Trip to Yerkaud

It was the long awaited long-weekend of October. Every soul in every corner of Bangalore was longing for this vacation. Due to the long weekend, most of the resorts were fully booked. After a big struggle, I managed to find an available resort in Yerkaud and quickly booked it online.

Yerkaud is a small hill station situated in Tamil Nadu and is around 5 hours drive from Bangalore. That would also avoid us the Mysore road and its Dushera rush.

Route:
Bangalore -> Krishnagiri -> Dharmapuri -> Salem -> Yerkaud (ard 225 kms)

The road from Bangalore till Salem is a perfect 4 lane road.
Bangalore -> Krishnagiri is the Chennai Expressway.
In Krishnagiri, take the road towards Salem.
From Salem, take a right to reach Yerkaud. From there, the uphill ascent starts with 20 hairpin bends. (ard 30 kms)
This drive from Salem to Yerkaud is really pleasant and enchanting with the dense forests, the mountains, the monkeys, the mist.

Accomodation:
We stayed in the GreenBerry Resort which on the way to Pagoda point.
It is nestled in the lush green forests, around 3 kms away from Yerkaud city.
They have a in house restuarent and also childrens play area.
As it was away from the city, our stay there was very pleasant.

Day 1:
We left Bangalore at 6 in the morning and reached Yerkaud at ard 11.30 noon.
Usually it takes ard 4-5 hours. But due to heavy rush at the Hosur toll gate, we took one hour extra.

Once you enter the Yerkaud town, the first thing that u see is the Yerkaud Lake. There are different boating options available. You can either go for motor boat or pedal boat or row boat. We went for row boating.

Next to it is the Deer Park. Though it is called deer park, you will find many other animals there like peacock, Guinea pig, etc. There are also some swings to entertain the kids.

Thats Charvi feeding the rabbits...

From there, we further went to Ladies Seat, from where you can get a view of the valley. Next to it, is the Gents Seat and also the Rose Garden. After savouring the authentic fruit called "RamFal", we returned back to our resort. Below is the picture of  the warning painted on rock next to the Ladies Seat.

In the late evening, we started for the Pagoda Point. The drive to this place is very scenic. Pagoda point is again a view point, but on a cliff where you get a good view of Salem city. The bext time to visit this place is in the late evening. We reached there at around 6.00 PM, when there was still some daylight. The experience of seeing the daylight fading away and taken over by moonlight was a mesmerizing one. Slowly we could see the lights in Salem city coming up.

After a wholesome happening day, we went back to the yerkaud town for dinner. The food options here are really less, especially if you are not a Chettinad fan. Once again we had to survive on the "Kal Dosa".

Day 2:
After having "Kal Dosa" once again for breakfast, we checked out of our resort and then started for Raja Rajeshwari temple. Since it was Dushera, we had reserved all temple visits for that day.

After the Raja Rajeshwari temple visit, we went further to visit the Servaroyan temple. This temple has a narrow and dark cave dedicated to the God Servarayan and the Goddess Kaveri. This place is usually very misty as it is the highest point in Yerkaud.

Finally we went to the Anna Park, which is just opposite the Big Lake. After a big stroll there, we decided to head back. After some fruit shopping - RamFal, Figs and Butter Fruit, we started our way back at around 12.30 PM. We had lunch at Dominos in Salem. On the way, also shopped some firecrackers in Hosur for Diwali preparations. Finally reached home at 6.00 PM.

Memorable trip to Sinhagad

Independance day holiday clubbed with a long weekend came after a long long wait for almost 4 months. That means it called for a short vacation. On a very short notice, we decided to go to Pune to visit my in laws. Fortunately it was a still longer weekend in MP and Pune as they had an additional holiday for Pathiti. So some more relatives also came to visit Pune. It was more like a family get togather. And that called for a trip togather.

After a lot of discussions we decided to go to Sinhagad fort; gad meaning fort in marathi. This place is famous for trekking. The trek from the base to the top is a very thrilling experience and it takes around 3 hours. But since my 2 year old and also my MIL and FIL were accompaning us, we decided to go by car till the top and then further trek from there. We were a group of 8 people, ranging from all age groups- the 2 year olds to the 60 year olds. We went by 1 car and 1 bike.

