Tresured Memories of Vaalparai
The most awaited one was my trip to Vaalparai. Not only because of the beauty of the place, but also because of the fact that it was long since I went out of Chennai for a tour. I had explored in the net about all the details of the places of visit in Vaalparai on the previous night. I went for the trip with my friend and her project mates. We were 20 of us including the van driver who joined us in Thirupur.
We reached Thirupur via Coimbatore Express at 6.15 in the morning. It was a bright morning with sun casting his rays through a less cloudy sky to show his arrival. One of our friends had arranged for tea and biscuits as energizer. It was refreshing as we were very tired after a less-sleep train journey. From there we had arranged for a van to reach Vaalparai via Pollachi. Thirupur to Pollachi was around 65Kms. Pollachi to Vaalparai was 64Kms round the hill. On the whole we set our journey to Vaalparai through an exciting road trip.
The van had stereo system and a TV to engage ourselves for the journey. Guys were as usual over-enthusiastic and were dancing for the latest fast numbers in Tamil like “Nakka Mukka” and few English songs like “Who let the dogs out…” It brought out huge smiles on everyone’s face. Since there was little space for all the guys to dance, they took turns and engaged us with their funny dancing steps. It was a full 2 and half hour entertainment and we all had exhausted the energy that we gained in the morning.
We reached Pollachi at around 9.00 A.M. and were already hungry. After filling our stomach with idlis and pongal we started our trip up the hill. It is advised either to eat something non-oily to your full-stomach or to not eat at all, on an uphill or downhill journey to avoid nausea. We bought few ‘Pulippu Mittai’ and lemon, for you know what! It was not a continuous journey to Vaalparai as we had plans to halt at 2 places. First one was Aliyar park.
When we entered it, I felt that it was like the usual parks. But its specialty was that, at the back side, there was a huge dam. After taking different shots of us at various places in the park, we climbed around 40 to 50 steps to reach the top to find a huge dam at the back. We decided to make use of our cameras to its fullest in the whole trip, so each of us took a minimum of 10 pics at this place itself. We gave different poses and the most remembered one for all of us was the pose given by two of our friends. They were standing in one leg with the other bent, like a ‘Rishi doing thavam’ on either side of the wall which was very high. I got really scared, as, if they had slipped their balance, they would directly fall into the huge dam. Once they got down, I thought to myself that these would be the craziest things they would remember doing on this trip and smiled to myself.
Our next place of halt was monkey falls. This was the one of the loveliest experience for me in this whole trip. I and my friend decided not to take bath in the falls as we had cold. We decided to just wet our legs and hands in the falls. The best moments in every human’s life would be the ones when they connected themselves with the nature. I saw the falls and I remembered the song “Chinna China Aasai” of the movie Roja. I closed my eyes and showed my hands in the water slowly. It was damn cold. The force along with the chillness made me to take my hands back immediately. It gave me a slight shock. But it was a lovely experience. I couldn’t resist myself not entering into the falls. I could see the same expression on my friend’s face. So we both decided to take bath no matter what. We pulled in 2 more girls who too were a little reluctant to enter. We four friends enjoyed under nature’s one of the loveliest creation. After 45 mins of our journey to heaven, we came out of the water and, I and my friend changed our wet clothes. We decided to dry ourselves under the hot sun and sat on the rocks for sometime. The warmth that the sun gave was perfect. It made us doze-off few minutes on the nearby rocks. We all noticed that the guys had climbed almost the top of the hill from where the falls originated. I told my friend “Now I know why this is called monkey falls” and we both laughed. Before we entered the van, a real naughty monkey took the chips packet from one of the guys’ hand and went up the tree. It was one the amusing experience we had there.
