Sunday, August 13, 2006

Awesome Agumbe!!


Yeah this was a kind a well planned trip, the plan was to go for water rafting, treking and beaches on the western part of Karnataka....friday night 8 o clock exactly, we got in to the TT(Tempo Traveller), eleven guys, the worst part was that i knew only Madhu there, others were all new to me..and to my surprise, all those were a kinda north indian guys, they speak hindi, the language that i don know!! So it was a kind a bad start for me! So, a formal introduction went on, they guys were Abishek, Anand, Amit, Ankush, Uday, Vikas, Mohit, another Vivek , Nagarajan and ofcourse Me!...so in the course of the journey, some one asked me "Vivek neenaga endha ooru??" ...great to hear a guy speaking in Tamil! Friday night was hell lotta traffic, it took us nearly on hour to cross the Majestic and catch up the Tumkur road...Yeah we watched TV and were listening to songs, and this went on for a long time and guys went to sleep..As i told this was not a good start!
People said not to travel by this time coz of the heavy rains, but we guys cared a damn! But u know, we got a bit afraid when on the way to Shimoga, a place 30 kms from Agumbe had a check post and a guard saying that its FLOODING here and to take another route! OOPS, i really got afraid if we could be able to raft...the next day, we reached the Someshwara Nature Camp..They are also named Adreno.. present in Hebri by 9 0clock , where the rafting is to be done! As time passed on, i made lotta friends! am one among them now, so i felt a bit comfortable...and in another half an hour, we started to raft on the so called Sita Nadi, and thank god it was not raining! The instructor gave us the formal instructions, like wat shld we do when we get fell off the raft etc...so this made us afraid...Not only this, we had a lotta life guarding materials, which made us really tremble. Then we was about to raft and then came a very heavy rain, we hardly went only about some 50m, and then the rain and the instructor asked us to row back!! For a sec we thought thats it, end of rafting. But the instructor Kamal said that it would be fun rafting in rain and i asked u to row back to just check out if u guys were comfortable rowing backwards..Wow! then started the thrill, adventure, etc etc...coz of the monsoon, the current in the river was not small...huh! we assumed it to be a dead river!! It s actually a 12 Km ride, when we rode on and on, the thrill was gone, so we wanted to use some of the life guarding materials! So, some of the guys jumped on the river!!..OOPS, don think it is swimming! it was just for a sec and we are back on the raft!..As time passed on, we pedalled faster and faster on the noisy river! We were wondering how could we get back in that river rowing in the opposite direction! Kamal said that was really impossible for the amateures! So we arrived at some bridge, Kamal said the rafting is done, and thats it..then we checked the time, it was about and hour and half..good experience! then we took the raft carried over to the bridge, put them top on the Jeep and travelled back! Uppoooh! great it was!
So, no breakfast and no lunch, aare yaar, all we guys were damn hungry! The nature camp said we l provide u food and shelter for 975 bucks a night...! Z0000000000m...we are on the way to Udupi... we stayed at Amarthranam, some kind a lodge..we kept the baggage aside and then straight to lunch! My God, the menu was simply awesome, the sea food, we had a shrimp cocktail, prawn gravey etc etc...and then straight away to Malpe beach, hardly some 10 kms from Udupi...Once we got down there, and started to play foot ball, oops, it started raining!! It was such heavy rain yaar, some guys went back to TT..huh, we din care a damn, we played and played and played!!!!! then went to the enjoy the Mega wave pool!! was good had a nice time on the beach aftera long time...yeah we had spent almost two and half hours n the beach and are about to leave, then came a gang of skool gals from bangalore! hehehe..we spent another one more hour there! so we left the beach only about 7 o clock, straight to the room, took bath, had dinner, thats it the day s over..!!!!!!!and by the way, i started understanding hindi man!
The next morning, 9 o clock sharp, we started to trek. Ppl said it was a jungle and not to go without a guide and the guide was real too costly..it cost us nearly 500 bucks a person! we thought it was waste of money and to hire a local guide..we even don know the exact location...we just went back to nature camp to arrange for a guide...there was another team from Adreno who are gonna trek that day! So great.. we followed them!...and by the way, the climate was awesome, raining, raining, raining all th day and night...We need to go some eleven km from the nature camp, so when we were following them , we lost track!! it was a perfect jungle and we are lost! thank god a small girl said that their Jeep to went the same way! Our hearts skipped a beat! Yup, we reached the starting point of the trek, the destination is the Agumbe water falls...So we guys started together as usual and as any other trek! actually we were late to that place and the other team from Adreno started their trek..so we moved fast to catch them..but some guys wanaa take photo s and enjoy the nature, so they came behind, so there are two groups now! One guy said that the route was confusing and to hire a guide..we searched for some and no one was available and we hurried fast to follow them! They also said that there would be leeches and to go carefully, it just fell on deaf ears! but anyways some of them carried Salt n all.. It was just OK at the beginning of the trek...as we move a little bit far, the rain started!! and at one point of time, we found the adreno gang! good man there were babes in that gang! So they were all waiting to cross a very very narrow bridge accross the river, made of just one log!! The river was very noisy and was really a great xperience for all of us to cross that river....then started the real trek! heavy rains, narrow path, awesome sceneries, crossing hell lotta streams and river, of course the same river only, but lotta crossings! This made us a real adventurous...i started loving this trek.!! Guess wat the leeches were like mosquitoes, they bit us then n there..the use of salt became more and more..for the next one hour we went up and down the hill will good concentration of our legs looking for leeches! Oops, a gal started crying for these leeches!So we mingled with that group now, a lotta ppl from Tamil Nadu, so was really enjoying their company! Ofcourse, the rain did not ease yaar! It was great trekking there..finally in the end, we reached the destination, the sight was really cool...we just xperienced a shower of that water fall..shower in the sense not the direct water fall, it is the ones that bounce back after hitting the ground.......that it self was really great...we were there exactly for 15 minutes taking photos! the pushed back..it took us four hours to travel up! during the return, the rain was even more heavier, was really great to trek in the rain!......No one prayed "Rain rain go away"....hehe..then we reached the starting point in another 2 hours, got a lotta friends from that new gang too! Thats it yaar, 2 days passed on in a second! When the Vellingiri trek was steep and enjoyable, this one was adventurous and enjoyable!! Not much pain of legs, but we were hungry!! Straingt to Shimoga, 30 kms from there, had the dinner for the day and zooooom, started off to bangalore, and we are there by 4 o clock in the morning! At the end of the day, i enjoyed the ride, learned a bit of hindi and then of course made lotta new friends!!....Awesome Agumbe!!!