Wayanad and Nagarhole forest

This again was a early morning departure plan. Arvind, Shuaib, Srikanth, Khalid and Naveen were all Picked up by Shankar in the Toyota Qualis that he had booked and we all left Bangalore before dawn. Shuaib from our Motivating and planning department was fully equipped with a lot of prinouts that had the route and a list of must-visit  places.  Srikanth had brought the main equipment: the Camera, to capture all the nasty things that we do. Naveen, Raghavendra and Arvind were the advisers and helped in decision making, While Khalid was in for everything and did not want to break his head over any issue. Khalid was on duty throughout the trip and had brought 2 official mobiles and a laptop and a Reliance netconnect to work from outdoors, which we used to check scores of the cricket matches.

Our first destination was Edakkal Caves, which is considered as a protected monument by the Department of Archaeology, Kerala. It is said that the caves were inhabited by people about 4000 years back. Trekking to this cave was a up hill task as we had to walk from the parking to the foothill, then we had to climb the hill for about 45 minutes on the occasional rugged steps. We enjoyed this up hill climb as we did not know that the cave is really far away and the cave was at the top of the hill, also the view of the tall trees and company from friends kept us engaged in a lot of talk and fun. After 45 min we reached the entrance of the cave where we had to buy tickets and we thought we had reached the cave and we were wrong. We had to climb the first half of the hill from within inside it, yes! we were climbing inside the hallow hill. We were surrounded by huge boulders and after the climb we came out and the second half we had to climb from outside, at last we reached the cave. After a tiring trek back down, it was time for some tender coconut and pineapple slices.

Trekking inside the hill

Naveen and Arvind investigate the cave carvings, while Shankar and Raghavendra pay attention

By the time we reached Wayanad, we had made a list of places to see and visit in an order with the help of the map and tourist spot list that Shuaib had got. But all our plans went in vain as we were denied entry through a particular city. There was some kind of Bandh and no one was allowed to enter and the whole town was empty, with few policemen and some goons. We had to get back and there are no alternate roads or parallel roads that we can take as most of these roads are on the hills and there are only one way. All of a sudden we were left with nothing to do, but return. So, the number of places which we had to visit reduced and we made new plans on the fly.

Waterfalls is always a great place to enjoy and we did not want to miss out on that. Next we visited one of the famous water falls of Wayanad, Soojipara Falls. To reach this falls we had to take a 10 minute walk  and another 30 minute trek. But reaching this natural beauty was worth it and we all had a dip in the water.

It was already too much of traveling and exercising to our legs for one day. By the time we go to city, the sun had set and we had to find a place to stay. We munched a bit in a cake shop and then we had dinner from a Udipi hotel, to get to the hotel we again walked a lot. Thought we did not get a great place to stay, we could watch ending of a Cricket match, which India won with an exciting ending.

Next day we got up early and set off to visit other places. First we went to Kuruva Island, an Island formed due to separation of a river into two parts and that again joins to form a single river. We got to see some birds on our way. The roads were horrible and stony. From there we went to The Pazhassi Raja Tomb (below), which was the last place visited in Kerala.

 We were all a little disappointed about not visiting many places in Kerala because of the bandh. So, Naveen suggested we visit Irrupu falls on our way to Bangalore. There was a lot of walking and hiking to reach the falls. We had a good time here, both taking photos and posing for it.We were quite surprised to see a swarm of Butterflies that were not affected by our presence and were fluttering by us.

Late afternoon, we entered Nagahole forest reserve. Though it was a bit early, we took a Wild life Safari. We got to see Spotted Deer, Monitor lizard, Sambar, Tortoise, Wild Boar, Elephant, Black monkey and many birds. After the safari, we were driving through the forest and we saw 2 elephants on the road side and our driver stopped near them so that we could see them and take a picture. All of a sudden the elephant turned and spread it's ears and gave a small charge and we all had some nerve rattling moment before we left from there.

A wild Sambar @ Nagarhole forest that had become friendly with humans.

Photos Part I

Photos Part II

Photos Part III