Dandeli Adventure Weekend.

This write-up, on Dandeli Adventure Weeked , is given by Prasad Kothe. Thank you for the write up on the dandeli experience, Prasad!

This write up was originally posted here:
http://www.facebook.com/notes/prasad-kothe/dandeli-adventure-weekend-17-18-april-2010/111932988842559


"Big jump with water around going thru a cave.”

We reached hubli sometime in the morning @ 7.30 AM and travelled to Dandeli via a bus and reached the outskirts of the
sanctuary from where the jeeps of the resort took us into the wildlife. It reminded me of Jurassic park and I am very happy that the dinosaurs are extinct. We had some poha(good start when u r hungry) and left for pitching the tents and had lunch after our introduction and this helped as I now know at least 4 of 30 people by name. It was now afternoon and we had the excitement of water rafting blown away as there was rain the earlier day due to which the dams gates cannot be opened as it could drown the village. You see government thinks about the people, . Since village was more important than our rafting, we moved to plan B of doing the Big Jump while Rappelling for the remaining part of the day and hoped we could do rafting the next day. Suddenly, for some strange reason the gates were opened by the authorities and everyone jumped out of joy except those who still could not have their rappelling fun for now. “The water cannot wait but the rocks can” so we moved to the shore of river kali and had fun like kids where we welcomed everyone into water with splashes of water. I did not know swimming and so I made sure I had someone who knew it beside me and that was good. Finally the boats(air filled water floating material called rafting boats) came and we had now divided into 4 teams( 8 , 8, 8, 5) and had started getting into river by round 6pm which was the time when the rafting would normally end as it gets dark. since GHAC is the greatest we were given a chance and we enjoyed the fun. This was a good team of people who did not see each other until 20 hrs back but still able to go in the dark on the river. The water trek was an 8 km of drive with water around and the possibility of being alive if we fall into water was feeble as there are no lights and the sun did not care to wait for us. But after 2.5 hrs of rafting in the wonderful weather and peaceful wildlife sanctuary under the moon(nelavanka) we reached some place where the jeep had its lights on indicating we still are on earth. I believe this is an example of team work where everyone collaborated perfectly even
with a stranger. Finally we called it a day of outing and had dinner at the resort and in the campfire some had exhibited /demonstrated skills of singing (good for singers like me, others cannot escape and I can have my full course vocal meal ).The music by Kranti on his guitar was very nice while others sang nice songs in melody that people fell asleep(also could be due to getting exhausted). Next day we got up at 5.00 and left for the cavala caves by 5.30 and reached a spot from where we had walked for about 4 kms to reach a curvy stairs of 500 steps which ended at the entrance of the cavala caves. The guide had taken everyone in a set of 10 people thru the cave where we had seen the lord Shiva formed by water drops from the cave. Nature can design wonderfully even in dark caves, and we just still can’t agree that nature is better than us. We did enjoy the dark caves and as per the guide there is a route from the cave to haridwar(I don’t know if I can try it). We started back but this time the jeeps were there at the end of the 500 steps and boy that was good as I had some issues with my knee and this was a relief (at least for me) which took us back to the resort. Enroute we stopped at a kirana store and had some soft drinks and played volleyball before getting on the jeep and going back to the resort. On the way back we feared poha so much for breakfast that we branded Poha(poha , poha juice, poha pickle, poha shirts, poha media company and others).But thank god, it was upma , ha ha ha. Now, I wanted to sleep for a while as others were going for either rapelling(due from y’day) and for swimming(I did not know swimming). We finally started back to the Hubli Bus stand by taxi/jeep and took bus to Hyderabad and reached home in time to leave to office for monitor check(after all we keep seeing monitors so much that everyone of us can become an expert in monitor quality check).
Thanks to Sishir, Prashant Pai and everyone for the pains in organizing this, and being a sport. I had fun time.
I am waiting for my next fun time, are you?