The trip to Ranganathittu and Mysore !

On thursday, some of us met might up, and right then and there, decided that we'd go on a trip to Ranghanathittu on Sat, that's yesterday. And amazingly, we actually did go.

Five of us - Sudhir, Suman, Parin, Shriganesh aka Garry, and I. Sudhir had arranged a Tata sumo. Garry came to my place at 6, and we left for Sudhir's place. We didn't know the way beyond City market, asked some folks for directions, and were managing just fine. Soon we got to a pretty remote place, with no soul in sight for over a kilometer's distance. Just then we noticed 2 chaps (C1, and C2), and delighted with this sudden abundance of humans, stopped to ask for directions. I went over to C1, while Garry handled C2. C1 apparently knew the way, and was supplyling me with the info. He paused midway to overhear C2, hurled some abuses at him, and continued where he left off and was soon done. I got back to watch Garry and C2 in conversation. They were yet to settle on a common language for communication. Garry later told me, that not knowing Kannada, he'd tried his luck with Hindi and English, and as a last resort, tried Tamil. C2 at that point, had turned deep red, and was about to get physical. Not aware of this, having arrived on the scene at a pivotal point, I tried Kannada with C2, and met with instant approval, and success. The man was earnestly talking nonsense - 'You go straight, and then you go straight and then you go straight and then you take right, and ' - He patted me encouragingly on my shoulder at this point, as if to say' Dar math beta, tu yeh kar sakta hai', and said triumphantly 'and then you take left !' The man was drunk. Garry and I took an unanimous decision to implement C1's ideas.

We were soon lost again. This time , we met C3, who cleverly asked us to take the bus route. He said it would lead us straight to our destination. I pointed out that there were no buses we could follow. 'No no ! you still take the bus route' , he insisted. Another chap said ' Take right at the next circle'. I'm now highly suspicious of the word 'circle'. I think we should have a standardised, and well accepted definition for the term. Some folks treat just about any crossroad to be a circle, while a few others expect some clearly circular edifice to be present there. Certain others expect an architectural wonder at the center for a crossroad to be elevated to the status of a 'circle'. The word 'circle' was to haunt us for the rest of the day. Finally we met a noble soul, who gave us clear directions, and we managed to reach Sudhir's place at about 7. We were soon off in a Tata Sumo.

We stopped at Kamat Lokaruchi for breakfast. We reached Ranganathittu at about 9:45. We'd originally hoped to be there by 8:30Since it was a weekend, we hoped the birds themselves would be up late, and would greet us enthusiastically. Suman captured an amazing video of a weaver bird at work. We were soon in a boat that we'd engaged for the five of us. Some birds chirped away to glory, while some seemed be engaging in raucous laughter, and a few others appeared to be groaning. All seemed busy. We mostly saw black-and white birds. To our delight, a painted stork family turned up on a small island, perhaps 30sq metres in size. They seemed to be busy washing their feet. We asked the boatman to get closer to the rock-island, captured a few snaps, and continued on our way. I was disappointed at not having seen any crocodiles. I'd been hoping for some safe(?) adventure, thought not quite along the lines of crocodile-driving. Our ride was done in about 30 min, and we lazed around for while. We left for Srirangapatna.

We got to Dariya Daulat, Tipu's summer place that's now been converted to a museum. There are some beautiful murals on the ouside walls. We soaked in some history, relaxed in the lawns for while, and were off to Sangam. Sangam's the meeting point of three rivers - cauvery, and two others whose names I forget. We went on a Theppa ride, worth experiencing for its instability (provided it doesn't overturn). By then, it was almost 1:30PM, and we decided to head to Mysore for lunch.

The hotel was crowded and poorly managed. We had to get lunch coupons, and then find ourselves a place to sit . The technique, as I've described in a earlier blog-post, was all about stalking and pouncing. You stand embarassing close to a chap who's eating and as soon as he's done, or almost done, you grab his place. This technique didn't appeal to our tastes , and we were soon off in search of another hotel. We walked for a about a km, and got to another place, and incredibly, this one too required you to use the same technique. Thankfully there was an AC section , where they took down your names, and the ' First cum first serve' law prevailed. After about 45 minutes of waiting, we got in, placed an order, and were promptly rewarded with further 25 minutes of waiting. Lots of practise waiting. Dunno why they call them waiters. We are the ones who end up doing all the waiting . We had lunch.

It was almost 4 when we finished lunch. It was starting to rain. We had to choose between Mysore palace, and Talkad. We chose the latter, and wisely so. The wind hitting our faces, the weather - almost raining but not quite , coupled with Parin's enthusiatic redering of Kishore da, and Mohammad Rafi, caused us to almost not notice the terribly bumpy road. We reached talkad at about 5:15. After some just-a-little-tiresome sand-walking, we got to the water. We'd unwittingly forgotten our shorts. We did some timepass in knee deep water anyway. We decided to try out another theppa ride. The cool breeze, calm waters, the setting sun, the endearingly unstable theppa, - all made for a very soothing time. We'd been out together for less than 12 others, but it seemed like we'd been together much longer than that,

By seven, we were back in the sumo, and were on our way back to Bangalore. At some point we had to get off at and push the Sumo. We stopped at Kamat again for dinner. To make things lively, we had a flat tire at about 10:30 pm. The stepney was thankfully functional, and we got to Sudhir's place at about 11:30. Garry drooped me off at my place, and was off to his own .

All in all, a very satisfyingly tiring trip!