Silent Valley Details

After my last post on trekking in Silent Valley, I got a few requests to put up some more details. Here the details:

Stay: I stayed in a resort called "Malleswaram Lodge" owned by a person called Dominic. The website is being updated http://www.malleeshwaram.com/ . According to Dominic, the website will be up and running in a day or two. You can contact Dominic at : +91-9961544663. Here is a blog link to their site: http://malleeshwaram.wordpress.com/  and http://malleeshwaram.blogspot.in/  (I f you looking to go to other places in Kerala, I would suggest Manoj, of Bumble Bee Holidays, for arranging your trips to Kerala. I have taken his help a couple of times. I find him very professional and helpful. He can be reached at: +91-8147087770.)

The resort we stayed in was an 'Eco Friendly' resort. Which meant there was no electricity at all. The resort was on the edge of the jungle. We we step out, on our left the ground dropped into a valley. It is a thick forest, so you cannot see the valley. There are only hurricane lamps in the room. No bulbs or fans. The 'hut' is made of mud. It would have been a real tribal thing had we not had a modern toilet !!! The dining area is also very dimly lit and you need to carry torches with you. The nights, if it is cloudy or nearing new moon day, will be pitch dark. I guess it will be wonderful on full moon days but when we went there was a cloud cover so the darkness was intense. A lovely experience. Dominic has only 3 cottages, so it is quite exclusive and very very quite. 

Drive: The resort was located in a place called 'Attappadi'. This is on the road from Mannarkad to Coimbatore. From Bangalore, you can approach Silent Valley from two ways. You can go via Coimbatore and then proceed from there to Silent Valley. The approach is to go to Mysore, on to Bandipur, Gudalur and through Nilambur to Mannarkad. From Mannarkad, Silent Valley is less than 20kms away. While going I went the Mysore way because I wanted to avoid driving through Coimbatore. Also because I love driving through Bandipur forest. We sighted a lone elephant along the way. Also the usual deers and monkeys. We avoided going into Nilambur by taking a village road before Nilambur and reached Mannarkad.

Silent Valley: The Silent Valley National park has limits to the number of people it allows inside the park per day. So you need to take prior permission. Dominic did this for us. You are taken in a jeep safari inside the park. Animal sightings are rare. We just saw one Malabar Squirrel and a couple of interesting birds. But I love the forest so I was quite happy with the drive. If you are interested in animal sighting, be prepared to be disappointed !!! If you like the forest experience, you will not be disappointed. In every jeep compulsorily has guide. Our guide's job was to sit as silent as possible. Even when I asked him something, the driver would answer!!! 

If you are a person who wants to see many places, then it is better to stay in Palghat and make a trip to Silent Valley and get back. Because there is nothing else than Silent Valley National Park in this place. As we did you can do a trek in some other part of that region. But if you are not in a position to trek, Palghat or Coimbatore may be the best place of stay.

Silent Valley Trek

"The huge cobra comes out at the appointed time, drinks the milk and then goes behind those rocks. It does not harm anyone". We instinctively moved a step back, though there was no signs of a cobra, for that matter of any snake whatsoever.

Our guide was an old man, more than sixty years of age. His body was that of a farm laborer. Not a single piece of fat anywhere, muscles tightly wound due to physical exertion, dark and extremely fit. As it happens in Kerala, the sixty plus years old man was called 'Baby' and he was describing to us about a local tribal festival.

"People gather here during the festival time. Tribal folks, from all around here and also far off, gather at this place. In the night there will lot of drinking and dancing. Drums will reverberate and music will be heard. This happens during a full moon day. This whole area will be full of people." Baby swept his across the hillside, now completely uninhabited. We had trekked here from our resort and were at a 'temple' built by stacking stones on top of each other. "Behind those stones lies the long black cobra, which will appear during the festival without fail" The temple was the high point of a small hill. The area was completely deserted and except for us there was no one to seen anywhere in the vicinity and there was no signs of any civilization.

"Now we will go through the grass and then we will go to the forest. We will then trek back through a tea estate". Babu mapped the trek path for us. The serious trek started after the snake temple. We went through grass which hid us completely and scratched our hands, through bushes with thorns which pricked us and through shrubs with insects which bit us once in a while. Gayathri and Harini then got the realization that watching Nature in Discovery channel was a better option. Baby turned around and told us, "If we are silent, we may sight a porcupine here. They are generally sighted at this place." But it was not be. Harini kept going, "When will we get out of this place", "How much more time will the trek take", "I am getting scratched", "Insects or biting me", on a continuous basis. We crossed that area and Baby looked at Harini, smiled and told, "If we were silent for just five minutes, we could have seen the porcupines."

We arrived at a clearing. There was a very small hut there and Baby told us, "This is the house of one of the tribal, who lives here with his family." We were stunned when we looked at the hut. The first thing which caught the eye was that the hut had no door at all!! It had a tiled roof and mud floor. A couple of dogs were lazing outside the hut. A feeble vegetable garden surrounded the hut. "There is no door. Everything is open. How do they sleep here? Don't they feel cold? Aren't they afraid of wild animals?". Those were questions which Gayathri asked rapidly. The hut was in the middle of the very definition of jungle, no other sign of any life nearby. You can easily imagine how that place would be during night, especially on a new moon night or on a cold night. But then, these are people who have made peace with the environment and know how to mingle with the elements. Unlike us, who need to condition the air we breathe.