The distance  from Pune to Sinhagad is around 30 kms and it is around 1 hour drive. We left Pune at around 10 AM and reached Sinhagad at around 11 AM. The initial 20 kms was through the Pune city and the last 10 kms was the uphill ascent to Sinhagad. This was the best time to visit this place in the month of Shravan as it is full of greenary. It felt like the mother earth has worn a green saree :)

The initial 20 kms, I travelled in the car. And the last 10 kms, I travelled by bike togather with my dear hubby and my little daughter. From the bike, we could see the pisturesque view with green green all around, the rocky mounains, the fog and the clouds. As we reached the top, it was getting more misty and looked really serene. Fortunately it did not rain that time. After reaching half the way, my cutie pie refused to wear her jacket and skarf to enjoy the cold breeze that was caressing us.

After reaching the top, we all assembled and we started our trek. At the entrace, there is a huge arc like structure which might be the remains of the fort. This was my guddu's first trek and she was enjoying every bit of it. We trekked for around half an hour and guddu also enjoyed the walk through the rocky hills, the trees, the fog, the vendors selling groundnuts, corn, etc. Since it was a long weekend, it attracted many tourists and the place was fully crowded.

After trekking for about an hour, all of us felt hungry as we had skipped our breakfast. You get this authentic marathi food there. 'Chulivarchi Jwarichi Bhakri' is quite popular in Sinhagad and many people visit this fort to enjoy the bhakri.  It is basically Jowar Bhakri prepared on the Chullah and hence it tastes just awesome.

We had garma garam 'Kekda bhaji' for starters. Kekda bhaji is basically onion pakodas prepared with more onion and less besan and hence look like Kekdas or crabs. Thats how they got the name. For main coarse , we had the delicious Pitla-Bhakri served with unlimited Pitla and pickle. . For desserts, we had the mouth-watering 'Matka Dahi' that is the curd served in matkas. We enjoyed the full three coarse meal at the top of Sinhagad. If you happen to visit Sinhagad, do not miss to try all these savouries. While we enjoyed our lunch, Charvi enjoyed her 'Jhula-Jhula'.

Finally after a full tummy, we proceeded further. It was getting more and more misty and windy. At last we reached a view point fron where we could see the beautiful valley. It was playing hide and seek with us as it was covered by the clouds every now and then. There was also remains of a fort like strucure probably that might be the actual gadh or the fort.

We kept trekking further and further passing some small and some big ponds, some majestic arcs, temples. On a way we had the malai kulfi, which was just awesome. In the cold chilling climate, having malai kulfi is just amazing.

Finally we reached the dead end and we had to head back. On our way, suddenly there were heavy showers and we had just 1 umbrella to share among 8 of us and ofcoarse the youngest had the priority. Finally we managed to get shelter in a small hut, which had given shelter to around 50 people. My hubby and brother in law enjoyed the rain standing outside the hut under the small umbrella in the heavy rains. The heavy rains stood much stronger than the umbrella and they both enjoyed getting wet.

Finally after around 10 mins, the rain subsided and we started back. This time the mist and the clouds had disappeared, but the weather had become very cool and the ground was full of running water. We could see mini waterfalls all around. Finally after spending around 4 hours in Sinhagad, we started our journey back home. On our way back, we visited the magnificient Khadakwasla dam.

It was a just a half day trip, but a very memorable one. Even the short trip becomes memorable if you have a good, jovial and a funloving group with you. Thanks to everyone who joined us for making this a wonderful trip. Special thanks to my cutie pie Charvi for making this trip a memorable one for all of us.

Memories of Italy

In the summer of 2010, me and my hubby were on a business trip to Nurnberg. One evening, we were lazying around watching the english movie "Italian Job". The depiction of Venice in that movie helped us to decide on our next travel destination - Venice, Italy.

The following evening, we started reading about Venice and how to reach there and finally our plan was ready. We booked return flight to Milan and decided to take the train to go from Milan to Venice.

On friday evening, directly from office, we left for Milan and by late evening we reached the Malpensa airport. It was really huge and looked much bigger than the Frankfurt airport also. From there, we took the airport bus to reach Milan. Milan had really old architecture and the metro systems also looked really old.

