Into the mists

The weekend of June 9-10, I travelled to Kodaicanal, one of South India's famous hill stations. The route we covered climbed from sea level to over 6700 feet. It felt almost like home. Many of the plant species looked familiar, but even those were somewhat different from the varieties I see in my familiar surroundings. The only one that didn't appear to have changed was the Century plant with its tall flower stalk and I was unable to capture any of them with my camera.

We arrived in "Kodai" via a night bus which was aptly designated a "Semi-Sleeper", as while the driver and a few of the passengers appeared to be in a nightmare, the rest of us were just along for the ride. The first half hour was great and relaxing, after that, the rest of the passengers boarded the bus and there was no room to breathe, much less sleep... but it got us there in time for a gorgeous sunrise and plenty of time to walk around town, have breakfast, find our hotel and our comrades before setting out on our rainforest trek.

Some interesting signs, an observatory that didn't allow visitors and several wedding parties who appeared to have been partying since the previous day... Kodaicanal is not a dry county...

The rainforest adventure took us into the hills courtesy of our guide Vijay, who has been living in the area for over 20 years and is imminently qualified to educate folks about the local environment, especially certain indigenous plants. David, this is for you: he reminded me uncannily of you. Whether it was body language, his smile or his apparently intimate knowledge of certain indigenous plants, I'm not sure, but the resemblance was definitely there.

We hiked up to a good vantage point in the Shola forest to look down at the mists rising up from the valley, saw tree ferns, calla lilies, wild golden raspberries, wild strawberries, datura, brugmansia, yellow sundrops, jack in the pulpit, lantana, and many other flowering plants, along with waterfalls, dense rainforest growth and lots of litter. I was truly wishing I had brought a trash bag with me so I could pick up trash like I did at Periyar... actually, it wasn't quite as bad, but it is disconcerting to have someone telling you how hard the officials are working at preserving the rainforest while at the same time hopping over a stream in which resides a used disposable diaper...

That said, we did see a lot of beautiful landscape. After lunch, during which I posed for my official International Knitting in Public Day photo, we had the obligatory shopping tour, finding among our treasures, the Eco Nut health food store, which just happened to be in the same building as our hotel and featured the first whole grain bread I have seen since arriving in India. They also provided me with some lovely homemade blueberry jam which I have been enjoying ever since. Another find was the Grandma's Jackfruit preserves, which I will share with any takers upon my return. The hardware store provided me with the 2 items I have been needing to make my room at the hospital complete: an extension cord (only one outlet) and a water heating coil for heating my porridge and tea water in the morning.

The lovely hot (yes) shower (that came out of a showerhead up on the wall!!!) was a welcome welcome to our cozy little hotel room. The ladies who stayed at the other hotel and described their accommodations aptly as a shed reported very cold temperatures overnight, but we were quite snug at J's after a lovely dinner at the Cloud Street Inn ( background of the knitting shot) I'm not advertising them, just want to make sure I remember if I ever get to go back... We were so spoiled by the food that we ate 2 more meals there.

The next morning I was surprised to hear a different sort of street noise from what I am used to hearing in Tirunelveli. No blaring temple music, no honking of horns and bicycle bells, but voices and the sound of carts being wheeled along the bumpy streets. The Sunday market! I had to go explore! I even put my camera on the "cuisine" setting when I saw all the great veggies and spices, fish and implements that were on offer! Those purple pointy things are banana flowers and the dangerous implements are tools for extracting coconut flesh from the shells. That big purple and white thing is me and my butt...

Next on the itinerary was the obligatory Kodai bike ride around the lake next to Bryant's Park. We rented them for 10 Rs per hour (25cents) and took off. Of course, the lake turned out to have a much longer perimeter than it appeared, due to the meandering nature of its "arms", but we made it past the shop stalls, lotuses, honeymooners and even all the volunteers who offered to take our pictures in just under 2 hours.

We even ran into the little old guy with his puppy whom I had been trying to catch in town! I bribed him for a good shot of him with his friend.

Then, suddenly, it was time to leave. The guys at the hotel were sweet and let us wash up after our bike ride and after having checked out! And just in time, too, because as our bus was arriving, it began to pour! We chugged back down the mountain past idyllic views and signs exhorting us to avoid plastic things. I'm sure that's good advice.

Until next time then...

June 2 post continues...

The canoe builders were hard at work, as I mentioned... We returned to the boat and had dinner, a swim and tied up at the shore for the night. It rained hard, which it is prone to doing during monsoon season, but brought a beautiful rainbow for the sunrise.

We got reacquainted with Maya, a little girl who introduced herself the previous evening and her friend in the yellow dress whose name I didn't catch.

Since no houseboat trip would be complete without a stint at the helm, Alison and I took turns driving, then a bridge was coming up so my fun got cut short... We were mooned by the Goddess of Light ( no, really) as we tooled back down the river. Our day of houseboat living was at an end and we were headed back to life and work as we currently know it.

Next installment will be our outing to Kodaicanal, which already happened, with a trek into a South Indian old growth evergreen rainforest, but that will have to wait until at least tomorrow.

Stay tuned!

I woke up Saturday morning , June 2, to a lovely quiet scene: the moon setting over the lake with houseboats on the opposite shore. I sat there on the hotel balcony taking pictures and working on Zhoie's sweater ( finished the body) and enjoyed the quiet.

The next picture after that one is the last half of a mongoose(left side of the picture) out hunting his breakfast.

I saw some fishermen setting out in a canoe.

After breakfast, we set out for the houseboat that would take us on the backwater tour for the next 24 hours. Aboard the boat, we passed under bridges where trains were crossing the river.

We were an endless source of amusement to local people, especially children. We saw another houseboat that actually looked like a floating house. The fellows on the boat must have spent all of their time preparing food for us because there certainly was a lot of it and my was it tasty, especially washed down with all of that good tea and coffee and even a beer on Saturday evening!

We floated past some tranquil looking islands, some with tiny cottages built on them!

Next, the happy campers (houseboaters) went canoeing up some tiny backwaters to do some exploring.

We met a nice lady whose family builds canoes, which sell for the equivalent cost of a motorcycle here and are much more durable and cheap to run...