A day visit to Bheemehswari

It was Friday morning and obviously the only thing that kept ticking in mind was plan for the weekend.  I kept pondering over the nearest places to go and the hands of my mind clock stopped  at Bheemeshwari. I had been to that place almost two years back with a couple of friends. Had  a fun filled time over there. Bheemeshwari is famous for its nature camp. It is located on the banks of river Cauvery. Earlier, it used be a fishing camp and quite popular among tourists for catching an unusual specimen of fishes.  However, later the fishing was stopped by the Government and from then onwards it had only outdoor activities to offer like trekking, zipping, motor biking, safari, kayaking, coracle ride etc.

The heat had taken its toll in the city and the temperature hovered around 34 to 37 degree Celsius. Despite the above fact, I wished to go to the nature camp as it was 100 kms from the city and the drive was generally good to the place. I immediately messaged my friend and asked him if he would like to go along and he replied in the affirmative. I grew excited and checked out the website for details. I started recalling about the last time I went to that place and memories started flooding back to mind. We decided to start early on Saturday and aimed to be back home in the evening.

I had pre agreed with my friend that he would give me a wakeup call at 6 AM. However, the arrival of my cook at 6 in the morning sufficed the purpose. Called up my friend who responded with a heavy “Hello” (seems my call woke him up). He said he would pick me up by 7.30. I got ready and was on time. We hit the roads by 8. Fresh, happy and excited to start off the journey.

It took us two hours to leave the hustling bustling crowd of the city. Leaving early helped us beat the traffic. We had to go via Kanakpura road to reach the place. The last night I had downloaded my favourite tracks so that we could listen to them while we drove. We plugged in the phone and started enjoying the music. Music is such an important part of our lives. Whoever invented music was a genius. It makes the whole journey lively, enjoyable and magical.

While crossing the city, my eyes fell on a billboard in which a model was advertising fast track watch and to my amazement, it was the same watch I bought 4 months back. I was filled with joy and pride to think that the brand I chose was now advertised.

Our conversation drew to the honking of vehicles and we were contemplating the fact that people in India are losing the patience and this leads to accidents.  It seemed my friend had not slept well at night and I was a bit worried since he had to drive the whole distance himself and I would not be able to contribute to it. We went on. I put on the navigation and after we crossed the city we grew hungry and wanted to stop by to have breakfast. We passed by a famous restaurant called A2B and on seeing huge number of cars parked outside, we decided to skip it and venture ahead. We had to take a left turn after passing Innovative Film City and the roads led us to a village type area and we thought we would not find any restaurants on the way except for small kirana shops. We spotted a lady selling coconut water and stopped to have some. We asked her the route towards Bheemeshwari and if she knew any restaurants that might fall on the way. She showed us the way but was not hopeful of any places to eat. We went ahead and halted to have bananas, biscuits and chocolates. We both admitted to the fact bananas contained abundant calories and so important to have it before work out (since, we both are gyming).

Our appetite was satisfied for some time. After we went few kilometres ahead, I asked my friend if I could drive for some distance and he let me. I was happy and anxious too as I was driving after a gap of six months. Since the roads were better, it gave me the confidence to drive. I started off and just when there was a turn, I could not balance the car and started jerking off. It scared the shit out of my friend and thus, I decided to go slow. I could actually see the expression on his face, he sat upright and not at ease while I drove. I giggled inside. Just when I saw in the front mirror few cars coming behind us , I decided to hand over the driving back to my friend. I felt we got a second life. The moment I stopped, a person riding a bike behind us also stopped and one of the cylinders that he was carrying fell down. I felt guilty about it. Anyways, I did not hit anyone. That’s the best part. My friend gave me few tips on driving which was quite helpful.

