The pleasant morning at Mannavanur - Day2 of Kodai trek

Jan22 2012: Day2


It was already 1 45AM when we went into the tent and i wanted to spend this day atleast some more for photography. The trek to Kukkal planned on this day was cancelled, since many preferred to end the trek here being it tiresome and few were not fit enough to continue. We all went into the sleeping bags and it felt that if we had stayed inside the forest we would have frozen to death, it was so cold.I woke up at 4AM and opened the tent, but it was dark and  i knew i had to wait for sometime and again i went for a sleep. Woke up again at 7 25AM and was astonished to see the view from my tent. I forgot to say that, there was a lake near the tent where we stayed that night. The lake was completely covered with fog and the lake was not visible at all.



The tent where we stayed.

After me, Aravidh also came out of the tent and JP was also there. It was terrifically cold such that JP made fire and was enjoying the chillness ;)

The view was spectacular from the lake. It was completely wide angled through my lens and i made some nice landscape shots.

Every time i click water bodies i fail to notice reflections. Reflections are really beautiful subject to be photographed. This time i was clear not to miss it. Keeping this in mind i clicked this pic and further more i waited for the sun to come out and got more dazzling reflections.

Here are a few.

And then everyone got up and since the trek to Kukkal was cancelled we planned to spend some time in kodaikanal. We asked the tempo which dropped us at Berijam the previous day to come and pick us. Meanwhile, we prepared Tea and hot water for Cup noodles and had a simple breakfast by the side of the lake. The sun had taken its position by then and it was great to feel hot sunlight mixed with the chillness. Meanwhile, only 6 train tickets were confirmed, and 3 wanted to travel in train. So cancelled the remaining 3tickets and booked bus ticket over call. Technology was really helpful for us in many situations during the trek[booking tickets getting number from net, calling ppl from forest, trying to access GPS]. Also, we collected all the plastic covers and Aluminium foils we used and threw it in a dustbin in kodaikanal. Everyone was very conscious not to pollute the nature and I was really happy and proud of our act. :)

Then we all packed our things and took some final group snaps and started to Kodaikanal.

We had a great farewell from the Mannavanur Lake. When we started a shepherd came with his flock of sheeps. We halted for 10 more minutes to click the sheeps. It was a great send off for us with a complete experience!!!!

One more thing that added to our surprise was we saw a jet flying high with the jet marks remaining for few minutes. I saw this after a looooooong time, in fact many years later. I guess these jets are not seen in chennai nowadays.

After all this, we started and reached Kodaikanal at 1 30PM. We had lunch and made some shopping and it was 4. Three of us  started to Madurai to get the train and we were roaming around the Kodaikanal lake for an hour and half and had a tea, emptied our bowels and boarded the bus at 6 30PM[Mani had said that he would come before we leave, but the bus started, suddenly he entered into moving bus and gave us a pack of homemade chocs and said Bye to everyone and left fast thanking the bus driver for slowing a bit :)] and reached chennai the next morning!!!

I knew only one person from the crew when i boarded the train on 20th evening and when i got out of the bus there were 12 hands saying "Bye Machi...!!! " . That was a great expedition. Cheers Eco Trampers !!!!