Awesome Get Away!!!

Last saturday(20th Aug), we went to this place called HuthriDurga to trek. We had read about this place in a news paper, and we got the route from our office cab driver. It was 5 of us and we decided to go there in my car only. We started at around 7:30 in the morning. Stopped for breakfast in Magadi. The place is further 10 kms from Magadi. We got lost(expected) first and had missed a left turn.. We asked some villager and he guided us properly to the correct route. We asked few more ppl on the way and reached the place finally!.. the hill looked awesome from below. There is a road that goes to the foot of the hill. It is pretty narrow and very twisted.. loved driving there!!! :D

At the foot of the hill, as the road was very narrow had to struggle to take reverse!! Eventually did it and parked the car there and set out enroute to conquer the mountain. The hill actually has a fort with 7 doorways( Elu Suttina Kote (Kannada)... In one of the pics u can see the three-tiers of the fort!). The climb was pretty steep at places.. breeze was heavy... yeah .. it was great!! We took some 2 hours to climb(including breaks in b/n). We reached the top at around 1 PM.. There is a temple there, very neat place.. not a single soul was present there ( Except for us and few monkeys :P ). We had got some junk food with us there for lunch!! had it.. took few snaps.. sang few songs.!!!

I stood there looking at the awesome view i was being shown.. land as far as one could see.. the sunlight and clouds playing games... I broke away from the group.. took some time for myself... around 30 mins i was just standing in the wind, thinking nothing(Not really).. total freedom.. total happiness.. total solitude!!!

We started descending at around 2-15... descent was pretty quick.. we were down within 4.. then decided to take a break and sat down in the shade of trees on lush green grass.. chatted away to glory!! After that we started the journey back.. and on the way back visited the Cafe Coffee Day in Global Village, Mysore road.. kewl place.. and again we were the only ppl there also!!! All in all a gr8 day!!!

The best things abt the trek were that, we never littered any place.. all the waste was collected in a separate cover and went in to garbage back in B'lore!! Its amazing how ppl can feel free with each other after such a thing.. talk without any apprehensions... felt good!!!

Huthridurga.. Place worth a visit. :) Look down for pics...

2 Pics out of these were taken from my friends cam(Thanks Deepti for the car reverse pic and the temple pic :))

Beautiful sunset...

Circus for taking reverse :P

Brahma Kamala .... What a flower ( Blossoms only in the night!

Another one :)

Spectacular view..

Coool...

The temple at the top

Shadow of a cloud!

Rock Climbing in bare hands (Was a flop anyways :P)

Steps on which we climbed!

The mountain we conquered.. (You can see the temple as well at the top!)

A bridge along the way...

Just before the fall!

Bharachukki.. complete view..

Sivanasamudra Valley...

What a place!!!!

Cloud seem to be a perfect background for the tree!!

Liked the clouds!!!

Water rushing in towards the falls...

Gaganachukki ( You can also see the water sprayed due to the Bharachukki falls )

See that tree in the center of the pic which is all dried up!? I Liked that one!!!

Waterfalls at Sivanasamudra ( Bharachukki )

Shivanasamudra PowerHouse

Shiamak!!!!

Yesterday there was a "Demo Dance Class" held at our office by the Shiamak Dance Institute... Around 60 ppl had shown interest in this class and only 20 odd made it to the demo class.. It was a mix of ppl tho.. Freshers, Team leads, Senior S/W enggs, etc..
Demo class started with warm up.... After the warm up everyone was too tired to dance.. People not used to doing any physical activity at all will ofcors not be able to do all this in one day! But anyways the instructors were too lively, and they got everyone dance!! Next they started with teaching us few steps.. first simple ones only.. I was standing between my Tech Lead and Lead of a different team ( This person is really tall and his arms are really loooong, I was very conscious cos, while swinging his arms he could have hit me easily!!! ). It was fun as everyone was doing the dance in their own way and always turn the opposite way to the direction the person next to you is turning!

This lasted for around 45 mins.. after this we saw a video abt Shaimak Davar.. kewl it was.. after that we all signed up for further classes... All in all it was a gr8 exp.. I was more happy as more ppl from my team had turned up there... Its good to see ppl in so much enthu to do something interesting other than sitting and slogging for the whole day!!!