Vellari mala and Vavul mala trek

Where is this place:    90km from Calicut, near wayanad in Kerala.

How to reach:            From Calicut government buses are available to                                   Muthappanpuzha, from the village trek starting point is 4km

 Is it difficult:                Yess...it takes around 8 hours of climbing with a total distance of 14km

 Is Guide necessary:    Yes....there is no proper trail....

early morning on the top

When i read in other posts that Vellarimala trek is the toughest trek in South India, i did not believe, i thought they did not go to Velliangiri, which is very difficult. But after completing vellari mala trek, i feel it is tougher than velliangiri for two reasons

1.  Whole 14 kilometer trail is steep, in other treks..you see a flat path somewhere on the top, you motivate yourself to reach there and take rest, but in this trek, the whole trail is steep..you have to climb, climb and climb

2. It is completely dense forest, like other treks...there are no views of hills, clouds, valleys....if you do trek to have some good view of hills and clouds or if you motivate yourself to finish the trek to see the view on the top...then this trek is not for you....

iruvanjipuzha river flowing down the hill

 

A small stream is available near the trek starting point which is a good place to get fresh up and start the trek.

From the trek starting point it will take two hours to reach water falls called 'olichuchattam'....there will be lot of leeches throughout the trail in the rainy season.

olichuchattam falls

view from falls

From the falls you have to cross the stream two more times and after that we have to walk two more hours(5-6 hours from starting point) to reach the first camping site called 'Mastakapara'




It is a good place to camp, where 8-10 tents can fit, but there wont be water resource available.

The temperature gets down to 10 degrees on the top

If you want to camp near water resource, then REC para is correct place, REC para is 1 hour away from Mastakapara.

In between REC para and MASTAKA para, a view point will come which is called Ketanpara...you can have a good view of hills where you can see the chembra peak, vavul mala peak.

view from Ketanpara view point

After camping in the night either in REC para or MASTAKA para, we can climb to VAVUL mala next day morning...it will take some 2-3 hours to reach the peak.


The whole trail is through dense forest, so if you want to spend some good time in thick jungle, experience the real thick forest....this trek is for you.

Here is a video made by me about this trek, watch for more clear information

Silent Valley National Park- one day jeep ride

Silent valley is not a place where you find  large mammals like lion, tiger, elephant, etc. Here you can go into the dense rain forest which is very remote and can spend time with nature in all its glory. You can enjoy the beauty of the forest, the cool refreshing breeze, the crystal clear water of the river Kuntipuzha.

Me and my friends went to Palakkad to attend a marriage, after marriage we planned to go to silent valley. The reason for choosing this place apart from beauty is summer, may month, hot sun. Whichever place we go, there is no way we can escape the hot sun, but silent valley is a rain forest, it rains almost every day in silent valley.

How to reach:

Silent valley is in Palakkad district, Kerala. The entrance of the park is in the town MUKKALI, it is about 80km far from Coimbatore and Palakkad, takes two to three hours to reach. From Coimbatore we have to take bus to Anaikatty and then to Mukkali. From palakkad we have to take bus to Mannarkkad and then to Mukkali, there are no direct buses. Comparatively the road from Palakkad to Mukkali is more scenic.

 Coimbatore-(by bus)- Anaikatty- (by bus)- Mukkali town(entrance of the park)
Palakkad- (by bus)- Mannarkkad-(by bus)- Mukkali town

Only Forest department vehicles are allowed inside silent valley, call up the forest department (08589895652, they are quite helpful) before coming and ensure a jeep availability, they'll probably ask you to arrive between 8:30 am and 1 pm post which entry for this trip closes.

23 KM jeep ride:

The ride started from forest check post in Mukkali, our jeep driver started explaining about silent valley. He told that out of this 23km ride only the last 1km comes under the core zone of the forest, the place we are going is called Sairandhri vanam which is 23km away.  For the first 5-6 Km the forest is dry. After 6Km we reached a place where we can see the tribal settlements.

After this place the forest started getting thick, driver told that it is difficult to spot animals as they run away after listening to the jeep sound. We saw a lion taled black monkey and a giant malabar squirrel, i could not able to capture them into my camera. We stopped at several places to have a good glance of that thick forest. There are trees which have a 10 meters circumference, trees with big hole inside the trunk, Sunlight tried very hard to get inside and touch the ground, but the big trees gave a tough fight.