After having lovely time in the falls, we went back to the van to start our journey to the Anamalai mountain range’s top – Vaalparai. I loaded my mp3 player with Ilayaraja’s hits as those were the best to be listened on a journey to such a place. I slept off listening to the songs. At around 2.30P.M., we reached Vaalparai and the van stopped for few minutes and then it followed a bike in which the manager and our friend who arranged for the trip were riding. It was then that I woke up and saw the beauty of Vaalparai. I started feeling a little cold as my friend sun, which travelled with us till the falls, hid behind the clouds. I wore my sweater and looked around in the van. Many of them were in deep sleep. Our van was rounding the bends. My eyes were filled with green color and the pleasant smell of tea made me take deep breaths. I had a little head-ache and wanted to drink some tea. My friend too woke up after her quick nap. We both were really tired and our eyes were red. One of the guys said we would be reaching the house in few minutes and that lunch was waiting there, for us to be consumed, at the house in which we stayed.
Here I should mention about the house in which we stayed. It was a typical house at hill stations that we would see in movies. I loved it at the very sight of it. We were told that it was built in 1920 and still remained strong as it was, during the time of built. It had 5 huge rooms and a big sit-out. It had all the things that a normal house needed including TV and set-top box. The first thing I noticed was that, the house had no fans, but had a fireplace in each of the rooms. Then I realized how cold it would be in the nights and was a little scared as I am easily prone to wheezing. We five girls stayed in one room and the rest were accommodated accordingly. We took a quick bath and went to the dining room to fill our stomach. The food was prepared by the servants there and tasted as if it was homemade and was awesome.
It was nearly 4.30 I guess, and it was very cold. There was no sign of sun’s existence in Vaalparai. The very thought gave me a little scare as I am from Chennai, sun god’s own place. My hair was still wet. We all got dressed and gathered near the van. We set our journey to the next dam there. I started developing a little fever, but I decided not to spoil other’s trip by making an issue of it. I decided that dozing off for a while would give me the strength I needed for the next day. So I decided not to go. My friend said that she too would halt for me. We both slept off in the van and when we woke up it was dark. It was almost 3 hrs and others were not yet back. There was Chennai 28 movie CD in the van. So we both decided to see the movie. Just as the funny scene of Shiva’s love song got over, our friends arrived. They narrated their fun trip to the dam. They were accompanied by a dog which came from the beginning till they came back to van. They all took photos with the dog and said they had never seen such a faithful and loving dog in their lives.
We went for a quick shopping there and came back to the house and started preparing ourselves for a camp fire. After our dinner, we all gathered around the fire which reassured me that I will not die of cold. I went a little close to the fire and enjoyed its heat. Guys and girls were dancing and I was watching them dance. Everyone danced for the last song “Nakka Mukka” and then we all decided to play “Kola Kolaya Mundirika”. I always wondered what game would be best to play as a gang. And after this trip I decided that there could be no better game than this. Everyone was made to run and it was damn funny. After playing this game for a long time, we decided to play Anthakshari. We had to be awake till 12 as it was birth day of one our friends. At 12 we all celebrated her birthday and went to bed. Soon everyone went to deep sleep and none of us woke up in between in the mid night as we were more than tired.
I heard the alarm at 5 A.M. in the morning as we had planned for trekking at 6 A.M. in the hills of STANMORE tea estate, the place which was owned by the STANMORE group, who owned the house that we stayed in. I got up and got ready in 15 mins. My friend couldn’t get up, but after a tough effort from other four of us, she was made to wake up. I thought to myself “Poor Girl” and felt bad for her, as she was not used to getting up early. We went for trekking at 7 in the morning. It was not as cold as the previous day since I could see my pal sun smiling at me. I missed him a lot the previous day. After a quick tea, we all set out for trekking. It was a memorable journey. We saw wild animals like Bison, Cheetah. We were told that there could be wild elephants, squirrels and lions. I was really excited. I decided that I should compensate this journey by doing crazy things, as I missed the previous day’s fun trip to dam. I listened to all the stories that the guide told us, from how the wild lions ate 6 children there, to, how he had a near death experience coz of a wild elephant. Just then, he caught a leach and said there was plenty of it in the tea fields. He said that it would suck blood only after 5 to 10 mins. One of the guys asked him to leave that leach in his hand. He took pic with it. I said I too wanted it in my hand and took it. That was the craziest thing that I did in Vaalparai. I cannot forget it!
