Wonder what this is? This is what the signboard reads as you start to head out ot Bangalore city towards Mysore.
Imagine this for a moment. Covering a distance of 120 kms in a little over 3 hrs. sounds interesting? Not quite right? Well.. this is how the Bangalore-Mysore road used to be couple of years back. A plethora of vehicles racing on the narrow 2 way stretch, and ofcourse the road-widening activity, the hold-ups etc. I always used to think twice, thrice before I got myself to drive down that road on weekends.
Then it all happened.
Well, it did not happen in a night, but when it happened, it happened for good. The narrow 2 way stretch gave way to wider, four-lane fast lane. What used to take a painstaking 3-3.5 hrs was considerably reduced. Now, one can cover the distance of 120 kms between the 2 cities in 2 hrs. Hows that ?
It was last weekend of July 2007, rainy season in Maharashtra and we, a group of 11 people (extended family) went to three days trip to Mahabaleshwar and Panchgani. It was my second visit to these small hill stations amidst the heights of Sahyadris mountains.
Only eighteen kms from Mahabaleshwar, the hill station of Panchgani is no lesser known to tourists. It is a frequented hill resort and is an ideal base for some good trekking, hiking, biking and parasailing (seasonal).
The parasailing takes place at a vast plateau, the second highest in Asia (and 4.5 km long) after the Tibetian plateau and locally known as “Tableland”. More on tableland in another post.
Lucerne (Luzern in German), is situated on the western tip of Lake Lucerne, which lies at the geographical and spiritual heart of Switzerland, where the tops of the mountains are covered with snow and their sides flanked with glaciers. Standing at the foothills of the St. Gotthard Pass, the lake winds deep into the Alpine Ranges of Central Switzerland, Lucerne, thus is a fabulous starting point for many rewarding excursions to the scenic places of this most beautiful part of the world.
The river Reuss splits the town and flows rapidly to the northwest, where the lake ends. The Lake Lucerne also known as Lake of four cantons – Uri, Schwyz, Nidwalden and Obwalden, is also popularly known as the William Tell Country, the legendary figure from Uri countryside who supposedly paved way for formation of the Swiss Confederation.
The trip to Dharamshala got planned just like that.One fine evening as we didn’t have anything to do to pass sometime prior to dinner we ended up planning a trip to….I don’t recall now what was the initially intended destination…..but there must have been at least a dozen suggestions followed by prolonged discussions.Finally, we found that we were just incapable of reaching consensus.Well then I forgot about it all and one day I found Jagan walking towards my cubicle to inform me that he was indeed going to Dharamshala with some friends and asked if I would like to come along though he was least expecting me to say yes :)
Reaching Dharamshala from Delhi is I guess far more easier than reaching the old Delhi railway station from Noida, so it is highly advisable to keep a margin of atleast one hour if you don’t want your trip to be a “throw yourself in the train at the last moment” types. Well our first moment of bliss was successfully boarding the train with 100% of the group and the luggage of the group in tact but anyways this exercise instilled the spirit of being a group though 75% of the group comprised of people I was meeting for the first time.So, amidst Britannia cakes and a group of cacophonic aunties(according to whom the chain in a train is meant to be pulled when “ladies” can’t board it…..must have been invented by some ultragallant gentleman) we finally reached Pathankot from where we caught (read threw ourselves in) a train for Kangra (the fare for five people was Rs90 only :)) and this was when the group leader started on his “desire is the cause of suffering so I hereby renounce this desire” spree which we had to endure through remaining of the trip but anyways we were going to the place which is the seat of His Holiness ,the Dalai Lama ,”the little Lhasa in India”, so such an outburst of realisations was not very unnatural.On reaching Kangra we had to walk from the railway station to the nearest bus stop, accompanied by a few langurs, from where we caught a bus to the nearest taxi stand.Taxis are generally easily available for Mcleodganj (which was our destination) and by evening we reached there. Mcleodganj is the place where the present abode of the His Holiness, the Dalai Lama is situated. The day we reached,we just strolled around and then got divided in two groups on account of varying paces and spent the remaining time locating each other.Well, after all it was time for dinner and we had a sumptuous dinner of stuffed paranthas, curd etc(no Tibetan delicacies were present in the menu).
