Spring sprung and is no more..

Things have been varyingly hectic (I mean, hectic due to different reasons) in my household. Have lots to write, but just don't seem to have the energy to sit in front of the computer and type these days. I can always use the pregnancy excuse, but somehow feel like its the easy way out. No matter what, I wish I had an assistant to type out whatever I wanted. Wait a minute! Sri............ :-D.

Anyways as I said, various things have happened to me over the past month (yup it has been a month since my last post in case you didn't notice :-p). After I wrote the last post, the very next check-up I went to was the Gestational diabetes + Anemia check milestone one. My gestational diabetes was fine, err I mean it doesn't exist :-D, but hemoglobin wasn't. It was low by a couple of points and so I was suggested iron tablets to bring it up. Well, now we know the reason for my tiredness. I also found out that the antacids I have been guLuming for my heartburn aren't very helpful when it comes to iron absorption - it seems they coat the stomach wall and don't let the iron be absorbed easily :-p.

Just when I was getting used to the iron tablets (just a week later), one day I woke up with a sore throat. It turned into a cold and cough next day and that very night I woke up with chills. Next morning checked my temperature and found it to be a 101.7. Now I had to get to the doctor, right? Took an appointment and after several tests found out that it was the dreaded flu - flu is supposedly very bad for pregnant women. Immediately was prescribed an anti-flu medication and thankfully the symptoms were gone in 2 days (otherwise my gynec had threatened to have me hospitalized :-p). But for 2 days, the household was literally in shambles as I couldn't even get up for the minutest chores. Thank God I have Sri, he took over everything! Even cooking (to my horror :-D).

After some sad few weeks, April 2nd week was one of the happiest with my mom heading here on April 11th. She was a bit ill the previous week and was travelling alone again, but this time I was pretty calm about the whole thing since she has travelled here already and I was confident in her abilities. Until the day she left India. I had told her I'd call her after her check-in formalities and every time I called, she still was in one of the lines with the plane leaving in an hour or so! So the headache was back in full measure :-D. Later I did find out that she climbed aboard the plane which was a relief. Then the whole 24 hours wait began - the first flight was from Bangalore to London, 2nd from London to Chicago, then the immigration and customs in Chicago and a 3rd flight from Chicago to Cincinnati. We picked her up at almost midnight in Cincinnati. She had a bad headache in the first flight and was okay in the 2nd. But the Chicago immigration line was really crazy with about a 300 people and though she had 3 hours layover, it was 2 hours by the time she got through immigration and customs. Well, she safely reached Lexington and that was a major relief. I had packed a couple of paratas for her just in case she was hungry and guess what Snugli's first dialogue to her ammamma was? "Ammamma, mammu tandiddivi nimge." ("Ammamma, we have brought you food") :-D. From then on she has been her ammamma's shadow, making even me jealous some days, hehehe :-D.

Phew, after mom came here, we have been eating all the goodies she bought us and they are all almost gone ;-). Dad and Darsh will be here next month, now thats going to be lots of fun :). Meanwhile, we have been enjoying walks around with mom enjoying the remaining flowers of spring. But before she came here, I did take some photos of spring flowers in and around my neighbourhood. They are all up on my photography page on Facebook - Through Deepthi's Eyes photography. The below picture reminded me of a thoraNa and click on it to see the Spring glory :-D.

Spring is in the air..

Flowers everywhere
Fragrance in the air..




Roads that bring cheer
Smiles there and here..




The bulbs are in bloom
Dissipating the gloom..




Gladness fill my heart
Sorrows miles apart..




Not a chill in sight
Warmth day and night..




Mother Nature is awake,
Back from her winter break.

The sights are divine
Time to rise and shine :).

(As you can see, have been busy with photography experimentation. More soon :-D).

An airplane away to autumn..

Have been meaning to write about this trip of ours for days now. I mean it is more than 2 months already! But as you do see, I had other things on my mind, mainly the BTFYA series (the incidents I had to write about all happened during this time, so well, you have nothing to complain about as you were getting more than enough posts from me :-D). But I haven't been able to get to the trip post at all and I am glad to get to this, believe me. Now this post is going to be a treat because for the first time on my blog, I'm putting up videos of my own :).

You know that fall is my favourite season and we usually have had trips just to see the colours. We always have wanted to head to the North-east US since the time we heard that fall colours are really impressive there. Finally the time for that arrived this year :). We actually planned the trip towards the end of October where we were getting a great deal on flight tickets and we would be able to stay there for 4 days. But later we found out that fall colours would peak somewhere in the second week of October there, so well, our "plan" didn't make any sense. So we actually booked tickets for 2nd weekend of October. Sadly this meant that our flights were timed in a way that technically we were able to be there only for 2 days. Plus we weren't getting a direct flight from Cincinnati (as per our earlier "plan"), but a 1-stop flight, that too from Dayton :(. But we had no choice :(.

And so on 10th October 2009, we left Lexington around 9:30 AM and drove north to Dayton. We had to catch a flight to Detroit at about 12:30 PM and from there to Boston, Massachusetts. I had packed Snugli's lunch and we picked up something for us to eat on the way. Again, I was worried about how Snugli would handle the flight, but she mostly slept through one and was pretty okay on the other, so it wasn't as big a deal as I thought it'd be. The cold hit us as soon as we landed in Boston and due to day-light savings end, the sun sets much sooner, so it was already dark when we landed there at about 6PM. We planned to drive to Manchester, North Hampshire which was about an hour away and planned to settle there for the night.

One thing we thought of half-outsourcing this time was Snugli's food. We did book hotel rooms with microwaves just like the Seattle trip, but this time we wanted to introduce her to outside food, if not the bland American food, atleast that available in Indian restaurants. So we planned it to be microwaved rice (curd rice with boiled veggies that I had packed and carried from home) in the noons and outside food in the nights. Since she is okay with a cheerios (a type of cereal) and bread, breakfast was fine and we bought fruits and biscuits for snack time :).So on the way to Manchester, we stopped at an Indian restaurant and fed ourselves and her some rotis and curd rice. The rice is a bit harder in the restaurants (not as soft as she is used to), but if requested, they heat it up and it may come to some type of mashable form :).

