Trek to Dhabbe Falls and Kanoor Fort

Before starting this blog about the experiences of the beautiful trek to Dhabbe Falls and Kanoor fort, I would like to tell you one thing if you are only interested about the route and how to reach the Kanoor Fort, please go to the end of this blog. All the information are provided there…

It been a long time we had a trek, since elephant census we never gone for a trek. We are insisting Aman and yogi to arrange a trek; at last they came up with the plan of trek to Kanoor fort. As soon as the place and dates are finalized we started checking with all of our friends who are willing to join with us, finally 11 of us agreed to go for the trek .. me, Aman, Yogi, Prashant, Shwetha, Om Guru, Guru, Ashok, Praachi, Giri, Akash. Myself and Guru started from Bangalore to sagara and the rest of the folks came from Mysore. We booked the ticket to Sagara and the bus started by 9:30 pm sharp and we both were very happy to know that the bus started on time. It reached Shimoga by 4:30 am, again on time and the driver took the bus to depot and stoped in the depot, after 30 mins only we realized that the front tyre of the bus got punctured both the driver and conductor were struggling in removing the nuts from the tyre. For our fate there were no mechanic for the night shift.. this is the sad part of Shimoga bus depot, our own CM’s native L . After struggling for 2 hours we were able to replace the tyre and get the bus out of the depot and headed towards to sagara.

We reached sagara and from there we boarded a bus to Karagal which is 30 KM from sagara. We reached there in 1 hour and from there we boarded one more bus to Biligaru.The rest of the people joined us in Kargal. One important thing here is there are lot of buses to Kargal but there are few buses to Biligaru. While planning for the trek please make sure to reach Kargal early. Biligaru is another 20 KM from Kargal. After some 40 mins of travel we reached Biligaru.

Biligaru is the starting point of trek to Dhabbe falls. From Biligaru Dhabbe falls is 8 kms. We had breakfast there in Biligaru and started the trek after a KM of walking, Guru started jumping, it took some fraction of seconds to realize that there is a Green wine Snake wrapped around Guru’s leg, He was struggling to get the snake out of his leg at the meantime myself and yogi were taking out the camera to capture the photo, but all the effort gone in vein, cos the snake was so frightened we didn’t see where it went. For your information there are lot of snakes in the route, be careful while you trek. There are leaches also. We started from there and continued the trek , the place was awesome and the scenic beauty cannot be expressed in words. There are some agricultural lands also in the path and a lot stream was flowing in the route. We no need to worry about the water in whole trek there are plenty of streams flowing. While walking we found one more Green Wine Snake near to one stream, Prache identified the snake. We all gathered around it and took a lot of photograph. It didn’t move at all, as if it was giving a pose to us.

After trek of around 2 hours we reached Dhabbe falls. There is a house near to Dhabbe falls we need to pay Rs 5 per person and register our name. The path towards Dhabbe falls is very steep and be careful while getting down. We got down and saw the falls from distance, it was HUGE ………….. very beautiful. Almost 400 mts height the water is flowing. We didn’t get down to the falls, because we need to cover another 18 KM to Kanoor Fort so we consoled ourselves by seeing the falls from distance. Since there are lots of leaches we cannot stand still for long time and watch the falls. After some photo sessions we started climbing back to the house. We had our lunch and started enquiring the about the route to Kanoor fort. The guy in that house told us that it will be difficult to reach the Kanoor fort if we start at that time. The time was 2:00 PM and he suggested to reach the kanoor Shale (School) and stay there in night and morning start towards Kanoor Fort, since the route was very confusing we requested him to leave us in Kanoor Shale and he agreed for that and we paid some money also. The route was very confusing; we need to go in between the agricultural lands to reach that place. After walking around 10 Km we reached the kanoor shale by that time it was 6:00 Pm in evening. The school was very small but beautifully maintained. There are some houses around the school. The hard fact about that school is that some of the students are coming from 4-7 KM distance. All of them will walk to reach the school.

We started preparing for the dinner. The family near to the school gave us some firewood. I took the responsibility of making the Tea and made a Tea. After that Shwetha and Prachi our main cooks started the Palav and Pachidi preparation. We accompanied them and helped them in preparing the food. After an hour we had a nice Palav and Pachidi.. thanks to Shwetha and Prachi for their efforts of preparing nice food in spite of the tiredness. The Palav was awesome in taste and I cannot continue further without mentioning one more name behind the taste of this Palav, that is Kumuda, Sad part is that she cannot able join us in the trek to enjoy the tasty palav. After having the food we had a nice sleep. We all slept in the veranda of the school. We need to leave the school premises by 7:00 am. The next day was Karanataka Rajyotsava and the school kids will come by 7:00 am for the Rajyothsava celebrations. We all planned to wake up by 5:00 AM so that we can leave that place early.

