[balan]

Jan 24th to Jan 26th Bangalore to Muduamalai and Back

Wanted to do a pictorial of my trip to my guest house in mudumalai. Fianlly managed to take some snaps and post here

Had to start on 24th noon from my Kid's school as they decided tohave the nursery sports day on Saturday. Usually I drive off from school on Friday afternoon.
Due to the relative afternoonish time, traffic was free on the Mysore road

Mysore road was free as all the people seemed to have traveled out of bangalore on Friday evening / night



In Mandya, there was this person on a 4 wheeler which put all cars to shame. HP = Human Power


Before Srirangapatnam comes Atlantic Textile Mill which is still proud of Gandhiji's visit in 1934. I think the mill is shut down now and is a prime target for realtors


In the lake before Mysore airport wall was this beautiful bronze winged jacana


This large egret didn't want to be photographed


Black Winged Stilt wasnt shy at all


After Mysore in Nanjungad over river kabini is this 185 year old bridge now part of a heritage monument


With the evening sun into your eyes, it was a nice shot for a silhoutte.


Lots of Peacocks were on the way. Dont feed the animals and birds




Saw lot of bullets on the way to Rider mania RTMC ISHTYLE (STYLE) in Ooty. Except for the bullet with flag others were decently silent.

On 25th was part of Kenneth Anderson Nature Society's Bandipur RoadKill awareness program advising drivers to drive slow inside forest, dont make any noise, dont feed animals, etc. Most of the Indie Thumpers were all receptive, saying yes, thats a good thing you guys are doing and when they revved up and rode on, it was like tearing your ear drums off
We counted 1000 vehicles in 3 hours. During peak season, the road is too heavy with traffic. As I was sitting alone after all volunteers had gone for lunch, there wasnt a moment when the forest was still and silent. Vehicles were passing along at an astonishing frequency and pace. I thought my scorpio was silent but sitting there and listening to all the sound and disturbance gave me a guilt consiousness.


While returning saw this acccident which had occured few minutes before. The road is downward gradient and turns sharply and this lorry driver new to the route took the curve on full speed and turned turtle




Indie Thumpers from Delhi were amused to see this esteem break down and other drivers on road trying to push start it, push the car off the road






The bad roads in bandipur gundelpet section made the thumpers stop frequently. On smooth roads, they seemed to fly




Saw these guys with cycles who seem to say their 2 wheels are better than our 4 wheels


Then in Gundelpet saw this accident. Police man was making report of the blood spill spot


Saw grey heorn, painted stork, spot billed pelicans in lake outside mysore

There was a total of 7 accidents I saw during the return trip. fast cars, heavy return traffic on Mysore road.
Near the heritage bridge in najungad, a bus scraped off the fender of a maruti. Near Bidadi, 3 vehilces were involved in a pile up accident.


The return traffic on Monday 26th was unimaginable. There were MUVs and cars and MUVs and cars and MUVs and cars and MUVs and cars and MUVs and cars and ......................
Jeez. I hate crowded roads. As a relief all roads in Bangalore were free
Seems everybody went out of bangalore for the long weekend.

[mjothi]

Nice pics. Especially those birds. Btw, I too noticed similar (may be same???) Bullet gangs on my way back from Mysore on 26th afternoon. And 2 bullets I saw was a AP registered. When I went to Airport to drop my friend, again these 2 bullets caught my eyes. So, may be from Hyderabad???

[rjstyles69]

Hey me too met a few bulleteers on my way back. I did my return trip from Wayanad on the 26th in the evening.

The return traffic on Monday 26th was unimaginable. There were MUVs and cars and MUVs and cars and MUVs and cars and MUVs and cars and MUVs and cars and ......................

Ask me about it. My usual time is less than 2hrs Mysore-bangalore and on the 26th i took me 2hrs and 45 mins. Overtaking was the biggest pain here, every time I wanted to over take, the line up would be a min. of 5/6 cars with everyone cruising at 60kmph in the right most lane.

I lost count of the number of people I cursed that evening for their lousie traffic etiquttes on a state highway.

[balan]

I think there was 600 bullets in Ooty against a projected number of 400. There were all sorts of bullets and ppl on them. One thing I found bit strange. In gudalur, the delhi guys and kerala guys came face to face but there was no hi or greeting. Strange.

[magiceye]

that indeed was a beautiful pictorial. loved your bird pictures!

[-GT-]

Absolutely beautiful pictures of lovely birds!

Apart from the accidents and the traffic (both of which you obviously detested and hence the weekend trip to Bandipur/Mudumalai), can you please post a few pics of the jungle jaunt?

[balan]

Originally Posted by -GT-

Absolutely beautiful pictures of lovely birds!

Apart from the accidents and the traffic (both of which you obviously detested and hence the weekend trip to Bandipur/Mudumalai), can you please post a few pics of the jungle jaunt?

Thanks for the comments.
You can see more of my bird pictures / animal pictures in Bandipur Mudumalai Masinagudi Wildlife Photos - Home

By Jungle jaunt you mean safari pictures or where I stayed? I stay at my guest house on the forest border. It wouldnt be appropriate for me to post about my own guest house would it?

Best regards
Bala

[rajshenoy]

Nice Travelogue

Yes indeed bangalore was all empty.. For a change i just loved driving in Bangalore

[deadguy25]

Nice pics, especially the ones of the birds.

[hellstar]

amazing pictures my friend , and Gundulpet seems to be an accident prone zoen , as i passed through Gundulpet three time in the past three months and every time i saw accident and of which two were on the spot fatalities.

[balan]

Saw this Vintage Chevrolet
I kinda scared them with my combined driving / photography
Hence overtook them, stopped at a shady spot, took their pictures.
Nice people waved back as they drove along
Sure would love to have it in my garage. But first I would need a garage i suppose