Baiguney, Sikkim

Sikkim was our first trip to the Northeast. We went in December and the weather was fine, not very cold.

Sikkim is a scenic place with rolling hills, blue mountains and leafy, misty woods. You come across the turquoise blue waters of River Rangit and Teestha (WB) almost everywhere. The people are simple, warm and friendly and instinctively smile at strangers. The Baiguney Club Mahindra resort where we stayed is also a beautiful place, on the right bank of River Rangit beyond which rises a mountain. Sikkim is all mountains and streams and valleys carpeted with wild flowers. Roads are very good and road-widening is going on at some places.

The Sidkeong Tulku Bird Park at Gyalshing in West Sikkim district is another lovely place. Set in the most dense forest I have ever seen, it is a half an hour exhilarating walk through silver oaks and other trees that reach for the sky. Sun light hardly falls through the dense canopy. I may or may never do the Appalachian trail but I was reminded of Robert Redford's `Walk in the woods' :) The walk leads to the ruins of ancient capital of Sikkim, Rabdentse, and the fort offers expansive views of the Kanchanjunga range. 

River Rangit

River Teestha (WB)

Baiguney Club Mahindra 

River bank, Club Mahindra

Pelling Skywalk

View of Kanchanjunga range from Pelling Skywalk

Darjeeling

Darjeeling tea gardens

Memorable drive from Darjeeling to Pasupathinagar

We visited the 17th century Sangchen Pemayangtse Monastery where ancient scrolls of Buddha's teachings are kept. 

Pelling is a quiet holiday station. There is a skywalk which offers beautiful views of mountains. The periphery and outskirts of Darjeeling are very scenic but Darjeeling town is over-rated. The tea gardens are really lovely and refreshing. You can enjoy the views from cable car also. The cable cars are a bit scary but it was safe. Darjeeling hill station is congested and jammed with traffic. There is an army memorial at Darjeeling worth visiting. We took a 30-km drive from Darjeeling to Nepal border town of Pasupathinagar. The route via Ghoom, Sukhia Pokhari, and Simana is very scenic with pine forest slopes on both sides of the road. It is a beautiful and memorable drive. We went into Pasupathinagar inside Nepal which is a tax free zone. Although people claim that the goods are all original but cheap, I found most of the items to be clever duplicates. It is a good place to buy jackets though.

There is a little town named Jorthung, 3 kms away from Baiguney.

Jorthang

 It has a well laid out market centre...good place to buy trinkets and souvenirs. Outside the Biguney Club Mahindra, about 100 metres away on the Nayabazar-Legship-Reshi Road, we discovered a little eating place lovingly named Baiguney’s Rasoi. 

Baiguney's Rasoi

Baiguney's Rasoi nice place

It is a small joint run by two women, and their home-cooked food was delicious and hygienic. And the food is reasonably priced. You can have sumptuous breakfast of Aloo Parathas, Puri Sabzi or bread omelette there itself on neatly laid out tables with the sun streaming in over the mountain. They prepare vegetarian and non-vegetarian lunch and dinner also if you inform in advance. There are lots of Oyos and other small hotels in Jorthang, Pelling, and Gyalshing. The Geyzing market was interesting with fresh fruits, and the Taatopani hot spring.

We spent most of the time in West Sikkim and South Sikkim districts. We will do Gangtok and above next time.

If you have a morning flight (between 9 am- 12 noon) from Bagdogra, it would be a good idea to start early from Gangtok, Baiguney or Jorthang as landslides can sometimes block the road. If you have a very early morning flight, better to return to Bagdogra the previous evening.

Yercaud, TN
If u like rolling hills, distant misty mountains, quiet little villages perched above grassy valleys,  deserted forest pathways carpeted with fallen leaves, flowers of all hues saying hello all along, sweeping views of thick woods, trees reaching for the skies from slopes below, you will like this place very much. It is an introvert's retreat. And of course hot omelettes topped with bread spread with spicy red chutney!

Yercaud is a small hill station in Tamil Nadu. It is 34 kms from Salem. It is at an altitude of 4970 feet in the Shevaroys range of Eastern Ghats. `Yeri’ means lake `Kaadu’ means forest and that is how Yercaud gets its name. 

 It is a lovely little place with Frost’s misty woods, quiet nooks and corners, and a beautiful lake in the middle. There are three or four points high up in the hills from where you can get panoramic views of the valley and the Shevaroys hills.

 Beware of taxi and autorickshaw drivers. They fleece unsuspecting tourists unlike anywhere else. You cannot even bargain if you do not know the local language.

Yercaud is 200 kms from Coimbatore and 215 kms from Bengaluru.  We took a Volvo Airavat from Bangalore to Salem and a cab from there to Yercaud. The bus drops you at AVR Bend at Salem from where you can either hire a cab to Yercaud or go to the New Salem Bus Station and catch a city bus to Yercaud. The non-negotiable cab fare from Salem to Yercaud is Rs 1,000. I feel that it is better to take a bus from Salem to Yercaud because it is convenient but hire a cab when returning from Yercaud to Salem. You can also hire cabs from Bangalore or Coimbatore but it is an expensive proposition. There is good bus connectivity from Salem.

