May 10, 2012 04:40 PM
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Our family had planned for a summer outing to go somewhere cool and far way from city life for 3 days. Our first choice was Ooty, however we dropped the plan to go to Ooty due to the rush in this peak season and instead decided to visit Mudumalai. We started from Bangalore on 6th May at 7AM in the morning and halted at Kamat for breakfast around 8:30AM. By 10AM we were on the outskirts of Mysore and decided to visit the palace and brindavan gardens on our return journey.
The road till Mysore was very good but the traffic was nothing less than the bangalore traffic. Since I am not a regular driver on highways, it took me around 3 hours to reach Mysore. I had the route map with me and did not have any difficulty in getting to the Ooty road.
It was a straight road (though not a four lane road) and road condition was very good. The traffic eased out after I crossed Mysore and Nanjangud ( this is about 20 kms after mysore). We stopped for a 15 mins break after Nanjangud near a tender coconut vendor ( there are lots of tender coconut shops along the way).
By 12:30, we reached Bandipur forest gate and the kids were excited that we are in the forest finally and wanted to see wild animals..Hardly 2 mins in to the forest, we had our first sighting of a huge herd of deers..It was an excellent view..We started moving ahead and crossed the Bandipur forest department office and headed towards Mudumalai.
The drive was excellent (minus the speed breakers ) every 50 meters, later came to know this was an initiative by the forest department of tamilnadu and karnataka to reduce wild animals getting hurt by speeding vehicles.
Finally round 1:30PM, we reached the Tamil Nadu hotel where our accommodation was booked earlier. This is right opposite the Tamil Nadu Forest department office. The place was very simple but with breathtaking atmosphere around. There was a river stream flowing just outside the hotel, but we were told not to get in to the waters as the river had crocodiles in them. So we kept our safe distance from the river and enjoyed the view from far.
The climate was very cool and it was drizzling when we had checked in. After a late lunch, we walked to the government forest department counter and got safari tickets for 4 of us. The ticket costed me around Rs.150 for 4 of us. The van safari was 30 mins minutes in the forest and we were able to spot lots of deers and couple of peacock. While we were about to come out of the forest, the driver of the van spotted a huge bison and there was lot of excitement in the van.
After safari, we entered the elephant camp and the kids had great time interacting with the tamed elephants and got to know how elephants are fed and their behaviours.
We returned back to the hotel and were too tired for any more activity for the day. The next day, we got up to some wonderful chirping of lots of birds around the hotel. When I stepped out of the room, I saw a huge eagle on one of the rocks in the river..It was simply amazing..
After having breakfast, we had to check out on 7th May as we got the reservation for 6th May only due to peak season. I had the booking done prior with a homestay in Masinagudi for 7th and 8th May.. After checking out, we headed towards Masinagudi which is 8 kms and reached the homestay.
The owners were a middle aged couple and were very courteous and friendly. The food was very homely and tasty..After lunch we took a drive to Ooty which was only 28 Kms from where we stayed..But after 5 Kms we realized that this is a completely ghat road and it took us almost 2 hours to cover this distance..This road had 36 hair pin bends..This road literally stress tested my fairly new Alto car…
When we reached Ooty, it was raining very heavily and couldn’t see a thing infront of us. So we decided to turn back and go to homestay..
By 6, we were back to home stay and after discussing with the owners , we went for a jeep safari..The safari was on the peripheral roads for most of time and till the forest check post in ooty-bangalore road. The peripheral road in safari route took us to some small villages..We were shocked to see people living inside the forest with very little or no basic amenities.
On the return journey of our safari, the driver spotted a single elephant on the side of a road and alerted us..all of us were very thrilled to see this beautiful animal. The driver stopped the vehicle at a safe distance from this elephant..The elephant glanced at us and did not seem to bother..It continued to walk towards the road and crossed the road..A surprise awaited us, the single elephant was followed by 2 other big elephants, a baby elephant and another medium sized elephant which had a tusk..
This was a view which me and my family members will not forget for a very long time..They would cross the road and come back to the road and again go to other side..It was a nail biting excitement..Finally after 10 mins, the elephants moved away from the road towards the other side..We continued our safari, hardly half kilometer away , the driver suddenly stopped and took reverse and showed us 3 jumbo sized bisons near a tree..We were amazed to see how this driver was able to spot these animals..when we asked him, all he did was give us a smile and told us that this is what he does for a living.
We were thoroughly happy with the trip so far and returned back to our homestay..The next day all we did was take rest and enjoyed the view and nice climate...
On 9th may, we had to reluctantly leave this beautiful forest and head back to bangalore.. The cost for 4 of us in the homestay came to Rs.9000/- for 2 days ( for accomodation, food, safari )..
Overall a nice experience and planning to return back this year..