Next morning we set off on our Fall colour viewing drive to the White Mountains in the northern regions of North Hampshire. The drive was beautiful, as you can see ;-) (mute the player before you start off, since Sri is shouting something to Snugli :-D).

Our first stop was the Cannon mountain aerial tramway, just because we thought that the view from up should be pretty good :).




Here's the actual tramway:




When we arrived at the top, we found out that it was freezing! it was 2 degrees below 0 degree Celsius. Thankfully, Snugli was covered from head to foot, but we couldn't say the same for ourselves :-p.





We thought we should be able to trek for 1/2 a mile to an observation tower and back, but on the way Snugli got very quiet (probably because she was getting cold) and so Sri went back to the warm restaurant (the entry point for the tramway at the top), while I made a solo trek to the tower.




The view was pretty good all around, but sadly I can't say the same about the colours. The hike was pretty exerting and once I was back at the restaurant, we agreed that the colours weren't really as good as we expected them to be (atleast from here). Well, we were at the top, so we had to take the photos right? ;-).




After getting down the tramway, our plan was to drive on a scenic highway to see the colours all around the place. The drive was wonderful..




Its not that the colours were any different from the Smoky mountain ones, but these were more extensive. There were more stretches of colours together. So it was enjoyable. We made a couple of stops, but couldn't really stop at many others we wanted to, since the scenic highway became a two-lane road after a certain point and hence traffic literally stopped at a couple of places.







So we actually lost out on a rail ride on the mountains and a couple of waterfalls that I wanted to see. Oh well, that was it for the day.

Next morning, our plan was to drive through Boston and head to a bay south of Boston to do a whale-watching cruise. We had thought that if possible, we'll catch a quick break at the downtown Boston too. But on the way there, we found another place which was just half an hour away - Glouchester, Massachusetts hosting one of these type of cruises. So we headed there instead. The small town had a lovely bay..




We, especially Snugli, had a nice time walking around. We did go to a beach, but the water was brrrrrrrrrr-cold, so simply came back :).




I had lots of worries about the cruise as such. First, the water was pretty cold and hence the wind would be very chilly in the middle of the Atlantic ocean :-p. Second we just had our lunch and didn't know how Snugli would react to a boat trip in the swells of the sea right after lunch. There were restrooms on the boat, but it'd be difficult to handle her in there, since there were no changing tables as such. Also once we were on the way, there was no way to get off for 4-odd hours (that was the length of the cruise). But well, no sea sickness happened and we (make that Sri) were able to manage her pretty well.

The whale watching happens in the gulf of Maine which is supposedly a whale conservatory (fishing is controlled and absolutely no whaling is allowed) and there are lots of whales spotted there usually in summer to fall. The guide on the boat was a whale researcher and so were some of the crew members, so there was a loads of information that we got from the guide as such. The whales usually habit the gulf during summertime to feed and later migrate south in winter to breed. Since they don't feed at all in the winter, they literally guLum tons of fish during their stay in the Gulf of Maine.

And the whales, wow! That was hands down one of the best experiences of my life. They were soooo cool, literally and whimsically :). When we got the tickets, they had this statement saying that if there was so whale-sighting then they'd give us replacement tickets for some other time. So Sri kept saying that they'd probably show us one from far and then their obligation would be over ;-). But we encountered a group of 3 whales right away.




This was a group of 3 female whales, one named "Salt" - one of the earliest named whales, another named "Cardhu" and yet another, the guide couldn't recognize. They are named according to markings on their tail fin (and some other markings on their bodies) and each whale's tail fin is unique. They were quite fascinating to watch, blowing water through the blow holes and splashing their tail fins, obviously used to the people watching them. One even put its head out of the water to say Hello, which the guide assured us, was pretty rare :).




The way we kept the whales in sight was also pretty fascinating. The whales would stay around us for quite sometime (8-10 min) then plunge down into the depths of the ocean with spectacular dives. We would be unable to see them for around 5-10 min, but we would be on the lookout for them. Then they'd pop out of the water quite far away from the boat. Then the boat would speed up to catch up with them and slow down and cruise along with them :).




The sheer size of these creatures was mind-boggling. I mean if they chose to do something about the pestering boat around them, it'd be a piece of cake for them ;-). And its worth mentioning how less we know about these creatures. It seems all our studies are based on the time they spend above water (which makes up only about 10% of their lifetime) and no wonder, scientists still don't have concrete evidence of many of the gestures and sounds that the whales make (they do have theories).

After the 3 whales with whom we spent a long time, we got to see around 3 more individual whales, one of whom was named "Bat", again a female whale whose spectacular dive down I was able to capture in my camera :).




Meanwhile, Snugli loved the whales. I was hellbent on taking the photos, while Sri was carrying her around. When we pointed to the whales and asked her what it was she said "Bhale" (she didn't know the "va" sound :-D). Later for a couple of weeks she'd recall that we went on a boat and saw whales :-D. She saw them for quite sometime but later her afternoon nap caught up with her and she fell asleep in Sri's arms. We had good seating arrangements, so we were able to place her comfortably where we sat.

And that was about it. She slept almost until we got back to the shore and we just had a quick dinner at an Indian restaurant and retired for the night. We had an early morning 4AM flight from Boston to Detroit and then caught a late morning one to Dayton and had lunch at Cincinnati. I surprised myself on the 4AM flight, since I slept right through it (I have always watched the flight take-off and land in every flight I had been in until then and this was the first time I didn't :-O). In fact all of us slept right through it :-D.