From the city centre, we had to change two trains to reach our hotel - The Hotel Edy. We also explored the city centre and its magnificient railway station which stood like a ancient monument. Reaching our hotel was quite difficult for us and finally we spotted it somewhere around mid night.

The next day early morning we had to head to Venice. So we requested the hotel receptionist to give us a wakeup call at 5.00 AM. She kept her promise and was just very punctual. We packed some bread and jam for breakfast and then headed for the Milan Centralle to catch the train to Venice. The Journey from Milan to Venice was very mesmering one. We could see the Alps overlooking us, the same Alps where we had been some few weeks ago for trekking. But now they looked really magnificient and yet very beautiful. The crowd in the train was also very interesting, right from college going friends to some romancing old couples.

After a wonderful 2 hours journey through TrinItalia, we were about to reach Venice or "Venezia". To reach the canal city of Venice, we had to cover a 20 minute odd drive over a bridge and the road to Venice was also running parallel to it. Alreday we could see some houses in water as we had seen in that movie. It was an amazing view outside from the train window.

Finally my feet touched the sands of Venice and it was like a dream come true to visit this romatic place togather with my sweetheart :)

We bought a Venice map and started with our romantic exploration.
Just as we stepped out of the railway station, there stood the famous Grand Canal" and the "Rialto Bridge" crossing the Grand Canal. The Grand Canal housed the famous Gondolas, also the water taxis, ambulance and also police cab. It felt like a differnet world altogather...or I can say a dream world.

There were houses surrounded by water all around and they had this little parking space under water to park their personal boats, which also had a gate to keep their so called water garage locked. We walked further to see the "Doge's Palace"and the criss cross bridges. Finally we dumped the map in the bag and started walking aimlesslessly along the romatintic canal. On the way we captured the pictures of churches, pizzerias, stalls selling masks, bridges, gondolas on our camera as well is our eyes.

Finally it was lunch time and we enjoyed Italian pizza followed by hot coffee. It is a tradition in Italy to have coffee after a meal.

After lunch, we explored the place still further and it looked like we were entering deeper and deeper into the town. We passed by large number of bridges and saw many other interesting monuments on the way.

Finally in the evening, capturing all these memories in our heart, we started our way back to Milan by train. Our hearts were just not ready to leave this place. On the way back, while crossing the same old long bridge to reach outside this town, we were trying to recollect the wonderful time spent here.

We reached Milan quite late in the night but still with full of energy. After taking the metro, We went to see the highest cathedral in the world. WOW, it was really magnificent and looked really beautiful in moonlight. To our surprise, the place was fully crowded. The was a huge mall just sitting adjacent to this cathedral but it looked tiny in front of it. We had some Italian pasta and then finally decided to head back to our hotel.

The next day, we woke up early morning and visited the "Santa Maria delle Grazie" museam which also houses the famous painting "The Last Supper" by Lernardo da Vinci. After having a quick breakfast at our hotel, we checkedout from the hotel to explore the city further but this time, loaded with bags.

Next destination was "Porta Sempione" the city gate of Milan. At the entrance, there were two military guys statued to welcome the tourists. The huge fountain gave us some relief from the scorching heat. We played around the water for some time, clicking snaps here and there. There was this huge fort like structure, which looked really ancient. Some creppers had coverred this fort completely and so it looked green. There was also lunch available inside the premices. We had a good Italian lunch here with Pizza, varities of pasta, some bread and juice. The area around this place was full of greenary. There was a small fish pond surrounded by some rare species of birds. Finally we saw the Gate.

In the evening, we saw some floats on the road which was very similar to the Carnival floats held in Goa. Later we went to see the malls and fashion streets in Milan. It was a wonderful evening. Finally we left for Malpensa airport to board the flight back to Nurnberg.

Overall, it was a wonderful and romatic trip - to the Canal city of Venice and also Fashion city of Milan. The memories of this trip are still alive in our hearts... even after four long years.

Wedding Aniversary Celebrations @ Chikmagalur

Our 5th Wedding Anniversary was approaching and love was in the air. My husband gave me a very big surprise with two lovely gifts - a Capresse handbag and a Fasttrack watch. Mere man me laddoo foota. Next he said "Lets go on a trip to Chikmagalur". Mere man me aur ek laddoo foota.