I was thinking that nobody will wake up by 5:00 AM but surprisingly I heard Aman and Giri’s voice @ 5:00 am , hey everybody woke up except Prashant .. it’s a usual procedure he is the one always wake up late. We had a fresh tea and finished our daily routines J and had breakfast. By that time some school kids started coming and they started Rajyotsava celebration preparations. We left the place by 8:00 AM and headed towards Kanoor Fort. It was 8 KM from Kanoor Shale. The route to Kanoor Fort was beautiful, there is a jeep track. We all walked in the forest for nearly 3 hours and saw a house. We filled up all our emptied water bottles and the Kanoor fort is 1 KM from there. We need to walk in a jeep track and after a while we need to take a right turn a small place heading towards Kanoor Fort. Finally we all discovered the great Kanoor fort. It was not very huge but rigid, I think now also it can withstand any missile attacks. Be careful in the fort there are lot of snakes, we saw some three snakes in the fort. There is a Doctors house near that fort that is around 2 km from there. Now nobody is staying in doctors house. From Kanoor Fort it is 15 KM distance to Gersoppa. This is the place where we need permission from forest officials (Shimoga District forest). The whole route is full of dense forest and leaches. There is no place to relax or sit for a while, we should be walking all the way. Everybody including me got exhausted and we were desperately looking for a place to sit. Finally we saw a stream flowing and next to that there is a house. We had lunch there and relaxed for a while and started again. It was some 7 KM from there. After walking a KM we saw a beautiful stream flowing, we all had a small dip in the water and refreshed ourselves and started the journey again. Now the route was simple but all our energy got exhausted. Finally we reached gerusoppa village, here we need to cross the Sharavathy river to go to other end. The cost for each person is 1 Re. One important thing to note here is that, there are bus facilities near the bank of the river, the last bus comes by 6:30 PM. If we miss the bus we need to walk another 2 KM. Luckily we got the bus and went near the main road, from there we got into another bus towards Sagara. Its 56 KM from Gerusoppa to Sagara. We reached Sagara, Myself, Guru, Prachi , Om Guru and Shwetha boarded Bangalore Bus and rest Boarded the Mysore Bus. A beautiful Trek came to an end.

Again we were planning to go for another trek in January 2011 the place is yet to be decided. If anybody interested can contact me @ satish06@gmail.com or reach me @ 9845889803

Thanks for your patience in reading the blog.

Route Information:

Sagara – Kargal 30 Kms (By Bus)

Kargal – Biligaru: 20 Kms (By Bus)

Trek from Biligaru – Dhabbe Falls: 8 Kms

Dhabbe Falls – Kanoor School : 10 Kms

Kanoor School to Kanoor Fort: 8 Kms

Kanoor Fort to Gerusoppa : 15 Kms

Total Trek is : 41 Kms.

Photo Link:

http://picasaweb.google.com/satiphoto1/TrekkToKanooorFort#

http://picasaweb.google.com/hnprashant/KannorFort#

GPS Route : http://www.everytrail.com/view_trip.php?trip_id=872463&code=049eee2caf3bb3a55312912e33ec7e59

Elephant Census 2010

On May 11th 2010 my friend Aman called me and told me about the elephant census which is going happen from may 14 to next four days, Suddenly I have decided to go there with another 3 friends. Totally we were 5 friends myself, Aman, Vinu, Ashok and Prashant.

With all excitement we all packed our luggage’s and left to Bandipur national forest on may 14th morning and reached there by 10:00 am. The reporting time was 10:00. After reaching there I saw around 150 volunteers from all over karanataka. Some o f them are having very high end camera and I was holding my small cyber shot camera, then I realized we should have high end camera to have a beautiful snaps.. There was a training program for us on Friday i.e, on the arriving day. We need to sign the declaration on the bond paper, while putting the signature my heart started beating a lot, because of the clause mentioned in the form. I am very excited to go into the forest and equally scared also... this was my first census program attended.

The training started around 12:00 pm and DCF Hanumanthappa, Prabakar (he is the one who gave us the opportunity to go the elephant census. Million thanks to him) and one more person was there.. Sorry i dont remember his name. It was supposed to be a training but I didnt understood what they are saying. DCF himself was so confused and he dont know what to speak, we had lot of fun in hearing his Kanglish (Kannada + English).

After the training in kanglish we had lunch @ 2:00 pm. After lunch the forest officials started allotting the places for each group. We have been allotted Kundakere range in the Dhyavarmodu anti pouching camp (APC) . Slowly the allotted teams started moving to the there allotted camp. We started around 5:30 pm towards our camp in the forest jeep. While going to the camp we had one more team with us, they were allotted a APC which is on the way to our camp called chigrekaadu. Now the actual journey for the census started.