The 2-day trip just didn't seem enough. I wish we could have been there for a couple more. We didn't get to see Boston at all and I wanted to visit the MIT campus atleast from outside :(. Also later we found out that the colours in Vermont are even better :-\. So maybe there is a next time ;-) :-D. But the best part as I said in my earlier post, was Snugli's potty training. She surprised me by asking to go to the restroom every single time when we were outside. She hardly used 1-2 diapers per day and it was totally thrilling. Well, you know what happened when we got back :-p. But right now she's almost back to that same level - she asks to go a couple of times per day and we take her the other times, so we are down to 1 or 2 diapers per day :).

Thats it about the trip. Before I say Au revoir, let me leave you with one of my standard road humour photos taken inbetween Dayton and Cincinnati..




Everyone needs more roads I say! Even the roads :-D.

The intrusion..

Well, its said that when a black cat crosses your path, you get bad luck. What happened when a deer crosses your path? You get a beautiful, beautiful moment :).

We have this golf course near our house which we don't drive by that often. But these days, since another road is usually blocked by holiday traffic, I usually drive through the golf-course road on my way to YMCA. On Friday, I just took a turn into the road, when a deer with beautiful antlers, made its way through an opening in the golf course, crossed the road and jumped across a fence to the orchard on the other side of the road. We have seen a baby deer on the same road some 2 years back, so seeing a deer wasn't really a surprise. I was thankfully quite far away from the deer, so by the time I pressed on the breaks, the deer was already clear :-D. It was such a small moment in the big picture of life, an unexpected encounter which brought a smile to my face :). It felt like a big HI from Mother Nature herself ;-).

"The best remedy for those who are afraid, lonely or unhappy is to go outside, somewhere where they can be quiet, alone with the heavens, nature and God. Because only then does one feel that all is as it should be and that God wishes to see people happy, amidst the simple beauty of nature" - Anne Frank.

BTFYA 3 - Yedukumeri trek :)

Back to 5 years ago :). First of all, this whole post is simply based on the memories I have of the trek, unlike the post for Bisle trek since I didn't really note down anything. I think we went to Yedukumeri in August 2004, but certainly don't remember whether it was before my birthday or after (I guess it was after since I am pretty certain I'd have remembered having banged up knees on my birthday :-D). A little bit of history before we start off. I have always loved the train route between Bangalore and Mangalore. The sad part was that the trains were overnight trips, but I would be awake just to see the tunnels and beautiful bridges on route (it's be a treat whenever there was moonlight, the part between Sakleshpur and Yedekumeri). But sadly, the trains were stopped giving the elusive excuse of metre to broad gauge conversion and the system has only recently gotten back on its feet again.

Well, on the Bisle trek, I did have many chances to interact with fellow trekkies, but there were 28 people, so couldn't obviously talk to everyone. But I did find out about 2 wonderful treks - one to Yedukumeri and another to Kemmannugundi. Once I got back, I think it was one of the things I ALWAYS talked about. I must have troubled many a friend with that tale :-D (in my defense, I was just trying to get them to trek with me :-D). My mom really loved the Bisle saga and told me that if ever I'd go on the trek to Yedukumeri which would be basically walking on the railway track, she wanted to join me, since it'd not really have any climbs and be a flat ground trek. So I kept calling Kamesh to find out when they were planning one.

Finally I got to know there were 3 more takers (all my aged girls) for that particular trek to Yedukumeri, and so we'd be 5 trekkies + Kamesh and his assistants (Raj and Naagu). So we set off one Friday evening from Bangalore Majestic bus stand and caught a bus to somewhere near Sakleshpur (a little further away from Sakleshpur but sadly, I don't even have a clue about the name of the place). I only remember that we landed there at around 4 AM in the morning, setup a tent and slept right there at the bus stop until about 8AM in the morning :-D.

Later got up, walked till we found the railway track and cooked a breakfast of Maggi :-D. We finished brushing our teeth, washing our face, having the breakfast and exploring the bridge until then (if you notice carefully in the following photo, you'll find me and mom somewhere towards the left on the top of the bridge :-D).




Then we started walking. The trek would be totally for about 35km (17.5 km to Yedekumeri and another 17.5 km back)!! And the specialty of this trek was that there was no base camp. We had to carry every damn thing we had and that was a challenge..




That was us at the first tunnel. Walking in a tunnel is somehow very enigmatic, though practically there is nothing mysterious about it ;-). For me, the whole concept is a thrill - we'd make these sand tunnels using our feet when we were young and its amazing that the real ones are actually dug in mountains and make a pathway where there was none earlier :). The first tunnel even had a side opening through which we walked out and saw this beautiful waterfall somewhere in the valley below..




The photo is courtesy of the digital camera of a trekkie from a totally different group :-D. The route has about 19 tunnels and more than 25 bridges, so each one of them, big or small were absolutely enjoyable..




Except one thing about the bridges - they were my downfall, my pain in the neck (actually knees :-p), my nemesis, so to say :-D. It had rained the previous night and that Saturday was still partially cloudy and rainy, so it made the bridge logs pretty slippery. Somehow everyone seemed okay on them except myself :-p. I think I must have slipped and banged my knees on the logs about 5 times that day, so much that I was very scared the next day to even step foot on a bridge, but well, that part of the story has some more time to come ;-). Some of the bridges had an iron strip in the middle, so it was easier to walk on them, but most of them didn't, so the only way to cross the bridge was to cross the gap between each and every log (so we had to be very careful). Which means its very difficult to know whether the next log is slippery, we can only set a firm foot and hope that we would not slip. Well, as for me, I never got the "firm" footing right that day :-D.

Here's another tunnel which has wild banana (kaaDu baaLe) growing on top, almost like nature's very own thOraNa :-D..




