Mumbai - Bangalore - Munnar

Saturday, September 27, 2014

The day arrives. It's the day we leave to a vacation. It time to get along with friends. It's time for Thane-Mumbai-Bangalore-Munnar-Thekkady-Bangalore-Mumbai-Thane.
I got up early in the morning, taxi for airport pickup was at 12:30 PM. It was a long waiting time and too many last minute checkups..
11:30 AM taxi driver calls up "he's here for pickup". I tell him pickup is at 12:30 PM "WAIT!"
We all had early lunch, "brown bread and chicken curry". We get dressed and ready to go. Last minutes checks power and water taps. I call the taxi driver for pick up.
Oops!! 12:30 PM There is a power failure. Shit!!, it means we have to carry the 3 packed bags down 7 floor (ya :(, I live on the 7th floor)
I ask my wife to carry one light bag, kid the camera bag and for me two heavy bags. Wife and kid leave ahead of me as I lock the doors. Then start my swift descent. I'm too quick as my wife and kiddo are still on 2nd floor. I drop the heavy bags on the floor and take a couple deep breathes. I start and stop only on the ground floor. By now I'm sweating profusely. The taxi is waiting, the driver comes and picks the bags and loads them in the cab.
Now we are on the move 12:45 PM. The taxi's ACs isn't powerful I couldn't feel the cooling, I'm sweating. Just 10 mins into the journey, wife remembers she forgot to give kid Ondem, we stop by a medical store for the same. Finally, we are now on towards the airport.

The driver takes some smart routes to avoid traffic and at 1:45 PM we are dropped at the airport. I make the payments and check in the luggage, then a security check. Good thing that I had already done the web check in got seats of my choice.

We find a good seat near the gate and remember that I had decided to write this travelogue hence I start with the blog. I connect to the free wifi in the boarding area and start the blog.

I finished with the blog and then waited for the boarding. When plane boarding was announced I quickly jumped into the line only to realise we had forgotten the neck pillow at the security check. I approached the security, who after few questions handed the pillow. We then quickly jumped into boarding bus that took us to the aircraft.

Getting into the plane was an exciting thing for us as it was my kid's first experience. I must say it was a exciting experience to see the joy on her face. After being seated, what followed were a series of questions from her. The questions started with "Why are there cold fumes in the airplane?" Stumped! Thankfully my engineering education helped me in answering it. A short mobile photography session before the take off to capture the excitement.

The plane takes off for the one and half hour Mumbai-Bangalore flight. The take off was smooth but due to heavy haze could not get the desired view of the Arabian Sea and the Sea Link. During the journey, had the pre-booked snacks and at the end made a time-lapse video on my mobile.

It was a good landing in Bangalore "On Time". We collected our baggage.

Raj had booked a cab for airport pickup, we took off to Raj's place for night hault, not before a dinner with Raj and Amit (he missed the trip).

That was a very nice dinner with lots of fish and fun and games. It was good that we had the dinner. We were going to miss Amit and Sejal on the trip.

Sunday, September 28, 2014

Next morning we woke up at 5:30AM. At 6:45 AM got news from Amit the Tamil Nadu politician Jayalalita was arrested and imprisoned. This meant that there could be surprises along the Tamil Nadu region of passage. Hence we decided to have breakfast in Bangalore with Amit and Sejal. Everyone was ready with the luggage stacked in Raj's car "Maruti Swift" by 8 AM. On the way Raj topped the fuel tank and moved on with a short stop at a medical store for emergency travel medicines. As we started we had some traffic jam, however with Raj being familiar with Bangalore road immediately took an alternative route, within half-an-hour, we were at Ragvendra Upahar for a delicious Bangalorian breakfast.

Once done with the breakfast we started at 9:25 AM. It being a Sunday (and because maybe my Birthday) the Bangalore roads were without traffic, even the usually congested Silk Board Junction was a quick pass and by 9:35 AM we were driving on the elevated road towards electronic city and Hosur. The Elevated Road was smooth, 9:58 AM we crossed the states and were in Hosur, Tamil Nadu. Here the roads were in Work-in-Progress condition for a few kilometers, but due to less traffic our movement was quick. We headed quickly on the Kanyakumari Highway (NH-7). We had a quick stop at McDonalds. But since they only served breakfast muffins we skipped it and moved on. My Kid wanted Burgers :P. She has this knack of having specific hunger, this time it was specifically for McChicken/Magic Masala Burgers :'( and since they were not available and I had to give her an elaborated explanation to convince her. This part of Tamil Nadu close to Karnataka was functioning normally, that bought cheers as there was no effect of the Jayalalita arrest.