We moved ahead and the ground was sloping down. We were descending the hill and were coming close to the river which was running down in the valley. As I was about to sit at one place, Baby cautioned me. "Don't sit there. Can you see the mud path here? That mean the wild boar comes this way. In case he comes running you will be in his way." Not liking the prospect I moved further down and rested on a rock which had no such paths anywhere nearby. Now we could see the river flow. Baby started peering into the trees on the other bank. "I heard elephants were sighted on the other bank." Now we were not very keen on meeting the elephant in close quarters. I love elephants, in fact adore them, but I am not sure this fact has been communicated to them. We kept looking but the elephants were elsewhere doing whatever they do during that time of the day.

Now we started climbing up and Gayathri was very upset by all the climbing, scratching and biting. "Why do you insist on these treks when we are not keen." She was fully irritated now. As usual promising her that the end was very near, we continued the climb. We soon reached a waterfall. The sight of the waterfall and the prospect of sitting on the rocks with your legs in the water made everyone happy and all irritation and tiredness vanished. The kids sat by the running stream. Baby told us, "idhu kaataruvi yaanu.(Forest waterfall). No one has name it and very few people know about it." You can see what he told was true because there were no Pepsi/Coke bottles, or Frooti tetrapacks or Lays covers strewn around. It was as pristine as it can be.

Baby then pointed to an insect which was yellow in color and looked like a well fed caterpillar and asked us, "Do you want to hold it in your hands?" Before we could say "Nooo", Baby had already scooped the insect and it is then the magic happened. Upon the touch of Baby's fingers, the insect rolled itself into a ball and the outer coating was as thick as wood. Now in Baby's hands was a wooden ball, the insect had vanished. What marvels nature has in store for us.

After spending some time refreshing ourselves in the stream, the cool water driving away our tiredness, we continued our climb. Suddenly Baby stopped us and pointed to a space in between two big trees. For a minute I couldn't make out anything. Then I saw the web the spider has spun. The web was large and built across two trees. In the middle sat the huge spider, larger than any spider I have seen till now. It had red and black stripes. We were later to see another huge one with yellow and black stripes. Baby explained, "These spiders are poisonous. The bite of some spiders is painful. The bite of some spiders make you itch for almost a year. In some cases the itching stops after two or three days but exactly one year later the itch reappears for two or three days." Something like an itching anniversary!!! We now started walking more carefully watching both our steps as well as our heads. Scratching yourself for one full year is not a great prospect.

We then reached the tea plantation and well laid out paths. There was lot of joy all around seeing the tea plantation. I told Gayathri, "We are all tea plantation walkers, not trekkers." After walking through the tea plantation for a couple of kilometers we were back in the resort. In the whole trek we had not sighted a single animal and we realized that it didn't matter. For walking through the forest is an experience by itself and I enjoyed it thoroughly.

Spiti Valley / Kalpa / Sarahan : Impressions

Here are some impressions from my recent trip to Sarahan, Kalpa and Spiti Valley

- Banjara Camps did a great job of arranging the trip as usual. Special thanks to Kavitha. Thanks to Rajesh for a great lunch at their office. You can check out details about Banjara Camps at http://www.banjaracamps.com

- I finally figured out after 3 years as to how we reached Sangla from Shoja!!We had done this drive 3 years back

- The first place we stopped was Khairighat. This was more for the overnight stay. The aloo paranthas at this place were best in the trip according to Ranjani and Harini, who survived mainly on aloo paranthas

- Did a one station ride in the Toy Train. Nice views along the way.


- Our first major stop was Sarahan, which is a lovely place with a great view of the Srikand mountain range in front of you. The Bhimakali temple is worth a visit. I would highly recommend people to visit Sarahan

- We followed Sutlej from near Rampur, all the way till Khab. After Khab, we followed Spiti. There is no greater pleasure than running along with the river

- Sutlej is dirty and so is Spiti during this season. They turn clear during winter months it seems

- The next stop was Kalpa. Lot of greenery around Kalpa. We also saw the Kinner Kailash range. There is a rock on one of the mountains, which when viewed from far away, changes colors!!! The driver showed us the rock much before we reached Kalpa and we could see the changing colors. The strange thing was it was not changing colors due to change in the sunlight. It was happening on its own!!! Great experience to see this from that place and then from Kalpa. Couldn't see that the next day as the whole place was crowded

- The HPTDC hotel in Kalpa was very good. It got the best stay rating from Ranjani and Harini since it was duplex one and they had the top room all for themselves!!!

- Stopped at a charming waterfall on way to Tabo from Kalpa

- Visited Nako en route to Tabo. The Nako lake is the most photogenic lake I have ever seen. It looks very normal when seen nearby but in photos it looks amazing

- Saw the 'sangam' of Sutlej and Spiti at Khab. Sutlej comes in from Tibet and Spiti from the Spiti Valley. If we had climbed up one of the hills here we could have seen Tibet. But civilians are not allowed beyond a point. It is still a thrilling experience to know that beyond the hills you are seeing lies a foreign country

- We stopped on the banks of the Spiti River along the way. Gayathri and Ranjani found a rock which they christened 'Lion King' rock. Apparently, the lion in the movie stands on a similar looking rock.