Route:
The distance from Bangalore to Chikmagalur is around 250 kms and it should not take more than 5 hours.
The road is just awesome and you will really enjoy the drive.
The route map:
Bangalore -> Neelamangala -> Hassan -> Belur -> Chikmagalur
On NH4, take a diversion at Nelamangala, to reach Hassan via the Bangalore-Mangalore Highway. This road is 4 lane and is just amazing.
In the return journey, you can also visit Belur which has some archaeological shrines, since we had already been to these places before, we decided not to visit it again.

Accomodation:
We stayed in "The Spectrum" homestay. It is nestled in the coffee estate and is a wonderful place to be with the mother nature. It is around 10 kms from the Chikmagalur city.

Day 1:
We left Bangalore at around 6.30 in the morning and reached Chikmagalur at around 11.30 AM. When we read the board "Welcome to the coffee land of Chimagalur", it was a huge disappointment. There was no greenary, no mountains, no coffee estates. After driving for another 10 minutes in the city in hot sun, the next board read "Thank you visit again - Chikmagalur". Then as we moved further, the actual beauty and scenic view begun. Then we could see the coffee estates, the pepper plantations, the overlooking mountains and the colourful flowers hanging from the garden of every house. we started to feel a sudden chill and the weather became very pleasant all of a sudden. Within 2 kms, the hot air had transformed into chill air and now we could experience the hill station climate.

On entering the homestay, we decided to extend our vacation by 1 more day as we fell in love with this place...It was a huge relief from the hot scorching heat of Bangalore. After having lunch in the homestay, we drove till the Cafe coffee Barn, which is huge coffee estate and then went to see the Chikmagalur market area. We had some really amazing coffee there. Since we were a little tired, we decided not to venture further and came back to our homestay.

Day 2:
Next day early morning at around 6.00 AM, we went to see the highest peak - Mullayangiri. It was around 22 kms from our homestay and the last 6 km stech is very narrow . At some places only a single vehicle can pass. The last 2 kms is really dangerous. At some streches, there is no tar road and the path is really very narrow. To add to it, is the deep valley on one side and the steep ascent of the road. The best time to visit this place is early morning as at this time, the return traffic is minimal or almost nil. To put it in short, the drive to this place is highly adventurous and I guess my heart missed a beat on my occasions. But this drive is really worth the view that we get after reaching the place. It is really amazing and especially in early morning, it feels like heaven, when no much crowd is there around. You have to walk around 400 steps to reach the peak, where there is a small temple and still better view of the entire place. While coming back, the risk is less as you are on safer side of the road towards the mountain side and its a descent rather than an ascent. For naïve drivers, hiring a cab would be the best option. In fact, most of the roads in Chikamaglur leading to tourist places are not in a good shape, so it would be best to hire a cab.

After having a delicious lunch in the homestay, we started for the Kemmungundi Hills. This was around 60 kms from our homestay. While we were about to reach the kemmungundi hills, the road became really bad and there was no tar road for around 1 km. So we decided to hire a jeep to cover the remaining 5 kms and also hired a guide. The jeep took us to the interior of forests and all of us really enjoyed the safari. Finally there was a dead end and we had to trek further to see the Z point. The trek to this place turned out to be really adventurous. On the way, we passed through the Shanti Falls. As we walked further, the path became very narrow. To add to it, the guide said "Be careful, if you slip your leg, you will die on the spot." My husband was carrying our 2 year old daughter and I was more worried about them. My heart was really beating fast. Later we had to climb the hill to reach the top at the Z point. The trek turned out to be a little risky especially carrying an infant kid. From the Z point, you get the view of the entire Chikmagalur city as well as the beautiful mountains. It is a 360 degrees view

On our way back, we visited the rose garden. It was not really great but a sigh of relief from the previous trek. The so called rose garden had very few varities of roses, but the view from this hill top rose garden was breathtaking.

Another speciality about this place is that the rocks here contain iron. Hence they are brown in color. After spending some time lazying in the rose garden, we returned back to our homestay. The return journey was really enchanting. The clear dark sky was lit with bright stars. It felt like we are driving all alone in the hilly forests. The cool breeze took away all our tiredness along with it. It was one of our best drive till now. After reaching the homestay, we had a lovely dinner.

