All in Alibaug....

3rd December, 2011.... I am on my way to discovering the outskirts of Maharashtra with Kulasekaran, the official photographer and dear friend and 'chuddy buddy' Sandeep ..... we start at about 5.30am.... take our first halt at Birla mandir where photography is prohibited..... and drive all the way to ford Zanzeer at murud..... on our way we are forced to stop at the breathtaking view of the fort from the top.... and the mud red mountains surrounding it......

Myself in the car on the way to Zanzeer

The view of the fort from a distance

A different perspective

The hills at the back drop

And after reaching the destination we leave our car behind and set on our way to the Zanzeer fort on a sailing boat powered by wind...... We were accompanied by a bunch of unruly school kids and hell...I felt like the teenage days were back....

While on the shore the camera could not stop clicking

The overview of the fort from the sailing boat

The sail captured up close

A monochrome shot of a sailing boat

On reaching we  get access to the age old history of the Moguls through the entrance of the fort and what awaits us is the 'meetha pani ka talab'..(the lake of sweet water).... We chuck the idea of taking a guide and set off to create our own history....:)

The historic rubble....

The meetha talab

A different perspective

No not love birds but love flowers yeah....

The overlooking hills

Lost in nature

 As we discover the 22 acres spread ford we fall in love with the architecture...... the cannons, the parabola shaped windows, the broad doorways.... each and every  minute details fascinate us...... We get in sync with the archival atmosphere... but completely loathe the weekend crowd......

And Mumbai never fails to cast the Bollywood spell...:)

Parabola window

From our way to Alibaug from Zanzeer fort the 'kalakaar' in Kulasekaran spotted the hoards of birds in the shores which looked like speckles of white dots.....'Akshi' beach was our next halt..... the water was sparkling blue.... and the birds were a starling white...and a brown horse made my day......

 And finally we reach Alibaug..... before hitting the beach we take a full packed Chinese lunch...... and then for proper digestion we do all kinda exercises..:D.... row row row your boat.....

That's Sandeep trying out some thing innovative....

And the jet skiing..... loved it..... thanks to Kulasekaran and Sandeep to pursue me on.... it was an experience altogether....

Kulasekaran in excited state...

And Kulasekaran in ground state.....

And the final destination of the trip.....Kashid beach....the sea here took away the witness of my ups and downs for the past ten years....ven the stigmas of your mind is gone you feel light, u feel free... and so they state it correctly.....the sea takes away but gives away something in return.....the sea here took away the lie I have been believing all these years..... but gave me freedom... gave me the strength to fight away shackled thoughts.... we had great time in the water..... 

And then all drenched we get into our car and start back to IIT... on our way we stop at a road side hotel and have tea.... and by 10.30 pm we are back to our so-called-home... the exotica of 3.12.2011 is over literally but will be afresh in mah mind forever.... 

At the "Edge".....

Mr. "Lonely"

"Cross"  roads.....

Captive

Hulla-baloo in Hogenakkal

09.09.2012..... I plan a trip to Hogenakkal falls to Tamil Nadu and my faithful travel partners Debanjan, Abhisek and the latest addition to our small travel team Joydeep (Joga), an enthusiast in his own terms, choose to go by the plan. And my plans never fail.... They don't .... No matter what, I manage to come out unscratched.... A meticulous planner, you must think..... But I am just as erratic .... On the very day, we reach Majestic at 9.00 am and start haggling over the rate of car.... This time we were joined by Mayuk, Abhisek's friend, and thus the total head-count was five. Hence, an Indica was not enough and consequently we had to scourge for bigger cars and the negotiation was naturally more time-consuming. After commendable hard-work we settled for a Xylo which literally burnt  unfathomable crevices in our pockets. Each of us had to part with a luxurious thousand and a hundred (including seven hundred and fifty (750) bucks they take for cars to cross the Karnataka Tamil Nadu border (small cars have to pay around five hundred) and numerous toll taxes and parking fee). After almost four hours ride we reach our destination. And Coracles await us with their seemingly patient facades (A Coracle ride will cost you another grand thousand).

Well I am not an agony aunt giving out solutions to all your myriad problems and neither am I some Baba with magical powers to suck away your unhappiness..... 

The sole purpose of my blog is to share with you my knowledge of certain things that I feel I know and in the process I may have answers to some of your queries and you may indeed feel blissful reading something or the other..... 

Rummage through my Travel diary to find useful information about some place that you may like to visit over the next weekend ( Of course it goes without saying that I need to have traveled that place before you plan to visit it....)

In Cookbook, you will find some of the recipes I love to rustle up..... And it may happen that it titillates your taste-bud and you may actually want to try it all by yourself....

In Mirror you will literally find my reflection..... It will contain things I love to think and things I don't bother about..... How my mind reacts to a situation and how I overcome thoughts that clog my mind.... hope someone finds a solution through my thought process.......

In the Kodachrome shop, you can find multitude of photographs that I have clicked.... I am not a professional lens man and neither do I have some fancy camera..... I just love to click and capture moments and I think that is good enough reason to call myself a photographer.....

In Thesaurus,you will find honest reviews of books that I have read.

In About me of course you know what to expect.... 

Happy blogging.....

Cheers to Life......

Abstraction



United we "fall" .......



The top seems to be my favourite destination....

One day trip to Savandurga......

There was some random e-mail in my inbox from some website featuring flash deals regarding a conducted tour to a place called Savandurga, Asia's largest monolithic hill..... Largest, tallest, fattest and fastest.... These superlatives always have a deep impact on my mind.... And immediately I decided to visit the place.... I told Debanjan regarding the plan and my ever ready travelling partner gave me the responsibility to plan the entire trip.... I informed Joydeep, my friend form my undergraduate days, who currently lives in Bangalore, and he too answered in affirmative.... And I jumped on the task in hand..... Initially we planned to go by car but our budget was so tight that the car seemed to be a distant dream.... And immediately I looked for the bus routes... And to my surprise there were numerous buses plying from Majestic to the destination..... I noted down the bus numbers... And we were all geared up for an eventful climb to the top... Myself, Debanjan, Joydeep, and Jayanta, a friend from Bangalore......

The way to the top......

I and my friends Debanjan and Abishek made an unplanned trip to Chikkamagalur district of Karnataka over this weekend (28-29 April, 2012). On 26th night we made bus reservations from Bangalore to Chikkamagalur through K.S.R.T.C. website. Though we got Volvo tickets to our journey back to Bangalore on the 29th night ( though it may be called 30th morning as our boarding time was 12am), we did not get tickets under Premium service class on our way forward on 27th night and thus we were prepared for " A bumpy ride" as Enrique would love to say (or rather sing :P). I prepared some curry for dinner and planned to buy parathas from some roadside hotel but my "bhukkar" (glutton for all those who are not familiar with this colloquial term) friends did not find the curries enough when we finally met over dinner at our pick-up point, Kempegowda bus stand popularly known as Majestic. As a result we planted ourselves inside a nearby restaurant for a grand dinner.