Goodbye 2007... the trip to Coorg

Should we leave at 6AM or should it be 7AM was the question of the hour... late night Dec 29th 2007. We finally left at 7AM (what more can you expect from us... the lazy bunch). We stopped over at one of the restaurants on Mysore road for breakfast and then it was non stop ride up to Bylukuppe.
The Buddhist monastery here is just so beautiful. From a distance it looks like a golden sphere sparkling out of nowhere and as you get closer, you realize it is far more beautiful.
The monastery premises have been very well maintained - clean, green and pleasant. If you are impressed by the outer premises, you will be stunned by what you see inside the hall. The sheer size of the statues and the colour of the frescoes on all the walls will leave you mesmerised.
After that pit-stop it was a non-stop ride to Madikeri. I say non-stop because even after we reached Madikeri, we kept going up and down for more than an hour trying to locate the place where we'd booked our accommodation :) Thanks to the hills and valleys there, its really difficult to get hold of the cell phone network for more than a few minutes at a stretch. Finally we found a local PCO from which we called up the owner of the house who was offering us the home stay arrangement.
The home-stay arrangement works out well if you will be out all through the day and only need a place for the night. When you want to relax with your family a resort would be a better choice... (Take my word for it... its not very nice when you have to go ask someone very time you need water or for that matter even a glass. It would be a different experience - totally appreciable under different circumstances)

So there began our search for a different place to stay at. Orange County - though the most popular choice when it comes to Coorg - is actually 40kms away from Madikeri. Club Mahindra said they were full, so we went to the resort next to that. They said cottages were available from the next day. It was such a beautiful place, though on the expensive side... knew it would be worth it.

After booking the cottage for the next 2 days, off we went to Raja Seat, the sun-set view point.
After sun-set they have a musical fountain show which is pretty impressive. We got back to the home-stay place in time for dinner. Aunty made akki roti (roti made from rice flor - a Karnataka delicacy), dal, sambhar n rice for us. Very tasty food.

Oh I forgot to mention - since this was a bit away from the town, electricity is a problem... there Only one lamp that will work at a time. So if you better carry your torch along :)
Once it is dark, the roads get deserted. Its pitch dark expect for a truck or tourist bus that passes by once in a way. Sitting on the outside steps... gazing at clear sky... it was such a nice feeling.

Believe it or not, 5:30 AM I was up and ready to take the camera and go for a walk. It was so foggy outside and chill (in comparison to the awfully hot afternoon). For breakfast aunty had again made akki roti and this time we had puliyogere also yum.. yum...
We packed our bags after breakfast and headed to Thala Kaveri - the place where river Kaveri originates. There's a temple and a tank built there. Many people as a prayer walk across the tank of water to get God's blessing. Amma, mami and my cousin who were standing in the line for the darshan suddenly decided that they'd walk in the water... very impulsive people I tell you :)
Behind the temple is the Brahmagiri hill which has a brilliant view. As it was the middle of the afternoon, we didn't venture out on walking up the 2000 odd steps. We did that last time we were there - though that was more than a decade ago... we'd done it :)

Now it was time to drive back and check into the new accommodation. The cottages in this place are situated on various points along a slope. We had the top most cottage - closest to the pool, the restaurant and the club house :) otherwise it would have been a long, steep walk every time we got hungry :)
We reached there at 3PM but since we'd called them earlier and told them we'd be a bit late, they had lunch waiting for us... It felt like we were eating after so many days :)
Once the hunger part was taken care of, we (or atleast me ) started seeing the real beauty of the place. We were in the middle of a group of hills. Behind the restaurant was a deep drop into the valley below. Walking out of the restaurant we walked by the pool. It looked so beautiful. I've never felt so tempted to get into the pool as I did then. We quickly got back to the cottage, got into what would serve as swim wear (you would not carry any to a place like Coorg - where you'd expect it to be cold and chill, all we had with us was sweaters and jackets..)
As the sun started setting, it started getting chill and I started shivering. Out of the pool, huddle into two large towels... still shivering... until I changed into something warm and had hot coffee with pakodas - The perfect thing to have in that weather :)

Activity for the evening was a lot of table tennis and a crash course on billiards.
Dinner was by the bonfire, after which we pulled up chairs and sat outside the cottage gazing at the night sky trying to identify the 'sapta rishi mandal' (each of us had our own idea of which 7 stars made up the constellation)

The next day was complete relaxation and nothing else.
As it was the 31st night they'd arranged for a DJ from Bangalore and special dinner by the bonfire. It was around 10:30 when we saw smoke coming from lower down the hill. Fearing the worst I asked my brother to go see what was happening and true enough the cottage below ours was on fire. As it was so noisy, it took a few minutes of screaming and sign language to make the resort guys understand the situation. After that everyone set to work. It took about an hour, 12 fire extinguisher cans, dozens of buckets of water to douse the fire only after which the the fire engine arrived (just like they show in movies... after everything is over and done with). Once the situation was under control we all got back to the party mode till the clock struck 12...

2007 has been a great year - been good at work, learned new things, shared some good experiences and bestest of all ... made some great friends! Cheers to 2007 and Welcome 2008 :)