The road was smooth and Raj was happy to step down on the car's pedal to the fullest. On the way we had nice scenic views of the mountains with the clouds adding colours.

We moved very quickly on the NH-7 and were close to Salem at 12 PM. At Salem, we took a diversion towards Coimbatore on the SH-47. The road was in a very good condition. We by-passed Sankari (12:40 PM), Bhavani (12:50 PM), Erode (1:00 PM) and missed a diversion to service road towards Perundhurai (1:04 PM). The Perundhurai junction now has a flyover. Luckily, since I was tracking Google Maps on my mobile, I asked Raj to backup and manage to reverse and find a patch to move towards the service road and at 1:05 PM were are on the Perundhurai Road. We skipped a few vegetarian restaurants all along Bhavani. Our plan was to get to Kangayam for lunch at "Gayathri Veg and Non Veg restaurant" just near the Kangayam Bus stand. I had read about it on team-bhp travelogue.

However, as we passed through Perundhurai (1:10 PM) we were in for a surprise. The whole town was deserted, roads empty, only some bakeries were seen open. The Jayalalita arrest had effect on this part of Tamil Nadu. All the hungry rats in our tummies went mad as we realised that the hotels were closed. We proceeded hoping Kangayam would not be affected. We reached Kangayam (1:40 PM), the same story. We took a chance and checked Gayathri Restaurant, it was closed :'(. We decided to move ahead and turned around (Hotel Gayathri is on Tiruppur-Dharapuram road). As we turned around we saw a cart selling corn. Everyone loved corn. I quickly went out of the car, but immediately returned into the car. Damn! it was so hot outside! Then I collected myself and then went to get the corn. On reaching the cart, I realised "no hindi, no english, no kannada" I then had a short session of "Dumb Sharrotts" "how much?" "Give me 5". Luckily for me the the lady along with the seller knew numbers in Hindi. I bought the boiled corns and then quickly rushed into the car's comfortable air conditioned environment. We moved on towards Dharapuram eating the corn and temporarily filling our stomachs. As we passed through towns, villages all seemed to be closed.

On way to Dharapuram we came across a bakery (2:07 PM), we had some chips and water. We freshened up and started moving on. By now we had lost hopes of any lunch. We reached Dharapuram (2:30 PM), and were pleased to see restaurants open. We immediately stopped at the first restaurant. It was a vegetarian restaurant, now it was acceptable to us, we had mushroom fried rice and veg biryani. Even vegetarian and spicy tasted delicious. By 3:10 PM we were back on road and we had a light drizzle. Now we changed the drive and I jumped behind the wheels and Raj on the navigators seat.

Google Maps is good even with weak signals. Since, the voice on Google Navigation was of a Indian female, we started referring Google Maps Navigation as "Google Bai". "Bai" means lady in Marathi. We reached Udumalpet (3:44 PM), as guided by Google we took the route onward to Udamalpet-Munnar Road (Dhali Road). As we moved on the Dhali Road we were shocked, no road visible, a bridge was being constructed. I just paused and had a look around, asked Raj, whether any other routes were available? Meanwhile I saw a tipper moving straight along road. I decided to take a chance and move behind it. The patch of about 1 km took 5 minutes to cross as we moved slowly with doubts of going back and taking an alternative route. Once I stopped and moved back,however the tipper showed us the way again. Finally, we were on a paved road and we picked up speed. We topped the fuel (3:58 PM) where the fuel filling guy try to bluff us into paying more, however Raj was alert as to how much fuel was filled and paid appropriately . The fuel price was Rs. 6 lower than Bangalore. Raj joked he wished he had extra barrels to buy more fuel. Going ahead the sign boards clearly mentioned directions to Munnar, even our Google bai was constantly showing us the way. I was keen to cover as much distance in the day light as it was jungle area ahead. As we approached the Chinnar Wildlife Sanctuary, the view of the huge rocky mountains ahead was just awesome.

