Kumara-parvatha trek

Saturday, December 27, 2008 5 Comments »
I am back from an amazing weekend trek (Dec 20-21) to Kumara parvatha. Kumara parvatha is on the border between Dakshina kannada and Kodagu districts, standing 1712 meters above sea level (also known as Pushpagiri). It is a well-known trekking spot and every serious trekker from South India aspires to scale its heights. We ascended from the Somwarpet side on saturday, stayed overnight on top of KP and descended the following day from the Kukke side (13 km of a heck of a descent that almost ripped my legs off ;-). Overall, it was an unforgettable and an exhilarating experience. The beauty of the Western ghat ranges is just beyond words. Though I wanted to blog about this trek, my friend and a fellow trekker Srikanth has already taken care of it. Click here to read his post.

Here is a photo chronology of this incredible adventure (Click the pics to see enlarged versions):


The gang of 10: From left - Shreyas, Shreyas-2, Karthik, Goutham, Avinash, Rajesh, Srikanth, Balu, Kiran and photographer Srivatsan. This is on way to the Malalli falls at around 7:00 in the morning on Saturday.


Malalli falls as seen from the bottom. We had bath here and did quite a bit of (mis)adventure.


At Ponappa's house. This is after we got back from the falls, had breakfast and now ready to leave for the trek.


Near the check post. We walked 5 km here from Ponappa's house and we were exhausted even before we started trekking!


The hanging bridge just after the checkpost. We filled all our water bottles in the stream below.


Finally, we started on our way to scale the mighty Kumara parvatha.


View from the spot known as "view point" midway in our trek.


One of the three steep 60 degree inclined rocks we climbed.




We reached the top at around 4 in the evening and started building our nests!



The campfire we lit. Wasn't that powerful but did sustain us until 8:30 by which time we decided to sleep.


Around 6:00 in the morning. Sunrise as viewed from the top of KP. An awe inspiring sight.


Sunday morning: we started descending from the Kukke side. You can see the foot-path in the background disappear beyond the mountain.


At Bhattra mane. We had lunch here. I liked the simple foods and especially the butter milk.


After a grueling 13 km hike down, we reached Kukke!




The Kukke Subhramanya temple.

Movies I watched recently

Tuesday, December 09, 2008 4 Comments »
To start with, I am not a movie buff. Not very long ago, I used to watch even a hyped up movie only when it hit the TV screens a year or so after its release - that was if I coincidentally switched on the TV at the right time and was in a mood to watch ;-) But somehow, in the past few months things have changed dramatically - I am usually ending up watching a lot of new Bollywood movies pretty soon after their releases - mostly in theaters/multiplexes with my friends - sometimes as part of treats and sometimes just to subjugate boredom. The purpose of this post is not to give a review but to give a snippet of my opinion about these movies. I will try my best to keep it very short and to the point.

Dostana - A gay comedy movie where John Abraham and Abhishek Bachchan are not exactly gay but circumstances make them act that way. Most of the movie is rib tickling comedy with gay jokes and comedy-wrapped sentimental scenes. All in all, good movie to watch for some fun and entertainment.

1920 - A horror movie directed by Vikram Bhatt. A girl possessed by the ghost of her pichle janm ka ashish gets exorcised with Hanuman chalisa in the end. The plot, the story line, the screenplay were pretty intriguing. And most fascinating for me was Adah Sharma's antics as the possessed girl - quite scary stuff. I definitely recommend watching this one.

Yuvvraaj - Music was too good - it was from A R Rehman after all. Everything else was far below average. Story was very mediocre. I cannot even comprehend what was the point of such a story, so I won't even begin to talk about it. Location was very cinematic - somewhere in Austria. All in all, a pretty lame story line with some solid music and songs but still not a worthy entertainer.

Dasvidaniya - Here the lead actor, after coming to know about his apparently incurable stomach cancer, goes on to fulfill his dreams - buying new car, foreign trip, saying I love you to a childhood crush (who is now having 2 kids), etc. Nice movie to watch. Very good direction. Sentiments tied up in a manner that doesn't make you cry but subtly makes you feel the pain of the guy about to die.

Oye lucky, lucky Oye! - A movie about a thief who, since childhood does nothing but rob other people's stuff. Badly written story line, bad direction, lack of any intellectual or sentimental content that can keep you interested - I can go on. Overall the movie was quite stupid and I don't recommend it.
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