Trip to Kodaikanal with College friends

It was work as usual in office, but on the receeding front. Jaga called me up and continued on the B'lore plans that we were talking, the previous weekend. All of a sudden he opened up a hill-station plan which was indeed to Kodaikanal as the title suggests. We obviously had very little planning and very very little time to go with it but nevertheless we were free on the decided time. Fast forwarding the action to friday evening, I started from office around 7-30 for a 9-15 bus from office. Given that I have to take some money from ATM to even catch the bus, I was catching up fast with time and rain. It wasn't pouring though, but the rain made a nasty mess of the up and down Chennai road. Having reached CMBT pvt bus depot after a timely help from my colleage, I was well ahead of time at around 8-45 in the depot.

The combination of rain, mud, turned into more catastrophe when I got to know that the tickets were lost and Karthik was under the assumption that the bus was scheduled at 10-30. It was 9-05 when we got that information, he drive like a maniac to drive back and find that the 9-15 bus has not even arrived till 9-20 his check in time!

We started from the point writing an apology letter to the Bus unit for the tickets and left Chennai which was strung by a kaatrazhutha thaazhvu mandalam.Good morning! Madurai was the radio that I woke upto. Bus travel wasn't that bad after all. I almost got to sleep for 6 hours and sleep sound for 4 hours which happened - never before for me. We caught up a Maxi cab and drove amidst a mixed crowd towards Kodaikanal. It was discomforting to hear that the North crowd wasn't sport enough to hear tamil music along the way.

Twists and turns, ups and downs and hey we were there!. We found luxury, comfort and home in a 2-bed room appartments barely 5 mins from the lake view. The afternoon was spent in the most appropriate way - sleeping!. In the evening we went to a nearby theatre which was screening Shivaji movie. It was quite entertaining to watch the movie again, sans logic et al - (coz I knew what was coming). We walked out of the movie theatre to darkness. It was totally dark and we had 2 kms to walk back to the cottage. We walked through a Eucalyptus oil manufacturing neighbourhood and the entrancing smell stung on us for the rest of the walk. We had a few interesting topics to churn out though. The 2 kms math was soon forgotten as we hurried down to the cottage with little discomfort. Thus ended Day-1 in getting ourselved accustomed to Kodai.

Day - 2 can officially be called as Trek-day, the first place we headed is for that cascade falls which ideally is not a falls, but quite an incredible place indeed. It would have been a great sight to see it cascading over and over through the steps that it has created (That would have been a reality a 30 years ago). There was a cave which could play host to 2 big lions - rightfully named as Lion caves along the same route. It is not very much a trekking kinda for sure had some fascinating frames waiting there to be captures in frames *click*click*. Next top was over the hill top to the dolphin nosed rocks. Thus began mission Dolphin - affirmative.

"Calling all troopers, calling all troopers - we are left with the task of descending down the slopes to capture the dolphin and its nose is JPG format. Do you understand. -Affirmative(replies). Lets proceed"

It was almost a kilometer walk along wretched hilly roads which was slippery to say the least. As we took a good ten steps below, a person came up towards us finishing his trek beneath. Just looking at him blew us all out. He was of good built and shape, sweating all over struggling to put one foot followed by another. We gathered ourselves and started to walk, going down was not a problem atleast for me. Finally destination reached, we reached to the dolphin nose point which was like the pridelands rock from lion king ,extrapolating itself from the cliff towards the valley. Kodai was brimming with couples all over. almost all couple dared enough to come to the edge of the cliff and pose as if standing on the edge of the titanic. NOW! we had to take up the behemoth task of climbing all the way up. We had several pitstops here and there, and fiinnaaallyy we were able to drag ourselves out of the dolphin's lair.

Time out!Time out!, that is it, we rolled out from there to our bedroom. By the time we hit the rooms it was 4.00, by 5-15 we ventured out to take a bicycle ride around the lake, we were intimidated by the fact that it took around 45 mins to finish one lap around that kodai lake.Damn..!. We spread over the dew drops settled on the lush green lawn set besides the lake. Looking across a dark blue sky decorated by rocketing trees spreading all over the place. The hotels and cottages that stood before this divine scene were like Jewels glittering. A moment of bliss celebrated by ripples carrying the colors sprinked by the buildings on the other side of the park and with spicy roasted corn in this side of the park. We gathered around the bus stand to recieve Yogesh. After several stumbles he arrived on the pattaapatti bus stand. while we were expecting Yogesh, unexpectedly rain made its way in, we hurriedly packed the barottas we ordered - took a cab and rode all the way back to the cottage.

All thadiyans under one roof, there was no hero no zero. Everybody was pulling others legs whenever an opportunity was presented. We fell flat early to wake up early to the long trip to mannavannur. We were treated to some unbelievable and least expected sights on the way from Kodai to Mannavannur. The Silent valley, the other Pine forest, and some totally unchristened places, which were waiting for us to name them. The best part was that there was a car coming by in a period of 10 mins. No traffic absolutely, now can you think about that anywhere in any highway. Though this wasn't exactly a highway, it qualifes as it touches two states across over the hills. The best part was coming, we got down in this mannavannur village, took a 2.5 odd kms trek from the village's outskirts to all the way along the lake, across the dam, over some trickling water and what not.

From there on along the way back, we stopped at an exclusive restaurant which was serving on demand. We place our order, bought our chicken en route to this trek of ours and on the way back we were treated with some grand lunch arrangements. Appalams, Chicken curry, basmati rice, curd , porial and rasam .ohhh. I love home made stuff. .

That pretty much concludes it in perspective to the grand trek kodai tour, but the fun, faults continued - Yogesh who was fighting a strict timeline plan, came back to the bus stand and to his very delight all was in right place for him to meet his schedule, a bus exactly took off for him to goto thirupur. We gathered ourselves on his depart and went to buy some fruits, in just two minutes we came to know that Yogesh left his purse with us and that he got down 3kms downs the hill. He had to make a travel arrangement to reach thirupur that cost his around 900+600 rupees. We had no clue what the reasons were!.

Finally we hit back the cottage wished everybody adieu and hit back home. whoaa man!