Day 3:
Early in the morning, we went for a long walk, exploring the place. This is a very good place for bird watching. It was really peaceful and only sounds we could hear was that of the birds. It was truly mesmerizing. After a heavy breakfast, we left for Bangalore at around 12.30 Pm and reached Bangalore at around 6.00 PM.

Pondy Mahabalipuram Trip

One Friday morning, I got a surprise call from my husband. He said - "Start packing your bags. Guess what...We are going on a vacation to Pondy."
It was christmas time and everyone was in vacation mood in office. It was almost after 2 years we were going on a vacation, so we both were very excited. Fortunately I was at home that day, so I could manage packing the bags.

Route:
The initial plan was to go to Pondy but later we also visited Mahabalipuram.
Route to Pondy:
Bangalore -> Krishnagiri -> Vellore -> Cheyyar -> Vandavasi -> Tindivanam -> Pondicherry (ard 380 kms)
We left Blore at around 6 in the morning and reached Pondy at 1.00 PM. The road till Vellore is just awesome as it is the 6 lane Chennai express way.Further it is a single lane road and the route is quite confusing at times. On the way, we had breakfast at Krishnagiri.
From Pondy to Mahabalipuram, we took the East Coast road which runs parallel to the coastline. It is just 100 kms and should be around 2 hours drive.
Route back to Blore
Mahabalipuram -> Chengalpattu -> Kanchipuram -> Vellore -> Krishnagiri -> Bangalore (ard 350 kms)

Accomodation:
In Pondicherry, we stayed in Anandha Inn Resorts for 3 days
In Mahabalipuram, we stayed in Pallava Dynasty for 2 days

Day 1: In Pondicherry
We reached Pondy at around 1.00 PM. After having lunch, we took a short nap and then explored the resort. In the evening, we went to the Promenade beach. It is a rocky beach and hence one cannot enter the waters. This was a little disappointment for us. But the beach was really beautiful. We spent the whole evening on the beach side. Along the beach side, you can also see many Fench colonies. There is also this French War Memorial and a Gandhi statue. After having dinner, we returned back to our hotel.

Day 2: In Pondicherry
We got up early morning to visit the beach again, this time to see the sunrise. To our surprise, there was a huge crowd at the beach side. Most of the people had come for morning walk. And some were tourists like us, who had come to experience the divine sunrise. After capturing the sunrise in our eyes, we retuned back to our hotel. Breakfast was included complimentary in our package. After filling our tummies, we started with our next tourist spot - the well known Aurobindo Ashram. Kids are not allowed to enter this Ashram, Hence we had to go one by one. The Ashram is full of potted plants and you can see people in deep meditation around the samadhi. They also sell books on Aurobindo's works - the Mother. After this. we next headed towards Pondy museum. It showcases a wide diversity from astronomy to history. After the museum, we visited the Pondycherry Botanical Gardens. Finally we retuned back to our hotel. After lunch followed by a short nap, we continued our sight seeing again. We visited the Church of Sacred Jesus. It is very huge and has a Gothic architecture. Next we visted the Paradise beach, which is the only sandy beach in Pondy. By the time we reached there, it was very late evening and and the beach was very lonely and dark, so we decided to return back. On the way back, we had dinner in a Vietnamese Restuarent. You can find lot of Thai, Vietnamese, Italian and French restuarents here.

Day 3: In Pondicherry
After having breakfast in the hotel, we left towards the lake. It is around half an hour drive. The lake is very big and they also have boating facilities. We decided to go for motor boat as we had an infant daughter. The boat ride is for half an hour and it will take a complete round of the lake. You can spot some species of birds on a small island housed by the lake. After the mesmerising boat ride, we then went back to our hotel. We had lunch in our hotel and after a short nap started again towards the Paradise beach. My hubby was hoping to have a bath there. There were some handful of people this time on the beach. But the beach is quite deep and hence not suitable for taking a bath. So we just had a stroll along the beach dipping our legs in the water and playing with the water. On the way back, we again visited our favourite Promenade beach and had dinner in one of the restuarents there and returned back. On our way back, we also visited "Pothys". It is a huge shopping mart.

