Well the places mentioned on the heading are situated in the most splendid and awesome state called Karantaka and it’s a splendid breath taking 97 km ride from Bangalore.
Two friends of mine and I took off in two bikes towards the place. We enjoyed the ride even more since we’d been there once before but due to minor difficulties we couldn’t enjoy ourselves there. We started off from Bangalore at around 7.30 A.M and had some snacks along the way. The route is splendid (even the roads were surprisingly good except for 6 Km bad stretch), like I said, therefore we took our own sweet time to reach.
Our arrival to Sangam, the point where River Arkavathy and Cauvery converge, was around 10.30 A.M. We spent some time on the river bed of the Sangam after which we took a raft ride to cross the Sangam River to reach Mekadatu. The people of the area are a bit aggressive, even the beggars, so if you’re aggressive try not to show it out there.
Talking about the raft ride, the raft ride was a bit slow, but the whole ride was smooth and beautiful. It of course doesn’t come for free. The cost is around Rs.40 per person back and forth, and on top of that the raft rider asks for his tip which is around Rs.10. If you still got some energy left in you to reach the top of the hill walking, you can take a 4 km trek, which is up hill all the way, otherwise you have an option of either travelling by bus or if you’re a big group then you can book yourself a cab to take you back and forth. We took the bus, again costed us Rs.40 per person.
Talking about the bus. The bus you’ll sit in looks like a wreck, a complete wreck. The seats luckily are stuck to the bus throughout but the rods, the shock observers are completely out of place. And the ride, the ride was awesome (Am being sarcastic). The uphill bus journey is’nt that tiring, it’s worse than tiring.
Once reaching the top, you got to go downwards, with the help of half broken steps or some deformed rock. Mekadatu (Translation: Goat’s Leap), I’ll cut the story short as to why this place got the name of Mekadatu. Legends say that a tiger chased a goat and the goat, with no other option, actually jumped the cliff (now known as Mekedatu) and survived reaching the other side of the river. Below the cliff runs the Cauvery River in a full force.
The second best part of this trip of mine was to go to the cliff and simply doze of there and then. Fortunately not many visitors were around at that point of time.
After having a good 45 minute sleep, I get up fresh to see the rushing waters of Cauvery flowing with brute force right below the cliff. Simply Splendid. (By the way, beware the monkeys. They are way more aggressive than the locals)
We then made our way back the same way we came. After our visit, we zipped out of there quite quickly and made our way to Chunchi Falls. Chunchi Falls is a waterfall formed by the flowing Arkavathy River. Entering Chunchi Falls Parking Lot was a splendid view amazing, awesome, words can’t explain and am not being sarcastic. For going to the actual spot, take a local person’s help and he’ll give you the time of your life. The route towards the waterfall is awesome and gives you a 1% feeling of what it is to actually trek. He showed us how to get so freaking close to the falls that me and my friend, Jishnu, could’nt resist but to take a dip in the falls. The feeling of being under a waterfall is completely inexpressible. Giving words to this feeling will actually be injustice to the whole environment. We spent around 25 minutes under the fall and then made our way out of there since we didn’t want to reach Bangalore when the skies were dark. We made our way towards the parking lot pretty quickly, paid the guide a petty amount and zoomed out of there.
We made our way back by around 5.30 PM and on our way back, we had a somewhat lunch. Once back, the other bike went separate ways and I reached home. First thing after coming home was to take a proper shower and then fall onto the bed.
Photos will be uploaded as soon as I get them.
Wednesday, October 29, 2008
Saturday, October 25, 2008
One Night @ the Call Centre
One Night @ the Call Centre is a novel written by Chetan Bhagat and the story revolves around 6 call centre employees and their lives. I felt the book was one of normal novels you would read and was very well written, I liked the way he expressed the issues of a call centre. Call Centre employees would have loved the book but I would say it was nothing that great or anything.
Hello
'Hello'a bollywood flick with special apperances from Katrina Kaif, Salman Khan and Arbaz Khan (the before names are big names in the bollywood industry).
'Hello' is based on a best seller called 'One Night @ the call centre'. The story is about a night at the call centre and it revolves around 6 characters who work in the call centre.
The movie was a drag. It was'nt like the book and wasnt good at all. In the theatre I was dying for the end.
And if you've read the book, then you'll be even more sad because they've changed the most of the character's approach to the story.
When directors take up adaptation, I have no clue as to why they have to change something or the other from the book.
Hmm have to think about it.
I'm back
Well folks.It's been a long time since I ever blogged.
Partially because i've been swarmed by college activities, roamin around towards the country side, reading novels, watching films and lastly mainting my house, bike and most importantly myself.
