Myself , my bro (Vivek) and my cousin (Siva) , had been planning to go for a road trip for many, many years … And we finally made it happen , two months ago … So , Here we go …

This time , We decided to go by ourselves , only the three of us , in two bikes …

Fact Sheet about this trip …

Rollers :

Me (Karthick) , My Brother ( Vivek Kannan) and My cousin ( Siva Kumar )

Bikes :

Pulsar DTS i 150 CC

CBZ Star 150 CC

Route:

Kangeyam – Pollachi – Valparai – Sholaiyar – Athirapally Falls – Kalady – Perumbavoor – Kothamangalam – Neriamangalam – Adimaly – Pallivasal – Munnar  – Marayoor – Chinnar – Udumelpet – Palladam – Kangeyam

Gear:

Backpacks , Helmets , Jackets , Boots , and Panasonic DMC FZ-28 Digital Camera

Days:

3

Day 1 :

This is the month of Monsoon’s arrival – July … Monsoons are not yet started … Yet we imagined the worst case scenario of heavy showering , and  decided not to suspend the trip ,in any case …

Me and my bro started from our home in kangeyam and joined with siva at palladam , at somewhere around 4 am … We are ready to roll … We arrived at Pollachi by 5 AM and continued non stop to reach the foothills of valparai by 6 AM … We were a bit early to 6 , so we clicked some photos with the Aliyar Dam in the background and also sneaked into Monkey falls , which was completely deserted …The clouds are already dark , and we decided not to waste any more time here …

So we started our uphill ride to Valparai … A few kms up the hill , the clouds started pouring , slowly at first and then almost constant and heavily afterwards throughout the uphill … We never stopped for the rain until we reached valparai … We ate our breakfast at valparai and decided to waste not time here , as we have already been up here many a times …

We rolled into the jungles of Western Ghats , the stretch of jungle road , that I love the most …

The rain was completely stopped after we passed sholaiyar … We were rolling slowly … Time was at our side … We were careful not to miss anything … We clicked photos through this trip … We were eager to encounter at least any one animal , but unfortunately , we didn’t … But , someplace in the middle of the jungle , we stopped to piss and we heard some noise … We turned in the direction of the sound and We watched two or three large birds flying from one tree to another up in the tall trees … We could not see it clearly … And We never have seen any bird as huge as that …. Later , recently now , I found out that bird , while watching , Sandesh Kadur’s Documentary  ” Mountains of the Monsoon ” … And it was , the Great Indian Horn bill pictured below…

What a magnificent bird it is ?! … We continued rolling and stopped at Athirapally falls and ate our lunch here … After lunch , we trekked a bit to see the falls at the top , from where its pouring … We were heavily exhausted , by our ride through the constant rain in the morning … So we decided to skip the trek to the bottom of the falls , which we have already seen …

We then headed towards perumbavoor via kalady … This route is through the Rubber Plantations and it is known as shortcut road which saves some 18 kms to cochin ( kochi ) , instead of taking NH 47….

The road is just a single lane and fully deserted except for a few bikes until Kalady …. But we had some quite a unique ride through the rubber plantations …

We halted our journey for day 1 at Perumbavoor …

Day 2

We started from perumbavoor to munnar via famous NH 49 ( Munnar – Cochin) … I gotta tell you , this is one of the very exotic and scenic uphill roads in the southern india …. You pass through at least half a dozens of Water falls … Its quite busy traffic compared to udumelpet to Munnar road … We stopped at two of the water falls and took some pictures … We continued uphill and stopped at a place where the signboard read as Viewpoint … The view is really good … We could see only mountains and mountains from here , no plains or no civilization , as far as our eyes could see …. It was here , we pictured this flower in the backdrop of the mountains … It came out really well …

We reached a place alongside the road before 18 kms up to munnar … It was called something like Poonkavanam or Flower Garden (if transliterated abruptly) … A old man was standing at the entrance of that place, which was a muddy,steep path that goes down … Also an elephant was there … The old man told us , the place is a kinda park , where a stream is flowing and also have some caves … And we promised that we could have some real fun there … But since it was already noon , and also we were tired , we thought of coming the next day …

We rented a room in a small homestay some 4 kms before munnar at a place called pallivasal … The room was damn cheap at Rs.400 as it was off-season … And surprisingly we had a great view from the balcony of our room … We took some rest and decided to go to Munnar then … When we started , it was drizzling and we had some quite lovely mist covers over the valleys and mountains … Munnar shines at what it is famous for … THE MISTY MISTS … In fear of wetting the camera , we missed some great photos … Once we reached munnar , We had some snacks and decided to go to Mattupatty Dam and Echo Point and Top Station … As soon as we climbed up the road to Mattupatty Dam , the rain started pouring heavily …. And as it seemed , it won’t stop for a long time , we then ride back to the room … Again in the evening , we reached munnar and tried second time to go to mattupatty dam … But again , it started raining even before we could start from munnar … So we got back to the room and rested for the night …

Day 3

We vacated our room and went to Mattupatty Dam and also to Top Station … We clicked some beautiful pictures in the road from munnar to Top station … This road was frustratingly very curvy and full of up and downs … The 40 kms of this road seemed to be never – ending  and tiresome .. The road was very bad for 5 kms near Top Station … And it took toll on us … So we ate lunch at Top Station and the food was undeniably good … Once we reached back munnar , it looked the rain was gonna pour again … So we started downhill immediately , feeling unhappy that the trip was gonna fail us without any animal sightings except for a vague sight at “The Great Indian Hornbill”. Fortunately , We saved that humiliation upon us … My cousin and my bro were lucky that they got stopped by an elephant in the middle of the road with its calf … The elephants denied to move for some time and they had a wonderful time … But as I was way ahead of them riding my bike , I just stopped by a place where many keralites were standing and seeing something through the mountains … I asked one of them , what were they seeing ? … They told me , there was a herd of deer and also one gaur(indian bison) in the woods … But i could not sight them clearly through my eyes , so i took my camera and zoomed in the direction where they were pointing their fingers … Now , I clearly see them … It was so clear through my camera and i really felt happy that i bought a camera with 18x zoom … Shortly , the other two arrived at the place and We had some wonderful videos shot …

We then descended downhill through chinnar wildlife sanctuary and again we spotted some more deers and a boar and also some more wild birds …

It ended our trip on a high note…

P.S: More photos coming soon