- Most of the villages on the way to Tabo have population of 75 to 230 people. Way less than the people in one multi storied apartment complex in Bangalore!!

- The most thrilling part of the trip, according to Ranjani, was the crossing of Tinku naala, when the water was in full flow

- Tabo monastery is definitely worth a visit. There are some life size figures mounted on a pedestal inside the monastery which are breathtaking.

- Saw some zillion stars in the night sky. Pollution does not exist here

- The drive to Dhankar Monastery and the view from there is superb. You can see the Pin River joining Spiti River from here.

- Visited the highest inhabited village called Kibber. We saw the Ki monastery on the way but did not go in. You can clearly see and feel the remoteness of these places.

- Saw a Himalayan Red Fox during our drive to Ki. Took lot of snaps. The fox almost merges with the surroundings

- Also saw a bunch of Bharal or Himalayan Blue Sheep on our way

- Tabo and Kaza remind you of Ladhak. The same sort of landscape, wide open spaces and lack of greenery. The only difference is that in Ladhak, everything is far bigger

- When we were returning back to Kalpa from Tabo, Gayathri remarked, "Aah. Now it feels we are back in civilization", after seeing some greenery near Kalpa

- Could not visit Pin Valley as the roads were not in great condition. Looks like if you were to see wildlife in Pin valley, you must trek.

- Good food everywhere. In HPTDC hotels, in Tabo and in Banjara Camps in Kaza. Very tasty North Indian food. Anyone going from down South should be prepared to eat North Indian food

- Driver stopped at a couple of places along the way for lunch. The ambience was nothing to shout about but the food was very good. I had instructed him that to me food mattered more than the ambience!!

- The most surprising part of the journey was the inability to get a good cup of tea!!! I mean, if at all you expect some good tea, it is in North India but it was not to be. We can't expect it in Spiti Valley since it is too remote and doesn't have much cattle. They depend on Amul tetra packs for milk. But you do expect it in Chandigarh or Narkanda or Shimla but everyone has now started using tea bags!!! The guy in Chandigarh station told me that given the rush, they did not want to 'make' tea. Hence tea bags!! It looks like people just want to have the satisfaction of having had something called tea. Hot and sweet is all they seem to look for. Otherwise I cannot explain how people can accept tea bags!!

- Overall a great trip. A bit exhausting because we kept driving all the 10 days but some amount of physical pain has to be endured if you want to see these lovely places.

Spiti Valley : The Thrilling Adventure


"Do you see the dark, damp patches out there", asked our driver, Amit, pointing to the hill on the other side of the river. "This is the place where the mountain caved in, trapping a convoy of 34 military trucks. People say that some of the trucks were carrying oil and the oil is slowly seeping up to the surface. They have not been able to dig out the trucks nor the people trapped inside." Our driver was full of such anecdotes, which he dispensed liberally throughout the trip, heightening Gayathri's anxiety. But I am getting ahead of myself. Let me start from the beginning.


We arrived in Delhi, were picked up by my friend Ramakrishna, whom I was seeing after a gap of more than 2 decades. He took us home, then drove us to Banjara Camps office, where we met Rajesh and Kavitha. Our adventure started in Delhi itself. We left Banjara Camps office a bit late and I was not sure when we will get to the railway station. Ramakrishan had a GPS system in his car and luckily for us, it worked, since Ramakrishna was not sure of the directions to the station. The stern lady, who spoke to us from the GPS console, guided us perfectly asking us to 'take a right at the next turn', 'now take a left' etc. We arrived at Delhi station around 10-15 mins before departure, quickly engaged a porter. As luck would have it, our platform was the furthest and so was our compartment. We got in with around 5 mins to spare. Rajesh called up asking if we were in the train as he was also not sure if we left his office early enough. Thanks to Ramakrishna and his GPS for getting us to station on time. We reached Chandigarh, from where the driver picked us up and drove us to Kairighat, where we stayed for the night.


The next day we wanted to take a small ride on the Simla mountain train. Having learned that the train would arrive at the next station in next 10 mins, our driver drove like a F1 drivers, taking the curves hard. Yet we missed that train. So we did the next best thing. We took the train that was going towards Kalka asking the driver to pick us up at the next station. Gayathri then told the driver that we have all the time in the world and not to worry about driving fast. 


The next day, we drove from Sarahan to Kalpa. The drive was good except for the dam site on the way. After we checked into the hotel, we went to a drive to a nearby village. The whole drive was a scary one. The mountains here had almost vertical sides and the depth was enough to give you vertigo. Amit stopped at one places, where there was sheer drop, informing us that this was the suicide point. When you get down and near the edge you can understand why it is called so, especially when your knees turn weak suddenly. Gayathri refused to come anywhere close to the edge and kept a safe 10 ft distance from the edge. As we drove on Ranjani asked, "Why is that place called suicide point? If you fall off from anywhere, you are gone." Harini replied, "Only from the point you will hit the ground straight, without hitting anything on the way." When we turned a curve we could see that what Harini said was very true. The mountain there was vertical and nothing to bounce off on the way down!! Amit, our driver told, "If someone is contemplating suicide, we must bring that person here. This is so scary that the person will immediately change his mind about suicide." 


