Re-discovering Koraput : Day-3

Route : 

Forenoon : Semliguda-Nadapur-Balda-Nageshwari Cave-Padua and back to Semliguda

Afternoon : Semliguda-Kunduli-Deomali and Back to Semliguda and then to Jeypore late in the evening.

It was the last week of October and winter had not yet taken the higher plateau of Koraput in its wintry embrace. Even so the morning was too chilly. Coming out from beneath the cosy warmth of my blanket on such a morning was not a very welcoming proposition. But we were on a road trip. I had to leave the bed, very reluctantly though, after several nudge from Udayan. When we came out of the hotel the sun of 29th October 2012 was shining bright in its rising path and had left the rim of Eastern ghat hills a little below. The morning air felt crisp and devoid of moisture. Perfecto. Most of the things I said about the food in Berhampur hold good for Koraput as well, with a few deviations. Today's breakfast consisted of puri and upma. It was nearing 9 am when we left Semliguda.

                                    Blanket of niger flower on the slopes of Koraput 

                                                   Agave plantation on the bare hill slopes.

Not even out of Semliguda town and the landscape around pressed into action their force of beckoning and there was no escaping. We stopped every now and then to click. We stopped and we clicked, we clicked and we stopped. Our ride was along a major district road. The country around was mostly undulating. Hills, as far as the vision went. Most of the low hills on the plateau are devoid of forest. Cultivation of niger seed(Guizotia abyssinica), Finger Millet(raagi)(Eleusine coracana) and Maize is taken up very industriously by the people on these hill slopes. Apart from these crops Cashew nut and agave are planted on many hill slopes. Cashew nut and agave have important role in the economy of the district. Cashew nuts and the fibre from agave are two important agricultural harvests from this region of the district. Apart from the harvest they aid the soil conservation on the hill slopes. Niger seed is also a major produce from this region of the state. The highlands are suitable for cultivation of this exotic plant. The niger flower blooms with the onset of winter and we were travelling right around that time. The hill slope blanketed with niger flower is a sight for sore eyes and offer irresistible frames for a shutter bug. The landscape to our right was bathing in the morning sunlight and looked incredible and to our left the hills had a trace of haze on them but looked equally amazing against the light. For me, the road had many memories attached to it. This is the same road that leads to Padua where we lived for six years between 1990 and 1996. Memories, irrepressible as they are, came floating. When we had to come to Jeypore from Padua we used to catch the bus at 7 o'clock at Padua. Irrespective of the season Maa would wrap us(me and my younger brother Sidharth) in warm clothes, because mornings used to be chilly in Padua, even in the summer back then. My favourite place in the bus would be the window seat or the one nearer to the driver as they offered the best view of the surroundings. I would be staring at the landscape passing by the window in great amusement. Typical Nadeem-Shravan or Anand-Milind songs of the 90's would be blaring from the cassette player in the bus. I was not grown up enough to appreciate the beauty around then. During the early nineties there was only a fair weather bridge across the river at Pitaguda. The bridge would submerge for six months of the year when the back waters of Kolab river swelled and two humongous boats ferried people across the river during this period. The boats were large enough to ferry a Tata 407 along with a horde of other loads. Crossing the river by that ferry was an adventure sort of for Sidhu and me. 

                                                            Agave flower buddings

Coming back to the trip, we reached Balda at about 10.30 am. Balda is a small village at the foot of the hill on which the Nageshwari caves are situated. It is nearly 35 kilometres from Semliguda. We found our way through the village to the caves. Here let me give you a rough idea of the hill we were ascending. It is a table top hill. The flat top is nearly 4 square kilometres in extent and stands at 1260 mtrs above sea level i.e more than 4100 feet. The Nageshwari cave is located on the south-eastern corner of this flat topped hill. The slopes are covered with dense moist deciduous vegetation. The road to the top of the hill winds through the forest on these slopes. When we were planning for a visit to these caves I took the help of Google earth to trace the road and found that there was a decent looking road leading up to the caves from Balda village. However the real picture was something far from what it looked like in Google imagery. The road we were riding on was no road at all. It looked like a well used boulder-strewn mountain path. The lone testimony to it being a road were the bushes which were cleared off by the people using it and gave it the look of a road. The first challenge the trip threw on us. I was leading the way. The first quarter of mile was not a big deal for me or the Classic. The torque that RE had packed into the engine was showing its apparent advantage. I was loving every bit of it. My hands gripping the handle bars firmly, my gaze fixed on the road and an in-suppressible smile on my face. I reached at the top of the first gradient and stopped to look back how Udayan and his TBTS were faring and found them not trailing far behind. A turn and there was the second gradient and the roads worsened. 

                                                There was a "Road" that was not There

                                                     Udayan and his Thunderbird fight the hill

                                          Terrain we rode on.