I loved it all (despite the torn knees :-D). Thankfully there were no leeches around on the railway track, though we did find some around on the wet mud beside the tracks. Each time I walked through a tunnel I'd be reminded of the saying I have on the bottom part of my blog - "Then it comes to be that the soothing light at the end of your tunnel was just a freight train coming your way!!" (Metallica in their song "No Leaf Clover"). Loved it, loved it, loved it :-D.

On the next bridge, Kamesh picked a spot for us to rappel (!!!) and decided to setup the equipment (yes, they carried the required ropes) then and there. I didn't even know what rappelling was until that particular moment :-p. The concept was pretty simple - they'd tie a set of ropes onto the logs of a railway bridge right next to a pillar and with the help of the pillar and ropes, we had to slowly rappel down. Practically, it was a different story. Yes there'd be a harness, but I was very much afraid to put my full weight on the ropes (I half thought the ropes would break :-p). This photo is just before I did it:




Again, the photo is courtesy of the digital camera of the same from a totally different group and we actually met that group at this point and they also enjoyed rappelling with us (one after one ofcourse :-p) and I remember asking the guy about the camera and finding out that the Olympus digital camera costed Rs. 20000 (that fact left my mouth hanging open :-D). We took several snaps of the deed in our analog camera but well, none of them are that good :-p. Anyways I was petrified at the moment you have let go of your foot from the ledges (the fact that I'm grinning in the photo has nothing to do with it - its actually a I-must-be-crazy-to-be-doing-this grin :-D), but rappelling turned out to be fun :). The ropes were a bit irritating, but cruising down the bridge with no care and then swinging on the ropes like a monkey (:-D) was really a highlight :). We (me and another girl) later had to cross a mini jungle and then climb a hill to get back to the bridge.

Mom was at first very hesitant to even try it. In face she flatly refused to. But Kamesh can be pretty persuasive :-D. So she decided to give it a try and actually did it. Sadly, I only have a blurred snap of her rappelling and thats one of my major regrets. But I can still see her rappelling down if I close my eyes, so the memory is locked in my head forever. I was (and am) oh-so-proud of her :)). She did have some difficulty in climbing back, but she did that too :)). It was one of those my-mom-is-so-cool moments for me :-D. Soon everyone was done and we wrapped everything up.

It actually started raining while we were crossing the next tunnel, so we stopped to have lunch (I think Kamesh and his assistants cooked up a quick meal of Avalakki oggaraNe :-D).




There was another ominous bridge right next to the tunnel and I took the opportunity to take a snap :-D (I think one of the girls actually lost her torch here - I don't know whether it was retrieved, I remember Raj doing some circus antics to get to it). Also I think I even graced this bridge with another of my falls :-p. (BTW see what I mean about the iron strip in some sections? You can see it in this bridge).




We reached the Yedukumeri station by evening. I don't even know whether there was a nearby path to any village or the highway (didn't bother finding out as we were heading out the way we came), but it did feel like there was no civilization around - the station obviously wasn't being used.




For the umpteenth time, the photo is from the same guy from the other group. We freshened up in a nearby stream first - that was fun :). We planned to put up tents on the platform and later cook there, but the rain had other plans. It came down heavily which caused the tent to literally fly and get completely drenched. Well, we had to settle for one of the sheds like the one above where we setup everything, including the place for cooking. As nightfall came in, the rain stopped, but everything was still too wet to set it up outside, so we even cooked inside.

We made pooris together, Kamesh made the bhaaji and we all enjoyed them a lot. I remember singing loads of songs and some of of my favourites - "Kahin door jab din dal jaaye" and "Gul raha he saara manzar" (by Shankar Mahadevan - it really jelled well with the fading sunlight) outside on the platform and feeling blessed for being there. This phrase from "Kahin door" fit my personal situation so well -

"Kabhi Yun Hi Jab Hui Ojhal Saansein
Bhar Aai Baithe Baithe Jab Yun Hi Aankhen
Tabhi Machal Ke Pyar Se Chal Ke
Chhuye Koi Mujhe Par Nazar Na Aaye, Nazar Na Aaye"

The frustration and hope combination was never ever defined so beautifully :). That night we slept with uncomfortable blankets on hard floor, with never tiring conversations, tired and aching bones (I think I even ran a fever for which I took tablets), a running rodent inside our room :-D (all of us ladies were in one room and some of them, not me or mom, actually screamed at the intruder :-D) and Kamesh voice scolding us from another room to get to sleep :-D.

The morning arrived with a beautiful view :).




We finished our morning rituals and I think had some bread for breakfast and set out.




Here is the entire team of 8 people just before we said goodbye to Yedukumeri..




Just after a few minutes of walking, we took a right turn to find this amazing waterfall :).




That was one of the times I felt the need for proper roads to such a place. Only people who knew the place knew that there was a waterfall there. In US, there are smaller waterfalls and they all have trek/hike paths and you can find most on the internet with maps included :-p. Anyways Kamesh setup river-crossing here and this time I was able to complete the entire route and back :).




Even mom went about 3/4th the way :-D. Did I mention how proud I am of her? :-D.




After everyone had their turn, we packed up and started back. At the first bridge, I was scared out of my wits that I'd fall again, but it was sunny and the logs were mostly dry, so we were able to spot the slippery parts and tread around carefully. I didn't fall at all that day and yeah, that was an achievement :-D.




The following is the longest tunnel enroute - 572m.




Everything was perfect until that point, but at about the next tunnel, there was a break in the path that we were treading on and mom, not noticing that, fell and twisted her ankle. Kamesh immediately wrapped her leg in a tight bound bandage and from then on Naagu carried her backpack. I knew she was in lots of pain, and I felt so bad, so terrible and so guilty of not watching out for her. Our pace obviously slowed down after that and we were able to get to the highway only after nightfall.