Entry to the Anamalai Tiger Reserve is allowed only between 5 AM to 5 PM.

At the check posts one is required to sign in the details, Raj did it for us. The are four check posts. By 4:09 PM we made it to the first Forest check post. Here there were a few vehicles, private taxis actually. One had foreign nationals who at the view of huge welcome hoarding "Anamalai Tiger Reserve" got excited and jumped out of the car and started clicking photos of the hoarding. The forest guard immediately went up to him and asked him to be seated in the car and when the driver returned after logging the details the guard instructed not to stop and allow the foreign nationals out of the car. Another taxi was moving in the opposite, on seeing our car (guess the number plate, Karnataka), one person approached me to inquire the situation in the state along the route. I assured him that it was fine to travel except that cities/hotels are closed.

We then started our climb in the Anamalai Tiger Reserve (Chinnar Wildlife Sanctuary), everyone was excited specially my daughter who wanted to see animals and click photos. As we moved forward slowly, we saw Peacock & Peahens. On the left the Amravathi Reservoir can be seen, a huge water body. We crossed the Tamil Nadu - Kerala state boundary at 4:40 PM. At the check post, one will find lots of monkeys, who are habituated to the cars. They won't hesitate to approach and pick anything they find in your car. Ensure that there is nothing on the dashboard that will attract them or keep the windows rolled up.

After passing the check posts we started our ascend up the mountains along the narrow roads. The scenic views all along the climb are breath taking. Initially we had decided that we won't be stopping on the road, but the views were so mesmerizing that we had to stop and click the pictures.

Thoovanam Waterfalls

All along the road in the sanctuary, on the kerala side, there are coffee houses and at 5:17 PM, we stopped at Wild Cafe coffee house as it was very scenic. We had coffee and biscuits. We were disappointed as it served Nescafe, we would have loved the freshly brewed strong coffee. The guy at the counter pointed out in the jungle below in the valley, a wild baby elephant was roaming around. I pounced on to my camera and zoom lens and then clicked a series of clicks. On uploading to Google Photos I got an awesome animation.

We resumed our journey at 5:43 PM, spent close to half hour at a single point in the fading light, and passed through Marayoor (5:48 PM). Marayoor is a Sandalwood Forest, here sandalwood grows naturally. The roads are fenced in this part with warning boards. As the forest is dense it suddenly got dark as we passed through the forest.

Going forward we had to travel through the Devan Kanan Hills and as the sun set there was fog all around. At one point the fog got so dense that we couldn't see the road beyond 10ft. Initially I stopped for a few seconds and then moved very slowly as it was all hill drive. At this point a car Toyota Innova closed on from behind I wished, prayed that the Innova overtakes me and shows me the path, but he didn't. That 5-10 minutes of drive felt like it was an hours drive all along wondering whether is was going to be till Munnar. Once the fog cleared after about 1-2 kms I allowed the Innova to overtake. Since it was the taxi, the Innova driver must have been a regular on the road, as he drove swiftly, I seized the opportunity and followed him through all the bends until we reached Munnar (7:20 PM). I thoroughly enjoyed the drive. A Marayoor-Munnar distance of 41 Kms took 1 Hour 30 Minutes.

We then had the Google Bai guiding us to our hotel, Hotel Abad Copper Castle on the Bison Valley Road. As we move Google Bai was instructing to turn left but I didn't see a road just an opening. In the dark, even Raj was confused. "Where is the road?" In motion, we moved ahead. Google Bai immediately started re-routing, I stopped and saw the new route, it was a very long distance of more than 50 kms, I realised, there was a road and turned back. Upon turning back we could see a sign board for Abad Copper Castle. As I turned right, a local rickshaw came from the front over a very narrow bridge. The iron truss bridge looked very old, it must have been built by the British. We crossed the bridge after the rickshaw passed by and were on the Bison Valley Road. We reached our Hotel Abad Copper Castle (7:34 PM). We checked into the rooms and had our buffet dinner at the hotel. Then we approached the the hotel reception asking him to guide us around Munnar, what should be done and what should be avoided. The person was very polite and helpful has he jotted in details as to how we should go about our stay. We then proceeded to our rooms tired with the journey and slept to wake up to a fresh morning.