It was a holiday morning,i prefer to stay at my cottage. My wish was to keep sleeping as long as in the morning without any interruption. But my mobile phone opposed this, it ranged early in the morning to interrupt my sleep. It was vinod at the end, “I will be there soon, Let's have a trip today ,be get ready quick“ he told, I really woke up then from the laziness of sleep, just because i am always crazy with the trips, no matter which the destination is.
Then all on a sudden, i got ready just before vinod arrives with his Hero Honda CD100, the destination not yet decided, we just decided to go ahead.... While riding the bike without any aim, we held a talk together, our destination decided as Vagamon .We need to turn the bike as we were on the opposite direction to
Vagamon route.
We set the route through Ettumanur- Pala to raeach Erattupetta, from there deviate to Theekoy, where the hairpins just starting. The Old CD100 was still in a good condition, the curvy hairpins and steeps poses not a threat to him. While heading up to the hill, the climate is changing every moment, the mist is everywhere,the deep trench in one side of the road shows the fierce face of the beauty, we are not at all equipped to have a bike ride through such a kind of situation , we even dont have a sweater or a cap to defend the extreme climate condition, we both shivering with utter cold. We desperately need to have some hot tea to move on and eagerly looking sideways to find a tea shop,but in vain . The misty wind inching towards us from toe to head,the driving become a herculian task, but still keep going. To our solace, an old board is seen, inscribing “TEA SHOP” in an unattractive manner. The two glasses of hot tea and snacks was really a heavenly one to us, the shop keeper told it is the coldest and worst climate in recent times , he wondered about we are travelling in an old bike without any pre requirements.After gaining some energy we keep moving.
I was eager to see the famous green meadows , which came in to mind while thinking about vagamon, if you have a google image search under the term “vagamon” the most of the result will be the images of meadows. After a while the big hairpins were over, the climate slowly bettering , the meadows are now visible. The meadow is the trade mark of vagamon, it look like the famous microsoft windows meadow wallpaper.
The weather is not ideal for photography, inspite of this, i managed to have some shots.The sight of green tiny hills covering with green grass carpets with small valleys was really an unforgettable one, the mist added a mystic feel to it. Just away, a newly wedded couples posing for their videographer, to make intimate love scenes for wedding video, they are hugging and smiling, and look in to each other's eyes (to add some spices to the romantic scenes) according to the instructions of the videographer, definitely meadow is an ideal place for such kind of shoots. There hears a shout with some abusive words, a group of youngsters having their celebration oblivious about other tourists and their comforts, definitely, they are fuelled with alcohol.It is the curse of our tourist destinations, someone beleives it is a place to have drinks in open space, they rush in to the tourist places with a vehicle full of liquor, consuming it in open spaces, then theit performance starts... who cares of others and their privacy ? Just have their own celebration at maximum.
We left the place to have just a glance of the other places, the time is 4 pm, now the call of stomach began to feel, definitely, hungry becomes a big truth, we hopefully drove to vagamon town, vagamon is a small town, unlike the other town adjoining to the tourist places, vagamon town never have the face of a tourist town, it may be due to the travellers never tend to visit or shop from the town , they just byepass the town as it takes a deviation from they road between meadow and pine forest. The kappa (tapioca) and fish curry was really a delicious one, refreshed by the food and a hot tea, I was in a mood to take some snaps of the street, an old man was peeping through the half door of his house attracted me, that was my chance for a close portrait, i take some shots without disturbing him.
The climate become worst again, now it is 5.30 pm, it is dangerous to drive back in such a condition, we needed to stay there, vinod have some relatives at elappara, after making a call to someone he told me that arrangements have been made for a one night stay at elappara and moved on. Next day, at an early morning we returned from elappara, on the way made a quick visit to pine forest, we need to attend our office,so we were in a hurry, it has been raining, but not strong enough, i feel it is very nice to drive through a snowy rainy morning. We were planning a come back on another day to have a detailed trip and an early morning photo shoot, i bid a temporary goodbye to the kerala switzerland and promised we will be back again soon ....(definitely we made another visit after a few month, this time prathap joseph, our mutual friend and freelance photographer accompanied us )
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