 Surender, myself, dharani and bala

A photography enthusiast will feel at home at this place and will probably dry up his camera battery. .....unfortunately we forgot to charge our camera and cell phones before night, so we could not able to take much photos.

After 20 Kms we saw a board and a gate welcoming us to the silent valley National park and soon we were at the place called Sairandhri, where there was a 150 meter high watch tower.

Watch tower:

very bad photo- but this is the only long shot of watch tower i got

From the top of the watch tower you can have a bird's view of the location, you can see the kunti puzha river, hanging bridge and all those hills covered with clouds. Any photo on watch tower looks beautiful in a huge scale. If you take binoculars and watch it from the top of the tower, there is a chance of spotting some animals.

 After climbing down the watch tower, we had parottah, there are no hotels in silent valley, so you need to get it from mukkali before starting the trip

 Hanging bridge and leeches:

This is the most beautiful and the best part of the trip. there is hanging bridge over kunti puzha river, it is located around 2km from the watch tower and takes 15-20 min trek down from watch tower, but the path that leads to the bridge is full of leeches and there is no way you can escape them. The best thing you can do is not to stop on the way, if you stop then 10-15 leeches will jump on your legs to taste your sweet blood(at least for them).

When we were on the half way, it started raining heavily, we continued our walk in that rain and reached the hanging bridge, the sight of bridge and the place is so stunning, i wish they allowed us into the water, but what to do, visitors are not allowed to enter into the river. You can have a good view of the river from the bridge. This is the last point of the silent valley trek, there is a route on the other side of the bridge, but visitors are not allowed.

bridge and kunti puzha river

We stayed there for some 20 minutes only, right from the watch tower the driver was on our ass telling that we are getting late, we should move fast. So. after 20 min we started climbing up to watch tower where our jeep was parked.

This climbing up part was somewhat difficult, not because of the slope or distance, but because of the leeches. It is almost a 20-30 min hike and you cannot stop in between, coz if you stop, the leeches will get on you legs...so you get tired..you want to stop..but you cannot and continue the hiking...it was so funny.

Finally after reaching the top, we removed our shoes and sandals to take the leeches out, Surender went a head and removed his pant to check any leech inside it.

Return journey and Bhavani river at Mukkali :

There is nothing much new to tell about return journey, we got tired after the trek and took a small nap. After reaching mukkali, we said good bye to silent valley and our driver and went to have a look of bhavani river. It is very near from forest office, you need to take the small way on the right side to the office. It is a very beautiful place, when we went, the time was 5 in the evening, few local women were taking bath and washing clothes. so we went to the other side where few local kids were taking bath and having fun.

We sat there for some 5 min, Surender tempted me to take bath but my return bus to Chennai was at 9 from Palakkad. So promising that we will take bath there in our next visit, we returned to the bus stop.

As i said before the silent valley gives you the experience of going into the real forest and most admirably with no plastics and other wastes, it is so pure and clean.

Points to remember:

 Book the jeep in advance,get the details from the number 08589895652, it costs around 1350 for jeep, maximum 6 persons are allowed, if you are less in number say two, you can share the jeep with others or take one separate for you.

Take food items from Mukkali, there is nothing except the fresh water you can get inside the park.

Reach the forest office at mukkali early, atleast before 12 to enjoy the complete trek without any hurry.

Kurangani to Top station trekking

Warning for the people who has the habit of working in office- THIS IS A LONG POST.

Last trekking i did was to Nagalapuram in October 2014, and after that i went to the same place three four times as none of my friends were ready for a long trip. During this time i used to ask my friend Bala about the next trip, two weeks back he told me that his friend JK is organizing a trek from Kurangani to Top station on Feb 14 and 15 and asked whether i am interested, like that i ended up in the group of 17 people.

Chennai to Kurangani:

We all gathered at Porur toll gate and got into the bus to Bodinayakanur at 8 pm, all introductions happened in the bus and our journey started. Fortunately i got a good sleep and woke up only at Bodi. Bus reached Bodi at early morning 6.30 on Saturday, the climate was so cool. After having a hot tea in that cool weather we took the next bus to Kurangani at 7.30. The road from Bodi to Kurungani is so beautiful and slowly introduced us to the Kurangani hills. Hills covered with mist, valleys with coconut trees, hair pin bends, suddenly we were in different world and started to feel the western ghats and enjoy its chillness.