I remember us waiting for a bus for a long time and then flagging down a lorry. I remember climbing onto the back of that lorry and us girls having a lot of fun jeering at people and behaving like taporis :-D. And I remember that we finally calmed down when the lorry driver requested us to ;-). We got dropped off at Hassan, had our dinner at a hotel and then caught a late night bus to Bangalore. We said our goodbyes early in the morning and scattered back to our own lives with the enriched memories.

Epilogue:

1) Mom was okay after a while, but the whole thing bothers me to this day. One new thing I learnt about myself this trek was role reversal. I was used to mom (in general, my parents) worrying about me all the time. But for the first time, it was the other way around. I worried whenever she walked on the bridges (even though I was the one falling), when she rappelled and river crossed. Later when she hurt her leg, I felt like a mother hen clucking around her chick :-D. It felt like a taste of what parents go through everyday when they wait for their children to come home and worry about their well-being constantly. Well, a very good beginning to whats going on now ;-). And mom was wonderful, she wanted to join me on a Kemmannugundi trek if I went on one and she even tried to convince dad to :-D.

2) I'm so glad we made it to the trek when we did. I was worried that I wouldn't be able to before the train service restarted, but we made it. They have the trains back on now and I believe they have day-trains these days, so it would be fun to ride on one and see a glimpse of the route again :). But thats in turn bad news for the trekkies, its certainly hard to walk on the bridges or tunnels confidently when you know a train can come in anytime (even if you know the train timings - Indian standard time delays :-D).

3) The trek was a test to my and all of our endurance. We had to carry stuff and walk, walk and walk. I found out that we can push our bodies to do things and it was an achievement of some sort. I found out that the more we go on, the more we wanted to go on, the more our determination and strength grew. I remember feeling victorious and invincible when it was over and couldn't wait to get back. But as you see, fate had other plans.. (To be continued)..

BTFYA 2 - Bisle trek :)

Its strange how the brain stores information that it needs and simply discards that it doesn't. Well, thats certainly not helpful when you are writing about a trek you went on more than 5 years ago :-D. In fact I didn't even remember the month I went to Bisle, leave alone the actual dates. I knew it was in the summer from March to June, but didn't know exactly when. How did I find out? You won't believe it, but I had penned one particular day's experiences in a .doc file thinking that I'll send it to my friends once I'm done. I never managed to complete the document, but still had it archived somewhere :-D. Guess my budding blogging instincts were already alive and breathing :-D. So, thanks to ME :-D, I can tell you the exact dates I went on the trek and how I found the trek group I went with :-D.

Just a note to remember before I start off, I still didn't know what a digital camera was then, so all the photos are courtesy of the Analog Cannon camera that has served my dad well for more than 20 years :). I had scanned pics of the same but of lower resolution (5 years ago 800x600 was the monitor's resolution! :-p), so had to get them scanned again to even write this post (thanks to dad). I had some other photos thanks to fellow trekkies, but sadly they are too low a resolution to be even featured :(. The point I'm getting to is that the photos may not be as good or as clear as the newer digital ones :-D. You have been warned. Also want to say that since there were a lot of people in the trek group, I won't be mentioning names (not really worried about copyright as such as it is my story, but somehow am hesitant to).

Maybe I always wanted to trek in some corner of my mind, but never actually had the urge to go at it alone (I remember I went on a trek to Saavandurga hill with my Yoga group when I was younger than 12 years and I took Darsh with me. But that was just a day trip with no overnight stay). What made me go for it this time, I'll never know (hey, if I haven't figured it out till now, then never :-p). Yes the frustrations I mentioned in the first post of the "Back to five years ago series" were a major part of it. But for a person who never travelled without her parents, it was a big step.

I found out about the trek to the Bisle forest through our newspaper. Bisle forest is part of the Western Ghats and has several peaks and tributaries of the Kaaveri river. The trek was being organized by a group called Nature Admire - so I called them repeatedly up to get all the details of the trek (wanted to make sure that there were a couple of girls/ladies going on the trek). The Nature Admire people came to know that another group called Mars Adventures was going to the same place and hence they decided to send whoever was registered with them with the Mars adventures group. And boy, am I glad they did, in hindsight. I also found out that there were totally 28 of us going. That helped me a lot in getting over my initial nervousness (not to mention my mom's ;-) :-D).

I met the group at night 8PM on 21st May 2004, carrying a backpack with me full of stuff that we were advised to bring - Ablution kit (Soap, towel, toothbrush and paste), a couple of clothes , a Rain coat, pairs of socks, canteen (plate, tumbler, water bottle 2 liters, a blanket, a torch, and a pen. I also carried my mobile (eventhough it was useless in the forest) and my dad's camera. We were also instructed to put everything in separate covers and put them all in a bigger cover (to protect them in case the backpack got wet). I met some of the members - a group of 4 s/w engineers (they are everywhere!), a couple, 2 children and a couple of familes! I also met the head of Mars adventures Kamesh and his 4 assistants (Vinay (fondly called Vinoba), Purushottham, Naagu and Hema). We climbed onto 2 vans and were off :).

It was early morning 5:30 AM on 22nd May 2004, when we reached Kukke Subrahmanya. It was drizzling slightly, so for a first time trek, this was turning out to be a rain trek ;-). We had only half an hour to complete our daily morning routines - so quickly completed those, had a cup of tea and were off to the place the vans would drop us. They dropped us on a road from which we had to trek downhill to the basecamp with our backpacks + oddities like utensils and sleeping bags. On the way, we found a hanging bridge we had to cross to get to the basecamp and it was literally hanging!!! There were a couple of logs which were floating away to glory, few which were blissfully submerged in water and others which were missing altogether. Moreover the logs were slippery due to the ongoing rain. We had to hold on to the railing of the bridge and sometimes even climb on to them to get across. Phew!!! The adventure had begun :).