                                                         View from Nageshwari Hill

Rain water had washed away the soil from the surface, leaving behind a litter of boulders and deep furrows. I made it to the top of the second gradient with much difficulty. But Udayan struggled a lot with his bike. At one point his engine stopped and he started skidding downhill but somehow managed to find a foothold. I went back to help him with the kick start. Because he could not have started the bike himself. I held his bike from behind while he kick started it. The Thunderbird was a little low on power compared to the Classic as it had a slightly lighter crank than the Classic. On the way we saw a group of wood cutters and asked them whether the bikes can go to the top on this road. They said yes but not with much conviction. We decided to proceed, taking it as a challenge. But the hill made it more difficult. I somehow managed to proceed a little further. Udayan stopped at a place and said his bikes clutch wire felt loose and he said it may snap any-time.Shit, I thought. We had another one kilometre to the cave and had no idea what was the condition of the road ahead. Then it dawned upon me what a situation we had run into. If Udayan's bike's clutch wire snapped it could possibly take the whole day to take the bike back to civilization and which meant we will have to postpone the Deomali visit to the next day which we obviously did not want to. We parked our bikes and sat beneath the shade of a mango tree. The sun was shining brightly and we started to feel the heat.Relieving myself from the jacket and camera I started pondering over the situation. Then we agreed mutually that proceeding further will be too risky given the state of road. Trekking to the top was neither a practicable proposition as we would be late for the Deomali drive. So discretion proved to be the better part of valour and we retraced from there after fifteen minutes.

                                                                 The Point of Return

The view from the place, where we were sitting, was serene. The sun midway on the sky felt a little hot for comfort. The back-waters of Jalaput reservoir gleamed in the distance. The vista helped a lot to bring the adrenalin levels down and meanwhile the bike engines also cooled off. The bikes had to be turned around the 50 degree slope very carefully and one at a time. I held for support while Udayan turned his bike and he supported me while I turned mine. I decided to descend first. I descended the slope with my engine running and put the Classic in first gear. I pushed the bike forward inches at a time and Udayan did the same with his engine off. Though climbing down was not very easy, our bikes were saved of the torture this time. But we had to perform a pretty good balancing act on the boulder-strewn mountain path. A stream on the way was good place to quench our thirst. With a promise to return once again and scale to its top we bade good by to the Nageshwari hills and proceeded to Padua.

                                                     The view that soothed our Senses

Roads or No Roads, My Bull took me there, where other mortal bikes fear to Tread

Padua is quaint little village in the remote part of Koraput with immensely beautiful landscape around and a climate that is exceptional. It came into little prominence during the Dandakaranya project. Homeless Bengali refugees were given transient accommodation here before being resettled in other parts of the district. I had not visited the place even for once after we left that place in 1996. This is the place where the first threads of attachment between me and nature were tied. The place had a few government establishment such as a dispensary, a veterinary centre, two schools, branch of a rural bank(of which my father was the manager), a police station and a handful other such offices, most of which ran in the dilapidated Dandakaranya project houses. A small railway station on the base of a hill gave the place a British era charm. Life at Padua was always easy going. Mornings use to be chilly. My school was at a stone throw distance from our house. I used to roam about a lot in the village after school and I remember good thrashings from my father for my overtime wanderings, though I was not mischievous at all. Most of the people liked me a lot in the village and I had free access to every household as a cute child. Thursday used to be the weekly market. I loved accompanying Baba to the haat. Most of our evenings would be spent near the reservoir back waters with Baba. Padua being a remote village suffered from frequent power outages. But we enjoyed the power outage period very much because it disrupted study time and Sidhu and me would coax Baba to tell us jungle tales. 

First we went to the inspection bungalow situated on the top of a knoll over looking the reservoir and the surrounding plateau. This is one of the many British time bungalows that are still there in undivided Koraput district. The location and architecture of the the bungalow fascinated me a lot and I dreamt of constructing my own bungalow in the same fashion as this one when I was a school boy. The bungalow compound and its adjoining scrub forest used to be a favourite haunt of ours. My father used to bring us here for a evenings birding and we would sit on the verandah of the house to see the sun set below the reservoir and hills. The rear portion of the bungalow had been damaged. Buildings such as this one should be preserved for their antique as well as aesthetic values. I always hold the British in awe for the reason that they always choose the best of places to construct their house and bungalows. 