We reached Kurungani at 8, it is a small village from where the trekking to Top station starts. Immediately after getting down the bus our first photo session started. There is a bridge near bus stop and few got down the bridge and got fresh up there, meanwhile JK took parcels of Idly for breakfast.

From left to right: JK, Shaan(in lungi), Karthik, Manoj, Me, Shiva, Karhik, Idhaya, Sathish, Arul, Naresh, Shankar, Kabilan, Tarshiq, Jalal, Bala and Vignesh

Kurungani to Middle station:

Finally around 8.30 we started our trekking, Idhaya and JK have already done this trekking, so they guided us the way. It was not sunny, the trail was wide, not that much steep and within an hour we reached the stream.

For this one hour i didn't attend the call from nature, once we reached the stream immediately i finished my poo poo. In an open place, inside the forest, water running under my feet, birds giving background score(encouraging), actually i enjoyed my poo poooing and it was a great experience, sorry i am getting carried away here.

near the stream

 After that we took bath in a small pool there, the water was so cool and refreshing. After taking the bath we had Idly and Vadai as break fast.

 From the stream we started at 10.30 am to middle station and the trek was some what difficult. Almost the entire way is a stone laid path with hair pin bends. Here my friend Satish found a technique to take rest instead of directly asking to wait- whenever he felt tired he used to ask us to pose for a photo saying 'the view is so beautiful macha', after one snap he would ask to pose for one more and then one more until he felt ok.

After two hours we reached middle station also called central station, it is a beautiful place with some 30 to 40 houses and a small shop, almost every one there work in coffee estate. We stopped at the shop and had a nice sharbat there.

Middle station to Top station:

This part of the trekking was the most scenic one, you want to put your every snap as your profile pic in Facebook, it was that much beautiful. You walk through the plain grasslands with beautiful hills surrounding you giving a breathtaking view.

Yes the climb was little difficult but the beauty of the place deserves it. Here we saw horses, you can rent them for 300 to climb from middle station to top station. Finally around 3.30 we reached our destination- Top station.

Top station:

 Top station is located near Munnar, some 5 km away from Kerala, the main attraction here is the view point, where you can have a good view of the hills. After reaching the top we went to a nearby hotel and had food, then we went to the resorts by jeep where we booked the rooms. Our resort is in Koviloor, Kerala state near vattavada village, it was a 20 minutes ride from Top station. The route was really good, a typical Idukki district route, Jeep driver started playing the love songs of A R Rahman. Feb 14, evening time, AR love songs in Gods own country- perfect combination. We stopped at Vattavada village to take photos, the village is so beautiful, everywhere there are farms of carrot, strawberry and coffee.

Vattavada village

We reached the hotel by 5.30, climate became so cool(almost equal to ooty climate).

our resort

Here comes the funniest part of the trip, after taking some rest, we had camp fire. We started talking, Tarshiq started discussion on one topic which we young people always think, this made the star of the evening SHAAN to interrupt and give his PERCEPTION on the topic through some memorable songs, it was so hilarious and those four five songs made our day. After that some dance vance happened, there was another group of four people who came from Cochin by car, they started dancing to tamil songs, we also joined them. Then we had dinner and slept.

Return Journey:

It was Feb 15, India vs Pakistan match, so we got ready by 8.30 and sat before T.V. We watched the match until the jeeps came.

Same 20 minutes ride to Top station, but this time jeep driver played old Ilayaraja songs. Morning time, jeep ride in western ghats, Ilayaraja songs- old combination, but old is gold.

These puppies gave pose for photographs in front of a house in Top station

We climbed down in the same path which we climbed up, near middle station there is a small masjid which we didnt notice while climbing up, we went there, one can have a good view of the hills from the top of the masjid.

Middle station and the houses at the bottom are at Kurangani

We reached Bodi at 5, our bus to Chennai was at 8, so we sat before a closed shop near bus stand and started playing dumb charades, it was fun. If this game gets included in Olympics, Idhaya will win gold medal for our country, every film name was on his lips.

 All good things must come to an end and so this trip. It was a nice trek, people with average fitness level can easily complete this trek. If you haven't gone to this place, go with your friends and enjoy the real beauty.

Trek details:

Distance is 12km(one way), not difficult, if you get tired in between you can rent a horse.