Day 4: In Mahabalipuram
After checking out from the resort, we started our journey to Mahabalipuram. The road to Mahabalipuram runs parallel to the East coastline, and hence it turned out to be a very pleasant drive. Once we reached Mahabalipuram, our first task was hotel hunt. We quickly managed to find a very good hotel in the centre of the city. After reaching there, we realised that it is a very small town. The owner told us that Indian Dance Festival had started there just 2 days back and we should not miss to see that. I guess thats the reason the place was flooded with foreigners. The same day in the evening we went to see the sea shore. The walk to the sea shore was difficult as the place was loaded with tourists and stalls. After that, we went to see the Dance festival. It was a good experience. Earlier we had decided to stay just one day here. But after visiting this place, we fell in love with it and decided to extend by one more day.

Day 5: In Mahabalipuram
Next day, early morning, we went to the beach to see the sun rise. The beach was not very clean but fine enough for a bath and my hubby did not miss this golden oppurtunity. On the other hand, I was having some fun time with my daughter. After the divine bath, we next went to the Varaha caves. The small trekking was really fun. Then we visited the Light House, from where you can get a good view of this town and also the beach. then we visited "Arjuna's Penance" There is also this Stone, which is known for its balancing technique. Then we visted some temples. By then, it was evening time, and we could not miss the Bharatnatyam dance at the Dance Festival. Late night, we explored the city and did some shopping. This city is known for stone sculptures. Here you can see lot of people carving amazing items from stone.

Day 6: In Mahabalipuram
It was the last day of our vacation. Early morning, we visited the Sea Shore Temple and then the Five Rathas. Both these monuments are listed as World Heritage sites and they are must see places in Mahabalipuram. Finally at around 12.00 PM, we left for Bangalore and reached home at around 7.00 PM.

We will always cherish and relive all those wonderful memories and the amazing time spent with family in this trip.

Trip to Wayanad

We had two consecutive holidays- one for Sankranti and one for Id in the month of January 2014, so we took a day off from office to get an extended 5 days vacation. The biggest question on our minds was where to spend the holidays - basically the confusion was between Wayanad (Kerala) and Yerkaud (Tamil Nadu). After some net surfing and talking to friends, finally we decided to go to Wayanad.

Route:
Google shows three routes to reach Wayanad from Bangalore.
The best one is Bangalore -> Mysore ->Nanjangud -> Gundlupet -> Bandipur -> Wayanad
The reason why we chose this route is that it passes through Bandipur and Muthunga wild life sanctuaries and if you are lucky, then you can spot some wild animals there. We left Bangalore early morning at around 5.00 AM and reached Wayanad at 12.00 PM. It should take around 5.5 hours to reach wayanad, but we took longer as we were travelling with our 1.5 year old daughter. On the way to Wayanad, we had our breakfast at Kamat Madhuban and on our return journey, we had our dinner at the same place. If you plan to visit this hotel, dont miss their jowar rotis. They prepare really amazing jowar rotis, the best i had so far.

Accomodation:
On the recommendation of one of our friends, we had booked "Rocky Nest" homestay which is located in kalpetta. After entering Wayanad, we have to cross Sulthan Bathery to reach Kalpetta. The owner of the home stay had come to recieve us at the bus stand and from there he guided us till the home stay.
The place was really good, well maintained and hygienic. It is build on the rock, hence the name Rocky Nest. The owner of this place, Abdul Salaam and his family is really helpful and they will try to help you out with every possible thing right from shopping to food to travel.

Day1: After having lunch in kalpetta, we took a short nap and then headed towards "Pookat Lake". The drive to this lake from Kalpetta was mesmerising with beautiful tea estates on both the sides. The lake was not very clean, hence we decided not to go for boating. But the area around the lake was nice and we took a short round around this lake. We also visited the aquarium here, which is really worth seeing. There was a small garden around the lake with some swings, etc which attracted my daughter. Finally we saw one eleplant and after that we decided to return back. To our surprise, monkeys were waiting on our car to welcome us. My husband tried to scare them away with the car alarm, but no gain. Atlast they left our car and we could proceed further. On the way back to the home stay, we experineced the same tea and coffee estates. After reaching the home stay, the food was ready for us. The food was simple yet very tasty, Aunty had prepared ghee rice with dal and papad and pickle. My daughter had a gala time playing with their kids and on the other side we all enjoyed the food. After a hectic day, we had a very good sleep.