                                                       The British Time Bungalow at Padua

                                                              View from the Bungalow

                                                                      British Charm

Just when we were about to leave the bungalow I spotted a flock of birds which flew from one tree to another as I watched them. I identified them as babblers. Of course they were babblers but babblers that whistled as they flew. Yes, there they were, a flock of Yellow-billed babblers. Yellow-billed babblers are a species of babblers(known as Kundakhia pakhi or Sat Bhai in Odisha). They were the birds I was looking for since a few months. The northern most range of this bird according to the field guides is up to the northern parts of Andhra Pradesh. These birds had never been reported from Odisha. Few months ago I had come across a babbler near Jeypore which looked like a yellow billed babbler. I had not got the confirmation as I had not heard the bird call. But this time I saw them in broad day light and also heard them whistle. The common and jungle babblers make raucous chatter or a metallic '"Ttich" '"Ttich" sound but yellow billed babblers have a sweet whistle like vocalization. We took a few photographs of these birds as a record so that Koraput can be included in their range of distribution later. Then we rode about in the village to see the place where we lived and the school where I started my formal education. The house where we lived was in a very dilapidated condition but the school where I studied had expanded and was in good state. The scenery around looked as beautiful as it used to 16 years ago. Nostalgia. That is what I had come here for. I showed Udayan the above places and told him in brief how my childhood days had passed in this beautiful place. I recognized a few familiar faces in the village but they could not recognize me for obvious reasons. I had left the place when I was a boy of 10 and now there I was as a man of 26 sporting a French beard and riding a Royal Enfield. I preferred not to startle them by divulging my identity and left Padua. 

We returned to Semliguda by 2 o'clock. A hasty bath and a quick lunch followed. I had asked a few of my friends from Jeypore and Sidhu(my younger brother) to accompany us to the top of Deomali. However others failed to turn up and Sidhu delayed his start from Jeypore. It was getting too late. I called him up and told him not to come and we started from Semliguda to Deomali at 3.15 in the afternoon. The plateau looked resplendent in the afternoon light of the sun, the right setting for photography. We took a left turn from the Kundli haat. This haat is famous through out the district for vegetables. The Mali tribe who inhabit the valleys near Deomali are very laborious people and they grow the best vegetables of the region using the traditional organic practices. Kundli haat is where all the vegetables are traded and then make their way to different parts of Odisha and Andhra Pradesh. The arch at Kundli haat welcomes all the visitors to Deomali peak. From Kundli onwards the road passes through a scenic valley with high and bare hills on two sides and cultivation and crystal clear streams in the middle. Anybody passing through this valley with a camera in hand cannot help but stop many times on this road to click pictures. So did we. The afternoon golden light had made the valley even more alluring. Though we were getting late we could not resist the temptation to take pictures. 

                     Deomali Peak, 1672 Mtrs from mean sea level as seen from the road leading to it

                                                      Deomali peak as seen from the valley below.

                                                                       Deomali Here I come

We reach Thuria, the village at the base of Deomali. The road from Thuria to Deomali is a riders delight. The zig-zagging mountain road felt awesome to ride on. As we rode up hill I felt the temperature dipping and the light fading. We reached at the shoulder of Deomali which offers a panoramic view of most of the hills and valleys around it. There is a 3 km stretch of road that runs on the shoulder of the hill and is the most scenic part of the road. The road ends at a place from where the peak is 2 kms away. We could see the sun fast disappearing behind the distant hills. We had to make it to the top of Deomali before darkness. But that seemed an impossible feat now. It was nearing five o'clock and the sun almost ready to go for the night. We were almost two hundred meters below the summit. A family was out there picnicking when we reached. Apart from them there was old cow-herder, smoking a rolled tobacco leaf. He asked for alms with a wide grin to which I could not say no. We decided to trek as far up as possible towards the peak before darkness. The picnicking family left the place as we started our trek, so did the cow-herder along with his custody. 

The roads on Deomali

Right there where it was Made to be

                                                              Eastern side of Deomali

                                                          The magical sunset at Deomali

                                                                 While trekking up Deomali

The only time the tripod was of used

There we were on the mountain, just two of us. With the light fading away rapidly we trekked at a brisk pace. The anabatic mountain breeze was sweeping across the hill side. We reached an observation tower(view point). By now we were a little out of breath. It was almost dark now. To reach the peak was our target, but given the terrain we were walking on it would have been very difficult to come back from the summit unhurt in the dark. The mountain side was full of loose boulders and scrub. There were also many sloth bears on the other face of the hills which we might unknowingly stumble upon inadvertently. I always carry a small Maglite torch with me but that would not have been of much use while trekking up or down. We stop at the watch tower to enjoy the vista for a while before going downhill again. We sat on the tower enjoying the serenity and tranquillity of Deomali. We decided to keep mum for sometime. I inhaled and filled my lungs with the clean and cold mountain air and it had its own magical effect on the body. Every muscle and nerve felt extremely relaxed. A few insects chirped under some boulder or in some bush, a red-wattle lapwing gave its did-you-do-it , did-you-do-it call at some distance, a few birds sang their evening songs to bid adieu to the departing day. To the west, behind the hill, the sun had already sank into a slumber. Only the golden glow of its fading rays lit up the western sky like a golden canvas. To the east I could see the full moon(it was a full moon day) lazily rising above the rim of distant hills. Down below in the valleys to my right and left a thick mist was descending on the villages. We sat there for quite a while. The tower was half broken, some of the steel rods used in its construction had been stolen, the place was littered with polythene wrappers, cigarette packs etc. The tower's walls and pillars served as the "wall of fame" or I must say "wall of name" for many lovers of the district. This has to stop somehow. 

