Day 2 - Entering Kerala

21-12-2014

377 KM

"Dude its time for us to see the sunrise, lets wake up. But is it worth loosing the sugar sleep?? Yes, definitely. I think we need to look around for some nice frames. Oh yeah ... I'm not in boring Bangalore at this moment, lets get out of the tent to explore". This was the conversation we were having inside the tent in the early morning. Unzipping the tent door, we found that, we were already late. Though we were late for the sunrise, we weren't unlucky, as it was a cloudy day. We could see some fishermen were already busy with their coracle for fishing. We thought of having a fresh tea, but since we never had carried tea, we ended up sipping hot water out of the mugs, we bought yesterday. We felt the place is pretty safe for people to camp, but our sincere request for all is to avoid littering this place, as we saw the back water view point is littered badly by tourists. Just to save our toothpaste for next few days, we tried the natural way of brushing the teeth with the left out charcoal out of our camp fire. That was a nice feeling. We got in touch with a fisherman and asked him, if we could buy a fresh fish, he has just captured. He agreed and headed towards us. It was a quite big fish, he offered for around INR 150. We had to deny his offer, as I was the only Non Vegetarian, and it was too big for this breakfast. I wish we could have another Non-Veg partner, so that both of us could have a nice treat in the morning with a camp fire cooked fish. Refreshing up at this natural habitat was a good start for the day. It was a fresh chilly weather welcoming us for today's journey, though Shakila got stuck in the wet muddy back water bank. Santhosh had to sacrifice his jeans helping getting Shakila out of the mess.

Morning at KRS Back Water 

Morning at KRS Back Water 

Morning at KRS Back Water 

Morning at KRS Back Water 

Morning at KRS Back Water 

Morning at KRS Back Water 

Morning at KRS Back Water 

Morning at KRS Back Water 

On the way back from KRS back water, we had been stopped by a small hotel to finish up our breakfast. It was only "Tatte Idli", "Daal Wada" and "Rice Bhat", but we never compromised with our character and had tummy full out of it. It was time for us to take a discussion for today's route for our next journey. Santhosh and myself spent some time with the map to start our journey towards Nagarhole National Park, as it would be easy for us to get in to the western ghat right from north Kerala. After taking a right turn from Ranganthitu-Hunsur Road, we got on to Madikeri road. As we were going out of state, we made the balance fat on our BSNL SIM. We filled our tank at Hunsur and after a quick check up of the bike, we started towards Nagarhole National Park.

Deciding on the route map

There are two routes from Mysore to Nagarhole, one is right through the dense forest, which is only allowed for light four wheeler. The other route, which is kissing the north border of the forest, which we opted. After riding around 20 KM from Hunsur, we both started feeling sleepy, may be because of the heavy breakfast. So now we stopped at a tea shop on the way. Right after sipping one tea, Santhosh slept for some time. I had put our phone batteries for charging. While Santhosh is sleepy, it's good for me to sip another tea to enhance my write up. Ha ha ha.. Just now some local people approached the tea shop and started asking me "You Army?", "You Foreigner?". Santhosh had to wake up finally and answer all question as my Kannada is similar to their English. They got excited about our travel plan and suggested us a near by place on the river bank, where we can sight elephants, but may be we have to wait till late in the evening and it's absolutely depends on our luck. It is now 11 AM and It's not worth spending the entire day here to sight elephants. Myself and Santhosh decided to move. It seems some part of the roads are bad from here, anyway it's all part of our journey. Okey!!! I am stopping my write up here to experience further for this blog. 

Wow!!! Another experience, today we ended up at a church dormitory and how did we get here, it's a long story. Let me start from where I left. After a warm see off at the tea shop, we headed straight and reached Gonikoppal. Another decision to make; straight is Virajpet which would have taken us near to coast to start our journey in Kerala, but we decided to start our journey from western ghat and took a left turn from Gonikoppal towards Mananthavadi, as it would be the starting of western ghat in Kerala. 

With a tough experience of cooking with and uneven stove prepared out of locally available stones last night, our engineering brains designed a simple stand which would simplify our effort in cooking. We started looking for welding workshop and implement our design. Thanks to Vinod Engineering Works, who made the stand for us absolutely free, after hearing our travel plan. On the way we tried getting in to Nagarhole Reserve Forest from the other end, but rules are very strict there, the forest guard did not even properly answer to our queries and we ended up to a small hotel at Kutta. It was around 3 PM, we reached there and the hotel lady some how managed food for us. Even though it was left over for the day, I would not mind to say it was our first Mallu style lunch, which was pretty yummy. And don't be scared if you hear the word "chor" around kerala, it means cooked rice in Malyalam.

At Nagarhole Reserve Forest Check Post

At Nagarhole Reserve Forest Check Post

After the lunch and some local enquiry, we started towards Mananthavadi. There was a caring instruction from the hotel lady saying, we should cross the forest to reach Mananthavadi, before sun set, as there would be animal crossing on the road at most of the places. On the way to Mananthavadi, we could able to realize that we are climbing western ghat and slowly the climate started changing. We enjoyed our ride on those curvy road covered with dense forest from both sides. Though there was a hope to see some wild animals, Shakila was much concerned about her safety with a monstrous sound. 

Keeping in mind that this place comes under reserve forest and there would be animal roaming in the night, we decided to put the tent near by a village. On the way near to Kattikkulam, we stopped seeing some clustered 10-15 houses. I approached one of the house and asked which language they understand. It was Vaishnavi, who whispered English. I was totally surprised with that. Vaishnavi is a 8th standard school girl, who is staying in hostel at Trivandrum and is on Christmas holiday to her aunt's place over here. After listening to our travel plan, she spoke to some people to get us a place for the tent, but due to reserve forest and maoist problem, we came to a conclusion, where we had to get forest department's permission to put the tent. After having some more discussion with Vaishnavi, we thanked for her effort to help us and started our journey. By that time we realized, tenting up in reserve forest would be difficult, specially when the administration is concerned about maoists. We tried our best asking people for a place just to sleep tonight with our sleeping bags, but disappointments every where. Suddenly we met a person near to a church asking for the same and that person helped us getting a dormitory in side the church. We had a discussion with father about our travel plan and he agreed to give us a stay @ INR 70/- per head. As there was some preparation happening for the Christmas eve till 7 PM, father suggested us to visit near by Kabini river. 

At Kattikkulam, we had big time difficulty making people understand, what we were looking for. Even the local police was not able to understand any other language. But thanks to the people of Kerala, they some how managed a person, who was fair with Hindi. At Kattikkulam, we crossed the Kerala border and got in to Karnataka on the way to HD Kote. That road was coming under Begur Reserve Forest and the only intention we got in to that road to try our luck to sight some animals. Though it was a disappointment, we came to know Kabini river separates Kerala from Karnataka and people use ferry service to cross the  border. We rode further till Bavali Forest Check Post having a discussion with some people over a tea shop to find out a place for the night halt. Disappointment everywhere; forest department, villagers all suggested us to check in to the near by resort, because of the maoist problem. It was final, that we would be staying at the church. On the way back from Bavali, we could only see some deer. It was getting darker, we reached Kattikkulam and finished up with the dinner. 

After some formality at the church, we got the entire dormitory hall for us to use. We got freshen up quickly and went out looking for tea. Right after our night tea at a near by shop, we spent some time in night photography. As it was very cold out side, we did not spend much time and came back to the church. After that we spent some time with the map to figure out our route for tomorrow. It's now around 11 PM and I am stopping my write up. Good Night!!!

Church Dormitory we are spending tonight

Church from outside

Church from outside