Trip to Shivana Samudra

Date : 10/18/2009 6:20 AM
Route : Bangalore - Muthati - Shivana Samudra - Gagan Chukki falls - Bhara Chukki falls - Talakad - B'lore
Vehicle : NEW Hyundai i10 - Blue
Journey : 1 day, 300 Kms
Camera : LG KP500, 3M

Santosh, my office Colleague bought a new i10 and he has learnt to drive in city. His interest in long journey driving requested me for assistance. A 1 day trip to Shivana Samudra falls on Cauvery river was planned for during Diwali weekend. Me, Santosh & his parents were the occupants.



All the way, he drove the vehicle and there was minimal guidance from me. As per plan we started early in the morning from Bangalore along National highway 209, for some 40 kms till Kanakapura, had breakfast and took a deviation along village roads to go along Cauvery river upstream and reached point 1, Muthati.

Due to recent floods, river seems to have strong currents. Quite inhabitated and not much interesting, we went to a small temple and spent some time on the shores of the river. To my surprise, Santosh's mother was quite adventurous where we felt some fear! We have seen some boating camp with people about to go on rafting.

Now we took off from there to point 2 Shivana Samudra along some hilly regions, where the driver got good experience of few S-curves, step inclines which he easily maneuvered. This place was 100+ years old, and first hydro electric project constructed (in India suppose!!). There is our first water falls, Gagan chukki. (sky drop). Too many cars, nice girls & couples were already enjoying there at this dead-end. The place was simply awesome with beautiful scenery & noise of water falls. No metrics regarding height, volume of falls, but too much of water flowing in narrow rockways! From a viewpoint, enjoyed few minutes and took few snaps. Later, had a good home packaged lunch under a big tree which almost gave shade for number of cars.

Moving on to next point on the other side of the river, crossed the river by travelling 10 kms reached another waterfalls named Bhara chukki (never ending?). This was somewhat larger in area and lucky thing is we had a rock steps to reach the bottom. We started climbing down but worried if we can ever come back climbing! As soon we entered the base of the falls, there were lot of people. We had taken a round manual theddu (mara boat?) to go near the falls in the river (aka niagara falls!!). 5 members in the boat, sitting balanced, had a thrilling experience on that joy ride. One of them was full speed rotation in the water. We kept on screaming with joy!!



Now its time to manually cross some rock path in the river to go under the falls! It was tough to cross with water flow & knee/hip height water with slippery and unstable base. Somehow reached the other end with some helping hands! Then awe! WOW...people taking bath under the falls (especially young girls! -:))

Could n't resist temptation, jumped & went under the falls to feel the cold water. You can enjoy the massage of the water falling hard on your body. Had fun there with other groups screaming and enjoying. We all 4 members spent time there feeling some hot water underneath & cold water up!

Energized or rejuvenated, we climbed the rocks uphill easily, believe it or not! As time is reaching sunset, we had to reach our last point Talakad. This place was 25 kms from there and we experienced bad roads almost 20 kms/hr. It was almost dark while we reached this historical place. Lots of temples buried in Sand with excavation still going on under Archeology Dept. We took a guide who took us places and explained the history. I didn't get anything because of Kannada, but I can understand the place visually!

Now its almost 9 PM and we are almost 130 kms to home. The night driving was good and we took Mysore-Bangalore road which was expressway kinda road. We almost done 70-80 in the dark night with other vehicles simply overtaking from left!

Finally we landed at home at around 12.30 AM and I had to rest at Santosh's home.

At the end of the day, We all together had a great weekend with our new driver getting lots of confidence!

Bye for now,
Murali