The Vista from the top most watch tower of Deomali

Deomali Landscape 

I was not at all feeling like leaving that place. The only thought that bothered me while sitting there was in case one of our bikes broke down on the way or got a flat tyre we could be in real trouble. I kept that thought to myself and prayed for a safe ride back up to Semliguda. We started our walk back to the place where our REs were parked below. We collected dry brushwood along the way and made a small bonfire on the road for ourselves. The bonfire was a token celebration for having made it to Deomali at last. It was an end to years of waiting, years of yearning and here I was at the Deomali, the highest hill in the whole of Eastern Ghat mountain range. Lighting the fire was not easy though on the windy mountain top. Lighting up the fire we sat there for a while, posed for a few photographs near it. The road on which we were sitting had Maoist slogans and messages written all over it. We call it a day. As the fire died down we started on our way back. The full moon in its full glory lit up the bare mountain side in a ghostly shade. On the way back we saw Barn Owls sitting on the ground, probably the red wattle lapwing which was calling did-you-do-it a few minutes ago and a fox. On one of the U-turns on the way down a few men suddenly appeared with long staves in their hand and gave quite a shock to both of us. Udayan was leading this time. One of the man raised his arm to ask for lift but we did not stop for obvious reasons. I sighed in relief when we reached Thuria village. From then on we drove faster. On the way between Thuria and Kundli Udayan told me there was four-wheeler which was trying to catch up with us. I told him to accelerate and in two minutes we were to far ahead to be caught up with. 

The Bonfire

We reached Semliguda at about 8 o'clock. After having a little snack break there we checked out of the hotel and proceeded on our way to Jeypore, my home town. The journey to Jeypore was uneventful. We reached Jeypore around 9.30pm. That was the end to Day-3. The off road biking earlier in the day gave us the high we were looking for. Deomali without a doubt was the literal high point of our trip. These two beautiful places along with many other in Koraput hold a lot of potential to be promoted as tourist destination. But sometimes it amazes me that many people of Odisha don't have the slightest idea that places like Deomali exist in their own state. Vigorous promotion and good tourist facilities at the right places by the tourism department can definitely help to increase visitors foot fall. Deomali as I noticed has scope for adventure sports such as trekking and para-gliding. My word for any one reading this : Deomali is definitely a place you must see in Odisha. 

Hope you enjoyed the travelogue as much as I loved the travel.

Day-4: To Continue, Trek to the base of 160 mtr high Duduma water fall in the next post. Till then these photographs will keep you company.

For more of my pictures visit my Flickr photo stream at http://www.flickr.com/photos/75813070@N08/
or My Picasa web album at  https://plus.google.com/u/0/photos/108824607231013281975/albums

Re-discovering Koraput : Day-2

Route : Berhampur-Srikakulam-Rajam-Rambhadrapuram-Salur-Pottangi-Semiliguda

When in Berhampur Do as the Berhampurias Do:

Though the actual Odia name of the city is "Brahmapur" it has come to be pronounced and written as Berhampur since the time of British rule, as the British had this ill-famed reputation of corrupting every Indian name to suite their tongues. As an unwritten rule any Berhampuria doesn't return from his/her morning walk without having breakfast or tea at some roadside tiffin(breakfast, as we call it in our part of the country) stall, or that is what it appeared to me. Udayan and me were supposed to leave Berhampur as "early" as possible in the morning. However it was not until 7.30 or 8 am that we were awake. Though the alarms were set at 6 o'clock, we slept till 8 o'clock, snoozing the alarms. We finished our daily morning chores hastily, taking turns. The first thing we noticed when we stepped out of the hotel to have breakfast, that it was a great sunny morning, exactly the kind of day you would wish for while on a biking tour. Having said that Berhampur is a pot-pourri of Odia and Telugu cuisines, the morning breakfast can not be skipped at any cost. I am a street food junky from very early days. So we set out to break our fasts with some steaming Idly accompanied by sambar, chutney and the typical Odia guguni. Guguni is not so popular among the Telugu people, but for Odia people it is like water. Especially the Odias of the coastal districts. Guguni goes well with almost anything and everything. Be it idly, puri, upma, kakara and halwa (can you believe it, curry of lentils and potatoes poured over your plate of halwa). The bond of guguni and coastal Odia people is so strong that we(me and my brother Situ bhaina, apparently belonging to hills of Odisha) used to crack a joke on this love for guguni. The joke goes something like this. A person breathing his last, in any other part of the country, will die asking for water, i.e paani...! paani...!(as we often see in our movies). But a typical coastal Odia guy in his death bed will die groaning guguniii....! guguniii...! (No offences meant). However personally I find it a little hard to digest that guguni can be had with almost anything. However a mixed serving of sambar, chutney and guguni with idly, puri, upma, uttapam etc is a combo that no Odia or Telugu guy can say no to. So we scout for a road side stall serving the above delicacies and there is no dearth of such stalls in Berhampur. Very soon we find one and start our gorging of literally steaming idly with sambar, chutney and guguni. What a sumptuous breakfast it was. The sambar and guguni were a little hotter than what I expected them to be. Along with us, some twenty men and women, most of them in their fifties were busy gorging similar stuff at the stall. They all, from their attire, appeared to me like morning walkers. Breakfast was followed by cups of tea. Then we went looking for a cobbler to repair Udayan's Woodland shoe, his trusted old companion of seven years in times thick and thin.
We checked out of the hotel at 9.30 am. Loading and fastening of our bags to the bikes took another 15 mins, In the meanwhile the hotel owner and a few other guys were questioning us like a judging panel. We said good bye to them before they could completely satiate their curiosity. We took the Komapalli-Lanjipalli flyover and were out on NH-5. We filled out fuel tanks at a filling station near Konisi. Right at ten we were cruising on NH-5.

