A drive towards Nagarhole & Irupu (pics incl.)

[kaushik_s]

As it seems like lots of Team-Bhpian's were heading that way this travelogue will be something similar. But still I asked myself why I shouldn't write mine also and bore the people to death he he..
If I ask myself "What make me to take this trip ?", well had a long weekend(4-6Apr), nothing much to do except getting the ICE done(thanks Satya,it was nicely done and the music was just rocking) for the car on the Saturday I still had two more days to kill.One forced bachelor friend called me and forced me to decide on some place to go for a trip. And somehow Nagarhole was on back of my mind and I told him that we'll start by 7pm that day and stay at Mysore and next day to Nagarhole or Coorg or something. But the work on the ICE took much more time and it was finished only by 9pm. By that time another forced bachelor also joined in and we decided to start the party by next day early morning.I reached home by 12.30 and seen that the AC is not working,had to open the console and seems like the guys forgot to connect the AC console connector.Fixed that and went to sleep by 1am..
So as decided the people reached my place after 2 hours from the decided time and the journey started. Route to be taken was Kanakapura Road - NICE road - Mysore Road - diversion @ Sriranganathittu- Hunsur-diversion towards Nagarhole -Nagarhole-Kutta. Road was in good shape in most of the places.. Even Mysore to Hunsur was dual carriageway(i didn't expect that). It took us around 6 hours to reach Nagarhole with umpteen breaks we took for tea,photo session,to fix the passenger side power window(well that was also same story as the AC console) or just to enjoy the beauty.

By the time we reached Nagarhole hunger pangs were kicking in..So we ditched the wildlife and head for civilization. Had some very forgettable food at Kutta and that food have forced us to believe that we better find some good acco first.Then the idea of going to Irupu came as many homestays are there.
The road towards Irupu was not in good condition, mostly broken but still doable. Irupu was just 10-12km from Kutta but it took almost close to an hour. We took refuge in a homestay type place called Ramcad Estate.Nice place although food was not something to talk home about(for the vegetarians).But breakfast was not bad though.We went to Irupu by 5pm around and it was kinda mild walk through the jungle for around 20-25 minutes. The falls is quite scenic one and good thing was not so spoiled as many tourist spots are.We spend lota time there (me clicking and other guys enjoying the water)



Morning we were supposed to take the safari and had to reach Nagarhole by 7.30am but as lazy we are we reached there by 9am only and came to know that there was no safari at that time.

But there were quite a few people around who also came late and the forest officials agreed for another bus tour for us. As it was past 9am and it was raining few days back I was not expecting to see any wildlife and we could only see a Elephant and a turtle.I could spot quite a few birds also.


After the safari we left for Bangalore and minced the miles quite fast.Reached Srirangapatnam by 12 and we thought of finding out a place to eat. I recalled one nice resort by the side of the Cauvery and after few tries I was able to find it. Food was good as it was before and the experience of having food by the side of river was just awesome.(the resort is called Amblee resort if I can recall correctly) Here is a pic from the sitting space ->

Well after heavy food although felt like sleeping we thought of reaching home and take rest at home. Mysore road was almost empty that day and in no time we reached home.
Total Distance Travelled : Approx 500Km
Time required : should be 5 hrs but we stopped in many places so took us more time.
Road condition : Good overall.Just Kutta to Irupu is broken in places
Food on the way : small shop at Kutta not good.
Irupu Racad Estate : OK food.But non-veg have better option.Breakfast was good.
Amblee Resort(Srirangapatna) :Very good food.nice ambience.

I hope you people liked the photos and the travelogue.Would love to have your comments.
Regards,
Kaushik

[phamilyman]

very naish pics, but the album effect is jarring. the deer seemed to have posed for you!

[kaushik_s]

Thanks Phamilyman,Seems like Irfanview have screwed up the pics. I can now also see kinda square shaped grids on the pics.
Mods please remove the photographs from the first post. I hope it's ok to repost the photos. I'm uploading a new set of photographs.Really sorry for the goof-up.

[sj_koova]

nice pics dude.
very good image stability.
What camera do you have? Should be a DSLR

[indfo]

The snaps are really wonderful.
Loved the deer snap. Great exposure overall...

Thanks for sharing

[smsrini]

I particularly liked the waterfall photos... what shutter speed/aperture did you use ?

Do you use a DSLR or a point&shoot ?

cheers!
Srini

[rjstyles69]

Hey Kaushik nice pics man and good getaway. Looks like the images were over-saturated, never the less good pics .

Originally Posted by smsrini

I particularly liked the waterfall photos... what shutter speed/aperture did you use ?

Me thinks a 2 sec exposure coupled with an Aperture of 4.0 or above should give you this.

[kaushik_s]

Thanks a lot sj_koova,indfo,smsrini for liking the pictures,Yes they were all shot with a DSLR, most of the shot except the Irupu falls shot(4th shot) was shot by Canon 70-200mm f4 IS and 4th one with canon 10-22mm. For that particular shot I've used a Graduated ND filter handheld infront of the lens to compensate the light on the top part.. All the waterfall shot was shot on tripod with longer exposure.
Riju,thanks man, yeah if I can remember the exposure was more then 2 sec or in that range (probably around 10 sec or so) but I'm not sure now,aperture was at f11 probably,will upload the exif info once I 'm back home today. BTW actually I like the saturated colors mostly due to the fact that I was so much used to the color saturation given by Transparencies that in digital also I try to make it look similar to velvia slides (and probably I end up doing it more sometimes he he)
Regards,
Kaushik

[kvish]

wow! brilliant pics!. Nagarhole is becoming a team-bhp aDDa these days!

[Nitin]

Superb pics!! Its so good to see all the flora & fauna in all its glory!

[CorsaLove]

Nice report. Good pictures you have there. Post some more if you have

[kaushik_s]

thanks a lot Kvish,nitin and CorsaLove.. Yeah, will see if I have any more good photographs that I can share..