Movies on International Affairs

Mudumalai Ooty - Forest Adventure

Very soon it will be time to say goodbye to Bangalore & we wanted to make the most of the time left over here. So we thought of a short getaway & decided to call it a “Mini Honeymoon”. Whether it was a mini honey moon or another episode of “Globe trekker” is what we are still debating on.

So we decided to have a 4 day trip, but with no planning on the books it looked absurd to me. I have been an risk-averse , planned person very much unlike namita who likes to take risks & draws thrill from it. This time it was her call & we decided to set off on Thursday morning. I wanted to drive down but with rain gods bestowing his blessings it was not advisable to drive into the jungles. So we decided to take a bus. This time we were well geared to survive in such a remote place.

On boarding the bus we asked the conductor to drop us at “theppakkadu” which has the “Tiger reserve wildlife reception center”. He gave a strange look at us , may be he expected us to go till ooty & not getting down in the mid-way jungle. We had a French couple in the bus & voila they too got down at the same place.

We went to the wildlife reception center & they guided us to our cottage. It looked like it rained very heavily the previous night & it was still gloomy with slight drizzle. We started walking towards our cottage as guided by the officer. A group of monkeys welcomed us , and as we came closer to our cottage we could hear the soothing sound of water flowing and bingo! what we see is a full blown river bank opposite our cottage. Just outside our room was a huge tree & there was a woodpecker indulged in his business. The sound was loud & we were wondering how would it be during night.

We went out for a stroll & came to know that there is a facility of “night safari” available. That’s it ! Namita found an activity for the late evening but that dint impress me much as I by very nature started looking on the –ve side of it. Namita realized this & tried to bundle the French couple who too were having a stroll. With their pathetic English skills we still managed to communicate them our need.

But before that there was another activity lined up which interested me immensely. How about feeding the elephants both baby & adult. I have been to the other corners of this jungle – Bandipur , nagarhole barring BR hills but none of them have such dense forest, riverside location & activities. We went to the site & what we saw is nutritious gourmet for our Big brothers. We saw a 2 year old baby elephant whose mother died after his delivery & would drink milk with the LPG gas pipe & what quantity? – 40 liters a day !!

Next we went to an animal museum where they had real animal bodies “stuffed” – Remember Alfred Hitchcock’s Phsyco mother? What attracted me most was the huge pelvis & skull bones of elephant. Also present were Bison heads , pangolins , hyena , tiger , spotted deer.

It was time for the night safari & we headed along with the French invaders in a Jeep with our guide Siva. The forest looked dreadful at night with the trees getting lighted up by our headlight. The guide was an expert as he could make out from the shape the animal on the sidelines. It was almost 8.00 pm & the jungle was quite , the jeep suddenly stopped & so did my heartbeat. Siva asked us to be quite & to my side there was a huge Bison grazing barely 3 meters from us. It was huge & seemed like the “Incredible hulk”, also were lots of spotted dear , sambar , wild boar , elephants etc. Don’t expect tiger to be seen, I feel that the anticipation of seeing one is more enthralling.

Siva took us for dinner at masinagudi 10 kms away from our cottage as in such jungle food was a scarce commodity. Dining with the non-english speaking French was an experience as for them everything in india is spicy. They had a 7 year old son “Actuange”… I still can’t pronounce his name. He never would have heard so many versions of his name. He had plain rice with butter. Namita immediately got into her favourite topic “Kitchen” and asked cordenne does she cook? YES ! pat came the reply “I make salads”. I never saw such a “self-pride” look on namita’s face earlier.

Back into the cottage by 10.00 pm we found that the porch lights were off & the scene looked straight out of the horror movies of the 80’s. But it still looked romantic for namita who wanted to have a stroll & chat. Reluctantly I joined her & we happened to look up into the sky. My god ! the sky was studded with so many stars, it looked more like a planetarium. We suddenly heard a sound of some animal from the riverside. Was it hunted? Was it drowning? Is what came to our mind. We decided to ignore it & headed to the bed. I realized that we were out of stock for water but with all lights off outside had no option but to sleep thirsty. The sleep was the best I had for years & getting up with the chirping of the birds & river flow was straight out of Sean penn’s “Into the wild” movie.

Day 2
we headed for a trek again in the morning followed by an early morning safari by the forest officials. Later in the afternoon was the time to head for Ooty. We hired a jeep & took the steep route with 36 hairpin bends via masinagudi to ooty. Our driver cum guide took us to kalatty falls en-route to ooty.

Reaching ooty was not the best of the feeling after such a tryst with raw nature. Even in the so called off-season we were getting irritated with the crowed. The weather was excellent but not the crowed. We took the row-boating & tried to imagine us being in Venice :-) The weather was pleasant slightly cooler.

Day 3
As unplanned as ever & not knowing what to do we headed to the ooty railway station. We somehow managed to catch the toy train to coonoor. The view was breath taking with steep valleys & the small villages which resembled the glossy pictures of the Travel Magazines. At coonoor we hired a taxi with murugan as our driver who seemed to be more interested in taking our pictures than the site seeing. Coonoor is warmer but many a times you will find yourself amidst clouds which gives a pristine feeling.
We headed to a tea factory , bought some fresh tea & headed back to ooty. Evening was spent at botanical garden,shopping etc.

When in ooty –
· Buy chocolates from “KINGS” in charring cross market close to botanical garden
· Do visit “Western catchment” which is an untouched waterfall/river which is a serene place
· Do visit “Avalanche” which has the fresh water “Trout” fishing etc.

We missed these but this is reason enough for us to be back there sometime.
I realized that leading life unplanned may not be that awful, as it contains the element of surprise.
Afterall thrills can’t be planned. Can they?

Nishant