Hi All
This has been a long time coming and i apologise for the same. The reason is the same old one, no time. Here we go for the second part before i forget the critical areas of the trip.
We got ready to hit the Periyar National Park or Periyar Tiger Reserve by 10 in the morning. It was only a 5 minute drive from our hotel. We reached at the entrance and had to buy our entry passes. At the gate we were informed about the rules (No Litter, No Plastic, No horns and care for the animals if they pass you) and that the next boat ride was at 11 and we were thrilled. To look at wildlife, elephants and tigers in their habitat -- wow. We got our tickets and were parking our car where we met our family friends who had come from Chennai and was a blessing in disguise, as they had the contact's in Thekkady and they could get us the tickets for the boat ride, as it was a run for the tickets being the Easter weekend.
We had sometime before we hit the boats and during that time, i was fascinated with a few monkey's, little one's, just a few weeks old, hanging around, learning to climb and jump, to eat and of course getting all the unconditional LOVE from their mother's. It was a truly an awesome site. I just gave myself up there, nothing of myself was there and I was into the monkey's totally.
Then the time came for our ride and we were excited to check out the animals. We got a top deck on a boat for a panoramic view of the tiger reserve. The climate was passionate, slight drizzle, 20 odd degrees, the nature at its best, the calm surrounding me -- exhilarating. I just gave myself once again to nature. The boat ride for 2 hours was great, but we did not find any animals, except a few birds and bison's. I thoroughly enjoyed the boat ride though -- AN experience if your one of them trying to seek solace and inner peace.
The ride took most of the time of the day. At the end of the reserve, we could see a bit of the Periyar dam's cleansing system. Not many people are allowed there. It was an awesome site and thanks to the diplomacy and bureaucracy in the political system -- guess what - the actual mechanised system does not work and labourers have to go in deep daily to flush out the debris.
We headed for lunch and check out and the 140 Km drive to Munnar. An awesome drive through the western ghats, narrow roads and the evening setting in quickly. An absolute bad stretch of 20 KM took out most of our time and wasted, more than a hour of the three hour drive. As the evening set, we could feel the mist through the head lights and we had to slow down considerably with the vicinity dropping by the minute. We reached our wonderful resort around 8 in the evening and the resort was about 20 Km before Munnar. We said a temporary bye to our family friends whose booking was in munnar and the resort had no vacancies to accommodate them as well. We had dinner and hit the bed to go Munnar in the Morning.
A good day -- so to say.
Keep watching this space for Part three and Munnar -- Trust me the best is to come.