It's been long since i've read a proper novel and now i've made it a point to start reviving my reading habits.
Recently I just finished reading a graphic novel called 'Artemis Fowl' and a best seller called 'One night @ the call centre'
Wednesday, October 15, 2008
Places to be, Things to see : Janapada Loka , Big Banyan Tree
Last Thursday, my friend, Jishnu and I, planned to ride to Big Banyan tree located around 25 Kms from Bangalore. It was supposedly has its branches covering 3 acres of land. As we reached the Mysore Road, it was around 12 Noon. We adjusted our plans accordingly to go to the renowned restaurant called Lokaruchi ( located on the Mysore Road around 40 Kms from Bangalore) for lunch.
We reach Lokaruchi at about 12.45 PM and the first thing we do is to order the lunch which is one major delicacies of the place. We ate, ate and ate. While eating we ate like we never ate before, but after we finished with it, we were screwed. I mean heavy stomach and very sleepy.
While having lunch we felt something fishy in the neighborhood, since there was live folk music in the background. So just after lunch, we asked one of the waiters as to what was going on the other side. They were pretty happy in telling us that since that day was some festival, the next door was a folklore college called Janapada Loka which has a cultural program on special days. I was shocked actually, because I’ve been to Lokaruchi like a lot of times but never knew that there was a folklore college right next door.
Stomach full.
To enjoy our while out there, we paid a short visit to Janapada Loka. Talking about Janapada Loka, it's an amazing place to be in. The environment is lovely, and way better than the 'GARDEN CITY' Bangalore. The smell and breath of the place makes you to stay longer.
We just hanged around there, and tried keeping our eyes open since we were very sleepy after the heavy lunch, looking at the museum's and artifacts till around 3 PM. At around 3 PM a cultural show began, and the show just swept the audience of their feet. The lively music. The energetic and amazing dance. Words can't explain anything.
At around 4, when the program got over, we departed from there and made our way to the Big Banyan Tree.
The ride was wonderful. There's at least one place where good roads are there and they are on the outskirts of the city.
Reaching the big banyan tree, we were stunned. The tree’s branches actually spread around 3 acres of land. When we went there, we never understood where it started from. It was amazingly huge, unbelievable size. We stopped there for a short time and then zoomed out of there since it was getting dark.
We enjoyed the whole day, especially the opportunity to watch the cultural dance, since it's done only on special days.
Wednesday, October 8, 2008
Innovative Film City
It’s a Film City situated around 28 kms from Bangalore in a place called Bidadi. This film city includes attractions like an Amusement park, Arcade Playing Centre, Mirror Maze and also involves big attractions like Ripley’s Believe It Or Not, Louis Tussad’s Wax Museum and a 4 Dimensional Movie.
Your budget needs to be a minimum of around Rs.600 excluding your transportation cost. You can reach this place using the public bus facility or on own transport.
Me and my friend went to the film city on Oct 4 2008. We had a pretty enjoyable ride to the place since the road is pretty well maintained (It’s a rarity to find well maintained roads in Bangalore). We reached there around 11.30 and then started clicking some photos of the entrance of the film city. Going towards the ticket counter to get an entrance for ourselves, we were approached by some helpers who gave us a brief description on what is where and how much would it cost. The best part of the film city is that it’s not a necessity to visit all the parts of the place. If wanted we could go to which ever parts we wanted and pay on the spot for the entrance. We saved up some cash there since we didn’t go for the Dino World, Water Park and the Kids play area. Yea sure, you’d get a discounted entrance if you’d buy a ticket for Rs.699 for everything in the place.
We both bought the entrance ticket for Rs.50 each and then a ticket for our camera which costed us Rs.100. Once entering we passed by a huge street with awesome architectural designs and this street was called the MAIN STREET.
Our next stop was the mirror maze. This is amazing maze, which will entertain you. Once you enter and walk a few meters you’ll bang into a mirror which you would’nt know unless your hands stretched out straight. And the main aim of going into the maze is to get out of it which is also the biggest problem as the whole place look the same. So I guess you understand what I mean. It’s pretty small but we were almost stuck for about half an hour and unknowingly made it back to the entrance more than twice.
After exiting the Maze, we were dizzy, still in the same world as the maze and made our way to our ticket counter were we bought ourselves a ticket for the Louis Tussad’s Musuem and Mini Golf which cost us Rs.50 each.
Our next stop was the Louis Tussad’s Wax Museum. The museum had a variety of personalities from different part of the continents like there was Mahatma Gandhi, Angelina Jolie, Elvis, Nelson Mandela, Walt Disney and many other famous personalities. There were more than we’d expected so it took quite sometime to go through the whole place.
