this place in mind .... One day I will be back here.

I planned to leave by next day morning around 8am. But it was a foggy day, nothing was visible. There was a rain too, my friend suggested not to start the travel at that time. So I waited another 2 hours, somehow the weather completely reversed. It was like a sunny day :-)
My friend bought 'Varukki roti", (Kind of biscuit) and Salt biscuits both are very famous in Kothagiri. My back bag is full again !! This time I got down the other side, that is towards Mettupalayam. The route is through Sirumugai - Bhavani - Bannari - Thimbam - Satyamangalam - Chamrajnagar - Kollegal - Mallavalli - Bangalore. This is one of the very scenic stretch of road I have seen in Tamilnadu border, nicely put roads until CH Nagar. Good for bike rides. I reached Bangalore in the late evening 9.40PM. It was a long memorable day packed with full of joy!!

Kumaraparvatha Trek

After so many bike trips, I thought of trying something different, first thing came in my mind was trekking. Mostly I go alone for Bike trips, whatever the distance is, the fact is nobody was interested to join with me !! But this time I decided to get some guys from my team, I lured them as much as possible. We drafted a plan to trek in Mukurthi peak. I called up the DFO office in Ooty and asked the trek permission process, he said I need to go there by person to get it. So I though I can go there by Friday and make arrangements, Thursday I called them again, one good soul in DFO office gave me some more details, it is nothing but to trek inside Mukurthi I need to get a permission from "Niligiri Wildlife Society", this actually for the Fishing hut which is located near the lake. Luckily(!) that was booked until December 7th, so our plans went burst. I had created lots of expectations and at-least don't want to stay in Bangalore over that weekend. So final day we met and googled for places, all of a sudden we remembered one of our friends suggestion to go to Kumaraparvatha. But Govind in our group had already visited this place, and seems not interested going second time there. So opted to toss a coin(just to make Govind agree), head for yes, fortunately (!) it was a head !!!!

So planned and made all purchases, rented sleeping bags and started from JP Nagar at 9.30 PM Saturday. We are four, me, Govind, Juan and Vikram. Our car driver knows the route better, we are in a better mode that we won't get lost in the middle. Around 5AM Saturday we reached Somwarpet town, searched for a lodge. It is a small town with 2 to 3 lodges, some film shooting was going on, so all the rooms were occupied. Finally we made a deal with the lodge guy for 2Hrs 200 bucks :-) Started towards the trek point around 7AM after pushing 7 idlies !! At exactly 7.45 we were at trek starting point, we were exited a lot.

Generally people try from Kukke side to reach peak and they return back towards the same route. For them other side is unknown. Around 8AM we started climbing up, after few hundred meters there is a forest office out post, where we got our permission for trekking. We are packed with energy in mind as well as in body, a fresh start towards the peak....

We could see trees everywhere, no sign of animals. We were talking crap and kept moving up. Red color arrow marks everywhere to show the trek route, Thanks for whoever done that !! After 1 Hour we reached a view point, where you will get awesome view of the place where you have started. We had some rest and had some oranges, then started climbing up further, slowly Juan's engine started giving problems, he got muscle cramp in his leg. So the speed reduced, and we had frequent rests. We encountered three big steep rocks, negotiating them was really challenging with all luggage we had. There was a funny incident when we approached the second such rock, Vikram said he won't climb further, he said "Are you asking me to go hell?" :-) We pushed him to his limits. We saw some guys in one of the peak opposite to us, Govind said that is the second highest peak in that place. I read it in many blogs people saying that, by mistake they thought that is Pushpagiri and returned back. On the way I spotted a Porcupine quill, and put that behind my ears. Unfortunately I lost that when I was climbing down !!


Voila !!! At 12PM we are are at peak, all in our group felt like achieved something great in life, like climbed Himalayas (I don't know what else to say here, don't know how I feel if I climb Himalayas). The view was awesome, we could see the place where we had started our trek. I had a Sony DSLR, shot some good pics !! We met a group of doctors, and wipro guys !! We sat near to the edge of the peak for about half an hour, then started climbing down other side. Our plan is to reach the mantapa and stay there over night.

Trekking down is a difficult task, the whole body weight is on your knees, they beg you to stop every 5 mins if you are not physically good or had some injuries in the past. Better carry a wooden stick, use as a third leg. I had some injuries in the past, so my left leg was not in a good condition when we started climbing down, so I stopped bending left leg and was climbing down using my right leg heavily. We could see only peaks, peaks everywhere !! Don't know how much distance is for our destination. Govind was simply running in the rocks, rocking :-) After crossing a peak we saw a rocky peak nearby which seems to made of a single boulder. We had some snaps. After 2 more peaks we reached Mantapa, there is a small stream nearby, we refreshed ourselves, it was quite a difficult time climbing down. I was not in a position to walk further, so asked Juan and Govind to check for firewood, luckily somebody put up the fire in a big firewood and left near the mantapa. One group was moving from mantapa to climb further, so we rushed to occupy it. Our ultimate plan is to sleep in the mantapa !! There were two school guys, missed their friends and about to stay near the mantapa with out food, we asked them to join with us, and prepared rice, used MTR ready-made currys. No spoons, we used Nippets to serve the rice(Don't know the english name, I suspect there will be one). Around 8PM we went to sleep. It was cloudy, no wind at all. We were tired but not feeling sleepy, had some talk about a-z. Around 3AM we could see stars all over the sky, it was clear and it was 1 day after the full moon. I remember the days when I was a kid, used to go to the field and sleep under the bullock cart only with jute bags, I felt the same warmth !! I don't think I have exited this extent when I got my first month hefty salary :-)

Morning 6.50 we started climbing down, both of my knees started giving trouble now. So in the middle I went inside the bushes, and broke one guava stick from the tree, now the 3rd leg is ready, it was really great !! We got Bhatter mane within 1hr 30 mins. It looked like a simple country side house, don't bother about the hygiene, under the nature nothing is inhygiene. We had a great breakfast Chittranna and Wheat uppuma, with Bhatter's special Pickle :-) Govind was always talking about Bhatta's pickle, I got a chance to taste it !! Food is prepared by a Grandma who seems to be Bhatta's mother or in-law, I am not sure. I saw her photo in Govind's album. Hearty thanks for Grandma and Bhatta for sumptuous food. Don't come without talking food from that home, then it is very similar to "Going to kasi and not talking bath in Ganga", in Vikram's style "Going to Tirupathi returning with hairs". You need to call and inform Bhatta to prepare food prior you reach his place, otherwise you may have to wait for an hour or so, his number is 9448647947.

After Bhatter mane, it is almost steep down path. We were like snails except Govind and Juan, they were moderately doing good. I compared the photos taken at starting and now, no glow in the faces :-) we are very eager to see the grounds of Kukke !! Atlast we saw some fence around, like columbus did see the birds !! Reached down at around 11.50 PM. There was a stream on the road side, we dipped our bodies inside, called car driver to pick us up there. After the bath we were rocking again, (Really, believe me, I can't compare this with what I do daily in my Bangalore bathroom). Govind went for dharshan, I was too interested in the free lunch, but the hanuman tail like line had dissolved my dreams :-) . Totally we had an unmemorable experience, thanks a lot to my Ooty friend(who spoiled the Mukurhi trek plan) and Govind(who guided us in every step in this trekking).

We reached Bangalore at around 9.30PM. I could see dust and smoke everywhere, every single molucule of air is polluted. Remembered an old tamil song "ponal pogattm poda ..... intha boomil nilayai valnthavar yarada"....