On the outskirts of Berhampur 

NH-5 , The road as straight as a die:

We had to cover nearly 170 kilometres on NH-5. The roads as straight as a die and the excellent surface could not contain the teenagers with in us and we let the two REs run full throttle. When a RE goes all guns blazing on a highway it is a sight to behold, and there were two of them for the admiration and bewilderment of the onlookers. We went past each and every vehicle plying on the highway. Constantly clocking speeds of 110 and 115 kmph was an amazing experience. In certain patches we kept cruising at 120 kmph for kilometres together and our bikes responding to the throttle like the most docile horse. Tekkali was the pit stop for tea and re-hydration. At exactly hundred kilometers from Berhampur, Tekkali was the right stop for a break. We had covered the 100 kilometers in just one hour. At the tea stall which was inside a filling station we drank some water and sitting on the verandah of the shop praised ourselves for the zippy progress we had made. We knew that we were running 4 hours late from our schedule. Sitting there I clicked some pictures for the memoir. Two-three pariah kites(scavenging birds) were flying low near the filling station, offering good shots. When I was trying to get one of them into focus I spotted three more birds flying much higher. Initially they looked like open-billed storks. But a closer view through the view finder of my camera revealed something else. Alas. They were pelicans. Spot-billed pelicans in every probability. I motioned to Udayan that they are pelicans. In the excitement of the situation  I could not take a good photographs of the birds though. I clicked two photographs, one was out of focus and the other one was grossly against the sun. Anyway that was a lifer for me. Pelicans on the highway. The Telineelapuram bird sanctuary is located close to the town of Tekkali where Spot-billed Pelicans and Painted Storks arrive from upper reaches of our hemisphere in winter. Unfortunately the place was not on our itinerary.
Twenty minutes of rest and again we were on the roads with the exception that we had swapped our bikes. Once again we were cruising at three digit speeds till we reached the Chillakapalem tri-junction. We took a right turn from this junction to enter the Chillakapalem-Pondur-Rajam-Rambhadrapuram road. Here we stopped again to check our baggage and refastened them. Here the first glitch of the trip surfaced. We had swapped bikes for only 70 kms. Our backs having accustomed to the riding postures of our respective bikes did not take it too well. I felt the pain in my lower back and Udayan felt the pain higher on his back. We mutually agreed not to swap bikes any more through out the trip. The bikes did not take the swapping very agreeably as well and responded with punitive measures later in the trip, at least Udayan's RE did. To start with, Udayan's RE won't start with the self starter when we resumed our journey. It sprang to life with the kick starter but the electric motor starter did not work. His battery had run low. Udayan's heart sank at the juncture. I cheered him up saying that its fine and we will get it fixed at Jeypore.

The High-way

Udayan Rides On

Biriyani and Sambar

At one thirty in the after noon we were at Ramabhadrapuram. The dhaba at Ramabhadrapuram is a crowded place as most of the vehicles plying on NH-26(previously NH-43) beween Vishakhapatnam and Jeypore stop there for food or refreshment. Again our bikes parked out side the dhaba with the baggages tied attracted onlookers and admirers. My order was Chicken biriyaani(Andhra Style) and Udayan wanted a plain Andhra thali(meal) that included liberal helpings of  sambar and rasam to go with it. Udayan wanted me to try some sambar and rasam with the biriyaani. I hesitatingly took a morsel and found its taste quite amusing. After finishing off the meal we left the town of Ramabhadrapuram. Let me tell you for the information sake that Rambhadrapuram and Salur are among the filthiest towns of northern Andhra Pradesh. The lesser time you spend there, the better you will feel. Just outside the town we found for ourselves a shady place, on a culvert, to snatch some rest and stretch our backs. The pain acquired from the swapping of bike had waned to a great extent by now. We lay stretched on the culvert for sometime, listening to the calls of parakeets, bulbuls and copper-smith barbets in the fields near-by and  travellers passing by were giving us bewildered looks. 2.30 pm saw us back on the road.

