Adventures @ Chic-Maglur, Karnataka

[IMAGE: the lovely tree house]

DESTINATION:

Eagle Eye Holiday Home is located at Hoscodu Estate, which is a sprawling 130 acre plantation land situated in Chikmaglur District in Karnataka, India. Eagle Eye Holiday Home is exactly 48 Kms. from Chikmaglur and approximately 300 Kms from Bangalore.

CONTACT:

G.H. Monis, Managing Director, Eagle Eye Holidays
Hoscodu Estate, Kadavanthi, Sangameshwar Pet Post, Chikmagalur 577136, Ph. 08262-252153 Cell. 9448317760

HIGHWAY STARS:

The journey began with antakshari. It was the front-seaters Vs. the back-seaters. The songs ranged from loud enthu songs by the backers and almost audible senti-numbers by the fronters.

Songs were being created on the fly.. Papa Kehte bada naam kare ga, “QA” mein apna naam karega.. a bit of techi-touch there. Courtesy: Gurvinder Paaji.. Later Antakshari was followed by shayari with the famous radio line “Babar Sher”..

ROAD TRIPPIN:

At first light, I could see the bus was going through a narrow ghat-section road. There were jungles as far I could see. But something was wrong.. the bus stopped near a small hut, some of them got down including the driver and were asking directions to the Resort we were heading to.

We were told to “GO LEFT” but the guy seems to pointing to the right direction.. Luckily after more R&D by the driver, we found the bus traveling towards two waiting jeeps. The jeeps took us through a narrow path in a coffee estate to “EAGLE EYE RESORT”.

RUN TO THE HILLS:

The sight was amazing from this resort. The most appropriate name “Eagle eye”, the view from here was a beautiful valley between the blue ranges of the Western Ghats and clouds and mist stuck between the mountains like cotton.
The Resort also had a beautiful Gazebo, badminton court and a fishing pond.

Most of us were given cottages and one lucky bunch got to live in a tree-house. The tree house looks straight out of national geographic special or a webshots wallpaper, actually better.

The cottages given to us were beautiful, actually quite smartly built. It was covered on the roof by hay and the inner walls covered by bamboo sticks, gave a simulation of an authentic jungle cottage. The day began with badminton between the mist for some and others still admiring the soul pleasing view. Next stop “rock climbing”.

STAIRWAY TO HEAVEN:

The King of snakes “Naga-raj” got the responsibility to lead the team up the thorny path with a huge knife (machete kinds) to cut any thorny bushes off the path.

The stairway to the peak was a knotted nylon rope and that’s all. They must be kidding, it was solid 20 feet to the top. After a lot of inspiration, coaxing and suggestions and ideas almost all including the three women Reetu, Rashmi and Samreen conquered the journey up.

The climb down the vertical rock face is technically called Rappeling in rock-climbers jargon. Other Jargon for rock climbing gear I learnt: Harness, Carabiners, claw knots. The whole Rappeling and heat experience tired us quite a bit, luckily we were given a energy drink nope.. not “RED BULL”, it was a sweet white toddy like drink obtained from the elephant palm tree it seems.

MUDDY WATERS:

The pond near the resort was originally meant for fish farming. But for us “tourists”, its being used for coracling and fishing. Coracling was quite tricky actually with 3 people in and 2 of them rowing with paddles in opposite directions, most of the time we ended up with rotating boats goin nowhere. The backwater boy Sambhu was swimming like an ace while some others were floating around in deep “3″ feet of water. That was a good laugh!!

At the other end of the pond, “the fishermen” were waiting patiently with their fishing lines in. The king of snakes struck gold and caught the only fish of the day. A small but great catch for us newbies, he did throw the fish back in the water and it leaped around in the water as though celebrating its new freedom.

STAR WARS:

Two teams, yellow and blue marked by corresponding bands on our arms.

The first game, “screaming contest”, won by the blue team with the super-enthu people in it. The next game, “passing the ring” while holding each other’s hand, won again by blue team, thanks to some good teamwork. Next was, “crossing the river (not literally)” walking on wooden planks which needed good coordination was won by the yellow team. Next was, “break the pot”, while being blind. Team yellow, too slow, confused by the screaming blue men, taking almost 10 minutes. Team blue, thanks to some strategic ideas and coded telugu communication cracked the pot in less than a minute.

SCARY MOVIES:

Fast forward to the dark night and all of us were around the camp fire. In spite of the mood-dampening music (which was too slow, and the crowd wanted some fast dance numbers), we managed to have some fun playing dumb charades.

Thakshak - Dhak.. Dhak.. Bevafa.. Shak.. was a hard one. Another movie name split into five parts and the third part indicated by the bird from Samreen. It was quite confusing for them. Ha.. haa.. that was a good laugh. Schindler’s List - Feet.. shin.. tough one.

JUNGLE ALL THE WAY:

The next day began with a walk in the jungle. We were armed with our cameras to shoot anything that moved. Unfortunately or fortunately, we had to make do by shooting each other.

During the walk, the guidelines were simple “keep walking along the trails, keep the chatter to a minimum and try to enjoy nature. We were told “nature will change every minute”, never understood that. Anyways, these guidelines were courtesy our adventure sports specialist, Ishwar.

We walked through thick jungle mainly bamboos, rosewood and those tall mountain trees covering about five to six kms. The view from the hilltop we reached was amazing and at a distance we saw a single jungle bungalow nestled among the green valley. Its another holiday home, we were told.

BLACK:

Next the reenactment of the hindi movie “BLACK”. We were blind folded and led through the trail, led by one of us, whose blindfold was removed.

We walked like a train holding each others shoulders and hands. Communicating just by talking about the path ahead big rock, small rock, rolling rocks, on the left, on the right.. Eventually the leaders changed one by one and we made to another hill, were we had our breakfast. Hot idly and sambar, yummy!

LOST:

On the way back we were told to find the way back to the resort ourselves. Now, this was a challenge. Some of us took the lead and made our own way through the jungle, sometimes even ignoring the fact that we had split from the crowd and were lost. After about an hour, the sight of a plantation and a hut at a distance cheered us up and we found ourselves shouting like tarzan and mowgli.

THE BRIDGE ON RIVER BADRA:

Fast forward to the evening, after a delicious lunch at the resort and Ellakhi bananas (small and really sweet bananas, a crowd favourite). We were at the banks of the river Bhadra. The sight and touch of water was most soothing after a tiring day. Most of them were in the water either swimming or floating with their lifejackets. Slowly one by one, we crossed the river sitting in the harness and pulling ourselves. Below one could see the gushing water, thundering down the small waterfall, but I think we didnt want to wait long to see it. We were more happy to cross it safely in one piece.

WORLD FAMOUS IN CHIKMAGLUR:
The two days were most satisfying; I think most of us needed a break from the concrete and electronic jungle. However the fun wasn’t over yet. At the place where we stopped for tea, few kids from the local village were most excited as they realised that Harbajjan Singh had stopped over there. They had mistaken our Gurvinder for him.

He was questioned by them kids “why didn’t you take enough wickets against Pakistan in the recent series?” The older kids didn’t want to miss the chance. “How do you bowl the doosra?”, they asked. They ran around to get their bats for autographs and also took photos sitting next to their superstar.

Note: This post is renewed from my sumontour blog