Scenic Sunday at Sakleshpur...

                        

                         We 5 can re-create Mahabharatha, if we can go back in time. Though we are office mates, we got comfort zone of college friends. With such a thrilling bachelor conspiracy, we planned to visit Sakleshpur, as rain kept intimidating us and office work kept taunting us. Journey started at night and by morning 5, we were at Sakleshpur. Except Amrith, all 4 of us had driving experience only in "NFS". Bachelor jokes, crazy naming conventions and pointless non-sense kept Amrith awake.

Start of Green Mile

                     Little droplets of water gave clue about essence of rain ahead. After 4 hours of journey from Bangalore, we reached Sakleshpur Via Hasan. Hot tea, cool breeze and touch of rain drops - As per guidance from Chai-wala, we headed towards our first destiny- Kadumane estate. Early morning blue sky gave an artistic touch to the trip .

Early morning Blue Sky

                      Ride to Kadumane is like journey in fairyland. We literally stopped for every 10 minutes. We went ahead , then came back, then took a wrong route. But who cares? Even wrong route was beautiful. Every surrounding is a green mile.

Road to Heaven

                       Crazy photoshoot on a beautiful bisecting road was something to remember in the beginning. "Swap Naveen" (Name comes due to many swaps in shift at office), went crazy in that road. He was jumping like a frog in rain. Selfie with scenary, instant upload on facebook - well, technology is like a drug!.

Bisecting Road

                           Kannada songs can make any trip romantic ( don't take me wrong :P ) .With soothing sonu nigam songs,mist covered roads, paddy fields, water droplets slowly moving down the car window, rain falling in love with green - Even god feels jealousy about his own creation. A small waterfalls in the green looked like a diamond ring with Green pearl around - A Gift of god to mother nature.

                        Home made chapati by Kurkure ( Kurkure is nick name - not a snack :P )- A million thanks to his mom. We kept looking at war happening between rain n umbrella. Entrance gate towards Kadumane looked like a gate to heaven shown in Epic movies. View of Kadumane from the top looked like well Machu Picchu. Just once you can forget your existence and let your memories in rain.

Top view from the entrance gate

'

                         With thunder of cold feel piercing through sweater and wonder of rain drops meeting our inner soul, we kept walking through tea estates. You can hide under tea forests and world will never know. Every row is parallel and looks like a world made of green. Can you imagine having green tea in Green tea forest holding umbrella in one hand ( You can replace umbrella with a girl and can get a romantic feel) or you can hold your hands together and pretend like you are with someone :P

                      We walked in those paddy fields. "Peace trials" as one of my friend calls it. You can simply take any photo, it looks awesome in one or other way. Naveen had desire to take photos with tea forest workers in their costume. Permission granted to some extent. Some crazy photos, some romatic photos, some single photos, some weird poses -camera cried and no one noticed it because of rain!

On the way to Kadumane

                      Smell of tea kept haunting as we reached near tea manufacturing industry. Owner of 54 estates came in Bermuda and royal shoes. We wished at least he could give us one estate! Man at the entrance explained about manufacturing of tea, though we made our own stories and invented a new process out of it! But the smell, i can still feel it when i think about it.

Tea manufacturing unit

                        Our next destiny was " Manjarabad fort " , a star on earth. You can Google it and fort looks like a "star". Bush kept making some archaeological predictions about structure and purpose of every structure - Though most of his predictions were " Multidimensional" or to quote " out of this world". Who can forget " Paravashanaadenu" song, with gorgeous Deepa Sannidhi, in this fort. We had an argument about owning Deepa Sannidhi. We argued like once we decide, she will come with us.

Manjarabad Fort

                      20,30,40,50,60 - Different numbers given by people when we asked about how much far Bisile Ghat is from fort. We stopped asking as parameter seemed like a variable. Clock kept moving faster than car, because road looked like it is made of small rivers and oceans :P With 2.5 hours journey , we covered 40 km and we found that constant!

                         After walking for a while, we reached Bisile view point, though due to mist , it looked like an infinite invisible white void. To tell franky, it seemed like 4th dimensional view.But one guy told that, as time is 5 PM already, you go further and reach Subrahmanya, it is just 20 km. He was drunk, but looked sensible. By saying an end to Chapatis, we headed further.

Bisile View point

                      Oh dear god! that 20 km journey had hell lot of adventure. No one had ever experienced that before. Forest kept getting deeper and deeper. It was a scary forest. Every step had one waterfall and it was covered with trees. Sound of birds, water, car, wind mixed all together to give various kind of feels. Sometimes scary, sometimes beautiful.

A beautiful lake

                       We saw a lake on the way. Water was so clean, we lost belief that we are on earth. Though me and bush felt like we should stay there for while, Naveen kept calling us. Our next stop was a bridge. We parked car and took some photos. Forest ahead looked like end point of this world. It was scary, it was awesome, it was unbelievable, it was unforgettable. It seemed like we cannot reach other side before dark.

To the end of world

                       One can see strain in Amrith's eyes, as driving in that road was like a hell-ride. I took a video of that ride,as a proof to myself in future :P A smile of relief appeared as we saw a forest house, and yes, it was end of that 20 KM journey, which kept us spell-bound. It was like Amazon rainforest and yes, trip like this once in a while keeps our energy alive...