Here come the Hills

Riding High

While travelling on NH-26, just prior to entering the small town of Salur, the faint outlines of distant hill ranges appear before you. These hills are the eastern face of the great Eastern Ghat mountains. Closer you approach them, they present a more imposing and majestic view. The NH-26 winds its way through these hills for around 40 kms. These 40 kms are a bliss to the traveller seeking picturesque view and a nightmare for the less fortunate ones having travel-sickness tendencies. There is a temple right at the beginning of the ghat from Salur side. The vehicles stop there to pray for a safe journey and passage through the ghat roads. I had my camera hanging from my neck when we began our ride up hill. The Classic 350 negotiating the curves like a hot knife slicing through butter. It was an ecstatic feeling. On earlier occasions I had driven cars along that road and it was great fun. But riding a RE Classic was something far more euphoric. The torque of the motorcycle urging hard to me to speed up but I kept a restraint on the throttle to make it a safe ride. Since Udayan had buried his camera somewhere deep inside his cavernous bag I had to do all the photography for the memoirs. We stopped now and then to click. After negotiating the first range of hills,  which are in Andhra Pradesh territory, we came to the top of a ridge. I was video-graphing the ride, with one hand on the throttle and the camera in the other, when we reached the ridge and the hills of my state appeared in front. Many a times I have seen them appear before me on earlier journeys along that road but the feeling I had this time to see them is beyond my words. The hills that I can call my own were welcoming me with arms wide open. The view from the border of the two states is bound to take one's breath away. It did take my breath away, one more time. There after the progress was very slow. We would stop often to take photographs, of the landscape and of ourselves. This continued till we reached Pottangi. Its worth mentioning here that the highest highway road point of the state is on this route. The point from where the descent to the western face of the hills begins, is the highest highway road point in the whole of Eastern Ghat. The altitude at this point is nearly 1100 metres from mean sea level. The peak of Deomali is clearly visible from this place. Many travellers stop at this point to enjoy the vista for a while before proceeding on their way. So did we. The expansion work of the highway is on(since last two years) near this part and is probably the roughest patch on the entire length of the highway.

Hills that Talk to You: View from the roads of Salur-Sunki Ghats

Winding Roads : Ride to Unwind
On Salur-Sunki Ghat

ME

Parked Beauties(Somewhere near Sunki)

Our Own Valley of Flowers(View of Deomali from highest road point)

We reached Semliguda at about 5.30 pm and checked into a hotel named Bright Star. We washed ourselves clean and set out to go to Sunabeda town where the aero engine manufacturing facility of Hindustan Aeronautics Ltd. is located and my friend Udayan had grown up. It was time for him to get nostalgic. We roamed about the town for sometime. Udayan showed to me his school, hang outs, play grounds and the house in which he lived. We also went to the aeronautical museum which houses a few photographs of the initial days of HAL and a "flying coffin" i.e a MIG-21. The MIG had participated in the 1971 war with Pakistan. The jet engine had been removed from the body and is on display separately. The body along with the cockpit is placed outside for the public to see. One thing that we noticed was, the MIG's body was full of patch works like a poor fellows rags. Small patches of metals riveted to the body at a hundred place. I wondered if the pilots who flew it knew about the patch works or were brave enough to take those machines out into open sky despite knowing the risks involved. My respect for the brave pilots of our nation doubled after seeing this for myself.
We went back to Semliguda as it was dinner time. There is a restaurant named C'n'C at the heart of Semliguda. We went in to it and ordered soup for the starter. Paratha and chilly chicken followed the soup. The food was good, but the place was too crowded. A noisy family was dining along with us and they appeared to be good enough to beat the size of the families from a Suraj Badjatya flick. A noisy end to Day-2.  The cruising on NH-5 and the Salur-Sunki ghat were definitely the high points of the day. I went to sleep  thinking how many souls get to travel through these heavenly landscapes? And how many of them get to ride on a Royal Enfield on those ethereal roads?

Lucky ME, huh?

Re-discovering Koraput

What will be the apt  quote to start a  travelogue? 

"The ride to the destination is as interesting as the destination" ? 

Or "The journey not the arrival matters"(T.S.Eliot) 

or "Two roads diverged in a wood and I took the one less  travelled by"(Robert Frost). All above lines make sense to travellers in their own way.

The broad categorization of the travellers according to me goes something like this

1. the one who takes the age old beaten path as earlier taken by many
2. the one who takes the path less travelled, the path full of adventure and anticipation

Strictly speaking this is a broad categorization. However there is another breed of travellers, to which I belong. The traveller who doesn't shy away from the beaten path. Rather he takes the same beaten path but comes out with a list of things that the Category i) travellers failed to see on the way.

And I can say with conviction that I am one of them. The travelogue I am going to narrate here for you is based on the very essence of the above lines.