Next day we started from Kalpa for Tabo. After travelling for some time, I saw a very fragile mountain on the other side of the river. It was as if the mountain was just made of sand and would collapse any time now . I pointed the mountain out this fact to Amit. To which he said, "Do you see the dark, damp patches out there? This is the place where the mountain caved in, trapping a convoy of 34 military trucks. People say that some of the trucks were carrying oil and the oil is slowly seeping up to the surface. They have not been able to dig out neither the trucks till nor the people trapped inside." He continued, "That was the original road to Tabo. Since that portion caved in, they have built this road. Landslides and mountains caving in are quite common here. Whenever I start from my house to Spiti Valley I am not sure if I will get back. So I never tell my parents I am going to Spiti Valley." I could then see why he was saying that since most of the mountains around that area seemed very fragile. We crossed a bridge and went to the other side and I was looking at all those mountains and it was not encouraging at all. It seemed that all the mountains were looking for the least pretext to start a landslide. There were enough rocks of varying sizes on each one of them and vegetation was completely absent. No signs of greenery around. We left it back in Kalpa. 

We proceeded further and then saw some people drilling on the side of the mountain. So we had to stop for a few minutes. There were a couple of people on the top who were doing the drilling part and a couple of guys below regulating the traffic. The guys regulating the traffic waved us on. Apparently they had not made this fact known to the guys drilling up. So a few meters away from us some mud and stone rained down. Our driver shouted, "Do you guys plan to kill us?" We passed that hurdle and after some more time saw a line of vehicles stopped at one place. Our driver stopped as well and checked what the problem was. 


We all love  waterfalls, isn't it. This problem also had to do with a waterfall. It was a nice waterfall, except that it was falling on the road. The flow of water was high and our driver remarked that sometimes this flow can wash away large trucks!! The place where the water flowed on the road was in bad shape as can be expected. The filled up the craters with some stones using a large earth moving equipment. Ranjani and I went to see this spot, which was not visible from where our car was parked. Slowly vehicles started moving and each one rocked and rolled as they crossed this hurdle. Our driver had one anecdote for this spot. "Once the flow was so high that we were stuck under this overhang here", he said pointing to an overhang. "We were here for two days. One Nepali fellow was serving tea for Rs.20/- and paranthas were costing Rs.50/- each." We were thankful we got out of that place, which was known as Tinku naala and a well known problem spot in the route.

We proceeded towards Nako, after having seen the sangam of Sutlej and Spiti at Khab. The mountains were again looking ominous. There were two types of mountains here. One type looked as if it was made of a single stone and other type looked as if it was a humongous file of sand!! It was mid day, the sun was hot and absolutely not a single soul or vehicle as far as the eye can see. Amit kept pointing to the road we will be taking, which looked as like a parting of hair. And the road ran so high that you were scared just looking at it. That there was no sign of any habitation wasn't helping either. 

We got to Nako and after lunch proceeded towards Tabo. Along the way is the most notorious of all hurdles, Maling naala. The way the driver spoke, this place is almost legendary in this area now. This was to be the most difficult and dangerous crossing. The driver stopped at a temple before the Maling naala, prayed and then got into the car. The Maling naala was supposed to be similar to Tinku naala, with water flowing on the road but more dangerous because of is location at a curve in the road between two mountains. It was an anti climax there as Maling naala was completely dry!!! Something which the driver did not anticipate. He more than made up for lack of excitement by his driving. Imagine this scenario. We are on a mountain road with no protection against crashing down, the road curves every 5 mts, the road is wide enough to let one and half vehicles simultaneously. In this road, our driver drove at around 50 or 60 kms speed, with one hand on the steering, his neck craning forward and up, his eyes focussed on the mountain above to see if any landslide is starting, and all the while turning the car left and right as demanded by the mountain. All the while me staring at the mountain side and the sheer drop below. "This area is very dangerous. At any point here a landslide can happen and we can be trapped." Apparently he has not thought about the possibility of us hurtling downwards. He then showed us a spot, on the left of which was a sheer drop, and told, "This is the place where once I got my car out of water and for a minute the car made it as if it was going to go down the side. I pumped my accelerator and got myself out of that mess but I was shit scared." After crossing Maling naala, we reached Tabo without any further incidents. Next day we left for Kaza. As we were approaching Kaza, we saw a couple of very dirty 'naalas' on the other side of the Spiti river. Gayathri asked what they were. Amit replied, "They are naalas." "Where does the road go?" "That goes to Pin Valley". Gayathri, who had enough of naalas, told firmly, "We are not going to Pin Valley."

