Runaway to the Woods - Day 2

Pykara and Mudumalai National Park

On the second day, our destination was Mudumalai National Park. But we chose to cover some of the tourist spots on the way too. There are two ways to reach there; one via the beautiful downhill road with dangerous hairpin bends to Masinagudi and the other not so dangerous but a long way through Gudalur. The Pykara falls and the lake lies on the Gudalur way and so started first in that direction.

On the way, we first reach the Hindustan Photo Films Mfg. Co. Ltd. The products manufactured here are sold in the brand name of 'Indu' which means 'Silver' in Sankrit. Once this company was the proud of Ooty but now it is running in total loss and many VRS packages are announced to the employees so that the government can shut it down as soon as possible. The local people feel that the governments lack of interest to update technology and some of the politician's greediness to swallow this vast property resulted in this slow death of the company. When you move further, you can see all the housing quarters and other buildings of HPF turning into ruins.

  Then comes the Cinema Shooting spot; where the all actors of the southern Indian movies are dancing on the grass hills in the name of duets since the time of MGR, Sivaji, etc. As we have seen this place many times both in real and on the screen, we moved to the next place. The next one in the Pine Forest, which is also a cinema shooting place used by the young heroes now. For example, the 'Paiya' song sequence was shot here. We skipped this place also and moved to the next.

Next comes the Pykara lake and the falls. We decided to visit the falls first. To visit the falls, you have to park your vehicle on side of the road and go on a short walk on a hill up and down. The falls is not huge and more like a natural checkdam but very beautiful.


After the falls we made a U turn and returned to the Pykara lake Boat house. There is a toll for the short road from the main road to the boat house and I have seen better roads than these even inside the deep forests of Ooty. In Pykara, all type of boating are available including speed boating. Since my parents are afraid of the word 'speed', we went on the motor boat seating 8 persons sharing with a malayali family.


After the boat ride, we returned to the Masinagudi road since it is a short route to Mudumalai and in better condition than the Gudalur road. But it is very dangerous with many hairpin bends and our driver said that the police mostly allow only the local vehicles through this road.

We reached Masinagudi at midday and decided to finish our lunch here. Since this is the main route to Mysore from Ooty, and It passes through two National Parks, Mudumalai and Bandipur. Masinagudi has some moderate hotels and I had my usual sunday lunch - briyani (could get only kerala style) here. FYI, Masinagudi also has a CCD.

Mudumalai has been in my checklist for a long time. Even though I have went to through this route to Mysore a couple of times before, I didn't get to see it. When my father was working in Ooty, once my parents came here with some special guests for a night safari, and keep boasting about it whenever I mention the name. So visiting Mudumalai and seeing wild elephants and a tiger moved to my top priority list.

We reached on time for the first afternoon safari. I thought it has better chance of seeing the wild animals since those were not disturbed by any safari vehicle's noise for a few hours. As usual I could not see any animals on the way to Reception Centre, and the board there saying Sighting wild animals is just a matter of luck also didd't help to lift up my spirit.

The safari route was shorter than I thought and a great disappointment for me. The vehicle went on the Mysore route for a short time and took a left turn and went on half circle around the reception center and reached the center from its back. There are many artificial ponds along the path for the animals but most of them were dry and just mud with elephants footmarks. All we could see was many spotted deers and Indian bisons called Gaurs. The only elephant I saw through this safari is the one was a kumki elephant that was tied near the safari van parking shed.



After this very disappointing safari we returned to Ooty and reached home for dinner. Even though I want to blame the Forest Department for having bad safaris like this, I know that it is not entirely their fault too. First, the time I chose to go for the safari is a bad one. Even wild elephants need their afternoon nap. Second, As I expressed in the blogpost about Bannerghatta National Park, when you don't want to see the animals outside captive and in a vast area, you should also be ready to meet disappointments like this.

But the forest department also can do a better job by maintaining the ponds, taking a longer route for the safari and having some resorts like Karantaka is doing in Bandipur. So the final verdict is, if you go in early morning or later evening and have a great amount of luck then you can some exciting animals here and Mudumalai will be a worth trip for you.

My First Safari: A Consolation Trip

Bannerghatta National Park, Bangalore, Karnataka

Sometimes we do an exciting elaborative plan, but what happens is totally opposite to that. But if you are lucky, that will also turn out to be a good thing; Just like how I planeed to visit a friend's marriage in Ranchi and end up in Bannerghatta National Park!


Bannerghatta National Park is 22 km away from Bangalore and has three attractions: Safari, Zoo and the Butterfly Park(said to be India's First). After reading in wikitravel that getting tickets for safari in weekends after 2 PM would be very difficult, we tried our maximum to start as early as possible i.e. 11.30 AM and reached the park by exactly 2 PM.

While buying tickets, you have three options. The normal Non AC bus package ('Grand Safari Pack' I think) is Rs.260 per person and you can visit safari and zoo with it. For Butterfly Park, you have to pay Rs.30 separately. The bus/van looks like the one used by police to transfer prisoners except this is in green color. May be the driver of the prison bus would drive carefully to transfer the prisoners safely which you can't expect in this safari trip. I wonder why they haven't put an warning on the back side of the ticket that says 'If you stand up when the bus is on the move and loose some tooth by falling, the authority is not responsible' ! If you want to take pictures also during this safari, then this bus ride will test the agility of both your camera(autofocus) and yours(moving to the left and right side of the bus).  If you are a DSLR person I wouldn't recommend this option for you, unless you want to break your costly camera also with your tooth during this bumpy ride. Other than this silly reason, this mode is the cheapest and best.

Other than this, there is an AC bus package for Rs.500 which uses the bus/van similar to the ones used in IT companies. There is no fence on the windows in this bus, so you might be able to take better pictures, unless you are so unlucky that the glass window is very dirty outside and your camera automatically focus on that dirt instead of animals in autofocus mode. The another option is by jeep, which costs Rs. 2500 for 4 persons. I saw some Mahindra Bolero going inside while I was coming out, so I hope those are the jeeps used for safari. I think this would be the best option, if you want to take some good pictures without any hurry using your DSLR.

The safari consists the enclosures of deers, elephants, bears, lions and tigers (both bengal and white tigers). The authorities have created artificial water tanks and ponds along the safari road, so you can definitely see all the animals. I have seen so many animals along the road that I really got the doubt whether they really have 100 sq. km area in this national park. Especially the white tiger enclosure looked even smaller than an indoor stadium. But these should be the concerns of the animals and not ours. As a visitor, you are ensured to get what you paid for.



The Butterfly park is near the entry of safari and outside of the premises of safari and zoo. It is said to be the first of its kind in India. Even though, most of the butterflies looked same to me in black color, there are many inside (also outside) and you can find some interesting or big ones too.

Even though I have resided in Mysore for six months and Chennai (near Vandalur) for an year I didn't visit Zoos there. So this was my visit to zoo after a very long time.  Though we were unfortunate not to see the white peafowl dance and an awaken king cobra, we were fortunate enough to see some interesting activities of rat snakes, lizards and leopards. We also saw a lazy bear lying in supine position and got choked from a sugarcane which it was eating. It also has a large number of macaws. Many monkeys could be seen outside rather than inside of the cages. The other animals are fox, ostrich, owls, deer, porcupine, etc.



So, Finally, Is this place worth visiting or not ? Yes, Definitely it is. It might not be worth to plan a trip just to visit here, but if you are around Bangalore and free for a day, you can visit here and have a good time.

P.S: There's a Hillview Restaurant inside the premises. Since I haven't tried it, not sure about the quality and price of food available here.