It took me nearly six months to zero in on the motorcycle that I should buy. The only bikes that came to my mind back then were the TVS Apache RTR or Yamaha FZ. I had not in my wildest imagination thought of buying another Royal Enfield, as I had already spent a fortune on  acquiring and restoring a 1965 Royal Enfield the previous year. Since I needed a bike to commute between home and office and occasional touring, the old Royal Enfield, I knew, would fail me miserably given its poor fuel efficiency and highly unreliable mechanicals/electricals. A timely pay hike and a test ride of a 500 cc Royal Enfield Desert Storm(belonging to my friend Aditya) did the trick. Then there was no stopping till the a Royal Enfield Classic 350 stood at my door step on the evening of 4th April 2012. It was a impulsive as well as a well weighted decision to buy a Classic 350. A 350 Classic costs nearly 1.5 times as much as any other RTRs, CBZs or Unicorns do, gives nearly the same  mileage in spite of flaunting a 350 cc mill and most importantly much more comfortable than any other Indian bike when it comes to long rides. To cut a long story short I finally gave in to the temptation of owning another Royal Enfield and join the breed of motorcyclists who consider themselves a  league extraordinaire . I was indifferent to the burden that it would pile on my monthly balance sheet for at least a year to come.  Anyway, I was a proud owner of a Royal Enfield Classic 350 by I was 26. Sounds like quite an achievement. While I was running the bike in during the first 5 or 6 thousand  kilometres I started hatching plans for the tours that I would be taking in the winter. And the first thing that came to my mind was that my Royal Enfield must tread on the soil of Koraput this winter. First things first. Subsequently I gave a definite shape to the plan and attached an objective to the plan.

Koraput needs no introduction to someone from Odisha. But let me give a brief introduction of Koraput for the benefit of our outsider friends. Koraput is a district in the southern part of Odisha. The district is divided roughly into two parts by the Eastern Ghat hills viz a hill range running north-south, ranging between 700-1650 mtrs above mean sea level and another plateau 300-600 mtrs high from sea level but mostly flat country with little undulation. The lower plateau lies due west to the high hill range. The hills give Koraput a climate that is comparable only to a few other places of the state and a beautiful landscape that is comparable to none. The hills and dales of Koraput are the home to a number of aborigine tribes such as Poroja, Kondh, Dhurua, Bhumiya etc. who have been inhabiting there since time immemorial. Nature has bestowed Koraput with immense beauty and bountiful resources. In spite of all the bounties of nature Koraput has remained an underdeveloped district of the state. Most of its population live a life that revolves around a square meal for the family, completely at the mercy of nature. The tourism potential the district holds is good enough to make the district a tourism centric economy. However as is the case in the whole state of Odisha, we don't have anything in spite of having everything.

Coming to our travelogue I hatched a rough plan during the month of July-August to ride all the way to Koraput from Bhubaneswar on the Royal Enfield and return. A visit to Deomali peak(the highest peak in the entire Easter Ghat hill range) had always eluded me. So it was a must visit place for me during the trip.  To undertake the feat alone was not a wise thing to do I thought and explained the plan to a few trusted friends who could give me the kind of company I needed. It was not just the company I was looking for but a person who had the right kind of temperament as I have and one who must be able to soak in the beauty of Koraput rather than complaining about the bad roads. The right man on my mind was my friend Udayan. He, having grown up at Sunabeda in Koraput is an avid lover of nature and the right kind of person one would like to be friends with. During a casual conversation I revealed to him my desire to take my Royal Enfield to Koraput and especially Deomali. Right things said at the right time do have the right effect. He jumped at the proposition of going to Koraput and that too on a bike. He instantly made up his mind to go on the trip with me on his Royal Enfield Thunderbird Twin Spark. TBTS in short. Till mid September the plan was just a vague idea. To give it some definite shape we choose to attach an objective, and the task we choose was to photograph Koraput landscapes extensively. Aditya, the owner of the Desert storm was also supposed to go with us but he had to back out as his bike had some serious electrical issues.

The Plan in Short:

To ride on two REs to Koraput district. Visit the most visited tourist places of Koraput over a weeks time. Take photographs at those places from a different perspective. Keep a look out for interesting bird species. Collect information on wildlife if going to a wild area. Eat well. Ride Safe and Pheel Good.

The Preparation:

The preparation for the trip started with making a monetary provision for the week long sojourn. Next came the thought to make ourselves and the REs fit for the long rides. Me and Udayan being grossly overweight and not too athletic we decided to hit the jogging track every morning for at least a month before the trip. But the month of jogging had hardly 15 days in it instead of the usual 30. Then came the riding gears. Gears were sourced from a store in Bhubaneswar at a price little higher than what they should be.(thankfully the city has at least two stores to choose from). Udayan took care of the packing list as efficiently as a good housewife would, thus I was relieved of that chore. First aid, Swiss knife, scissor and hordes of such other items were very meticulously packed by him. I had taken leave in advance from our my job stating "Personal Work" as the reason behind the absence.

