Travelogue - Kodai Kadhai : Part III

11AM Sat Morning Aug14

Its time to start exploring this part of the world.
And with the mind and body daring to go out, v kicked off the day with a
drive straight to Suicide Point. KK was very much for it, right from the beginning
of the trip. But the fog there, ruined his plans (And our hopes...)
But boy , that was some sight with u as if standing over a sea of cloud..
Wonderful scenic sight.
Next : Pillar Rocks. And to disappoint us, there was this fog there too..
Fog-ine theri paranjondirikkumbo, in a second, with a gush of wind, the fog wuz gone!
And there u r, the pillar rocks in front of u.
U could actually see the Holy Cross on top of it.
There is some story behind it, that somebody went up there to put up this Cross and
lost his life in the effort. Well, some maniac, he shud be. Or some distant cousin of
our own N.Branthan.
In the mean time, we went over to the nearby forest and took some mind blowing pix.
And to add to the beauty and glamour was my presence in the pix ;-)
Pictures are on the way...

Shudnt be forgotten that it wuz a really gud driver that we had. He added up as a guide
too ! His name - Thankam :) He is a local.

Went to the Pine forest Nearby. Well, thatz not Thankam said. he said "Fine Porest" ;-)
This is the kinda place, where u cant resist doing a round-the-tree romance scene.
But alas.. no galz around.. So made ourselves happy, running here 'n there, taking a few
snaps, and exploring unexplored tracks. Like what Robert Frost said,
" I took the less trodden path ". OK, I'm not into poetry..

Time by now wus 2PM. And the agenda said (rather our faces said) FOOD !
So within a click, all into Sumo, back to Daney Guest House.
A plate full of Chicken 'n Beef was waiting for us.
Alright, there was rice also, but who cares ?!!
Heavy lunch, and then, a small nap...

(By the time i finished this much, had to leave for a film-Runway. Dileep in serious role.
Watchable film. Bhavana in guest role - kinda item number ;-)

Travelogue : Kodai Kadhai - Part II

Day 1 : 5.30AM!
Prabhaatham potti vidarnnu... Sound kettu njaan chaadi eneettu.
Only to realize that v r going in the reverse direction.
After a few minutes, when my mind booted up completely, realised that
v might hav turned around at some major junction...

We were worried whether the other 4some gang would get up in time.
A genuine worry, considering the fact that Jins 'n Kiron were among 'em.
Robin had already made plans to watchout for a porter at the station to 'unload' Jins
from the train. Luckily, dint need to do that.

Set foot on Kodai Road Rly Station at 6.30AM.
Now, v need a vehicle to reach Kodai Hills. It is some odd 80Km from Kodai Stn.
Boarding a bus wont b a good idea, 'coz that will cost u half a day.
So decided to hire a sumo... A guy had already approached us..
He said "sumo venamaa... sir 1300 kodu.. drop pannalen.. ungalkkaage 1200 vangiren.."
One of us (who claims to know tamil in-and-out) "2 days-kku ethana aavum ? "
He said "sir .. athu vanthu... 2500 aakum sir."

Now v started bargaining. Only to find its of no use.
"Athraykkaayo .. ayaal parayunna paisakku ente patti povum.. Nammal parayunna paisakku
varaamenkil maathram vannaal mathi. 2600-inu varumo ?" was what one 'smart' guy asked.
Avane side-ilottu maattti nirthi nammal 2.5K enna amount-inu sumo pidichu.

First 40-50 Km wuz kool.. Straight, flat road (unlike in kerala).
But the later half was tuff.. With too much of hill climbing and hairpin curves. It made us dizzy.
But no untoward incident happened.

Reached 'Daney Guest House' at 10 AM. That is around 2.5 hrs of travel.
First things first.. Without giving any notice to the hotel guyz, headed for the nearest room (read toilet)
Tell u what ! The water wuz cold enuff to paralyze u in full !!
Now once the refreshing activities were done with, v headed for the mess, inside the restaurant.
A big container full of Dosa wuz there on the table. And in no time, it wuz empty.
Upon completion of this task , with many still hungry , came to know that v had just emptied a set of 60 dosas.
Juz 8 of us :-)

11AM
More to come.........

Travelogue : Kodai Kadhai - Part I

Yet another Travelogue.
This time to Kodaikanal.
The touring team
KK,
Sow,
Jins,
Bijoy,
Kiron,
Sand,
Robin,
and Rat (thats me) :)

REad on ... This is the first part...

Well begun is half done. How true !
Having made all the bookings (train, hotel) in advance helped our cause a lot.

As planned, all the techies gathered around Bangalore City Rly Station at 8.30PM.
No, not all.. Just KK, Sow, Jins, Bijoy(compsci) and me..
The other batch - Kiron, Sand and Robin - got delayed, thanks to an umpteen number
of 'aiyyoo.. edaa .. oru secondeey..'
Enthokkeyaayaalum, by 9PM, we got into the Platform.
Sowji was the neatly packed guy in the gang. Just one office bag on his right shoulder.
That too, just the right number of amenities..
U know what ? KK had a big bag to assist his suitcase. God knows what he had in 'em..

Jins, for the sake of preparation for the tour, had taken A DAY OFF from office ! Wud u bleev it ??!
Thatz the kinda dedication that helped the touring gang ;-)
The number of jokes - rather , words - that Jins spoke, will qualify for a mega epic comedy serial..
Jins Kadhakal shall be narrated.. as and when I remember 'em...

Since the tickets were booked from two different counters, the Sleeper berths were on two ends of the train
S1 and S9. We randomly (?) split into two batches. Our gang made sure that Kiron was on the other side ;-)
So sand, Rob, Sow and me in S1 ; The rest in S9.
We had for company a 14yr old girl. U wont say she is 14, looked like 19 :-)
Called goose, for a timepass.
Asked him, why he wouldnt join us. He replied " Ngaee... edaa athu ningal jab chap pluf muf.."
Kathiyadichu kure kazhinju oru 10-11 aayappo urangaan theerumaanichu..
End of Day 0.

The following days ought to be coulourul with pix :D