A trip to Kudremukha - Execution 2

The route to hanuman gunDi (ಹನುಮಾನ್ ಗುಂಡಿ ಜಲಪಾತ) falls is a scenic one. The road is constructed on a valley and due to frequent raining  for a few months now, the surrounding was lush green with breathtaking scenic spots. On the way to hanuman gunDi falls we got down a couple of times from the cab to take pictures of the beautiful scenery in front of us.

hanuman gunDi falls

hanuman gunDi falls is an exotic locale which is just a few kilometers from the Sringeri town. One can find a board directing the people about the falls when we travel from Singeri towards Kudremukha though the entrance to the falls is right next to the main road. The falls is formed by the water falling from a height of nearly 100 feet. And it is maintained by the forest department . So the entrance fee to the water falls was Rs 30.00/- per person, which I feel is quite OK. Also the place is well maintained, though the tourists aren't worried much about maintaining the same.

We spent nearly 1 to 2 hours at hanuman gunDi falls, though we didn't get into water or even wet ourselves a little bit!! Guess this is just another reason for all of us to visit this place once again in the future... :) To go near the water, one has to climb down the stairs. I'd like to caution the weak people against getting down since the path is quite steep and might seem to be dangerous too. Nevertheless at certain places, small concrete benches have been laid out for one to take rest.

Full view of the water falls

After climbing up we bought cut-pieces of pineapple fruit (locally called as parangi - ಪರಂಗಿ) Don't know if it was hunger or if the fruit was really tasty, but we felt we had had the finest pineapple of our life until then. A plate of pineapple containing nearly 7 or 8 thin slices of the fruit cost Rs. 10.00/-. We had, probably, 5 plates of the same and then started moving towards our next destination - gangamoola (ಗಂಗಾಮೂಲ).

gangamoola is said to be the birthplace of 3 rivers namely tunga (ತುಂಗಾ), bhadra (ಭದ್ರ) and nethravathi (ನೇತ್ರಾವತಿ) though we couldn't find the any proof for the same. It is again on the way to kudremukha from sringeri after hanuman gunDi falls. The actual place is a kilometer from the main road and one has to walk the entire distance from the main road.  The path is a scenic grassland and a photographer's paradise. If you are a photographer and dying to take a panoramic photograph, then this can be your best opportunity. Try it once and you will never repent. But don't forget to take your tripod! ;)

Milestone directing the travelers to gangamoola

gangamoola

We do not know what we saw was actually gangamoola or there was something else much above our reach. We saw a huge rock and some water under it. Since we were already hungry and didn't have enough energy to climb further, we took photos of the same and returned to our vehicle. We went to our next destination - Lakya Dam.

Our itinerary had "Jamalabad fort" too. But it was strange to know that none of the locals knew or had any information about this famous fort built by Tipu Sultan. We asked quite a lot of them and each one replied the same. They haven't seen any fort in the area, and they haven't heard of anybody ask for it before. One person even went on to say that Tipu had built only one fort which is in Mysore. Little did he know that Tipu had built several forts and most of us had already seen at least 4-5 of them in and around Bangalore and Mysore. With no help available we had to drop this place from our list and move towards Lakya Dam.

Random pictures - Continued

2. Pictures taken at Kudremukha, Chikmagalur Taluk, Karnataka, India

hanuman gunDi falls

Grass land on the way to gangamoola

Some shrubs at gangamoola

Close up of hanuman gunDi falls

A breath-taking view of kudremukha range
from kudremukha peak

A far-away view of kudremukha peak

Another view of the closely laid kudremukha hill ranges.

A full view of hanuman gunDi falls

Panoramic view of wester ghats from kudremukha peak

Another panoramic view

One more panoramic view of the cloud covered western ghats hill ranges

A small flower - found on the way to gangamoola

Shot at Lalbagh - 14th August 2010 - on the occasion of
India Independence Day

A sugar candy - a child's delight.

Random pictures

All these pictures were taken by me during last one year or so on various occasions....

1. All photos from Kerala trip 2009

A trip to Kudremukha - Execution 1

It is especially rare when one's plan and execution of it fall in place exactly... and this kudremukha trip was one such rare occasion where the execution did follow the plan...