Starting point is Kurangani village (Theni dist, Tamilnadu)

Accomodation: There are lot of hotels on Top station.

The curious case of A R Rahman song

Do you remember those paragon slippers that we used to wear in childhood. How can we forget them for all the trouble we faced while using them, removing thorns from it using safety pin, putting that rubber thing back in the front hole every time it came out, every time my chappals become old enough to buy a new pair, i used to feel excited coz i am going to have a new pair of chappals. When you wear those new slippers, for the initial two three days, they bite your feet, but after those initial hiccups they stop biting and start serving your feet.

When an A R Rahman album is going to get released, i wait for that date. When the songs are getting downloaded i wait with some excitement, this waiting period increases the expectations on the album and i know that rahman is going to tower over those expectations. Listening to the AR's album for the first time is like entering into a new and unknown world. First time you don't get it, your mind says  that the songs are average and not as good as his previous albums, but then immediately your heart starts scolding your mind -'Idiot, it's A R Rahman, how can his songs sound average, how many times i have to tell you, AR songs are like slow posion, you have to give it some time, you have to listen for three four times to get it, listen to it again carefully'. After listening for two to three times your mind replies to your heart 'yes, sorry i forgot'.

Last week 'I' album got released, the scene that i explained above got repeated again, it's not new to me, it happens for every rahman album, after listening for 4 to 5 times slowly one song after the other started winning me. All you people who feel that 'I' songs are average, just give them some time, just listen to them one more time, you start feeling the magic

Kerala- God's Own Country

The social studies text book in my school introduced this small state to me saying 'This state has highest literacy'. All those beautiful Malayali heroines (meera jasmine, asin, nayanatara, nithya menon and others) who acted in Telugu films and all those Telugu films shot in Kerala, especially 'yem maaya chesave (vinnai thaandi varuvaaya') created a WOW impression about Kerala. so when i joined PSG COLLEGE OF TECHNOLOGY in Coimbatore, the first thing i wanted to do is to visit Kerala.

                        
When you go to any Kerala hotel the first thing that you will notice is 'Medicated water'-hot water with some recipe mixed in it. They use this Medicated water for drinking in every hotel of Kerala which is very good for health. The Malayalam language sounds so sweet and it uses a script peculiarly apt for this part of the world. The letters with all round curves and looping twirls, beautifully match the landscape. Fittingly, the word Malayalam itself means “hill region”. The word is a conjugation of 'Malai(mountain) and 'Aalam (valley or depth). In brief, 'mountain peaks & valleys', which is to say 'hill-country'.The houses in Kerala are different, the most distinct feature is long, steep sloping roof and if there is 100% land, they use only 20% of it to build house, rest of 80% contains trees. Even in a city like Palakkad  there is no apartment culture and all the houses are individual houses with a small forest around them.

 Life in Kerala goes slowly and beautifully like a K.J.Yesudas melody song and when it rains then the pace of time gets divided and the beauty of Kerala gets multiplied by the rain drops falling. On such a rainy day i visited Kerala for the first time and i felt that the tagline 'God's Own Country' used by Kerala government to promote tourism is not an exaggeration. There is no Silicon Valley-like activity that you see in Bangalore, Chennai and other cities. Levi's and Wrangler pants have no place in Kerala, all you see is a lungi rolled around the waist.

                           
If we mix the beauty of aishwarya rai, katrina kaif, angelina jolie, scarlett jhonson, kavya madhevan in a mixer, then the result is equal to the stunning natural beauty for which Kerala is renowned. From the stunning beaches along the Malabar Coast in the north to the  backwater canals in the south cutting through the glorious rolling hillside tea plantations in the Western Ghats, every part of Kerala is beautiful.  The way they preserved the forest reserves and ancient arts like 'kalari payattu', Ayurveda, etc is excellent.

                    
 When you are entering into the Kerala, then just listen to the melody songs of A.R.Rahman from 90's, the beauty of the song will be in front of you and you feel so good, it is the same feeling that you get when you see a beautiful malayali girl in that traditional white saree speaking that sweet Malayalam language, when you see those stunning tea estates in MUNNAR, when you see those awsome waterfalls like ATHIRAPILLY, when you see a boat going over the backwaters in ALLEPEY, when you watch those beautiful Malayalam movies. One should experience it to understand it. I hope to have that experience from now onwards in every month, and i will share those moments with you.