We were listening to songs in the rest of the trekking journey and went back to van at around 11A.M. We had walked 6 Kms for about 3 hours. I could never imagine myself doing this on a regular day. The place where we had stationed our van was another house. It was one of a well known house there, since it was one of the houses where British lived, before independence. It had all the furniture they used during that time. It also had a swing in which I and my friend were swinging and playing. We took an awesome live video too. From there we went back to our house, saw TV for some time. This was the only time we relaxed at that house in the whole trip. After taking a little time off from this eventful weekend, we again started getting ready for our trip to the river.
Karamalai River was a picturesque place to see in Vaalparai. We went there by noon. Almost everyone except me took bath in the river. I decided to enjoy the scenery and wanted to spend time for myself or rather, I wanted to be alone for sometime with the nature. So I was sitting on a rock and listening to awesome songs and collecting pebbles. I saw my friends taking bath, swimming and having fun in the river. The river and the flow of the water in between the rocks was really a sight to behold. I was more than jubilant to watch the sight. The river, trees around, and sound of water took me back to my childhood. I realized the very existence of me. I discovered a photographer in me. I took few photos in the digi-cam that we had, but my eyes were taking 100 photos of every lovely thing around me. I and my friend played the game of who throws the pebbles at a longer distance. Soon we saw many joining us to play the same game. With that beautiful place, we closed our trip in Vaalparai. The memories of that place will remain deep in my mind forever.
Our return journey started by 3.30 P.M. in the noon and this time we dint have any halt. From Vaalparai we reached erode. At erode we went to one of our friends’ house to have our dinner. Tamilians are known for their hospitality. This is a well known fact. I experienced that when I went to her house, as her family was really sweet in welcoming all of us. They provided dinner which was more than filling. We caught our train to Chennai at Erode junction at 9 in the night. We reached Chennai by 4 in the morning and I caught the train to Urapakkam, my home.
I came back home and switched on the TV to relax myself. While I was changing channels I stopped at CHUTTI T.V. The upcoming cartoon was “Doravil Payanangal”. I smiled to myself and decided to pen-down my experiences.
To know more about Vaalparai click here - http://www.valparai.com
We reached Thirupur via Coimbatore Express at 6.15 in the morning. It was a bright morning with sun casting his rays through a less cloudy sky to show his arrival. One of our friends had arranged for tea and biscuits as energizer. It was refreshing as we were very tired after a less-sleep train journey. From there we had arranged for a van to reach Vaalparai via Pollachi. Thirupur to Pollachi was around 65Kms. Pollachi to Vaalparai was 64Kms round the hill. On the whole we set our journey to Vaalparai through an exciting road trip.
The van had stereo system and a TV to engage ourselves for the journey. Guys were as usual over-enthusiastic and were dancing for the latest fast numbers in Tamil like “Nakka Mukka” and few English songs like “Who let the dogs out…” It brought out huge smiles on everyone’s face. Since there was little space for all the guys to dance, they took turns and engaged us with their funny dancing steps. It was a full 2 and half hour entertainment and we all had exhausted the energy that we gained in the morning.
We reached Pollachi at around 9.00 A.M. and were already hungry. After filling our stomach with idlis and pongal we started our trip up the hill. It is advised either to eat something non-oily to your full-stomach or to not eat at all, on an uphill or downhill journey to avoid nausea. We bought few ‘Pulippu Mittai’ and lemon, for you know what! It was not a continuous journey to Vaalparai as we had plans to halt at 2 places. First one was Aliyar park.
When we entered it, I felt that it was like the usual parks. But its specialty was that, at the back side, there was a huge dam. After taking different shots of us at various places in the park, we climbed around 40 to 50 steps to reach the top to find a huge dam at the back. We decided to make use of our cameras to its fullest in the whole trip, so each of us took a minimum of 10 pics at this place itself. We gave different poses and the most remembered one for all of us was the pose given by two of our friends. They were standing in one leg with the other bent, like a ‘Rishi doing thavam’ on either side of the wall which was very high. I got really scared, as, if they had slipped their balance, they would directly fall into the huge dam. Once they got down, I thought to myself that these would be the craziest things they would remember doing on this trip and smiled to myself.