We reached the base camp soon enough. The base camp had several huts and a platform which was an advantage - we need not carry all the things we brought with us. We dumped our back sacks inside the hut, Kamesh got the hut secured (since it was raining, there were lots of leeches around and we certainly didn't want them hiding in the backpacks :-D), had a quick breakfast of ganji and bread and listened to trek instructions from Kamesh (for Eg, if you encounter an elephant, you should run uphill and not downhill!! Also if you get lost in the forest, the best thing to do is find water and follow it upriver/downriver because you are bound to find some life near water). Our plan that day was to trek and climb a hill. The trek would be 8km uphill and then later 8km back downhill :-O.

Let me tell you for a first time trekkie, 8 km is certainly not a child's play (though the children who were along with us made it feel like one :-D). By the time we crossed 1.5 km, I was feeling really tired and wondering whether I’ll be able to make it :(. I wasn’t sure why I really decided to trek anymore. I even remember thinking “I cannot believe that I paid for this torture” :-D. It was raining on and off and since we did wear raincoats, the rain wasn't really a problem. But the leeches couldn't so easily be dismissed. They seemed hell-bent upon getting into our shoes and enjoying their meal. All of us had sticks in our hands to pick the leeches off our legs (can’t lift them off with hands, as they attach themselves to the hand and start sucking :-p). It didn’t matter that we had smothered our legs with odomos, tobacco leaves, stuffed our shoes with salt and what not!! The first time a leech climbed on me, I was like “eeks!!!” and somehow managed to get rid of it. Soon, we got the hang of it. You just had to keep moving fast to avoid them. Whenever we needed a breather, the only way to stop was to find a smooth rock with no leeches on it to stand upon. Yet, one lucky leech (unlucky for me :-D) managed to crawl its way into my shoe. I couldn’t even remove my shoe as there were its relatives waiting to attack my leg ;-). So just went on :(.

After sometime we stopped caring about the leeches. Know why? We started seeing snakes. There were orange coloured leaves everywhere and these snakes were small and orange in colour. It was our plain luck that none of us stepped on one :-D (BTW my document on this trek ends here, so the rest of this post are actual memories :-D). Kamesh and his team were wonderful, divided the entire group of people into sub-groups of 7 each and would shout to each other to find out if everything was alright (so that if one group stopped for any reason, the group ahead would be notified). At almost the peak, the climb became steeper. One of the assistants did some rock climbing to attach ropes, with which we all pulled ourselves up to a precipice (it was damn scary). But the view beyond was worth it :).




We sat there and had some biscuits and eatables just enjoying the view.




The climb down was obviously easier and faster, but scarier. Somehow when you are climbing up, you don't really notice the steepness ;-). Yup there were a couple of muddy falls, but oh well, thats expected on a muddy downward path right? :-p. Once we were back in the base camp, the first thing we did was remove our shoes and check for leeches. I did have a couple of bites and one leech stuck in my shoe, but it's stomach was already full, so it was not interested in me anymore ;-). I think one man had the largest number of bites - I think it was somewhere inbetween 18 to 25!




We all washed up in the river, helped setup the camp and soon had a campfire blazing :).




I think we did the usual Anthyakshari, sang lots of songs, had some dinner (don't remember what now - some type of rice) and headed to sleep off. I slept in a hugggggggggge tent they set up on the platform shown above. Some people slept in one of the huts and others in sleeping bags. It was not very cold and the rain had stopped, so we had an open tent and I think it fit some 10 of us. I remember being worried that the leeches will climb onto the platform and get into my hair and that I wouldn't be able to get them out (it seems funny now, but at that time, I wasn't really crazy about that thought :-p). But as I lay on the hard ground staring up at the opening of trees which revealed the brightest stars, I knew that was precisely where I wanted to be :). I think that was the moment when I knew I wanted to do it again and again (yeah pay and get tortured :-D). It was awesome and I loved the adventure of it all :).

Next morning we were up early and had the usual breakfast. This was our big tent:




Our plan for the day was to leave by noon and get back to Bangalore within the night. But before that we want to do some river-crossing with the help of ropes on a smaller branch of the river. So we had to cross the main branch by foot first..




I love nature, especially gushing rivers and waterfalls. The previous evening I spent a long time just sitting one one of the boulders and feeling blissful. To be in the middle of nature with no touch as such to any technology is indescribable. It makes you feel so much awe for it all, such a meagre mortal in front of a tremendous force :). Anyways, we headed to the smaller branch where Kamesh setup the ropes for river-crossing.




It looks easy, but its not really. You have to pull your weight on the ropes and well, since I am not easy on the weight part, the arms get tired easily. I made it about 3/4th of the way and back. But the fun was that each and every person from age 9 to around 60 actually did it :).



After that, we headed back and actually had lunch at a hotel on the way. As I said in the earlier post of the series, the trip helped me a lot in finding out a part of my true-self and recovering from a lot of frustrations I had building up in me :).

Epilogue:

1) I am a fan of Kamesh and his troupe for life, though I went on only one other trek with the guys. He was so strict about cleanliness (asked for the trash to be picked up in the trek) and so careful about our safety. The best part was that his assistants were poor kids he encouraged and trained to participate in rock-climbing competitions (so in other words - sponsored). They just had a Yahoo group from which I'd get mails updating about treks till a few months back, but recently they have a blog in which they write about all the treks! Here's the blog - Mars Adventures: Climbing in Bangalore and they have the contact details in case anyone is interested. Recently they posted about a trek to Kemmannugundi and man, I was so jealous. Before I got married, I wanted to trek with them there, but well, Sri was in a hurry :-D. Hopefully I'll get to do that once I'm back in Bangalore for good :-D.

2) I wanted to write this post to relive the trek, to kind of tell myself to get back to it :-D. Since we have Snugli, things have obviously slackened on our part. Trekking means we have to carry her, which is not a good idea, believe me :-D. We thought we'll atleast go camping this year, but now its too late. But have to go next year sometime :).