After bandipur we crossed one small village, there we did some small shopping and left the place. After traveling 1 km from the village we actually entered the forest. Only jeep can travel on that road, slowly the sunlight started weakening and we are not able to see the forest properly. Everybody in the jeep started peeping there head out of jeep anxiously, not only to spot some animals but also to make sure that no animals are there in the path. After some 10 km of journey we reached the first camp where the other team need to get down. I.e. chigrekaadu camp. The camp looked beautiful.. There was a big trench and compound around the camp, it seems be very safe from animals especially elephants. That was the first APC camp that I saw in my life.

The chigrekadu team have to get down there.. but they said that they wanted to see our camp that is Devramadu APC . They kept there luggage in that camp and came with us. Slowly the sun was going down and visibility was getting reduced. All are anxious to reach the camp, After travelling some 4 - 5 km we saw a very big female elephant standing next to the jeep route .... all of our heart stopped for a second and nobody knows what to do.. the elephant was also in the confused state , whether to leave us or attack on us .. it was coming towards the jeep and also going backward. The forester asked our driver to slow down but he is in hurry to go, he was also scared.. After some 3 mins the elephant was still and we started moving further.. I and my friend Ashok thought for a while that, have we taken the wise decision to come for the elephant census???? :)... we moved further with the jeep lights on and zero visibility around us except the jeep light... and while approaching to the camp we spotted a group of bison.. The group was having around 20 numbers ...since it was in a group we have not got that much fear, we started moving further, Very next to the APC we saw a big bison , single one just crossing our jeep route. Finally we reached the camp. huuuhhhhh ... The Dvermadu camp (Our camp) is not so secured as chigrekadu camp , there was no trench and elephants can easily come inside the camp. There are incidents of elephants entering into the camp. Everybody got into the camp and saw only one watcher was there called chandrappa. He was alone staying in the camp from past three days rest of the watchers and guard had left to their native, then chandrappa started telling some of his old stories of elephant attacks on him, meeting with Veerappan etc etc. After hearing the stories we all got more scared. He served dinner for us, after having the dinner we slept.
at any moment if we hear any sound we used to get up and look at each other...actually we didn’t sleep @ all 1:00 am.. then we heard the jeep sound and so many came they are all the watchers and guards of the devrmadu camp. We introduced ourselves to them. After seeing them our fear went away a bit and then we slept peacefully.

Next day early morning without any alarm ring all woke up by 6:30 AM except prashant... after finishing our nithya karma in jungle we got ready. They made chitranna for breakfast and we had a heavy breakfast... and we all had a photo session and we left to jungle. Actually in the elephant census there is a rule that one volunteer will go with 2 forest guards/watcher since there was a shortage of forest personnel we have decided to go together and visit all the beat (a beat is a point where one has to visit. ) about how to do the elephant census, I will be telling at the end of this blog. We had a boring day for the first few hours, because we are unable to find any elephants only we saw many bisons on way. One interesting place we saw that was a cave and the watchers who came with us told that, Veerappan used to hide in that cave. We saw places where veerappan stayed. We had lunch in the cave and started walking further and we spotted our first elephant in the census. It was standing in the valley and it was too distant from us . We could rarely spot it by our eyes, we used binocular to see that and everybody was happy. After sometime we started walking and we reached our APC. Even though the frist day story look small we all had covered 15 KM walking huuuhhhhhh ..... We drunk lot of water in the camp and the forest personnel served lemon juice and black tea made out of jaggery .. it as awesome .. While we were taking rest.. Suddenly watcher Anand told us that there is a group of elephants on the other mount of our camp. Vinu and prashant ran to see that and they spotted around 10 elephants. We spent lot of energy and time to walk to see elephants but they came to see us to the camp only :). It was a fun filled day. As usual our chanrappa and thammana gang prepared the food for dinner and it was great ... we had lot of witty talks and slept.. that was the end of first day.

As usual morning we woke up.. But this time we all had a sound sleep because of the tiredness we had in the previous day. 2nd day also same chitranna :( hmmmmm but we cannot tell anything to them also. We were so happy to get some food in the middle of forest. This day we decided to visit a beautiful place called Moyar valley. Chandrappa was asking us not to visit the place because of deep valley and he said we cannot climb the mountain. But Yasim our gaurd told us not to worry about that and we can do it.. ... We started from the camp after breakfast. Some 3o mins walk I spotted a female elephant with a baby elephant ... the baby elephant was very cute ..... I thought of bringing it to my place.. but I can't feed it .. so left the idea there itself. The day started with spotting elephants. Soon after that we saw a group of elephants on the mount. We were safe down the hill, elephants wont come down that easily and if it comes also we will have enough time to run :) around 20 elephants we spotted. We continued further and had a photo session in the middle of forest... each and everyone was giving a different poses. We started from there and reached to the top of one mountain and saw the Moyar valley from there. It was superb there is a river flowing and adjacent to the river there is thick forest .so from the top we cannot see the river, only one thick line of trees we can see. Don’t worry for those who were not part of our census the photos are link is given...
Slowly we started getting down the mountain; it was very slippery and very difficult to get down. and we took around 1 hr to get down . Once we got down we were astonished to see..WOW.. Great.. I don’t know how many time in this blog I have said awesome great ....I cannot put in words what I felt, I mean there are no words to describe also. Once in life we should visit that place, there are no roads to reach that place.. We need to walk only. Civilians a not supposed to enter, it is a restricted forest, and so only option is elephant or tiger census.