Our next place of halt was monkey falls. This was the one of the loveliest experience for me in this whole trip. I and my friend decided not to take bath in the falls as we had cold. We decided to just wet our legs and hands in the falls. The best moments in every human’s life would be the ones when they connected themselves with the nature. I saw the falls and I remembered the song “Chinna China Aasai” of the movie Roja. I closed my eyes and showed my hands in the water slowly. It was damn cold. The force along with the chillness made me to take my hands back immediately. It gave me a slight shock. But it was a lovely experience. I couldn’t resist myself not entering into the falls. I could see the same expression on my friend’s face. So we both decided to take bath no matter what. We pulled in 2 more girls who too were a little reluctant to enter. We four friends enjoyed under nature’s one of the loveliest creation. After 45 mins of our journey to heaven, we came out of the water and, I and my friend changed our wet clothes. We decided to dry ourselves under the hot sun and sat on the rocks for sometime. The warmth that the sun gave was perfect. It made us doze-off few minutes on the nearby rocks. We all noticed that the guys had climbed almost the top of the hill from where the falls originated. I told my friend “Now I know why this is called monkey falls” and we both laughed. Before we entered the van, a real naughty monkey took the chips packet from one of the guys’ hand and went up the tree. It was one the amusing experience we had there.
After having lovely time in the falls, we went back to the van to start our journey to the Anamalai mountain range’s top – Vaalparai. I loaded my mp3 player with Ilayaraja’s hits as those were the best to be listened on a journey to such a place. I slept off listening to the songs. At around 2.30P.M., we reached Vaalparai and the van stopped for few minutes and then it followed a bike in which the manager and our friend who arranged for the trip were riding. It was then that I woke up and saw the beauty of Vaalparai. I started feeling a little cold as my friend sun, which travelled with us till the falls, hid behind the clouds. I wore my sweater and looked around in the van. Many of them were in deep sleep. Our van was rounding the bends. My eyes were filled with green color and the pleasant smell of tea made me take deep breaths. I had a little head-ache and wanted to drink some tea. My friend too woke up after her quick nap. We both were really tired and our eyes were red. One of the guys said we would be reaching the house in few minutes and that lunch was waiting there, for us to be consumed, at the house in which we stayed.
Here I should mention about the house in which we stayed. It was a typical house at hill stations that we would see in movies. I loved it at the very sight of it. We were told that it was built in 1920 and still remained strong as it was, during the time of built. It had 5 huge rooms and a big sit-out. It had all the things that a normal house needed including TV and set-top box. The first thing I noticed was that, the house had no fans, but had a fireplace in each of the rooms. Then I realized how cold it would be in the nights and was a little scared as I am easily prone to wheezing. We five girls stayed in one room and the rest were accommodated accordingly. We took a quick bath and went to the dining room to fill our stomach. The food was prepared by the servants there and tasted as if it was homemade and was awesome.
It was nearly 4.30 I guess, and it was very cold. There was no sign of sun’s existence in Vaalparai. The very thought gave me a little scare as I am from Chennai, sun god’s own place. My hair was still wet. We all got dressed and gathered near the van. We set our journey to the next dam there. I started developing a little fever, but I decided not to spoil other’s trip by making an issue of it. I decided that dozing off for a while would give me the strength I needed for the next day. So I decided not to go. My friend said that she too would halt for me. We both slept off in the van and when we woke up it was dark. It was almost 3 hrs and others were not yet back. There was Chennai 28 movie CD in the van. So we both decided to see the movie. Just as the funny scene of Shiva’s love song got over, our friends arrived. They narrated their fun trip to the dam. They were accompanied by a dog which came from the beginning till they came back to van. They all took photos with the dog and said they had never seen such a faithful and loving dog in their lives.