In my previous post, I'd described about the plan to kudremukha and nearby places we (5 friends) wanted to visit. We had decided on the following places to visit - kudremukha, sringeri, hanuman gunDi jalapatha, gangamoola, Jamalabad fort, and horanaDu. Of-course there was "bhadravathi Nature camp" but we had dropped it since we had decided to stay in a home-stay at kudremukha itself.

The Friday, 29th of October 2010, morning started as usual. I wasn't exited. In-fact I was still skeptical about the trip. Since my group is famous for canceling the shows at the 11th minute, I wasn't still sure that I'd be going to the trip. Anyway, I left office at around 5:30 PM and reached home at around 6:15 PM. No major traffic jams. So the travel time was surprisingly lesser! As soon as I reached home, I called up the travel agent and asked him to give me the cab driver's mobile number. The reply I got from the agent was shocking and brought immediate anger to me. I was told by the agent that I'd not booked the cab though I'd booked the cab in advance (2 days prior to our planned departure from bengalooru). When I argued that I'd already booked for a Toyota Qualis on so-and-so date and time, he asked for a few minutes' time and hung up the phone. After a while, the agent messaged driver's number to my mobile. And I took care of the rest. So the first task for the evening was done.

The next task was to get ready. I had to go out and buy a few things - medicines, snacks, etc. etc. Once I finished doing all that, I returned home, had dinner, and then started packing clothes for the 2 day trip. I had actually bought a lot of snacks for a mere 2 day trip with a 5 member group. And moreover all these snacks were deep fried items. Nevertheless I didn't want to see my friends or myself go hungry anytime during the trip, so I packed as many snacks as possible in the bag though most of them weren't necessary. The snacks itself had taken more than half of my 50 liter backpack space! In the remaining space I stuffed all the required clothes, toiletries, water, and also a pair of shoes for trekking. Now I was still left with my DSLR camera kit with no space in the 50 liter backpack! I decided to take my other 40 liter backpack, stuffed in my DSLR camera kit (1 D40x camera body, 3 lenses - 18-55mm lens, 55-200mm lens, and 70-300mm lens, lens cleaning materials, lens filters, charger, and a tripod). By the time I finished doing all these things, it was around 9:45 PM!

My friend, S, had called me up at around 9:20 PM. The cab had picked him up and they were moving towards the next pickup. P was picked up next and then the 3rd pickup were R and S. Mine was the last pickup and  I was the 5th person to get into the cab. When I boarded the cab it was around 10:30 PM. And so did the cab start towards its actual destination.

In the day P and I had decided that the best trip circuit would be to go to sringeri first and then cover the rest of the places - hanuman gunDi jalapatha, gangamoola, Jamalabad fort, kudremukha and horanaDu - in the same order. It was early morning, 530 hours on 30th of October 2010 when we reached the sacred town of sringeri. Immediately P and I booked a hotel room, and then one by one we all got ready, visited the temple, had breakfast and returned  to the hotel to wake up the driver who was happily sleeping until then. After the driver woke up, we gave him enough time to get ready, and have breakfast. The time was around 10:30 AM when we started from sringeri towards hanuman gunDi jalapatha.

In the wee hours of Saturday morning an incident had happened. We were in the verge of going off-road and hitting tree(s). But then somehow we had escaped unscathed. The reason for this was the sleepy driver and his high speed cornering at around 100 Km/H, even in hairpin corners. The vehicle had almost lost control - the front left and the rear wheels were completely off-road and the only wheel/tyre that had any control of the road was the front right one. The driver somehow managed to pull the vehicle back on the road and he continued driving towards our sringeri. Though we were angry and scared we didn't say a thing. The driver too, I guess, understood the seriousness of his mistake! From then on he drove carefully and well within the speed limits. So the rest of the journey was safe and sound without any bad incidents or any accidents.

And we say that we are working hard...

This is one of those email forwards which really moved me! I am not really aware of the original photographer. The credit for showing the difficulties of these children should go to him.

This is what one of my friends said when I forwarded the email to him.

Stopping child labour is a double-edged sword; you may force some children and their families into penury and starvation or begging…on other hand, there’s exploitation of children…the issue is truly tangled.

Thanks for the pics…helps maintain my sanity in a ego-filled world…