3) I also wanted to compare how it is to trek in India and how it is here in the US. There its more rustic, with the basic necessities and more of becoming one with the nature. Here you can chose to do it the rustic way (which is what the real trekkies do), but its easier to give in to the fancy parts. Camping with parking right on the campsite, having eatables just a mile drive away and ready-made firewood for a price somehow just doesn't cut it. Its like camping in your own backyard :-p. Though I like it that the forests aren't really "planned" in Karnataka, I am sad that some things are so under-developed. There are so many beautiful spots for trekking/hiking there, yet there is not much encouragement for it. The roads leading to the areas aren't really good and it feels like its in the middle of nowhere. I know I'm being contradictory, but I feel there should be a balance between convenience and the rusticity, so that more people can enjoy the getting closer to nature part :).

Sleepless in Seattle :-D.

Looks like I have to post an extremely happy or extremely sad post to get some comments. Very sad, I know :-p. Just wanted to let you guys know that I'm alright. Yup, was a bit down for days, but then as I said and so did many of you, maybe there's something better on the way. Or maybe the fact that I'm getting all this time with Snugli is the better thing. Anyways don't want to linger on that too much, because I have a hugge post to write on the trip we took a couple of weeks back. It did help in getting my mind off the MBA, but had to attend to it after I came back from the vacation, so the blow was a lot worse. But lets get on with the travelogue.

Coming to the title of the post, we were not exactly sleepless. But well, after travelling over timezones, to a far corner of the US, sleep was the last thing on our minds. When we booked the tickets about 2-odd months back, I was pretty apprehensive about the whole thing. First of all it had been almost an year since Snugli had been on a plane, so I wasn't sure how she'd behave. Secondly, the flight was pretty early (at 6 AM), that too from Cincinnati, so we had to leave atleast by 4:30 AM! With the little one around, it seemed like a tall order. The last worry was Snugli's food. In our Florida trip, I carried stuff basically because we had the car and the space. But this was a plane and we had restrictions :-p. It was not really feasible to carry a cooker and supplies :-D.

Sri came up with a good solution for the last problem. He suggested cooking the rice in microwave. I hadn't tried it before, wasn't really sure whether it'd work. Researched on the internet (hey, thats what its for!) and experimented a couple of times. The rice didn't cook as well as it did in the pressure cooker, but it was pretty good (I overcooked it for her as such - I have a 950 watt microwave, so it takes about 20 minutes of microwaving + 5 minutes letting it cool). So instead of packing the cooker, I just needed a glass bowl :). We made sure to book hotel rooms with microwaves. I did pack some rice, veggies, ghee, sugar and salt. Rest we could buy there :). One problem solved.

As for the getting up early and getting Snugli ready, it was pretty okay too. We thought of not really waking her up, but she woke up nevertheless. But it actually helped in a way that she slept most of the time on the plane, so it in turn solved the first problem quite a bit ;-). She did get frustrated now and then, but did have some fun looking outside at other planes, houses, clouds and saying "Hi" multiple times to the air hostesses :-D. All in all, not the ordeal I expected it to be :)). Well, the waving "hi" was an ordeal, believe me :-D.

To cut the story short (or should I say long :-p), we left home on Thursday April the 23rd 2009 at 4:30 AM, caught the plane from Cincinnati to Houston, Texas and from there to Portland, Oregon :). In fact we were so in control of things that, we breezed through the security checks and one lady behind us actually gasped in appreciation "You guys are soooo organized", hehehehe :-D. Anyways, the total flight time came to about 7-8 hours and we reached Portland at 11:30 AM PST. Drove north to Everett, Washington (about 3 hours) where we had our hotel booked. Since we had the evening still remaining, the first thing we did was to enjoy a ferry ride.

Washington state has various bays and lots of islands, most of which are connected to the mainland by Government run ferries. We wanted to ride one once, but hadn't decided which one (didn't really know how our situation would be after such a long flight). Since everything looked good and we did have to adjust to the timezone, we thought why not and went to the Mukilteo ferry which goes from a place called Mukilteo to Clinton island, a ride of about 30 min, just what we were looking for! Sri had been on one of these before when he was in Seattle (around 6 years back and it was before he met me :-D) and well, he really wanted us to try it once :).

The ferry was really nice, larger than those of North Carolina and Putin bay. In fact, it was hugggggge :). The weather was a bit chilly, but lovely :).




We stopped at the Clinton beach for sometime :).






That was it for the day. The next day is the crux of the whole story. Its the reason we made a trip, the excuse for going almost-coast-to-coast and the logic behind it all. Ok, ok I'll stop the suspense. April is the month of the annual Skagit Valley Tulip festival that happens north of Seattle. And I'm crazy about tulips. I have always wanted to go to Holland just to see the Keukenhof gardens which are supposed to have tulip fields that stretch to eyesight :). When I came to know that Skagit valley has something similar, just had to see it :). And Sri indulged my whim (he does that a lot, doesn't he? :-D), one of the reasons being that he hadn't seen anything around Seattle when he was there.

So was it worth the hype? Oh man, you have to see it to believe it! The first sight that greeted us was a field full of Daffodils!




Its not that the whole area is full of flowers. Its more like the area has fields and farms which grow flowers. We first visited the Roozengaarde fields and it was a breath-taking sight. Tulips grew in rows almost everywhere. It didn't really stretch as far as the eyesight, but was a sight to behold :). They had yellow, red and pink tulips, oh man! I must have taken 100s of photos and I certainly don't have the patience or the strength to put them all here, so I have made collages. Here's one of the daffodils and the Roozengarde fields (click to enlarge):




It didn't mean that we didn't take any photos with ourselves in them :-p.




I especially love the following 2 because we asked a pukka photographer to take them :).







Just one more in the fields, I promise :).




I wasn't really satisfied, but we had to move on. So next we went to the Roozengaarde gardens. In the gardens, they had tulips of various colours, shapes and sizes arranged in groups and it was enjoyable. How about another collage? ;-).