We went for a quick shopping there and came back to the house and started preparing ourselves for a camp fire. After our dinner, we all gathered around the fire which reassured me that I will not die of cold. I went a little close to the fire and enjoyed its heat. Guys and girls were dancing and I was watching them dance. Everyone danced for the last song “Nakka Mukka” and then we all decided to play “Kola Kolaya Mundirika”. I always wondered what game would be best to play as a gang. And after this trip I decided that there could be no better game than this. Everyone was made to run and it was damn funny. After playing this game for a long time, we decided to play Anthakshari. We had to be awake till 12 as it was birth day of one our friends. At 12 we all celebrated her birthday and went to bed. Soon everyone went to deep sleep and none of us woke up in between in the mid night as we were more than tired.
I heard the alarm at 5 A.M. in the morning as we had planned for trekking at 6 A.M. in the hills of STANMORE tea estate, the place which was owned by the STANMORE group, who owned the house that we stayed in. I got up and got ready in 15 mins. My friend couldn’t get up, but after a tough effort from other four of us, she was made to wake up. I thought to myself “Poor Girl” and felt bad for her, as she was not used to getting up early. We went for trekking at 7 in the morning. It was not as cold as the previous day since I could see my pal sun smiling at me. I missed him a lot the previous day. After a quick tea, we all set out for trekking. It was a memorable journey. We saw wild animals like Bison, Cheetah. We were told that there could be wild elephants, squirrels and lions. I was really excited. I decided that I should compensate this journey by doing crazy things, as I missed the previous day’s fun trip to dam. I listened to all the stories that the guide told us, from how the wild lions ate 6 children there, to, how he had a near death experience coz of a wild elephant. Just then, he caught a leach and said there was plenty of it in the tea fields. He said that it would suck blood only after 5 to 10 mins. One of the guys asked him to leave that leach in his hand. He took pic with it. I said I too wanted it in my hand and took it. That was the craziest thing that I did in Vaalparai. I cannot forget it!
We were listening to songs in the rest of the trekking journey and went back to van at around 11A.M. We had walked 6 Kms for about 3 hours. I could never imagine myself doing this on a regular day. The place where we had stationed our van was another house. It was one of a well known house there, since it was one of the houses where British lived, before independence. It had all the furniture they used during that time. It also had a swing in which I and my friend were swinging and playing. We took an awesome live video too. From there we went back to our house, saw TV for some time. This was the only time we relaxed at that house in the whole trip. After taking a little time off from this eventful weekend, we again started getting ready for our trip to the river.
Karamalai River was a picturesque place to see in Vaalparai. We went there by noon. Almost everyone except me took bath in the river. I decided to enjoy the scenery and wanted to spend time for myself or rather, I wanted to be alone for sometime with the nature. So I was sitting on a rock and listening to awesome songs and collecting pebbles. I saw my friends taking bath, swimming and having fun in the river. The river and the flow of the water in between the rocks was really a sight to behold. I was more than jubilant to watch the sight. The river, trees around, and sound of water took me back to my childhood. I realized the very existence of me. I discovered a photographer in me. I took few photos in the digi-cam that we had, but my eyes were taking 100 photos of every lovely thing around me. I and my friend played the game of who throws the pebbles at a longer distance. Soon we saw many joining us to play the same game. With that beautiful place, we closed our trip in Vaalparai. The memories of that place will remain deep in my mind forever.
Our return journey started by 3.30 P.M. in the noon and this time we dint have any halt. From Vaalparai we reached erode. At erode we went to one of our friends’ house to have our dinner. Tamilians are known for their hospitality. This is a well known fact. I experienced that when I went to her house, as her family was really sweet in welcoming all of us. They provided dinner which was more than filling. We caught our train to Chennai at Erode junction at 9 in the night. We reached Chennai by 4 in the morning and I caught the train to Urapakkam, my home.
I came back home and switched on the TV to relax myself. While I was changing channels I stopped at CHUTTI T.V. The upcoming cartoon was “Doravil Payanangal”. I smiled to myself and decided to pen-down my experiences.
To know more about Vaalparai click here - http://www.valparai.com
posted by astute columnist at 12:52 PM
1 Comments:
well desrcibed yaar. :)
but why photos are missing?
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