We reached the starting point of our trek after bamboo rafting across the Thekadi Lake.
Only when we reached the other side of the shore we realized we have to pace through the thick forest into its deepest interiors. We were only warned of leeches and not of Lions and Tigers. And so we had the necessary protection in terms of a pair of jute socks.
Flora, plants, vegetation, flowers, foliage, shrubbery, and undergrowth. That’s all we got to see. We could hear the hornbill throughout and sighted elephant tracks, Malabar giant squirrel, and the Nilgiri Langoor. The tree that you see in the above picture (right) is 300 years old.
The fear of having to come across the Tigers or Lions slowly disappeared as the leeches started crawling onto our feet. The focus shifted from enjoying the greenery and we were just trying to get the leeches off us most of the time. Fear setting in, half of us wanted to return while the rest wanted to continue. We decided to continue after a brief respite.
We came across lot of streams and a tree that took the shape of a king cobra. We were glad that we continued with the trek.
Finally, after about 3 hrs of walking through the jungle we returned. 3 of them had to lose a couple of ml of blood in them after leeches did their work. Despite all that, the trek had fun written all over it.
Trivia
Can you spot something unusual in the below picture ? If you can, put it in the comments
That yellowish brown thing right at the middle is a tree frog..:D We saw so many of those in honnemaradu... enna correcta??;)
ReplyDeleteNithya,
ReplyDeleteBingo... You got that right. Most people to whom we showed this pic in it's original resolution, could not figure it out !!
We were simply awestruck by the camouflaging mechanism nature had provided this little creature with.
There is another pic where one can see camouflage at it's best. Will post it sometime.
one helluva trip that must have been.. illaya? :) nice..
ReplyDeleteNijamthaan. It sure was one helluva trip Sudha
ReplyDeleteWe only wish we could have extended the trip to a couple of more days !
Wonderful description of Trip...
ReplyDeleteI never knew there was a frog like that.. Infact i still cant figure out which yellow one is the frog..
Smyta,
ReplyDeleteThanks. And yeah there is a frog there. Was quite a sight I should say. Just imagine someone being able to spot that in the vast forest. Hmmm some people really have an eye for details.
Art,
Thanks a lot !! Was quite difficult even for me initially. Now that I know where it is, it's a cake walk. U still have not spotted the frong ?
Ganga,
Honestly I did not know it was a tree frog until Nithya pointed out. Till then all I knew was that it's a frog !
Bash,
ReplyDeleteHavent forgotten that. Infact that's coming up next. After the tree frog trivia, I wanted to post the frog in bag thingy too.
That would figure in the concluding post - Independence day 3.
Btw, welcome aboard. You are the first one from the trip to comment here !
I saw the frog too but nice shot :)
ReplyDelete