WATEHALLI WEEKEND VISIT

This blog post contains my impressions of a weekend visit to Watehalli Home Stay, near Sakleshpur. My wife and I spent the weekend from 04-Feb-2017 to 06-Feb-2017 at the home stay.

NOTE: As is my practice, I have avoided using names. The photographs here do not have people in them. The photographs with people are available in the album shared separately. If you wish to view the photos, do let me know via email. I will provide the link.

We set off in the morning by bus. The Airavat Club class bus was comfortable. The fare came to Rs. 1100 and I regretted having to give away the only two Rs. 500 notes that I had. When the bus stopped for a coffee break, I paid using a Rs. 2000 note. Thankfully, I got the change. The movie "MS Dhoni: The untold story" kept us engaged during the journey. It seemed to be a decent movie. We must have seen most of it by the time we reached Sakleshpur at 12:30. I had requested the home stay owner to provide a pick up. The vehicle arrived a couple of minutes later. The driver was well informed about the current events and knew his weather-beaten van well.

It took him about half an hour to drop us at Watehalli Home Stay. The owner, the lady of the house, welcomed us at the door step. Her courtesy during our stay there made us feel privileged. The room we stayed in overlooked tall silver oak trees, which provide shade to the coffee shrubs. The owner informed us that they owned more than 80 acres in which they grew mostly coffee and pepper.

This was the view from the balcony of our room.

Lunch was a repast fit for kings ! There was delicious vegetarian fare prepared for us, including cabbage "palya", thin "neer dose", tasty rasam that made me reach for the bowl to drink more of it and also pullav. This was to be a constant feature of our 3 day stay. The meals were exceptionally tasty. We ate hot chapatis during dinner, always with tasty side dishes. The "akki rotti" prepared for breakfast on Sunday was a treat for our palates ! My wife quizzed the owner about the preparation and about the cuisine in general. We ended up buying a cast iron tawa at Sakleshpur to see if we can duplicate the thin "akki rottis" at home !

Since we had got up early, we had a nap for an hour. In the evening, a playful dog met us near the door. She was called Lisa and it seems she took an immediate affinity for my wife ! Lisa jumped on to my wife, who took it rather sportingly, to my surprise ! I had thought that my wife would be uncomfortable. We went to a pond nearby on the right and walked past it reaching another stream, which had almost dried. This walk took us barely 15 minutes. The greenery and the chirping of the birds returning home had enthused us. All around us, we saw coffee shrubs now laden with berries. One or two of the shrubs still had white coffee flowers, which were the late bloomers. We told the owner that we were game for another walk. She suggested that we could head in a perpendicular direction where we could see another small pond.

The leaves from shrubs and trees formed a cover on the ground, which crackled beneath our feet at places. This is "fall" season in Watehalli !

We reached this second pond in a few minutes' time. Lisa played the role of a guide, gambolling ahead. There was a narrow bridge of two stone slabs that looked flimsy. First, I stepped on it with some inward trepidation, hoping that the slabs would hold. They did ! My wife followed me. Soon, we found a fence marking the edge of our owner's plantation. At this point a big ant ("godda" in Kannada) bit me. I immediately removed my slippers and dusted it. This adventure made me decide that enough was enough ! So, we turned back and followed Lisa. When we came across a hump that we did not recall crossing, my wife voiced her doubt that we were on a wrong path. As we proceeded with more attention, we saw trees that looked unfamiliar. We were lost in the acres of plantation ! The light had just begin to diminish. I decided it was better to head back to the pond. Soon, we were back at the pond. There, we noticed that there were two paths approaching the pond. We had followed Lisa blindly, assuming that she would head back home. That had been our mistake ! Clearly, other attractions had distracted Lisa ! Back on the known path, we saw familiar sights, including a whitish stone and green trees which had earned our admiration earlier.

Back in the room, I discovered that the TV did not work. This turned out to be a blessing in disguise. A group of youngsters from Bihar had partied around a bonfire the previous night. My wife told me: "Enjoy the music they play. This may be the only modern entertainment we get !" She was right ! The current Hindi film music hits that the group played while partying entertained us. We spent time talking too, since there was no Wi-Fi and even the mobile network was poor. It was rather cool (almost cold) in the night. The hot rasam was welcome, during dinner !

The next day, we woke up to a colder morning. I found that I could see steam when I exhaled : that meant that the temperature may have been around 12 degrees Centigrade, if not cooler. A layer of mist hung about the tops of the tall silver oak trees, which we saw from our balcony. We went for a walk. I thought I saw smoke over the pond on the right side. When we came near, I saw that I was mistaken. It wasn't smoke : it was mist moving over the surface of the pond ! It was the first time in my life that I saw mist at ground level. We went some distance further. Since morning, the birds had made a symphony that was welcome to our ears. We could see a few of them flutter from tree top to tree top. Curiously, it appeared that the smallest among the birds were among the loudest ! The birdsong enlivened the morning. However, how prosaic the word "birdsong" sounds !

