"I love to think of nature as an unlimited broadcasting station, through which God speaks to us every hour, if we will only tune in." - George Washington Carver
After seeing a colleague's picture at Hogenakkal, I instantly made up my mind to visit the place on my return to Bangalore. I did a bit of research, got the team's consensus on heading out there for the weekend of 13th Oct, 2012. I was in my Scorpio, and Ajith in his Ford Figo, 12 of us in total.
Finishing work, we headed out at 11 pm, to Dharmapuri, from where Hogenakkal is about 40 km away. Dinner was done with at office, since it was pretty late to try and grab dinner en route. Traffic held us up for a bit at the Hosur toll gate, but we managed to squeeze out of the jam. I was in my Scorpio, my 1st SUV, which I was taking out after more than 6 months. I brought it back from Hyderabad, since I wanted to give my Aria a rest. And she was absolutely rocking, for a vehicle that had clocked 2.15 lakh km on Indian roads. Not many people drive that in a lifetime; I had done that in 6 years, thanks to several road trips in India. Ajith
Heavy rain took us by surprise after Hosur, and it was so bad that Ajith called me and wanted to pull over as visibility was down to zero, and being a busy highway, none of us wanted to take chances with the roads under 6 inches of water. So off we pulled in a Cafe Coffee Day on the highway. The rain didn't seem to relent, so we stayed put for more than an hour there, grabbing coffee and some snacks. We set off again after the rain stopped, but it came doubly strong, so we had to pull over for another hour, before we reached Dharmapuri. I saw a motel, and found they did have a few rooms available, so we checked in. After grabbing some piping hot tea, and the worst dosas I had ever eaten, off we went. It was a really nice drive to Hogenakkal, and the last section was through some very thick jungle before we hit the village. Grabbing some water, we set off for a long trek. We hired a couple of little boats, called Coracles, with our respective life jackets. These Coracles are real fun to be in!!! We reached one of the more famous spots, and captured several fantastic pictures.
After a 30 min ride in the gorge, which was a wonderful experience, we reached the other side of the river, got off. The boys managed to find some warm beer being sold, and had a go. The smell of fish, was too tempting to resist, so they had some too. Warm beer wasn't in my list, so I let it pass. After spending half an hour off we went. The sun was up in the horizon, and it started getting very warm. It was one hell of a trek, walking cautiously over the rocks, getting to the edge of the gorge, posing for pictures...and all the tiredness seemed to disappear as we saw the Cauvery river, gushing it's way past the rocks and falling into the gorge. Simply stunning I must admit. I used the tripod and remote I carried to good effect getting some fantastic pictures.
After spending a few hours there, we headed back on the coracle ride to take us to the starting point. With the sun beating down on us, it was a very warm ride back. On the shore, I took a few more shots of the Cauvery flowing, and started on what was an unending trek back to the vehicle. Famished as we were, we found a local eating joint, and grabbed some fried rice before we got back to the motel. The drive was a real refresher, having been out in the sun all day long. A few hours of rest, and we headed back home. Dinner was in Bangalore, before I dropped everyone home, and crashed out on reaching home. waking up the next day, I was feeling really rejuvenated after a fairly strenuous trip, and motivated to take on the work week with much enthusiasm. That's what my road trips do to me...Rejuvenate...Motivate...Enthuse...
As Henry Ford rightly said: "Enthusiasm is the yeast that makes your hopes shine to the stars.
Enthusiasm is the sparkle in your eyes, the swing in your gait. The grip of
your hand, the irresistible surge of will and energy to execute your
ideas."
No comments:
Post a Comment