We had a nice dip in the water, after entering to the forest that was the first time we all are taking bath :). We were in the water for 1 hour. The watchers are very cautious and always looking the surroundings, since it is a water spot animals can come there at any point of time. We had lunch there, the same chitranna. Then now it is the real time to test our stamina. We were about to climb the toughest peak in the Kundakere Range. We started slowly with all the water bottle filled. I went ahead of all, accompanied by watcher Anand, Kytha and gaurd Venkatesh, in half way I got exhausted and was not able to move a bit. They three motivated me like anything and made me to reach the top, after 45 mins all the others reached. I can proudly say now I am fit enough. By the time we all reached the top it was 2:00 pm and we should reach the camp within 5 pm. usually elephants starts migrating from 4:00 pm till early morning, it is dangerous period. We have been advised not to stop anywhere. Again the fear started and we all started walking. Now it is a plain land so it is not tough enough, but we need to cover around 10 km from there to camp. After walking half the distance all the water bottles emptied and there was not water with us and everybody was feeling thirsty. Venktesh, Anand and Kytha went to bring water to the nearby pond and they found an elephant there, they ran and came back to us and said it is dangerous to stay there it may come anytime to the place where we are standing. Vinu got exhausted too much and he said he needs some rest and he laid down under the tree. we all are so much worried that the elephant may come, after 2-3 mins he got up and we all started towards the camp. It was a nonstop journey till the camp. We did not walked on the same route which we have gone in the morning, because the elephants may cross that route, so we have to take a different route and there is no proper path. The route is full of stones. Finally we reached the camp, wowwwww we finally done.

For the dinner they prepared chicken and muddhe (raagi balls) and it was great. One thing I absorbed is that the food they prepared for dinner was awesome taste, it may be the taste of the food itself or we were so hungry anything will taste more. After dinner we had a nonstop entertainment from Thammanna (Watcher). He was telling all the fun stories that had happened during his stay. We slept @ 1:00 am. Next day was waterhole count. That means we have to stay near a water point and wait for the elephants to come near it and take the count of the elephants. Since there they had only on water reservoir and they cleaned recently, the water was muddy and there were no trace of elephants for the past 15 days, and that day also the elephants didn’t came there.

Finally it was the time we need to go out of the forest, very sad. We all started packing up and can see sadness in everybody's face. The jeep should come by 11:00 am due to some problem it came by 3:00 pm. nobody wants to go out but we are all bound to the outside world we should go out only. All the cr fixing, eclipse everything was popping up in my mind :(. we all got into the jeep and started our journey it was about 25 km, this time no fear because we were sitting in the jeep and we had a double barrel gun also :). During the travel inside the forest we spotted 5 more elephants and one group of bison’s, One was staring at us like anything and was about to charge on us, it might be there leader. We left that place and reached the chigrakaadu camp and from there we picked the other team also. We reached bandipur by 6:00 from there we boarded the bus to mysore.

The story is not ended here, all the stroies are exciting and thrilling but there are sad stories also, about the staff, especially watchers who are staying the forest. They have the least facilities over there. Basically almost all of them are came from a poor family background. We gave all our sleeping mats to them and collected some money and gave them. I took the address of one watcher and sent some money to him. I told this to so many friends, they all agreed extend their help towards the watchers family. We all are leaving in such a secured area with all the great facilities we should be proud of that, they don’t know when they will be killed by some animals or poachers and they leave with fear all the days. So we 5 friends are planning to visit that place once again with some help.

How elephant census is done:
There are three types of count.
1. Block Count
2. Dung Count
3. Water hole count

1.Block Count: Everybody is given a path called beat. The volunteer need to walk along with the watchers/guards to the beat and come back to the camp, During this period they need to count all the elephants that were spotted.

2. Dung Count: One transact line (Virtual line) will be given for each volunteer, we need to calculate the perpendicular distance of the dung from the transact line.

3 Water hole count: we have to stay near a water point and wait for whole day, count the elephants that come for drinking water.

Photo Links:
http://picasaweb.google.com/satiphoto1/ElephantCensus
http://picasaweb.google.com/vinu.pix/ElephantCensus2010

The elephant census will happen again in May 2012. If anybody interested to come you can reach me @ 9845889803 or email me satish06@gmail.com . Thanks a lot for having patience to read the whole blog.