I'll Be There Dreckly: Bamboo Safari

Kumily, India (map)

In this blog: a great bus ride, a bad cycle, and a walk in the park - safari park.

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Fighting monkeys

The answers rang off like an episode of Family Fortunes; with everyone answering with total conviction as if I was asking them the colour of the sky. There was no doubt in their voices, but total disparity between their answers. The question, a simple 'What time is the bus to a Kumily?':

Hotel manager: '2.20pm, but be there at 2'

Shopkeeper nearby: '2.20pm'

Rickshaw driver: '3.00pm'

Man waiting at bus stand: '3.20pm'

Another rickshaw driver: '3.30pm'

The bus driver himself: '3.45pm'

Total confusion as ever but fortunately waiting around for an hour or so wasn't a problem - you can only smile. To be fair, public transport in India generally isn't as bad as it may sound - it runs regularly and often leaves on time, despite the ever varying quality of buses, roads and driving.

Leaving the tea town of Munnar, I took the local bus on the four hour journey south - the fare as ever, unimaginably cheap at just 87p (87 rupees). I sat next to a guy in his mid-twenties who couldn't speak English, but who upon seeing my camera whipped out his phone and proudly showed me grainy and blurry videos of landscapes that he'd filmed on his tiny phone, bless him. Later after a break a pleasant old guy, also with no English, offered me his seat by the window then some of his peanuts. The driver and conductor were also both very friendly and helpful guys, even saying hello out of the blue the next day when I passed them on the street. There's kindness on every journey in India. But the journey itself; well what can I say, except that it was one of the most beautiful I've ever been on. Winding for an hour or so through tea plantations in the mountains, with rocky summits above, then going along a high ridgeline where you could see over miles of rolling hills and forest, before dropping into valleys, passing through cardamon plantations and small villages. A lovely afternoon, made all the better by the windowless buses they have in Kerala (except for the windscreen, that would be a bit suicidal).

We arrived in the dark at Kumily, a small town on the edge of Periyar National Park. The town itself is nothing to write home about - for the most part a typically noisy, dirty and delapated Indian town, but the park itself is one of the biggest parks in the country and professionally run for once. After two other safaris elsewhere in India I thought I'd do the hatrick - following one in a jeep, and one on a bus, this time it was both on foot and floating about on a bamboo raft.

Ride to Nowhere

Kumily was said to be a nice area for a cycle, so the next day naturally I grasped the opportunity and hired a ride for the day, since it was too late to arrange any activities in the park that day. As with most bikes I've hired in India the first one was terrible, so much so that with the forks wobbling violently and brakes barely working, I took it back and got a refund before it killed me, finding something else mildly better nearby. Finding a map was equally difficult - nothing was sold, and the printer in the Internet cafe wasn't working, so I ended up taking a photo of the map on screen using my tablet, before eventually I was on the road.

Logging truck

I set off on an aimless cruise about, first reaching a pair of official looking gates, getting refused entry by the guard as it turned out to be a tribal settlement. I instead went down a dirt track to the side, eventually getting back on another road. The houses nor fences didn't seem the usual style and there were few cars or bikes around. I then had a suspicion I'd inadvertently gone into the settlement, but wasn't sure. I decided to keep going anyway, passing fairly simple concrete houses, fences made from woven branches, and some simple mud huts. After ten minutes or so I started passing people, getting more looks than usual before passing a building which clearly said 'tribal school' outside, confirming my thoughts. The people looked and dressed the same as any typical Indian, so I guess these had been re-homed from the national park voluntarily or otherwise, and adapted to modern life somewhat. I found my way out the other end without any security dramas and continued on.

Normal when I cycle, an obvious loop presents itself but this time nothing seemed to flow. The turnings I needed to be able to make a loop didn't seem to exist, and after heading downhill a few miles I u-turned back to the start, before going up a steep hill a few miles, again finding no junctions and turning back the same way. The scenery was nice though, passing one spice garden after the next, a tea growing area, and a coffee plantation, before reaching a village in the hills where kids shouted and waved at me, with one group of young boys even trying to block the road to make me stop and talk. Despite being in the hills of the Western Ghat mountains where it's generally cooler, it was still darn hot so drained of energy, frustrated with the single-gear bike, and for once a bit bored, I headed back after a couple of hours and barely fifteen miles, instead going for a little stroll in the woods and reading a book instead. I'm not sure where anyone got the idea Kumily is good for cycling.