After two nights at Kaza, it was time to head back to Tabo after lunch. The weather had dramatically changed. It was dark now with ominous black clouds hovering on the horizon, a stiff wind was blowing. In the valley ahead we could see some sandstorms starting and a light drizzle had started as well. Just as we were ready to head out, our driver made the suggestion, "The weather is bad. Shall we stay here today and head for Kalpa directly tomorrow?" We decided against it saying that we will turn back in case we encounter any problem. "The wind is the biggest enemy', said our driver. "This wind is the one which starts the landslides. Even if there are no landslides, stones will start falling. Can you also keep an eye on the mountain so that we know when something is happening." I said yes and started keeping an eye on the barren mountains. Even if I were to take my eyes off for a second, Gayathri would urge me, "Keep looking at the mountains". Our driver was also driving with one eye on the mountain. Our vigil paid dividends as I spotted a place where small stones started running down. I asked Amit to stop. He stopped and we could see one small stone after another come down, hit the road, keep going down and land in the river below. It was clear demonstration of the power of gravity, acceleration due to gravity and the Newton laws. Reasonable sized stones were rolling down and you can clearly see the pace they gather as they come down. If you are on the way, the wind-shield is gone for sure. Amit hurriedly looked for an overhang and got the car parked under one so that we were safe from falling stones. The wind stopped blowing after a dozen stones had rolled down. Amit put his hand out of the window to check if the wind has stopped blowing and the started. The problem was that once we crossed the point where the stones have rained down, the whole mountain held the threat of more stones falling down for the next half a kilometre!! And there were no overhangs around!! If stones started rolling down from multiple places, you were sure to get hurt, whether you stop or proceed. Luckily for us, no such thing happened and we got out of that place safely. The rest of the drive to Tabo didn't give us any heart attacks.


Gayathri had only thing on her mind from the time we reached Tabo the first time. How are we going to get back across Maling and Tinku naala. The fear was accentuated when the driver before driving out of Tabo said, "Bring lots of food. You never where we will be stuck for how long. It is better to have food handy." Very practical guy. Our first hurdle was Maling. There was some water in it but not much. We crossed this without a problem. Then our driver showed a spot next to the Maling naala and said, "That portion had caved in once. I stood here for two days at a stretch and had to go back because they couldn't clear the road." 


One of the main reasons to dread these naalas is simple. If you were blocked on your way back, you stay blocked!! Let me explain. There are two routes to getting to Spiti Valley (Tabo and Kaza.) One comes from Manali and remains closed during winter till first week of June. We were in Spiti Valley during May second week and hence this approach was not feasible. So the only way out was through these naalas into Kinnaur and if there is any landslide along the way, you were stuck in the Spiti Valley for days together. 

Tinku naala too behaved itself and we crossed that without a problem. Then we came across a line of vehicles stopped on the road. This time it was not a naala but the same old drilling problem. Without waiting for the signal to proceed some vehicles started moving and this led to a traffic jam what with the vehicles coming from the other side at the same time. Our car was stuck in a place where pebbles started falling on our car from the freshly drilled mountain side. Our driver shouted to the vehicle driver behind him to move and we reversed our car, not before a few more pebbles fell on our car, irritating the driver. (For his was a brand new Innova.) As usual, he had an anecdote for such incidents as well. "Once I was stuck in such a jam because of drilling. Two guys in a car, foolish fellows, went forward without waiting for the signal to proceed. A huge tree fell on the car crushing those fellows to death. I used to take huge risks on the road earlier. After that incident I have mellowed down."

That was the last major incident before we reached Kalpa to stay for the night. The drive from Kalpa towards Kalka went smoothly. The flight back home was smooth as well. It was as if all adventure stopped once we got out of Spiti Valley. Thus ended a 10 day trip to one of India's remote areas. This is not a trip for the weak hearted. If you need some adventure, this is the place to go. You need to do nothing. Driving till there is adventure enough.


P.S: After I came back, I called Rajesh to thank him for the arrangements. He informed me that a few days after I left Tabo, there was a landslide somewhere near Maling naala which shut down the road for two days. He had to direct some of his visitors to Shoja since Tabo was not reachable. We were lucky. Both to see the Spiti Valley and not to get trapped!!

Far from the madding crowd - Red Hills Ooty

When Gods conspire against you there isn't much you can do. That was my feeling after my repeated attempts to undertake the Himalaya tour this summer failed. Lot of unavoidable factors came into play and by end April I gave up on the Himalayan tour. Instead I decided that I will undertake a small trip to Ooty. Not as a replacement for the Himalayas but more as an exploratory trip of this region. Turns out to be a lovely region and I enjoyed the trip thoroughly.

When I say Ooty, lot of experienced travellers must have felt, "What, Ooty and enjoyment? How can you enjoy in that crowd?" The secret was not to stay in Ooty but to stay far away. Around 28kms or so away. I had heard some good reports about this resort called Red Hills from my friend Andy and I looked it up in Outlook Traveller. I then called Vijaykumar, who owns this place, and made the necessary bookings. You can contact Vijaykumar at +91-9442254755. You can look up his web page at http://www.redhill-india.com/

I left home at around 6 am on the morning of 18th May and stopped at Kamat at Ramanagara on the way, as usual, for breakfast. Reached Ooty around 12:30. The roads were uniformly good except for a 10km stretch between Gundlupet and Bandipur. As usual, inside Bandipur we saw lot of spotted deer and black faced langurs. At Ooty I had some signal problems resulting in calling up Vijaykumar and getting the route. I finally got through to him and got the route from him. You need to get to a place called Emerald and after that the road is quite bad and there are two forest segments there. As usual Gayathri was not sure if we were on the right path. I too thought the same but told her we were going the correct way. Turned out I was right. We reached the Red Hills resort just after 2pm, in time for lunch.