Papikondalu Papi Hills Andhra Pradesh January 2017
Rajahmundry, East Godavari, INDIA

All of a sudden I and my wife decided to visit Papi Hills known as Papikondalu in Telugu. The mighty Godavari flows through the Papi Hills in East and West Godavari districts of Andhra Pradesh and it is known to be a very picturesque and a good place to enjoy a boat ride. We decided to drive down from Hyderabad to Rajahmundry, the nearest place.

Beautiful Papikondalu Hills Papi Hills. Photo Sreenivas J

We set out on January 11 morning and reached Rajahmundry at 3 pm and checked into River Bay hotel at Goutami Ghat. This hotel is located on the bank of Godavari and offers beautiful views of the river though I did not like the hotel room much.

Next, we booked tickets on a boat at AP Tourism office which is located nearby. The AP Tourism operates only one big boat with 40-odd passenger capacity. Private operators ply bigger luxury boats with push back chairs in the air-conditioned lower deck and normal chairs on the upper deck.  

On January 12, we reached the AP Tourism office at 7 am from where we were taken in a bus 40 kms away to Polavaram village. Here a dozen boats were waiting to pick up the tourists like us. At this point the river is wide and deep enough to allow the big boats to ply. On one side the Polavaram Project a multi-purpose irrigation dam, is coming up. When the dam is complete it would create a huge reservoir which will submerge the beautiful Papi Hills sometime after 2019. If you love nature and want to see beautiful hills with lush green forests, you should make a trip to see these scenic hills through which the river has cut its path through the millennia before they go down under water for ever.

At Polavaram village, agents guide you to your boat. If you are carrying any luggage you should be careful because you have to walk down a steep, muddy slippery path to get to your boat. The journey from this place to the last point of Papi Hills known as Parentalapally takes almost 4 hours. Breakfast is served onboard at 9 am. Once you settle into chairs on the upper deck it is a beautiful view on all sides. The tranquil river, the misty hill range, small, blue mountains of the Eastern Ghats in the distance, lush greenery and a gentle breeze make you fall in love with this place. The boat stops enroute at a riverside village to pick up boxes of piping hot South Indian lunch for us which is served at 1 pm.  Unless you are a hardcore nature lover who likes to take in the sights and sounds of hill and river the journey can be boring and monotonous. To keep families and restless kids entertained, the boats hire youngsters with dancing skills and they try to provide some entertainment with high pitched Tollywood hits blaring out of loud speakers. This spoiled my mood for a while and the decibel levels gave me a headache but a majority of the co-passengers enjoyed it. So, if you are looking for a quiet ride, forget it. There will be plenty of noise. The boat makes a stop at a riverside village where a famous temple is located.

Godavari flowing through a gorge in Papikondalu Papi Hills. Photo Sreenivas J

We chug upstream and as we enter the Papi HIls range the river narrows down to just 400 metres at some places and it is a sight to behold. The scenery of the river meandering through the gorges and ravines with lush green hills on either side is magnificent.

After a quick break at Parentalapalli, the last stop of Papi Hills tour, we start the return trip and reach Polavaram by 6 pm and take the bus back to Rajahmundry where we are dropped off from where we were picked up. We thoroughly enjoyed the beauty of these hills which would soon be lost of forever. We decided to stay the night at Challa Residency which was decent for Rs 1,500 a night.

Hyderabad to Rajahmundry is about 450 kms by road. There are trains, AC luxury buses, and flights too.

If you are going by road, you take Hyderabad-Vijayawada NH 65, Vijayawada-Rajahmundry NH 16 also known as AH 45 (Chennai-Srikakulam Highway). The Toll tax is quite high..close to a Rs 900 for both sides journey. 

AP Tourism boat ticket is Rs 650 per person. Private boats charge Rs 700. All boats have life jackets and basic life saving equipment. Season is October to March.

I always wanted to the see the Konaseema region, known as mini Kerala of Andhra Pradesh. So the next day we drove down that side.

Aguada Fortress, Goa

Early morning fog lifts over the Arabian Sea in this view from Aguada Fortress, Goa.

Tourist boats weave patterns in the calm waters of the bay below Aguada Fortress.

Away from Calangute and Baga, I found the Sinquerim beach quiet and beautiful.

Huge sea-facing mansions

Nagarjuna Sagar

Once the muddy monsoon inflow has settled down, the Nagarjuna Sagar Dam can be a good place to spend a day.

The huge reservoir acquires a blueish tinge and the bare rocks and small islands give it an ethereal look.

The Nagarjuna is the largest masonry dam in the world. There is one small island about 2 kms in the reservoir where there is a museum which exhibits all the relics of a third century Buddhist settlement that were found when the reservoir was being dug.

Ruins of centuries old temples were also unearthed which have been reconstructed on the island.

Ruins of centuries old temples were also unearthed which have been reconstructed on the island.