The gardens were pretty crowded, but Snugli really enjoyed running around the place. The best thing was that eventhough there were so many flowers, she just pointed to them and never attempted to pluck any of them :). Anyways, we stopped then for a bit of lunch and then encountered another part of Roozengaarde fields which had only red tulips :).



It was an awesome sight! So amazing to see flowers look like lush velvet blankets/carpets :). By then we had found out that there was another farm which we could visit called Tulip Farms. We at first thought it'd be more of the same and so were not sure whether to go there or not. But finally decided to see it anyways. And boy, am I glad!

At first, we saw only some indoor tulips and thought that it was a waste of time. But after sometime, when we did get out, man, it was totally a marvellous sight. Unlike the other fields which had tulips only in 3 colours, this farm had rows of different coloured tulips side by side stretching for a couple of acres! Make way for the collage..




They even had a trolley ride to take us to the far end of the farm (it wasn't THAT big :-p) and bring us back.







Sigh! I really wished I could be there forever. But the tulips only lasts till about 10 days in May thats it. And to tell you the truth, I still want to go to Keukenhof, because nope, the tulips huchchu hasn't gone yet :-D. We finally (me, reluctantly) said bye to the tulips and headed back.

Since there was some time remaining in the day, we decided to head over to the Boeing factory. The Boeing Factory in Everett, Washington is the largest commercial manufacturing site for Boeing Planes. Its worth a visit if you are in and around Seattle. They actually have a plant tour which takes 2.5 hours and they take you into the factory. But sadly, for us, babies are not allowed (min height of children should be 4 feet). They are not even allowed to be carried by parents! I am guessing something to do with safety, but it didn't mean that we weren't disappointed. Sri was looking forward to it the most, but we knew even before we left to Seattle that this was the case. Well, leaving Snugli and me somewhere and him going alone didn't make sense, so we just visited the gallery they had. Well, maybe next time ;-).

This was the actual factory:




The gallery wasn't much, they had a couple of engines, a couple of fuselages and some interesting videos about their new Dreamliner series.




Wish we could have seen the factory. Baby discrimination, I say! :-p. Anyways that was it for that day.

The next day, Saturday, we went on to explore the Seattle downtown. Call me jaded, but somehow the downtowns are failing to impress me these days. Maybe I've seen too many, or maybe I feel that nothing can beat the New York and Chicago sky-lines ;-). There were a couple of good buildings, but well, the downtown craze as such seems to have gone poof :-p. Anyways, the main purpose was to see the famous Space Needle.




Wasn't too impressed with that either. The one that we saw in Niagara Falls, Canada felt much better. Felt like, been there seen that :-p. But we still made an excursion to the top. The day was a bit cloudy, so maybe it all seemed all the more dull to me..




From then on we had lunch and caught a monorail to see the Pike market. Now this was fun. All the hustle and bustle, made me feel like I was in Jayanagar 4th block :-D (though you don't really find a shop selling sea food in Jayanagar :-p).




It felt like home, though (again), we did see hazelnuts and tulips shops which you don't really find back home :-D.




They had everything from clothes to vegetables, from artwork to spices :). And guess what! They had fresh fruit juice too, now thats a rare commodity in the US :-p. After the market, we caught the monorail back to place we parked our car and headed south. Our hotel was on the way back to Portland, but by the time we reached there it was already too late to do anything. So we rested :).

Sunday morning, the first place we went to was Mount St. Helens. The mount is an active volcano which had an eruption in 1982. Its not really tourist season yet there, so the observatory to see the actual crater was closed. But we still hoped for a view of the mount so went along anyways. As we went higher, the drive got more beautiful with the hillside surrounded by snow. Well, all the viewpoints were closed, so we weren't able to make out which of these mounts the volcano was..




Oh well :).




While coming back, we drove into a view point and our car got totally stuck in the snow. I thought the day was gone (the cellphones has no signal there and there was nobody we could contact), but thankfully, some strangers stopped and helped us out of the muddle (make that push the car out of the snow :-D). I was kinda worried mainly about the baby, but we were out of the jam in about 45 min and on our way to first lunch and then the Pacific ocean.

I have always wanted to visit the Pacific ocean since the time I came to US. Well, the worse thing for me personally was that Sri lived in the west coast before I married him. When my parents came, they went to California. Later my in-laws were here and they went to California too. And I haven't yet been to California :-p. They all got to see the Pacific ocean and I hadn't been able to until this trip. I know what you are gonna tell me, its all one large water body, so if you have seen the Indian ocean, you have seen it all ;-). But there's something about the "saptha saagara" concept that I haven't been able to let go of. The added charm is that the ocean is in another corner of US :).

Coming back to the drive, the ocean wasn't very near, it was almost a 2-hour drive from the highway we needed to take to get back to Portland (to catch our flight)! But if you want to see, you have to drive (in this case Sri did, he drove all the way because he was the "insured" person in the rented car. Damn, there goes my dream of driving a car in the west coast :-p). When we did reach the ocean, it was very chilly. The water was so cold that I almost jumped out of my skin when the waves hit my feet :-p.




Snugli loved walking all over the place (can't believe that the last time we went to a beach, she wasn't even able to walk yet :-D). Later we sat on a hilly grassy region where the wind was much lesser and enjoyed the beach for a while.




It was very pleasant and beautiful, but we had to leave and be back in Portland..




So that was it, we went to the hotel. Next day early morning, caught the flight to Houston, then to Cincinnati. Reached home at about 6 PM in the evening. Phew :).

The trip was an eye-opener - it showed us that we could travel with Snugli pretty easily and well, it gave me more ideas on where to head next :-D. Also some of the struggles we faced with her on the plane made me wonder all the more how the heck my parents managed to travel with me and Darsh all over India in trains and buses when we were pretty young. Another thing which makes me admire them all the more :). Hats off to them!