The location of Red Hills resort is something to die for. It is an old fashioned British bungalow, sitting on a top of a hill, which overlooks the lovely Emerald Lake. We could understand why the lake was named Emerald when we climbed up towards Red Hills resort. The water has a green hue and the whole lake shines. One look at the lake and our tiredness vanished!! Surrounding the Red Hills resort are some tea plantations and a mountain, which we would climb the next day. The eye could see only greenery all around and the huge lake. Very soothing sight indeed. Our room was in the rear and we had the view of the mountain. We had our lunch, rested for some time and then went out for a small walk, taking a zillion photos on the way, according to Ranjani and Harini. ("Why do you keep shooting the same thing again and again", they continuously ask. It is difficult to explain the concept of bracketing to them. Especially when all the photos turn out bad!!!) It was cold in the evening, requiring sweaters to be worn. The dinner was great. Infact all meals were great. The Red Hills people have a fabulous cook.

The next day was our trek day.

All treks start the same way, with a lot of enthusiasm. All treks end the same way, "Are we ever going to reach our place?!!". The trek started with four of us and with our current 'neighbor's' family. Mrs.Palak came for the trek along with her two adorable daughters, Eesha and Rithika. The trek started with everyone being gung ho about it and that lasted for a whole of 10 mins or so till the steep climb started. The whole climb was accompanied by the expected exclamations. "I can't walk a step further", "We still have to climb some more?!!" "I think we have climbed enough. Let's get back" etc. I urged everyone saying that we had only 10 more mins of climb and kept repeating this at 10 mins interval. We came to a clearing and flat ground and took a rest. The guide showed the peak to all members and the exclamations started again. "No way can we climb that much", "You guys go and come down. We will wait here". The guide put a rest to the argument saying that we will not be coming down the same way and instead would be taking a route through the forest. I told everyone that it will be great walking through the forest though I had no clue how it would be!! Slowly and steadily we reached the summit and the view from there was definitely worth all the trouble. Perched on the summit, we could see hills surrounding us on all sides and way below two lovely lakes and two dams. The clouds were right in front of us and it was as if we were on the top of the world. The loneliness, the silence and the vast space spread out in front of us eased the physical pain. After taking in the scenery to our heart's content and resting for some time, we started our trek downwards. The downward trek is always more tricky than the upward one, especially when the soil is loose or if it had rained recently. The track in front of us met both the requirements!! As the guide had promised, we came into the forest and it was a nice feeling being there. It was dark, both due to the fact that the weather was cloudy and due to the tree cover. There were lots of insects which would bite us once in a while. Nothing serious but I could realise what the early guys who explored the Amazon must have gone through!! We would not have made it through the forest without a guide. The trail just vanishes or takes unexpected turns. Suddenly we would not see the people who went before us and we would shout. They would shout back and then we knew what route they had taken. Harini kept asking, "How much more?" and as you would have guessed, I kept saying, "10 more minutes." We landed at our resort after passing through some tea plantations. The trip had taken us more than 3hrs. The star of the trek was the 5 yr old Eesha, who climbed effortlessly.

There was a suggestion earlier that we trek down to the lake later in the day. It is supposed to be a 30 min trek. After the morning trek, everyone dreaded the word trek and the idea was vetoed. Instead we decided to drive to Parson Valley and Pothemedu. Both these places have huge lakes and there is a dam on each of these lakes. More than the lakes, it was the possibility of seeing some wildlife that excited me. Palak and his family came with us and it was a joy having them along. We got an excellent guide called Rajendran, an elderly and experienced person. The route initially is not very great but after some time the roads become better and we enter into the forest area. This area is adjacent to the Mukurthi National Park. The National Park itself is closed to visitors since the road inside has been washed away. Rajendran pointed out to a mountain and told us that we had climbed that summit, which was way way up. There was a collective gasp. The enormity of what was achieved stuck everyone only now!! After we had gone a few kms, Rajendran asked me not to honk as we were getting into the area which had wildlife. We reached the parson valley dam without seeing any wildlife except for a mangoose which ran across and which only Rajendran and I saw. At the dam, we saw a wild rabbit, a huge fellow, run into the forest. Everyone was exited seeing the rabbit. The dam is a nice one and the lake is huge. From this dam we started to the Pothemedu lake and dam. As we were cruising along, Rajendran asked me to stop and pointed into the trees and said, "Sambhar Deer." None of us could make out where they were. It slowly dawned on us that Rajendran was pointing to the next hill via the trees and there they were. Two Sambar deer which were grazing, stopped the activity and were looking in our direction. Though they were quite far away they could hear us and they watched us with interest. Slowly they left that place and we started towards the lake. It was a lovely lake and Rajendran said that had it not been for the clouds, the lake at sunset would be even better. I could imagine that.

