Monday, September 9, 2013

Trek to Nishani Motte or Nishani betta and Coorg white water rafting


Hi All,
     I am back with a new blog on our recent Trekking to Nishani Motte, Coorg.

Last year around same time we trekked Mullayanagiri and it was amazing exp and we decided to take atleast 1 trek per year from our busy life. And that trek in this season will be amazing thing to do...Most of them think trek is all about physical activity. But I say it is lot more than that. Trekking brings a great confidence in yourself and it will refreshes your mind from the stress that we have in our day to day job. You feel really great, charged to take any challenge in life...Yes i do felt all myself after every trek. And a big thanks to my Wife who always believes and accompanies me in every thing I do...



Ok here are the quick bytes before we jump in into story...
  • About the place: Nishani motte also called as Nishani Betta is a relatively unknown peak in the talacauvery/ branhmagiri range, Coorg. The word Nishani means the Mark and Motte mean hill in local language. Britishers used this as mark for their directions on hill path to different places. 
  • Date: 31st Aug 2013
  • Trekking Guide: Bangalore Mountaineers Club  (For more details: www.bmcindia.org)
    Distance: ~500KM
  • Days of Travel: 2 days ... Just perfect for adventures weekend...
  • Trek Distance: 8km one way
 Story Begins...

     
          Started our journey from lifestyle build where BMC cab picked us at 11pm. We were 1 hour late as few folks came late. Started the journey with 22 other folks who joined us for the trek.

          Reached some homestay ( i do not remember the name) which is in Virajpet, Coorge (about 1 hour journey from Madikere) around 7am. Took some rest and got freshup. Had breakfast and packed our lunch also. Planned to have lunch some where in the middle of trek. The actual Trek start point is around one and half hour journey from the home stay.


Home Stay in Coorge

    
         Left the homestay at 10am. Reached Madikere around 11am. Got some time for shopping for things that we need during trek. Guidelines was given to carry as less as possible. Had small shopping where people bought water bottles, snacks, chocolates and few even bought shoes as slippers will be not that good to wear for trek. One of the local guide by name Kiran also joined the trek who is the one actually know the exact trek path.








Trek start point... Can you see a hill at back... Actually not visible fully...

       Reached the base of the hill around 11:30 am and we are ready to start trek with full enthu. This start point is around 500mts from sea level and we need to reach top of the hill which is around 1500mts from sea level. Before trekking we spent few mins in introducing ourself. Till that point we were complete strangers only. With this introductions we came to know about our fellow trekkers much better. Guide gave few quick instructions to follow during trek. Few of them like,
  • Always follow guide
  • Do not take your own path
  • No one should ask how much more time or how much more distance in middle of the trek :)
  • One guide will be at the start and other at the end and we have to make sure we are in between them...
      Finally Trek Started. First 20% of the path is jeep path where a small road will be there. One of our fellow trekker was layer by name Hemath. On the way he said a few nice things and one of them was, "Love the journey and not the goal". Yes it was biggest mistake we always used to make that I always try to concentrate on path and always think of reaching goal. And feels that there is a great joy in goal. This was absolute mistake. We should always enjoy the journey like watching the beautiful views around us, enjoy fresh air, spend time with others, make friends, and enjoy the nature. With this we actually reach goal very easy and also we will have a great joy of journey also. This is very true in our life also. From now I will try to enjoy the journey than the goal.




 
     Reached next part of the journey where there will be small mud road.



So many small falls like this on the way...

 Next reached where just a small trail exits. Initially we were bit tired and started thinking how much more to go… But we shut our mouth as it was strict guidelines not to ask for it… Soon after we adjusted to the trek and our body moulded to it.

     Reached the last stage of trek where there will no path but we need to make one. There were few places where it was very slippery and we have to take at most care. Few fellow trekkers who came for the first time were completely tired and facing lot of issues as they thought trek will be a jolly walk and this was completely diff. But few were really good and showing full energy till end even though they came for first time. We also had little pain in legs and little trouble but we were all OK as we know about this even before coming to it.


So hard some times...

     Some where in middle of trek around 2pm we thought of break and having lunch as we were all hungry, but guide instructed us to hold till we reach top of the hill as it will be difficult to walk with tummy full. So with some little snacks we continued the journey.

That's our Guide Sam...

Due to fog we were not able to see the top of the hill. Every time we reach some peak thinking it will be top but we see some more distance to go. We were eagerly waiting to see top.

      Finally reached the top by 3pm. It was a great joy and our soul is full of happiness reaching it. As soon we reach top, we felt more energetic and confident. Our mind was so confident that we were ready to take any challenge at that time. This time, we enjoyed the journey and goal both. By the time we reach top, we all became good friends who were just stranger at the start. Trekking teaches us a lot.





       Had a lunch and we made sure that no body litters the place as it was a imp instruction given to us. Took few snaps, enjoyed the views and we were ready to trek down. Down trek is much easier.
Started trekking back around 3:30pm. Some where near to end of trek we need to take 2KM deviation to reach small water fall around 4pm. This is was one more amazing moments we had. It was a beautiful waterfall completely hidden in the dense trees...


    Enjoy the fall for some time and started our journey back and finally reached bottom of hill around 5pm where cab was ready to pick us. All were very much tired and just slipped to sleep in few mins… Reached homestay, had a nice hot water bath and we were back to fresh mood.


    They arranged for fire camp and few people enjoyed the chilling weather with fire and few enjoyed few drinks (you know what I am saying) and few like us happily slept off memorizing all beautiful moments of the day.

Day-2:

All woke up early and got ready. Had breakfast and started second day journey to Coorg White water rafting around 10am. Missed the route many times and finally reached the rafting place at 12.

  Got few quick instructions and started the rafting… First did rafting on plain water to practice, took a dip in water to get adjusted to the water and get some confidence in water.
They had some thing like Level1 to Level4. Level1 is a small jump in water and Level 4 will be very big fall where our boat lifted in air and will fall and moves through gussing water… Level4 was really awesome and felt really adventures…





The bad part of this rafting is we need lift our boat to the river and take it back from it. Putting in river was ok as we had lot of enthu and engery. But after rafting we were tired and it was really hard to lift the boat from river to jeep.


 Came back to rafting camp… Got freshup and started our journey back at 2pm.
Some where on the way, we had lunch and reached Bangalore at 11pm. Thanks to bad traffic in Mysore road in Bangalore where it took so much time stuck in traffic due to water logging.
It was heavily raining in Bangalore and we used our rain jackets finally which was packed and untouched for entire trip…


Ok back to same routine life... But with full energy.... Bye Folks...