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It is was about my two-day visit to Arasinamakki, with my beloved one, which
I started narrating. Though it took us two hours to exit Bangaloru, in next two
hours there was exodus of greenery as we approached Hassan. We thought of a
quick stop at Hassan Ashok, but their excellent food, great ambience and
extremely competitive menu made us spend a little more time and a great start
for our journey. Though sleepy town of Sakleshpur we reached Shiradi ghat. If
you have been impressed about bad roads of Shiradi ghat, you are in for a
surprise for most of the part, barring few Km. We regret being restless and
rushing through the dusky light without trying to concentrate on the prettiness
around. As guided by our good friend, we kept a vigil on the sign boards, which
were sequenced Shiradi, Udane and Enjira. At Enjira we said good bye to NH 47
and started plying on a narrow road with patchy asphalt and no asphalt. Dark,
no light, absolutely no light, no houses and nothing around. That was exactly
what we wanted to drive by with only two of us around and was thrilling
(honestly I did have butterflies in my stomach while negotiating bad patches).
After traversing roughly three km, we reached a main road, turned right and
take there, an active village was welcoming us. Do not imagine thatched shops
and dirty water in front. All structures are well built with Mangalore
tiles and are absolutely clean. Ask anyone where is Buddha the stream of Joy,
they will guide you. If you are ready to shell out 25 bucks, an auto will guide
you till you get fragrance of Sambrani (Dhoop) at Buddha’s cave. We were
welcomed, offered water to freshen up and a cup of welcome herbal tea which
gave us the signal what is in for offer. My wife whispered “Where are we to
stay?”, as an ordinary looking private house seemed to have no
space for us. Our hosts prompted us to walk with them through uneven steps,
rocky bridges over water bodies and eerie silence for 100 meters and there we
reached the cool place. We chose to be in a cottage, all amber in color with
bright furnishing. Typically rustic ambience with clean walls brightened
our eyes. We had a sumptuous hot water shower and hurried to the dining hall.
Though we did not have much orientation in the darkness, we were getting hang
of the place. Dinner was SUPERB. Typically south Indian, but exotic. Not too
sure about what we had, some names where in Thulu others were sounding North
Indian. It didn’t matter since it was no less tasty than Ashok. Barely do I
remember what happened next as my wife was comforting my burning feet due to
long drive, I fell asleep. It was very cold during the night, March in
Arasinamakki seemed like winter in Bengaluru.
Next morning Malabar whistling thrush woke us up as signs of life were
appearing from silence of the night. I saw my wife struggling with the video
cam to record the long notes of the thrush and peeped through the window to
find our host standing at dining hall with coffee. We were in an areca nut
plantation under green canopy. A moderately louder gurgle could be heard from
the front window. Though weekends start beyond seven, we could not resist
opening the door at six. WOW, what a paradise we were in! Our cottage was bang
next to a river and the scene was picturesque. We looked at each other with eyes
wide open and wearing a very very big smile. Looked through the fog grazing
through waters, visible was a raft made out of Bamboo. We started to walk over pebbles of all
shapes and reached another small plantation. This trek was a part of bird
watching but there wasn’t even a crow around. LOOK, said the host with a
pointed finger towards a tree (all fingers will point towards a tree in the
jungle), we looked there was nothing. “Do you see as if a white handkerchief is
kept for drying? ” He yelled with excitement. Yeah said I (So what was actually
what we wanted to say). ‘That’s paradise fly catcher- Male’ he hummed. He had a
pair of powerful binoculars. As my wife pressed her eyes against the lens,
‘Beautiful’, she screamed, ‘Waggy’ look, it has two long tails with a
black head. Our interest in ornithology never stopped from there. We could see
noisy Tree pies, crimson red trogon (we were supposed to be lucky to see it),
restless racket tailed drongos, squeaky bright yellow oriole, many brown birds
which we cant remember, kingfishers – blue and black & white, a couple
called minivets one yellow and the other orange. These are all I can instantly
remember. The list in my note book was 16 of which black bird was the easiest
to remember. The walk was like a obstacle marathon through river, pebbles,
plantation, dry deciduous bushy mountain, serpentine road which ended with a
steep slop.
Rafting took me off to a all time high. The water
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