However, this vacation brought the fantasy as near to fact as it is possible in these days of faster and more efficient methods of communication, when we visited Poovar.

When my husband first suggested Poovar for our annual vacation, I asked him, “Where on earth is that?” So much for my awareness of places in my own country! He told me to look it up on a map, and that is when I realized that it was an island! That is what began my fascination with the place. The fascination grew when I learnt that it wasn’t just an island. There was a river merging with the sea, backwaters galore and the wide open sea all around! Just imagine – this is a place which is an island, set at the mouth of an estuary, with a beach on one side and backwaters on the other, with small lakes all over! This was a place which captured my imagination at once!

We flew down to Trivandrum, my son jumping with excitement at the sight of the vast blue sea and the deep green palm trees welcoming us to God’s own country. We spent a day at Trivandrum, visiting the temples and palace before heading out to Poovar. Instead of hiring a car, we decided to take an auto, a decision which turned to be wise, as our driver kept us regaled with his pronouncements about all the tourists who turned up.

The auto dropped us at the Poovar jetty, from where we took a boat to the Club Mahindra Floating Palms resort, where we had booked rooms. The ride is free for those who have reservations, but I wonder how many people actually turn up at such a remote place without reservations!

The ride to the resort was a wonderful journey, as we passed fishing boats with locals in them, the backwaters lined with cormorants. My son, who is just getting to recognize birds, squealed excitedly as a kingfisher swooped down to catch a fish, and a cormorant turned towards us lazily, perhaps wondering why humans were staring at them and pointing them out to others!

At the resort, we found that we had not been lucky enough to get one of the floating cottages, but the rooms we got were good, built amidst pools of water, and connected by wooden bridges. This again excited my son, who noticed fishes and crabs in the water, and spent most of the day standing on the bridges, looking out for them!

We spent three days at Poovar – three glorious days, when we did nothing but relax. It was hot in the afternoons, but the mornings and evenings were just right for a leisurely walk. The high point of the stay though was the backwater cruise.

The local fishing boat was itself a novelty, but even more were the fabulous sights. Green was obviously the dominant colour, closely followed by blue, but before this trip, I wouldn’t have been able to imagine so many shades of just these two colours! We took a cruise around the island, observing the darker shades of the backwaters as they merged into the lighter shade of the sea, the whole stretch of blue bordered by the green – lush green grasses and palm trees. It was difficult to distinguish between bluish-green and greenish-blue, and I was as excited as my son when we saw a purple heron disappearing into the foliage.

Amongst all these outpourings of nature were a few rude awakenings too, as we realized that this was not the only resort in this place. There were two others, one recently built, catering to the masses of tourists arriving in the peak season, and more were coming up! As we turned back towards home, lingering a while to see the sun set over the horizon, I could not help, but wonder if the place would manage to retain its identity and abundance of natural beauty a few years from now.

The Eagles, sung so beautifully by the famous Swedish pop group Abba, has been a perennial favourite of mine since my college days as it epitomizes the freedom one would love to enjoy – just like the eagles and other majestic birds.

During our trip to Amritsar & Dharamshala, the song kept echoing to me– when we visited Wagah, at the border with Pakistan, and again during our stay in Dharamshala.

As we travelled from Amritsar towards Dharamshala, the fog that had surrounded us was indeed a symbol of the life in the plains. All encompassing fog of a very cold and dreary late morning, making us fearful of our next move, showing us the silhouttes even where none existed, neither allowing us to experience the journey nor letting the feeble effort of sunrays to succeed in warming us. Travelling through such a fog for a distance of almost 100 Kms towards Pathankot was truly an “enlightening” experience that we could not have forgotten in a hurry.

The word “Dharamshala” can have two meanings – one, a place where pilgrims can stay free of cost, and the other, the abode of religion. Dharamshala makes one experience both the meanings of this word.

For the Tibetans, on their long & ever-lasting quest for freedom from Chinese imperialism, Mcleodganj, a few miles away from Dharamshala has been their seat of Government-in-exile, and one can be forgiven if the place is mistaken for Tibet.

On the other hand, a plethora of temples of Hindu deities, an ancient church, a couple of Buddhist monastries and a beautiful institute of Tibetan Art & Culture amidst the snow capped peaks of Dhauladhar range of Himalayas gives it an aura befitting a place that can be equated to an abode of religion.
Adding to the mystique were the sprawling tea gardens, poinsettias in full blooms, dry & rocky river beds, early morning winter sun, towering presence of Kangra fort, occasional clouds, in the words of Tagore, bringing colours to the sunset sky, all pervading silence most part of the day, broken only by the songs of birds – I am sure something like this must have been the inspiration when Gulzar wrote:

Barfili sardiyon men, kisi bhi pahad par, waadi men goonjti hui khamoshiyan sunen

With weather so refreshing the soul was ready to soar – just like those eagles & other raptors who were gracing the skies at Dharamshala – bringing me back to the song Eagles – where I began writing this travelogue.

At Wagah, amid the jingoistic shouting of people from both the sides of the borders and the entire chaos of hundreds of people wanting to get somehow a glimpse of the entire ceremony, the image that remained in my mind was that of the Mynahs & Sparrows, flitting with ease from one side of the border to another – just like the sun which had rose in the morning on the Indian side and was now setting across the border.

The song remained with me in Dharmshala as I frequently observed a large number of raptors soaring in the clear blue sky of crisp winters. These birds seamlessly fly across the mountains and waters and man-made borders as they migrate with the changing seasons and no barrier seems to be insurmountable to them.