Day 2: The next day the owwner agreed to accompnay us on our sightseeing. We had lovely breakfast of rice pooris and potato sabji along with some pancakes and left for our journey. First we visited the view point "Lakkidi". From here , you can get the view of the whole valley and the mountain ranges. The morning sight of this place is really amazing!! Next halt - Banasura Dam. On the way, we saw the famous Chain Tree. The story behind the tree is that as the tree grows, the chain expands. After reaching the entry point for banasura dam, we had to wait for half an hour for our jeep. There is a jeep which takes you to banasura Dam or if you like you can also walk till the dam. It should be around 1.5 kms. The dam is really huge and we can see the beautiful mountain ranges adjoining the dam. This is Asia's second largest earth dam and India's largest earth dam. Dont miss the speed boat ride here. It is just amazing. After a memorable speed boat experience, we decided to proceed to our next halt - Kuruwa Island. There is a garden surrounding this lake, which we skipped as it was noon time and quite hot. After taking the same jeep for return journey, we headed towards Kuruwa islands.

Our owner (cum guide now) had ordered some authentic homely Kerala food for us on the way to Kuruwa island. We really enjoyed every bite of the food that we ate here. There were around 20 palyas served with rice along with Kheer and red colored water (water boiled with some roots).
After overfilling our tummies, we headed towards Kuruwa Island. This is a small island with dence forests and we can reach this place by sailing on the bamboo boats which can accomodate around 60 people. Unfortunately, the island was captured by wild elephants, hence the entry to the island was blocked and we had to return back. Our next halt was Thirunelli temple which is around 3000 years old. It is said that Luva nd Kush studied in this temple . One amazing thing i noticed about this temple is that, there were no lights inside and the whole temple was lightened with lamps. Hence it looked more beautiful. This was our last halt and we decided to return back home as it was quite late in the evening and we were 60 kms from kalpetta. It took us around 2 hours to recah home thrugh the dence forests. On the way we spotted some deers.
Back home, aunty had prepared delicious vegetable Biryani along with omlette. All of us were really hungry and we gobbled all the food in front of us and had a very tight sleep after that.

Day 3: This was our last day in wayanad and we decided to see the Sochipura waterfalls and then return Bangalore. We had our breakfast and after a sad farewell to uncle and aunty and the home stay, we headed towards the waterfalls. The route to the waterfall is really scenic with tea estates on all four sides and cool breeze. We pre ordered food in one of the restuarent near the waterfall and then started towards the waterfall. It was written that we have to walk around 1 km. But this so called walk turned out to be the most adventurous walk for us especially with our little daughter. As i was not keeping very well, my husband had to carry her always.
In the beginning, it was a normal route, then we had to go down some steps and finally some rocky steps. To reach the bottom of the waterfall, we had to do some rock climbing with the rope and this was the most difficult part but somehow my husband managed to bring my naughty daughter safely to the waterfall area with the help of my brother in law. The waterfall is really deep and it is worth seeing. After spending some time there, we returned back and back jouney was much more tiring especially for my husband as he carried our daughter the full way. Really proud of my husband as he did gracefully without showing any signs of tiredness.

Finally we had some good lunch and then continued our journey back home. There on our way, we were unaware that some wild elephants were waiting for us. Once we crossed the Muthunga forests and entered the Bandipur forests, we spotted some deers, some elephants, a bison and some peacococks. After some time, we spotted one wild elephant on the road. We stopped for it to cross the road. But some truck drivers refused to stop and proceeded fast. The elephant got irritaed and started moving back and forth of the road. We quickly took a reverse turn and waited in a postion to flee in the back direction. After waiting for a very long time, finally the elephant crossed the road and we could proceed further. By then there was a huge traffic jam on both sides of the road. This was one of the first experience we had with the wild elephants and it was really a spine chilling experience.
Finally we reached Mysore at 9.00 PM and had our dinner and then reached home at around 1.00 AM.

Overall it was a wonderful trip loaded with lots of fun and adventure!!