How to start 2013? New a real good trip to begin. So the hunt for a drive and a getaway was on, loads of suggestions but nothing was exciting enough to say let's go on the highway.
then it stuck, why not get away from this chaos concert jungle and into the real jungle. Brains lit up and choice was bandipur, kabini or nagarohole, very next minute bandipur was ruled out as no open jeeps but a caged 22 seater bus where animals can view humans in a caged bus.
So the choice was between Kabini and Nagarohole, and somehow everyone agreed that Kabini would be a good choice for the weekend and it turned out to be the best decision as it gave us 2 memories that will stay forever.
By the way, this was a day's trip of four friends and a Verna on-route to kabini.
Now, for the plan, Leave bangalore and reach Orange County Resort by 5.45 AM so that we can get into the boat and reach the other side of the forest and get the best open jeep and be at the gate and enter the forest at 6.00 AM.
So, the grand master plan was set and 4 guys and a verna left Bangalore on last Saturday early morning at 1.00 AM sharp on a mission. Mission to catch a boat before it got away.
Now, I wont get into the route map to kabini from Bangalore as its been mention in many threads here and all I can say is, till HD Kote the roads are good, but post that till you reach Orange County Resort you can find some thing call road and after that its just driving on the moon experience. 25 kms stretch up to the resort gate was driven under 10kmph.
At this point of time, We had made up good ground thanks to very less traffic on the highway and the clock showed 5.10AM and a sign board said Orange County Resort 25 kms ahead. Well, we had almost made it but as the saying goes, It's not the overall distance but the last 20 kms that really counts and It did count.
5.15 AM and the discussions were H.R.Policies(Dont ask why this came up
) and news channels (Again, I have no clue who brought this up at that hour) then something magical happened, one the left side there were these huge trees and on to the right side, sugarcane fields. I had just flipped to high beam and noticed 2 glowing eyes(Not Red glowing but glowing to the car's headlight ) and I broke the on-going conversation that there is a nice local wildlife at this hour up head and its a nice dog.
Everyone started to laugh and as we got closer the car became totally silent as if we have reach the interesting bit of the movie's climax scene, The dog was a full grown male leopard and he just crossed the road and stood at the the other side looking at us, growling as if he did not like us turning the car and parking it sideways to look at him with high beam. Now there is excitement and total disbelief amongst us that how can we get so lucky at this hour to get to see a big cat in this place and then when all are just looking at him, The humble GPS from my friends iphone say's, in 500 mts take right turn.. We were confused whether to laugh or keep our focus on the leopard ahead and at the same time he had enough of us and turned around and vanished into the sugarcane filed.
after we soaked in the awesome sight we burst out laughing on the mr.gps and continued on to resort now all hate towards the bad road had gone as it gave us wonderful sight and we kept looking as we drove on hoping to spot a tiger(Too much expectations yield nothing) and ended up at the resort bang on time, 5.45 AM where a open canter was ready to leave with the few guests towards the waiting boat.
Kabini reservoir has dried up at an alarming rate and the boat man told us that this was a very bad sight and was worried that in next 6 months its going to go still worst.
Well, This is enough long talk till now and let the pictures do the talking as we have still the second magical thing in store
First set, from the resort to the forest with sun rise.
P.S. this marks my 666th post
-Sajan.
As we stepped out of the boat towards the safari jeep this sight greeted us at 6.00AM
Early morning view of kabini, water level is very low.
Made it in time at the gates with other jeeps ready to disturb the peaceful jungle
Once the gates opened, the mad rush began and all I could think of was the song, bhag d.k.bose, bhag d.k.bose........
This was worth all the drive
Sun slowly rises on the kabini
Water level is a worry here as the sun rise starts to give out the reality check
Reflection
The jungle slowly comes in its natural color.
Its just so peaceful and quite with only the sounds of the morning birds.