Hindustan Times (Gurugram) - Hindustan Times (Gurugram) - City
THE ENCHANTEDC HILLS
Ever fascinated by the dark of the moor in Arthur Conan Doyle’s The Hound of the Baskervilles, I found myself in a similar setting at Thekkady, in Kerala, recently. The red moon, crunch of leaves under the feet, the unknown wanderers, and the musty scent of the Periyar National Park had me both excited and a tad terrified. For, you never know k what a night in a jungle might m bring with it.
Every time our flashlights reflected r off the eyes of a deer, bison, b or an antelope, the heart was struck with a strange irony. While a part of it hoped that those shining diamonds in the night were of the bigger members of the cat family, for the place seemed full of the remains r of some feasts, a part was w relieved they weren’t.
Apart from that, the experience e was completed by seeing the rare-to-spot civet cats and nightjar birds, a couple of porcupines, rabbits, and a furious bison almost looking set to attack.
Although the wildlife was hard to spot, Periyar has a melancholic beauty that held me in a trance. The submerged dead trees in its lake stood like memories of the past; drearycoloured waterfowls and cormorants perched on their top seemed eerie. But that was only till we sailed closer to a herd of bison, making them abandon their grazing spot and breaking the ghostly silence of the jungle in the process.
The small ecosystem back at Cardamom County, facing the Periyar Tiger Reserve, was more buzzing with life in comparison. The cacophony of crickets, crowing and clucking of roosters and hens, and hooting of monkeys up above in the big trees seemed more alive. More so when a casual walk around the place was rewarded with uninterrupted minutes of observing the morally correct Indian Grey Hornbill — it’s believed to mate for life.
The eco safari to Gavi, around 50km from Thekkady, the next morning was the perfect start. After passing through the Photoshop-perfect tea estates, when many were sleeping, I was awake to welcome the first rays of the sun, coming from behind the misty mountains. So dense is the flora of the tropical forest that a Giant Malabar Squirrel had quietly been watching us from the tree above without being seen. It must have been our excited ‘wows’ at all the natural beauty that made it finally leave the spot for a quieter place and let us watch its soundless flight.
A quick small meal with sweet dwarf-sized bananas in Kerala followed. The uphill trek thereafter not only gave a reality check to the lungs and legs, but also gave a closer look at the macaques, Nilgiri langur, mountain goat, the ever-present bison, and the black eagle that kept circling close by. While there were leeches, too, the absence of elephants — the animals that this region is famous for — saddened me a bit. The forest guard explained: the giants moved towards the Tamil Nadu part of the forest well before monsoon to escape the dangerous water levels. That helped in making a quick promise to the self to be back.
Such promises, perhaps, are the best way to prepare oneself for the journey back. After all, how do you tear yourself away from such gorgeousness and return to the mundane? That must be why they call it God’s Own Country.
PERIYAR NATIONAL PARK HAS A MELANCHOLIC BEAUTY. IN ITS LAKE, THE SUBMERGED DEAD TREES STOOD LIKE MEMORIES OF THE PAST