Periyar National Park

After a disappointing safari a couple of weeks before, I thought I'd have one last stab at seeing the wildlife of India. I set off on a nice dawn stroll, heading a couple of miles along the road into the national park towards the visitors centre, seeing just a small herd of wild Indian Bison on the way, in some open grassland. At the park centre our group met - an Indian couple, a lawyer from California, and a Korean girl; all nice people. Along with two guides and an armed guard in case of elephant attacks, we headed off into the forest. As dangerous as that sounds, the guard said he'd not had to fired a warning shot once in over ten years! For the first couple of hours the scenery changed immensely, going from evergreen forest, to teak plantation, to denser forest, to open grassland. Visitor numbers are tightly controlled in the park and in fact we were one of just a couple of groups that day, making it feel very natural.

Malabar squirrel

The sound of crickets permeated the air throughout the day, but in one section they were overwhelmingly loud, to the point they almost hurt your ears; a football stadium of insects upset that we'd strayed onto their turf. The guides stopped and picked out various things along the way - termites decimating a branch, ants scrambling up a tree en-masse, a wild chicken rummaging in the undergrowth (they can fly properly you know), and niligiri langurs (monkeys) lazing in the trees. The guide held out his hand to us, indicating to stop, pointing high up in the trees to a Malabar squirrel - indigenous to the region and one of the worlds biggest, with a large bushy tail and a multi-coloured quilt of a coat. Quite a sight.

Rafting time

We stopped for the packed breakfast they'd issued (bread, bread, bread), before reaching the lake and starting the main part of the trip - bamboo rafting. The raft was fantastic - a home made beast made from huge pieces of bamboo tied together, with seats fashioned from smaller sections. The guides sat at the back doing most of the paddling, though we were handed a hand carved paddle each and encouraged to do our bit. The lake itself was built by the British in 1895 to supply water to towns in the neighbouring state of Tamil Nadu, and at this time of year the water level is pretty low, meaning you should easily be able to spot wild animals coming out of the forest to drink. Unfortunately we didn't. Despite being able to see miles of shoreline, all we managed to see was a couple of wildboar grazing. Oh well, nothing is guaranteed on a safari and that's half the excitement. All very relaxing though, slowly floating around in the sun.

We stopped for another hike in the forest. The guides pointed out a few trees, including the banyan - a parasite that climbs other trees, kills them and becomes the main tree itself. We saw huge climbers, the sort that Tarzan would swing on, some 8" or so in diameter, a curryleaf bush - a key part of Indian cooking, and a wild chilli bush - even spicier than the domestic chilli, as I found out after eating one. Tingly tongue would be an understatement. The guide scraped off some tree bark and held it to our noses - cinnamon it turned out, and picked a fruit from a bush which we tried - guava fruit. A little further on, excitingly a mongoose ran into site for a few seconds, but disappeared before we could really get a good glimpse. We returned to the shore where we left the boat, and the guys unfolded a big tarpaulin for us to lunch on. A snake wriggled it's way out, and headed towards the lake! It was only a small one, maybe an inch in diameter and a metre long, and was apparently a water snake, which would have climbed on board as we rafted. Reassuring!

Indian elephant,and
sambar deer

Disappointingly we rafted back exactly the same way as before, but did manage to spot a white necked stork, egrets, some little cormorants, and a fish eagle - I write these names in ignorance, just reciting the guides' expert knowledge. Beautiful birds though. After another walk for an hour or so, we were back at the visitors centre. Despite being packed with noisy tourists, ironically we saw the most wildlife of all (secretly fed by staff for the benefit of tourists I wondered) - a pack of sambar deer, and a mother and baby wild elephant, grazing on the other side of the river - finally! Our group dispersed, and I started wandering back to the village, spotting some monkeys hanging out on a building site. I sat down and watched them for twenty minutes or so - lazing, fighting, hanging from trees, stealing crisps from passing children. Prime time entertainment.

On the way back an Indian woman in her mid-twenties, walking along with her children, started talking to me. She was very friendly and chatty, and her husband and friends soon joined them - a group of sixteen of them on holiday together, having taken a thirty-eight hour train journey to get there! I got invited to have a tea with them, before finding the cafe was closed and saying goodbye. My point here is that it was the first time in over four months an Indian woman had initiated a proper conversation with me, after talking to hundreds of Indian men. It always appears to me to be be shyness, a lack of confidence, or domination by husbands. Or maybe I should start washing my clothes more often.