With a certain pesky animal out of the way, the time was ripe. But the plot had been hatched weeks ago knowing that this time would come. Maybe it’s the monsoons of India or plain ad-hoc-ism that this time of the year I get extremely interested to shrug the world off and head into the wild! And boy, we just did that and how!
This time around it was a often-trekkers-known place called Honnemaradu near the Karnataka district of Shimoga. Nine of us office guys-n-gals packed minimum stuff and headed to this environment friendly place where no smoking, drinking or even outside food is allowed. The facilities were also minimal with only an open well and four walls to do as a bathroom and a dilapidated toilet with a single pipe outside as the only source of water! But the staff in-charge at the place was skilled and well mannered and helped us have a great time.
The weekend spent in the islands was exhilarating and calming at the same time. The serene surroundings with nothing but wilderness around were a treat to the eyes. But what activities were planned for us took us into the groove! First we had a few hours of life-jacket aided swimming in the Sharavathi River, in the backwaters of the Linganamakki dam. Then we took coracles into the river and learnt the basics of rowing and maintaining direction. After a really tiring session in the waters we came back for lunch and after resting for sometime we headed off to one of the islands for a night camp and bon-fire et all!
Early morning we rose with the sun and had the arguably best half an hour of our trip. Sitting silently on the shore of a water body watching the sun rise in all its splendor, disturbing early morning mist and clearing the clouds is one experience worth having a 1000 times. Then we rowed back to the mainland and after a great breakfast of poori-sabji we were all ready for the trek up the nearby hill. We walked the trail of 1.5 kms that lead us to the hill top from where we could see the winding river and all the islands sprayed around and also the dam at a distance.
All was not yet over and we once again forayed into the river and this time as pairs in canoes. We had to put to practice what we learnt about rowing and each pair rowed to a distant island from the mainland and back. I would say it gave a sense of self-worth. Though we did not want to leave the place we already had a train waiting for us back to Bangalore. So we left with a heavy heart but a heady experience from Honnemarudu to Jog falls before taking our train back home.