We had to pass through a check post just before the forest started. My friend got down and wrote the details of the car in the register maintained at the check post. We saw group of eight guys riding  two –wheelers stop at the gate. We were surprised to see that on this fiery afternoon, they were riding in the open. On the contrary, we could not switch off the AC in the car even for a second. We saw monkeys on our way and fed them bananas. They were so close to our car windows that we could not keep it open for more than a second after throwing off the bananas.

The drive from the checkpost to the camp was through a rough patch of road. There were stones lying everywhere on the road. On both sides, we saw huge rocky mountains, the forest looked dried up in this summer. The trees had shed off leaves and only branches could be seen. We drove at a very slow pace and saw smoke billowing out from the forest. We also noticed dark ashes which indicated there had been a fire. We thought if there had been a forest fire and how the wild animals survived it. It saddened me to think of the animals how they managed to keep themselves cool in this heat. We moved ahead and saw a lush green tree amongst a bunch of dried ones. It made me think how this particular tree managed to stay green when all have dried up. It is like staying strong in times of adversity and not succumbing to circumstances. Strength builds over a period of time and the deeper the roots are the strong one gets.

We decided to click few pictures on our way. The outside temperature was rising up and we could feel the heat even with the AC switched on inside the car. It seemed we already passed the Jungle lodge resort and went ahead. We failed to see the board on our left. We asked few passers-by who showed us the way back. We finally reached the camp and went inside. We were disappointed to learn that the day outing had been cancelled since December and it was only the night stay that was allowed for which booking had to be made in advance. We tried to convince the officer to let us do few activities and we would pay for the same. But he was adamant. We went 100 yards after the camp to check into the forest department camp if they would let us in. They too had nothing to offer us. We asked the military guy if he knew any restaurants nearby where we could eat lunch. He told us to go near Shivasumadram around 35 kms from this place. We went in the car and headed back to Bangalore.

We were happy that we enjoyed the drive. Just when we drove a few metres ahead, we could hear some strange noise coming out from the car. It would go off and then start again. We could not make out the source of the sound and decided to pull over. My friend got down and started to do few checks. Even he had no clue as to from where it was emerging. Our phones did not have network to call a mechanic. We stood under the tree and waited. We saw few cops pass by on bikes and we asked them if they knew any mechanic who could help us. They told us to take help from the cops coming in the jeep behind them. Just then we saw a blue accent car stop few metres ahead of us and four men came down from the car and they were carrying bags containing puffed rice, biscuits to feed the monkeys. All of a sudden thousands of monkeys came running towards them and began eating food. It was a mesmerising sight to see them munch every bite of the food. It resembled the way humans ate. There were monkey moms who had their new born babies clung tightly to their bellies. Those babies looked super cute. I fed them too. I had never watched them eat standing so close to them before. I enjoyed every bit of it.

Those men tried to help us by calling the mechanic they knew. Sadly, they could not find any body specific to our car and told us to drive for 20 kms further where we might find one. We were in a dilemma to go ahead or not because the moment we started the car, the sound would persistently blurt out. We slowly moved ahead. We switched off the AC too. Just when I just took the AUX cable out of my phone and phew, the sound stopped. Alas! there was no sound for a while and longer. We laughed so much upon realizing that it was the cable which was making the noise and there was nothing wrong with the car. We had a sigh of relief and did a high –five. We were so glad about it. Our hunger came back to haunt us. We squandered for some time and spotted a family restaurant on our way. We decided to give it a try. We parked the car outside and went in. The place looked peaceful and calm. We sat outside beneath the shelter of a tree and placed our order.

It was a young boy who came and took our order. He looked to be between 9 to 12 years of age. I felt pity that a boy of his age was working so hard when he was supposed to study. We tipped him before leaving.

We headed back to pavilion. On our way we stopped at a restaurant to have chai. It was a great chai indeed and we ended up having two cups of it. 

We reached Bangalore by 8 PM amidst city traffic. It was a fun-filled day and an awesome drive. The whole journey was brimmed with laughter, jokes, serious thoughts at times. The trip would be etched in my memory forever.

J