Travelogue – Chimagalur a beautiful sojourn

After days of hectic work schedule it was time to take a break! And a long weekend was just the cherry on the icing. We went on a destination search spree to ensure we land up in a great place… and Chikmagalur it was to be!! Though as many of the things happen at the last moment with me… this trip was supposed to be no different.

After finalizing the destination we started calling the hotels for accommodation and to our despair, the week we decided to go to Chimagalur, half the world seemed to be headed that way. There were no rooms available. After some nth calls we finally managed to get bookings at a lodge. Next was the traveling issue and as luck could have it all the local buses heading that way were full… so we were literally in a soup! However another common friend was traveling to Chikmagalur for a relaxed weekend in his car and he was gracious enough to take us along.

On the D-day, early morning weather in Bangalore is amazing and I am already in a holiday mood, however my dreamy escapade is cut short by the heavy downpour that lashes the city. I console myself that Chikmagalur would be better. We hop into the car at 8… after some calling around as the decided time was 7 and as these guys didn’t turn up I thought they changed their decision of taking us and gave us a slip [:O] By then the Bangalore traffic was at its worst and we were stuck in slow moving traffic…. Though we were stuck only for half and hour but because my mind was racing way ahead I felt it took ages and by the time we got out our stomachs started to growl…sadly there was no hotel where we could stop and nurture our famished beings. So off we went on our journey….

The roads after we left Bangalore were just beautiful. The ride was so amazing that we literally fought to be front seat riders. As we reached closer to Chikmagalur the beautiful landscapes and serene surroundings just left us spell - bound. I again went on my day dreaming trip… dreaming the beautiful locations/points that lay ahead once we reached Chikmagalur…

Chikmagalur literally means ‘younger daughters village’ It is said that the Chieftain of a close by place called ‘Sakarepetha’ had given this place in dowry to his younger daughter. Just before you reach Chikmagalur there is a perpendicular road taking you to ‘Hiremagalur’ i.e elder daughters village.

We reached Chikmagalur by evening and after settling in our lodge decided to roam about the town or any close by place, but there was some religious procession in full swing and by the time that cleared we were informed by locals that there was no local transport in the evening to Mulyangiri and back- the place we wanted to visit.

As we had hired a cab for the whole next day and we decided to squeeze Mulyangiri in on the same day. After some more walks through the small roads of Chikmagalur we went for dinner at a place called Planters Court. The other thing I realized about Chikmagalur was that these guys like things quite hot! The food at the hotel literally brought tears in my eyes and smoke through my ears! After some dinner and lots of water we came out of the hotel and realized another thing, people in Chikmagalur sleep very early and hence we could not manage to get a single ‘rick’ back and that meant walking all the way… but it was fun roaming on the streets on an unknown town…. and after that we decided to call it a day.

One more thing beautiful about this place is its people. They are utmost hospitable and extremely friendly. For the very short time that we were there, they helped us in so many things- from getting directions to hiring a cab.

Well the next day, the much-hyped (by me of course!) day of trip was a complete washout… it was pouring on that day. We still dared to go and try our luck and went in the cab to Mulyangiri. By the time we reached, clouds and heavy downpour covered it! After trying our luck at ID peetha we decided to call it quits and returned to our hotel… too dejected! The picture here is the one shot by a friend of mine*

On the way, however we decided to try Belur- Halebid and that was the place we headed next. As we headed for the Heritage site our driver started showing us his driving skills! The way he was driving I wondered if we were part of a Formula1 race :D We roamed about these heritage monuments and clicking photos holding umbrellas was quite a task that we managed!

After returning we went to ‘Taj Retreat’ a Taj resort in Chikmagalur. If you are looking for a relaxed weekend, you can certainly think about going to Taj. So to sum it all, visiting Chikmagalur was basically a wonderful drive, lots of relaxed time and some fun getting wet and roaming around! However from the glimpses of Chikmagalur that I got to see, I am certainly about to make some more trips there in the near future.

*Photo by- Divya Ostwal, amateur photographer