The walk was refreshing and had stimulated our appetites. We bathed and then ate a hearty breakfast. This morning, the group of youngsters in the other rooms was ready for adventure. The owner of the home stay had set up a rope bridge across two trees and other similar exercises that would appeal to adventure seekers. I watched the group take up the exercises, with smartphones capturing their bravado in videos that would be shared with friends and close ones ! Meanwhile, by this time, my wife had collected two different types of seeds and dried coffee berries that could be used as dice. We played "chowka baara" using these seeds, a game of luck (mostly) and strategy (somewhat !), similar to Ludo. My wife won the game !

After lunch, we headed for Mullayanagiri in the same van that had picked us up the day earlier. We passed Watehalli, Arehalli, Biccod, Belur and Chikmagalur. I was pleasantly surprised to see a concrete road in Arehalli ! Later, the home stay owner informed that such roads had come up in other villages around Sakleshpur also. My wife observed that the villages here looked prosperous.

What was tragic to see was the empty Belur lake and Chikmagalur lake. Our driver remarked : "In thirty years, I had never seen these two lakes dry until now." We saw earth moving equipment remove the earth from the bed of the dry lakes. The failure of the monsoon has resulted in fields being dry.

Our plan was to reach near the steps that would lead to Mullayanagiri. However, since it was Sunday and vehicular traffic was high, the police had restricted vehicles, stopping them about 1.5 to 2 k.m. from the steps. So, we could have walked along the road or climbed the hill, until the steps. The hot sun made my wife opt to rest near the parking spot. Our driver and I decided to go to the top of Mullayanagiri. He asked me whether we should walk or take the climb. I opted to take the climb upwards, to challenge myself. It says a lot for my (lack of) fitness that I was short of breath every five minutes or so during this short climb ! The slope was about 30 degrees to the horizontal, I guess. I huffed and puffed up, stopping four times during the ascent. Whenever I stopped, I looked around me. The view was scenic and as we climbed, the scenery only became more beautiful. The hills of the Western Ghats unfolded before my eyes, one behind the other. The evening sun made my feet feel the heat from the rocks of the hill, but the wind that blowed on my face was cool. It was an unusual sensation. The 200 or so steps to the summit of Mullayanagiri was also challenging. The good part was that I saw everybody struggling on the steps, including students. Clearly, fatigue was par for the course !

This is the view from the top of Mullayanagiri.

The views from Mullayanagiri make the climb worthwhile.

There is a temple on the top of Mullayanagiri, 6300 feet above sea level. After I had finished praying, the customary rest in the temple felt welcome. I thought to myself : "For travellers making an arduous pilgrimage, the few minutes of repose in the temple must have been even more welcome. This may be why sitting in the temple premises has become a custom or tradition." From the highest point in Karnataka, the many hills surrounding the peak make for a pretty sight. After spending a few minutes enjoying the view, I told the driver that I preferred to take the road back to the parking spot. We were back there soon.

We drank coffee at Siri Coffee where there is a long statue of a woman lying on her side about 40 feet long that is quite an amazing work of art. The coffee was pricey at Rs. 30, but well worth the money spent.

I digress here to recall a memory from my childhood days: when I used to come in a train from Mumbai to Bengaluru in train, I remember passing solitary homes with just one feeble incandescent bulb lighting them up. As the train sped past such homes, I wondered what sort of life the people in those houses led, in the inadequate light provided by the lonely bulb. On the way back from Mullayanagiri, I noticed a big difference compared to those times : where there were yellow incandescent bulbs everywhere then, nearly half those lights were replaced by white Compact Fluorescent Lamps (CFL) or Light Emitting Diode (LED) lamps now ! This may be due to the subsidy the government provides. To my eyes, as we headed back, this sight was the most positive development in this stretch. It is a welcome change, I feel.

On Monday morning, the birds were more silent when we got up. The morning was cloudy. "Let us go to the pond and take the road where we were lost", I suggested. My wife agreed.

As the sun slowly appeared, the fear of the unfamiliar road experienced a couple of days ago vanished ! We saw wonderful trails on the way and did reach back through one of these trails. This route was longer, but in the daylight, it was an enjoyable walk.

After breakfast, we settled our bill and headed to Sakleshpur. The town is a bustling place compared to the villages around it. Our driver took us to a shop selling coffee powder and pepper on the Bengaluru - Mangaluru road.

The shopkeeper asked us where we lived in Bengaluru. When I told him, he said he had also lived there years ago. He recalled how quieter the area was, then. He also mentioned that he supplies coffee powder to a popular restaurant in our area. I thought to myself: "Small world, but what are the chances that I meet someone who stayed near me, 150 km from where I live?!" It is such unlikely events that make life interesting !

We went to Manjarabad fort after shopping. The steps have support railings, a recent addition according to our driver. The fort has six pillars. The views from the pillars are nice.

We reached Sakleshpur bus stand and took the 12:30 bus directly headed to Bengaluru. Several days after the trip, a few memories and lessons from the trip stand out: First, do not assume that dogs can be guides automatically ! Second, a non-functional TV in a home stay is a blessing in disguise ! Third, I need to huff and puff a lot, even for small climbs ! Finally, I remember a magical morning when mist floated over the surface of a lake, even as birds twittered to welcome the dawn of a new day !