Tuesday, January 20, 2009

TRIP TO MUNNAR (GODs OWN COUNTRY)

It was 24th Dec 08 evening and one of my friend called me up for a trip to munnar (Kerala) and I said yes ,actually it was me who initiated the trip idea a day back but then he was not very sure to join .So a yes from my side was quite obvious .
We were two family ,so it was decided that we will book a taxi (Quallis/Travera) as it will be pretty tough to travel in a 5 seater as we both in all have 3 kids.
I planned to start @8:30am but the Taxi guy came quite late at 9:45.
We then headed towards Banargata road where my friend resides and by the time we left from his place it was 11 .The driver took the hosur road via anekel.

Soon on the hosur road before hosur there was around an hour delay due to some state permit issue and we have to shed 700 bucks ,the driver told everyone need to pay that.
The roads after Hosur were simply great ,its NH7 (Bangalore ,Khrishnagiri /Dharmapuri/Salem).at
Although there were at certain points there was some maintance work ongoing but still it was good enough.
Suddenly before dharmapuri an idea cam to my mind that how about covering Hogonical fall which was some ~40 Km from NH7 ,thus an extra ~90 Km ,I felt it was worth trying and yes said my friend pankaj.
So we were now heading towards Hoganical falls (It’s a famous fall in TN ..to make things easier ..roja movie was shoot here).
It was around 3 when we reached the fall,and where dying of hunger thus desperately I checked for some good restaurant but for our bad luck we couldn’t find one and settled for some restaurant .
It was one of the worst food I ever had.Although rice sambar was good but paratha was horrible.
After completing the gr8 meals we headed to see the fall.I was really surprised that after every few meters there was another guy selling tickets ,although the tickets were not costly but they could have been collected at one point itself.
The fall was quite good ,it was worth a visit .we clicked some pics rather lots of pics.And also enjoyed the boat ride for a small distance .
Myself and pankaj went for bath under fall ,like I usually try for at any fall were ever its possible.

By the time we left from the fall it was 6 + and by the time we reached NH7 it was 7 and now I was wondering was it an right idea as it was not possible to reach munnar before or around 12 ..which was my target ,as I have two small kids.
My of my friends just wonder how I simply think of making such trips with two small kids ,one is 2 years another one is 6 months.
But that’s the way I am.

And as I was worried it was around 9 when we reached Salem so it was dinner time ,we had an excellent dinner at some restaurant at salem at decent price.
It was 10 when we started from salem ,now I was more worried as we have simply covered around 200KM of the 500 Km to munnar.
Panjak had done some search for the way to munnar …till salem it was common but after that it was different than what our driver planned ,he was planning the route via Coimbatore which to me was coming out to be some 75 Km extra ,So after lots of brainstorming I decided to take the route via Erode as it was 10: 30 PM ,munnar was impossible and going via Coimbatore was a extra distance and thus time .
Erode is some 50 KM from salem ,we found some lodge @ erode ,it was pretty econimocal .
Plan was made to start at 7 Am ,but just like it normally happens it turn out to me 8 Am ….i really hate delay ,but what can be done.
From Erode we took the route of Perundurai ->Dharmapuram -> Chinnar -> Munnar.

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