After exiting the museum, we headed towards the mini golf. The instructor gave a bit of a description of how it works and how we should approach it after which we were on the course. The course was awesome fun since it was located in a somewhat up and down region, so most of the time we hit the ball, it mostly came back down and some of the hole’s were located near fountains and Ashwin made it in there twice. So we had a good laugh while playing the whole course which was a 18 hole course.
Our next stop was the 4 Dimensional Movie. We both were animation students and our main reason to see the film was to find out how the 4 dimension worked. It was costly (Rs.100) but the film was very neat and nice. It really entertained us along with the common audience. I won’t break the suspense and tell you what the 4th dimension. It is for you to find out. Coming out, we looked around the arcade games. Speaking about these games, their screens are awesomely huge and if you enjoy arcade games, you’ll thrive in this condition.
After a look at these games, we headed of to the food court. The food court has a lot of variety, but the major problem here is that, the food isn’t good and another problem is that you can’t sneak in outside food in. They got tight security at the entrance. Once the eating was over, we walked around the place, looking at some dance competition and then singing and other of the attraction like caricature. After which we headed to the exit and then back home.
Over all I would say that the place is fun to be and you’ll enjoy the whole trip for sure. Unfortunate for us that we didn’t catch the Ripley’s attraction since it was closed, but still enjoyed the trip a lot.
Your budget needs to be a minimum of around Rs.600 excluding your transportation cost. You can reach this place using the public bus facility or on own transport.
Me and my friend went to the film city on Oct 4 2008. We had a pretty enjoyable ride to the place since the road is pretty well maintained (It’s a rarity to find well maintained roads in Bangalore). We reached there around 11.30 and then started clicking some photos of the entrance of the film city. Going towards the ticket counter to get an entrance for ourselves, we were approached by some helpers who gave us a brief description on what is where and how much would it cost. The best part of the film city is that it’s not a necessity to visit all the parts of the place. If wanted we could go to which ever parts we wanted and pay on the spot for the entrance. We saved up some cash there since we didn’t go for the Dino World, Water Park and the Kids play area. Yea sure, you’d get a discounted entrance if you’d buy a ticket for Rs.699 for everything in the place.
We both bought the entrance ticket for Rs.50 each and then a ticket for our camera which costed us Rs.100. Once entering we passed by a huge street with awesome architectural designs and this street was called the MAIN STREET.
Our next stop was the mirror maze. This is amazing maze, which will entertain you. Once you enter and walk a few meters you’ll bang into a mirror which you would’nt know unless your hands stretched out straight. And the main aim of going into the maze is to get out of it which is also the biggest problem as the whole place look the same. So I guess you understand what I mean. It’s pretty small but we were almost stuck for about half an hour and unknowingly made it back to the entrance more than twice.
After exiting the Maze, we were dizzy, still in the same world as the maze and made our way to our ticket counter were we bought ourselves a ticket for the Louis Tussad’s Musuem and Mini Golf which cost us Rs.50 each.
Our next stop was the Louis Tussad’s Wax Museum. The museum had a variety of personalities from different part of the continents like there was Mahatma Gandhi, Angelina Jolie, Elvis, Nelson Mandela, Walt Disney and many other famous personalities. There were more than we’d expected so it took quite sometime to go through the whole place.
After exiting the museum, we headed towards the mini golf. The instructor gave a bit of a description of how it works and how we should approach it after which we were on the course. The course was awesome fun since it was located in a somewhat up and down region, so most of the time we hit the ball, it mostly came back down and some of the hole’s were located near fountains and Ashwin made it in there twice. So we had a good laugh while playing the whole course which was a 18 hole course.
Our next stop was the 4 Dimensional Movie. We both were animation students and our main reason to see the film was to find out how the 4 dimension worked. It was costly (Rs.100) but the film was very neat and nice. It really entertained us along with the common audience. I won’t break the suspense and tell you what the 4th dimension. It is for you to find out. Coming out, we looked around the arcade games. Speaking about these games, their screens are awesomely huge and if you enjoy arcade games, you’ll thrive in this condition.
After a look at these games, we headed of to the food court. The food court has a lot of variety, but the major problem here is that, the food isn’t good and another problem is that you can’t sneak in outside food in. They got tight security at the entrance. Once the eating was over, we walked around the place, looking at some dance competition and then singing and other of the attraction like caricature. After which we headed to the exit and then back home.
Over all I would say that the place is fun to be and you’ll enjoy the whole trip for sure. Unfortunate for us that we didn’t catch the Ripley’s attraction since it was closed, but still enjoyed the trip a lot.
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