The D-Day:

The evening of 26th was when we shopped for bungee chords, ear plugs for Udayan and such stuffs. Both of us were fighting the mixed emotions of excitement, anxiety and fear with in. This continued till we rolled out of Udayan's place the next day evening.

Udayan Smiling Behera

Ready to Roll 

27th of October in the last week of October was the day we set out on the trip. The plan for day one was to start from Bhubaneswar late in the afternoon(say 4'o clock). Reach Balugaon by twilight. Kill the time of twilight there and start for Berhampur after complete darkness. Twilight time is the worst time to ride on a highway they say. Reach Berhampur and spend the night there and start for Semiliguda early next morning. Again schedules/plans are made either to be skipped or deferred. The starting point was Udayan's place. Udayan's mom was really concerned about our safety and kept telling us the do's and don'ts till we left the place. By the time we fastened our baggages to our pillion seats and got ready to roll it was 5.15 pm. A halt near Khandagiri to fill petrol in the TBTS, check air in the wheels and meet Tanuja and we hit the open highway. National Highway No-5, the life line of east coast of India. I let out a hurrah out on the highway. The dream was coming true and the feeling had yet to sink in that I was really out on a tour on my RE.   Gangapada toll plaza was the next stop. It was getting dark rapidly and we decided to halt for 15-20 mins to allow complete nightfall. What can be a better way to kill time than sipping a cup of tea, must say a glass of tea, in a way side dhaba or stall? There for the first time we got an idea of what is going to happen through out the trip. A few truck drivers and the tea stall guy fixed their gaze at our REs and us alternately. Then came the volley of questions like where are you coming from ? , where are you going to ? such a long distance ? what mileage does your bike give? etc. There was no escaping from this during the whole trip, wherever we went. 

The ride up to Berhampur was a smooth one. When we were totally out of the city limits and onto the less crowded parts of the highway we unleashed all the 23 horses beneath us. The progress we made was pretty quicker than we had anticipated and we reached Berhampur by 9 pm with stop overs at  two or three places to have chai and to re-fasten our bags. Udayan's bag was a thing to see. The bag he was carrying could very easily accommodate two 12 year old kids. I had no idea then what things he had stuffed into it. Carrying ones home along I thought.

Now Berhampur is a town that has a Nandan hotel in every second street. We had a difficult time finding the one we were looking for. After twenty minutes of search we found the one we were to check in to. We checked into a decent looking room that had the furnitures of 1980s. Only the LCD TV and split air conditioner looked like the things in the room that have some connection with our era. We didn't mind the antique nature of the furniture until the tariff was light on pocket, the bathroom clean and the mattress pest-free. It was getting close to ten when we set out of the hotel room to have dinner.

Of Chicken and Chicks :  

Berhampur offers a wide range of choice for a foodie. The food here is an unique amalgamation of Odia and Telugu flavours which is sure to tickle the taste buds. The style of preparation of food here is famous in Odisha as the Ganjaam style of cooking and all the Ganjamia people are very fond of non-vegetarian food. Personally I like the biriyani prepared in Ganjam style which actually is not biriyani but pulaao with a liberal dose of chillies in it. But Udayan wanted to have roti for dinner. So we went to the Girija restaurant near Ramalingam Tank in the heart of Berhampur. The restaurant is a land mark itself in the city. It is some 50 years old and is famous for its various dishes of chicken, pakoda being the most famous of all. My father used to be a regular to the place while he was a student of Berhampur university in the late seventies. We ordered chicken pakoda, chicken curry(the Ganjam special) and tandoor rotis. The curry and pakoda were real delights. The dessert that followed was the Girija special pudding and was awsome. To top it all, a family dining on the next table had two girls and the girls or at least one of the two girls was giving us cursory and sometimes long glances. I guess it was our roadie appearance that appealed to her. A truly happy meal I can say. 

Then it was time to take rest for the long day that lay ahead. We went back to the hotel and tried to snatch some sleep before six. The plan was to leave Berhampur as early as possible the next morning. Unfortunately there was only one double blanket provided in the room.(I guess it was a typical honeymooning lodge!). Now don't let your imagination run wild. We had to adjust. That's it.

A peaceful end to a day full of anticipation. According to us the ride from Bhubaneswar to Berhampur was the toughest most dangerous one. Firstly because we had to do it in the evening and secondly the wretched highway is home to drunk half-dead small vehicle drivers and even more dead truck drivers as Aditya puts it. The road diversions due to ongoing four-laning work are hardly visible even in broad daylight, thanks to NHAI. Night is night after all. We covered the 170 kms without any untoward event, it was a great relief.  I went to sleep feeling happy and satisfied. All anxiety and fear had vanished into the moonlit highway night. Eager to hit the roads again next morning. 

Day-2 to continue in the next post.

Awsome NH-5, Pelicans. Salur Ghat etc in the next post.