Din of the Cicadas

kanoor

a small write-up about one of my treks... but couldn't go on to complete it.

A Monsoon trek through the Sharavathy Valley Wildlife Sanctuary.
(few pictures)
Our circadian rhythms seemed to awaken our senses as we got restless with the smell of the approaching Indian monsoons. We knew it was time to go on that trek. Days of putting together of information of benevolent trekkers who shared their escapades over the internet was of very little help. Not many people could even sketch out a rough route to the abandoned fort of Kanoor, presumably deep in the jungles of the Sharavathy valley. Nevertheless we were ready to go, fuelled by the promise of walks through verdant foliage, of sweet rain mingling with our sweat and of making the pretty tiled roofs in Malnad our home for a few days.
So armed with only the names of a few places and a concocted route we landed at Sagara bus stop at 6 am on a misty morning. I had been here in this town more than a few times but watching the dark hours of a morning chugging slowly into a busy day is such a fascination. The newspaper guys are the first to claim the bus stand. Newspapers brought from Shimoga in carefully labeled bundles are unpacked for their final destination. The supplements are tucked into the main papers and so is the occasional pamphlet announcing a new restaurant in this little town. The baker arrives a little later with his young daughter and an umbrella. While he mechanically goes about prodding the show-case a little into the open, sprucing up the unsold cakes and exchanging pleasantries with his neighbors, his daughter gets busy sweeping their part of the bus stand. The woman selling strings of wild jasmines and champa takes her customary corner. The Udupi restaurateur finally gives orders to open the half pulled down shutter. As the light of the sodium finally goes off, the cacophony of the neatly dressed bus conductors becomes prominent.
Our conductor arrives at 7 30 am. He promises to put us down at Hosagadde in another hour and a half. As soon as we reach Hosagadde, a little bus stop, rain drenched and red-oxide floored threw a dejavu as we reminisced about similar looking ones at the beginning of a lot other treks. It was a perfect place to rearrange baggage, get the cameras out, feel comfortable in a pair of shorts and generally prepare ourselves for a new and exciting journey that none of us had experienced before. A shop-keeper next to the bus stop confirmed that this indeed was the route to Dabbe falls, our destination for the first day.
A rough path took us peacefully for sometime before it got murkier. We stopped. A cowherd thankfully directed us back on track but it wasn’t easy. We passed through many a farm jumping over fences, crossing bridges of slippery areca trunks, navigating check-dams overflowing with water. Gowdru mane was finally in sight at around 2 in the afternoon. It had started to pour heavily as we struggled to establish our identity behind our suspicious looking rain coats. I was an absolute alien in my borrowed blue rain coat. Once the dogs were the silenced, the masters quickly engaged us in a Q&A session. They invited us inside, for warmth and a place to keep our rug sacks. An even warmer conversation over a straw mat put us completely at ease.
Dabbe falls was not even close to what we had imagined it to be. It looked like a long silvery thread cut in pieces bisecting the thick evergreens of the valley. Worst still, it was absolutely unapproachable being on the other side of the valley we were on. So all we could do was to precariously descend down for a little distance before we managed to get a satisfying view of the falls and some photographs. Getting down itself was an adventure since the descent was steep, no sign of a path and plenty of leeches. We finally ended our attempts in search of better views and made our way back to Gowdru mane.
The Gowdru, it seemed, was however apprehensive about our plan to spend the night at his place. He definitely wasn’t in favor of our stay under his roof. Our plan for the night obviously had to be altered. Disappointment and confusion set in as we pondered about our next move. We had lost considerable time already exploring around the water fall, taking Gowdru mane for granted as our halt for the night. A quick conversation with the people revealed our possible destination to be a school, Shaale mane.
After getting off track plenty of times, we finally reached the home of Neel Kumar just as the night was making its appearance. His home was perfect (like all the homes in Malnad are!). His genuine friendliness was contagious and we sat down in his verandah to talk about life in cities and the price of coffee.
‘How big is Bengaluru?’ he asked. I said quite big, it takes an hour to travel from one end to the other. His wife carried a small oil lamp to join our conversation. ‘You know, we are getting electricity to our village’, she gleefully said, ‘all the villagers are pitching in to help the workers in getting the lamp posts erected’. I looked at her. Her smile was no less innocent from a child’s and I loved the fact that she is so delighted with the idea of getting a lamp in her home. The verandah went silent for some time as I looked at the hills fading into darkness, the soft light reflecting from their wrinkled faces, listened to the sound of a nightjar, the trickle of rain from the tile above, caught the scent of wild jasmine and the felt the coolness of clear crisp air silently settling amidst us. My destination was reached, I thought. This is exactly why I wanted to be here, to be among things that let my senses feel a slice of pure bliss, to talk to people who believe happiness can only be a state of mind, to wonder like a child at matters that intrigue our innocent minds.