After spending some time at the lake, we started back without realising that we were going to have a big wildlife encounter soon. As we drove all of us were looking for some animal or the other. As I turned a corner, right in front of the car was a herd of more than 30 bisons. They were on the road. They came in all sizes. Huge fellows and small fellows and lot in between. They had huge curved horns. The horns had great potential of hurting you. They were all standing in the middle and staring at the car. I stopped the car. Gayathri quickly brought up the window on her side. We started taking photos. Then I switched the camera to video mode and gave it to Rajendran to shoot. Gayathri was worried. "How do we get across?" Rajendran was an experienced guide and asked us not to worry. He told me to slowly move the car to the right, giving ample space on the left for the bison to move. I shifted my car to the right. The bisons slowly started moving to the left of the car. You can see they were also scared as the ran fast in order to cross the car. A few of the them ran, crossed the car in a hurry and were behind us now. Suddenly one bison decided that it was probably not safe to cross the car and after having come in line with the windows, turned sharply and went back to join the herd. After this maneuvour, the other bisons decided not to risk it and stood their ground and stared at us. Now we had reached an impasse in our peace talks!! I asked Rajendran what we should do. He asked me to honk and start moving slowly. I started the car and slowly crawled, honking once in a while. The bisons slowly started moving to my right and passing the car. Rajendran pointed to one huge fellow who was starting at us and didn't seem scared at all and said, "That is the leader. It is a male bison and is generally not afraid." His posture was such that he was looking at us as if we were some inferior beings. We passed without any more issues and later Rajendran told us how strong these bisons were and how they had killed a couple of people who happened to get down from their car. In our group I don't think anyone had that idea. One look at the horns was enough to deter any just adventurous ideas. On the way we saw another rabbit and Rajendran, who can pluck wildlife out of thin area, kept pointing to far away hills and showing us Sambhar Deer. There was no way that we could have seen any of the Sambhar Deer that day had it not been for Rajendran. The only sambhar we would have seen that night is the variety you mix with your rice!!

The next day I wanted to drive to the Upper Bhavani reservoir. I asked Rajendran to accompany us on the trip and he agreed. The initial part of the drive is through tea plantations and vegetable fields. You can see people growing cabbage, carrots and potatoes. After some time we come to a huge tea plantations. The hills surrounding you are full of tea plants. After crossing this plantation, we entered the forest area. Suddenly Rajendran pointed through the trees and said, "Sambhar". For the life of me, I could not see any deer. He again pointed and said, "It is drinking water". I could then see it. Rajendran had spotted the sambhar deer just back seeing its backside!! This guy was amazing. I got out of the car and saw into the trees. The deer turned and looked at me. He was a big fellow with big horns. Ranjani also got down and the deer was still staring at us. Before Gayathri could get down, it ran away but Gayathri and Harini could see it as it ran. After this forest stretch was another tea estate and after the tea estate was the last stretch of the forest before reaching the Upper Bhavani reservoir. As we were going through this forest area, we met some forest officials. They said that we should be careful as Elephants were sighted in this area. The reaction of Gayathri was predictable. "Lets turn around." We didn't and continued further. The forest in this area is not like that in Bandipur or Mudumalai. Those forests are neat, there are view lines and the forest is a bit away from the road. Here, the forest hugs you. It encloses you from all sides and you have the feeling of really being inside the stomach of the forest. Added to it the weather was cloudy and the feeling of this being a very personal forest increased. We reached Upper Bhavani reservoir without any more sightings of wild life.

At the reservoir, they wouldn't let is in because we did not have the required permits. They asked to come back and check after some time since some senior engineers were coming now. A forest guard suggested that we drive down the road and go see a smaller dam. It was drizzling lightly and we decided to take the advice. As we went down, the loneliness increased. Trees had fallen down and they have been cleared. No sign of any humans anywhere nearby, dark clouds, the thin drizzle, the forest around us and the potential of encountering an elephant or two!! It was turning scary for Gayathri and the kids. We reached the small lake on which there was a dam. Down below we could see a skeleton of a Sambhar deer. Rajendran said that the wild dogs must have attacked it and eaten it. We had our packed lunch there and started back to Upper Bhavani. On the way I spotted a Sambhar deer on my right. It was staring at us, then it jumped down and crossed the road and disappeard into the trees on my left. Everyone was thrilled seeing this.

When we reached Upper Bhavani reservoir again, they again said it was not possible for us to go to the dam. We need to walk down to the dam. So we asked permission to look at the lake and the dam from above. When we went in we couldn't see anything. Passing clouds had engulfed the whole area and all we could see was white all around. It was quite chill there. We waited for some time and then gave up. Rajendran was not happy saying that we had come all the way and not seen the dam. I asked him not to worry for the whole trip was about the drive and not the dam. As we were about to leave, it miraculously cleared. The clouds were blown away by the wind revealing outstanding scenery in front of us. First the lake became visible, then the dam and then a building in the other hill and then more hills all around. "Picturesque" said Gayathri and it was indeed a picturesque place. We imbibed the scenery to our heart's content and slowly the clouds started erasing the scenery and very quickly the whole scenery disappeared!! It was almost like a magic show with the magician briefly revealing the unexpected.

