Hi TAIs,
I have completed my second Long drive to Wayanad successfully with my Punto.
Start Date: 28-04-2012
End Date: 30-04-2012
Total Days: 03 Days
Total Person On-boarded:4 (Me, My Wife, My Wife's Friend and Her Husband)
Total KM Covered: 845 KMs
Avg. FE: 17.8 with A/C, (23.0 without A/C)
Destination: Wayanad (Kerala)
All the preparations were made in advance like our first trip. Accommodations were booked in advance, Tyre pressure checked, Tank filled, bags packed, Maps on place and we are ready for our trip.
Places Covered Day-wise,
1. Day-1 : Tea Estate Near our Homestay and Exploring Kalpetta
2. Day-2 : Edakkal Caves, Kanthanpara Waterfall , View Point (TBD)
3. Day-3 : Banasura Dam, Pookote Lake and Back to Bangalore
Day-1
------
Strated our Journey from Murugesh Palya @ 6:30 AM. Bags loaded, GPS from my Android phone turned on and moved to BTM. As we have to take our friends (couples) from their Home at BTM. I was worried about the boot space to take all stuff of two families. But once they kept their bags, it observed pretty easily. Hmm, Punto has good boot space that's what I realized. Then we took NICE road and reached Mandya very early and took our BF. A small gap started towards Mysore. Just after Srirangapatna, chnaged seats and I came to Passenger and my friend took the driver charge from me. He has a beat petrol and by driving my Punto, he was silent for few minutes. I asked him, what do you think abt this. He said it's simply superb. The handling is like awesome. Me and wife looked each other and smiled on that. Then we entered Mysore city, crossed Bus stand and headed to OOTY road. Road was good upto Gundalpet and after upto Bandipur Forest it's OK. After Bandipur Checkpost, Road is simply superb and green trees around you. It's Simply unbelivable. You will definitely feel like somebody has put a painting in front of you. We took some snaps though it's prohibited there and looking at us, two more cars stooped after us and they too strated Photography. The other couple located two elephents in that forest and too excited. As we have seen this many times while going to OOTY, we were not so excited, though happy to see a Kid elephant. In no time we reached Sultan Bathery. Took lunch in some hotel, and asked about the Edakkal Caves, whether that can be covered now. But that guy said, it's not worth to visit as it's already 3 PM when we finished our lunch. Then we started straight to Kalpetta and in 30 mins, we reached to our Homestay which was booked earlier. The owner came to receive us , but when we followed him, suddenly from the road side a Stiff elevated curve came and only one car can go thorugh it. I somehow adjusted and done it successfully. That bring some confidence in me of Ghat road driving and I thought of what this trip is going to be. We went to our rooms and took a small nap. When we enquired about the places taht can be covered in 2 days, our homestay owner gave us a local Map and guided us.So we came to know that nothing came be covered on that day. He told just 100 mts away one tea estate is there and that's an open one. So we went there and I tell you the wheather was so good that the view was simply superb. we took some snaps and came back to visit the Kalpetta town. Well it's a small town and there was apower cut from 7 to 7:30PM. We thought of taking the dinner at homestay but the owner told that the cook is not well and have to take from outside. So disappointed with that but controlled ourself and went outside. I tell you in kalpetta, if you are planning to have decent food get it before 8 Pm after that all shops are getting closed. Somehow we managed on that night.
Day-2
-----
Took our BF at 8:30AM and started towards Edakkal caves. We have come towards thSultan Bathery road but before 7 KMS from Sultan Bathery need to take a left turn to reach the Cave. Near the cave, the road is not good at all, still Punto did it. Unfortunately, I parked it much before where I should Park. Then Walked for around 25 mins to reach the ticket counter where a long queue was there.As it was a long weekend and was Sunda, heavy crowd was there. After a long wait of 1 Hr, got 4 tickets and 2 stickers for 2 bottles. They are charging 20 RS for each bottle and return it once you return back and show the bottles. Good tactics to make Plastic free zone.I tell you it's not easy to cover the cave root. Need a lot of effort. After 1 Hr trekking, reached the cave and inside it was not so great as it was described. I tell you, this place is unnecessarily hyped so much but not that good what I feel. Still saw the scripts on the rocks inside and took some snaps and started our return journey. Our wifes were very tired after covering such distance. On the way, small stalls are there where you will get coconut water, Honey Amal(a common thing here) and cold drinks. We refreshed with those stuff and came back to entrance. Got a decent hotrel outside the cave entrance and took south meal and omlette. I was also tired to drive but we had to cover places today only.
Rest of the Trip on next part.
Not able to upload pics here, some error is throughing...Will upload soon