This trip was one hell of an experience, the only trip that saw success after facing many obstacles. The same group of friends who hit the roads to Chikkamagalur this Monsoon decided to end the year in Kerala Backwaters, but with the weather, we saw in South India this winter with continuous rains and floods all over we decided to stick near to hometown and make a short trip rather than hectic one. One side I had just recovered from Dengue and my stamina being at its worst another side with a lot of work pressure over the last one year I really needed a break from everything.
Preparations started exactly a month ahead, Zoom car Booking was checked, our Rooms at the resort was booked all that remained was to hit the roads. But then came the Biggest surprise just 2 days before when we received a notification that Zoom car booking has been canceled due to some confusions at their backend. After a lot of discussion and arguments and it being the season for vacation for Zoom car we finally were offered for Scorpio, but that doesn’t substitute an XUV right! This created a mess in the zoom car office, and we were eventually proposed to pick our car from Shopper’s stop near Gopalan Mall on Friday night.
To our Surprise, there was no zoom car pickup point there which led us to travel another 7 km to JP Nagar some phase Near Brigade Millennium. The trip was to start at 10 PM, and we still didn’t have a car at 10:30 PM. Finally, it was 11:45 by the time we started from Bangalore to Masinagudi which is across the Bandipur Forest Reserve.
Our first Pitstop was at Rasta Cafe – it was on my Wishlist for a long, long time and I finally checked it off the list. We reached Rasta around 1:30 Am and were there for an hour or so.
With me on the front seat being the DJ and mixing songs and the empty roads everything was just perfect. We drove a little slow to avoid the wait near Bandipur check post, the event then we reached Masingudi by 6:20 and the view around was just excellent.
We Stayed in Bear Mountain Jungle Resort which is located right next to the mountain, and the Deers were roaming just around the room, and we had a real time around. There is a stream near the Resort where you can spend some time playing in the water and in summer you can plan for stream bath, but during this period of time water was just freezing cold. The stay was just fantastic completely relaxed without any tension or contact with the external world. We had BonFire and loads of play time, played sang danced and relaxed. Made the best memories as the year is coming to an end.
We left from Masinagudi on Sunday noon and had plans in Mysore to visit one of my friend’s place for lunch, followed by Mysore KRS Backwaters, we were able to catch the sunset at backwaters and reached Bangalore around 11 PM. Overall it was the most relaxing and Best trip of this year which got us all closer and gelled us even more!
C. A. Stubborn Pen 