The drive back was lovely because we spotted a lot of wildlife. I mean, Rajendran spotted a lot of wildlife. We saw quite a few sambhar deers, we saw black monkeys. These are not black faced monkeys that you see in Mudumalai and Bandipur. These are black all over except for the beard and head which are white. At one point we saw a lot of them. We also sighted some wild hens and a rabbit in a tea garden. Not to mention a huge variety of birds. No bisons though. It looked to us that all bisons were in the Pothamedu area yesterday!!! The eventual day ended with us reaching the resort at around 6pm and having a nice dinner. We left for Bangalore the next day.

Red Hills is a lovely resort. The hosts, Vijaykumars, are very friendly and very professional. The cook is amazing. He has magic in his hands. Added to it, for children there is a very friendly dog, a German Shepard, named Moby. The favorite pass time of the dog is to fetch something. It generally gets a big stone in his mouth and deposits in front of you. Once you throw the stone away, it fetches it back. The children love it and the dog is absolutely friendly and also accompanies people on their trek up the mountain!!! There are also a couple of cats and a kitten which come to the dining hall in the night. The white one is very friendly and used to sit on Ranjani's lap most of the time and would lick your hand. The children had a ball with these pets. I would definitely recommend a trip to this place if you want a bit of solitude for a few days.

On to the forbidden land

"It is as safe as shopping in a Delhi mall", replied Rajesh Ojha, of Banjara Camps, when I asked him by mail if it was safe to go to Srinagar. I was not sure what he meant for the weekends at Big Bazar cannot be termed safe!! Anyway I concluded that he meant there would be no issue and decided on my trip. It would be Srinagar and from there by road to Leh.

Planning is very crucial when you undertake a trip like this. I am not talking about the actual travel between Srinagar and Leh. I was sure Rajesh would take care of it. My worry was internal planning. That is, keeping the whole thing a secret from the family. There was no way that I could have made this happen had my parents or Gayathri's parents had got an indication of what we were trying to do. Kashmir is forbidden territory and add Kargil to the mix and it becomes explosive. Hence I told everyone including Gayathri and kids that it was a secret project and told them to guess. For sake of misleading them, I told them we would be going to a desert in summer. Technically Ladakh is a high altitude desert. Ranjani had this in her text book and she said, "Lets not go to any desert. If at all you want to go to a desert, lets go to Ladakh. It is an high altitude desert." I did not reply.

So no one except me had a clue as to where we would be going and the guessing game was on. We landed in Delhi, had lunch that day with Ghate and family, then went to the Banjara Camps office where we met Rajesh Ojha. As we were discussing with him, he showed the picture of Pangong Tso lake and told the kids, "This is where you are going." All of them were excited since the secret was out. Rajesh realized he had made a mistake since I had told him about the surprise factor earlier. Anyway he kept the Srinagar part a secret.

It was when we were standing in a queue at the airport that Gayathri saw Srinagar on the display and asked, "Are we going to Srinagar?" I said yes and she was happy that she had guessed right. The weather was excellent in the sense that there were no clouds when we flew into Srinagar and we had a wonderful view of the Pir Panjal range. From the flight you can see how wide the valley of Srinagar is. In case you are flying from Delhi, ensure you get a window seat and pray for a clear sky. The view is fantabulous and I am sure no one would want to miss it.

The a/c inside the plane was not working properly and everyone was sweating profusely. We landed in Srinagar and when we stepped out of the plane, it was an exhilarating feeling. It was exactly opposite of how you feel when you step out of flight in Chennai. It would be cool inside the flight and the humidity hits you when you step out. In case of Srinagar, it was hot inside the plane and when we stepped out it was as if we have entered a city which was centrally air conditioned!! The feeling is indescribable. A lovely airport with the Pir Panjal range all around you.

We called our respective homes. As expected, they were taken aback when we said we were in Srinagar. The question was the same, is it safe there? Ofcourse, their worry increased when we told our route which included Kargil. We told them that things were fine and there wouldn't be any problems.

The driver and our guide were waiting for us. They took us to the boat house on the Nageen Lake. The boat is a huge one and fully grounded. You don't get much of a feeling of being on a boat. It was very well done boat and had a cable TV and all. There was a nice dining room as well. We had some biscuits and tea and started for a shikara ride on the Nageen lake. We could see lot of bird life along the lake. A guy came in another shikara and sold us some seeds. Generally you have lot of people selling lot of things in the lake.

Afternoon led us to the various gardens in Srinagar. Three gardens are very famous and we visited two of them. The gardens are well laid out and well maintained. The highlight of that evening was the visit to Pari Mahal. This is situated on a hillock and offers excellent view of the famous Dal Lake and the whole of Srinagar. I took quite a few photos from here. It was dark by the time we left Pari Mahal and landed up near our boat house. We needed to cross the lake and get to the other side to reach our boat house. It was pitch dark there and Gayathri was wondering if the boatman can see anything. He could and he got us to our boat house. It was different kind of experience, having a ride on the lake so late in the evening when you can see almost nothing. It was dinner and rest. Gulmarg was awaiting us the next day.