Both the images were in so much contrast to the one of the border – with customary check posts and barricades – and of the people at both the sides – so similar in appearance and habits – and yet separated by an inanimate fence, with no soul, which could create such a difference that each one, in an one-upmanship, was screaming out slogans louder than the people from the other country.

And, we the human beings are supposed to be more gifted in our intelligence than the birds and animals.

Closer home, Jaaved Akhtar had penned it down so beautifully for the movie Refugee:

Panchhi, Nadiya, Pawan Ke Jhonke,
Koi Sarhad na Inhe Roke,
Sarhad Insanon ke liye hai
Socho, tumne aur maine, kya paya Insaan hoke!

And isn’t it true even within the border as we, in our personal life too, find more reasons that differentiate us than the reasons that can unite us. May be it is time for all us human beings to be intelligent enough to imbibe some of the attitude of supposedly lesser intelligent birds.

More pictures of the trip are available here.

You start moving towards the battlements and you have one of the most beautiful horizons greeting you. Right in front of you lies the infinite sea,with the sun playing hide and seek with the clouds. On the right side a river flowed towards the multitude,meeting it in a congregation of waves, symmetrically etched out on the blue-grey surface. All this was accompanied by the howl of winds blowing high and mighty. It was almost as if nature was telling man,” look, I can be the conductor and the painter at the same time!” Sitting on the battlements, spellbound by the magnificence around, you just get to realise how insignificant you are in the scheme of the cosmos. Man cribs, complains and struggles through life when all around him is the cogency of his father, provided to relieve him of all this. That day, two friends in the midst of a wonderful spectacle came very close to realizing this.

“What you don’t have you don’t need it now
What you don’t know you can feel it somehow
What you don’t have you don’t need it now
Don’t need it now
Was a beautiful day ”

And then he goes on an impromptu karoke session and sings out aloud . I ask him to translate the lyrics and he complies with a grin.

The chortens and the mani wheels whizz past us . The music suddenly changes and Dorjee is a bit silent. I tease him and he interrupts me in Hindi, “ This is not a romantic song madam, its a poem by Tsangyang Gyatso, our 6th Dalai Lama.” Dorjee does not elaborate further as we drive towards the lake Panggong Tso .

We spot a bit of green as we near the wetlands. And then something moves . The birder in me comes alive as I gesture to Dorjee to stop. “ Cha Tungtung karbo, madam..never seen them near Panggong before, “ he says as I move closer to take a picture of the black necked cranes .

The bird of Kashmir is a large whitish grey bird and has a black head, red crown patch , black upper neck and legs and a white patch near the eye. Another car stops by and we spend some silent moments clicking away.

Then Dorjee breaks the silence. “Cha means bird and tung tung karbo is long legged and white. That song madam, “ he says referring to the earlier melody “is a poem on the white crane . It talks about the rebirth of the Dalai Lama who was believed to have been murdered .”Cranes do have a spiritual significance in Buddhism as they symbolize marital longetivity. In fact I read later they have their own monastery and festival in Bhutan where they return every year.

Back home, I spoke to Gopi Sundar from the international crane foundation . I learnt that these Tibetan cranes visit Ladakh probably from the river valleys of Tibet for breeding between June and September. “When the snow melts, you will find these birds coming in pairs, marking their territories and dancing- a part of their hormonal activity. You would probably find 30 nests here, “ he says adding the remaining 60-70 are non breeders. The chicks later fly with their parents who are fiercely protective, guarding them from feral dogs. “Real estate is a serious issue here, “ says Gopi referring to the loss of habitat for these cranes as wetlands become lesser and tourism increases as well. Its tough life to be a crane now , “ he laughs. Listening to him, I go back to the walks around the lakes where Dorjee treated us to the prophetic song and dedicated it to his family

White crane, lovely bird,
Lend me your wings!
I’m not going far and away,
I’ll return through the land of Litang.

Peacocks from the east of India,
Parrots from the lower Kongpo area!
Though (their) birthplaces are different,
(Their) meeting-place is Lhasa, the land of Dharma wheels.

The willow lost its heart to the bird,
The bird lost its heart to the willow!
If affection concords in harmony,
The hawk cannot overpower (them).

I was even more thrilled as instead of checking into a pension, Turkish low budget hotels, I had booked into a cave hotel. But this was no ordinary cave hotel. For a change the backpacker in me, always looking for a cheap deal, took a back step and I decided to go all out and splurge. To be very honest this hotel, which I first saw in an email sent by a friend, was what pulled me to Turkey in the first place. As the car came to a stop in front of a rocky hill, I looked up at the dramatic and soaring structure, and I knew I had made the correct choice. The pictures on the mail could not do justice to this breathtaking view of the hotel- Yunak Evleri.

Carved into a mountain cliff in the ancient village of Urgup, the hotel includes eight cave houses all dating back to the 5th and the 6th century .A separate 19th century Greek mansion set on the base of the hill was bought by the owner, Yusuf Gorurgoz from a local Cappadocian family and now houses the reception, private dining hall,reading room and the lobby. An ex- Istanbul native, Gorurgoz realized that Cappadocia was fast changing from being a backpacker’s destination to becoming the ultimate city for troglodytes wishing to swim in the lap of luxury. Though the idea of buying crumbled hovels for a song and converting them to perfect idyllic retreat was not entirely new, Yunak Evleri, along with a couple of other hotels managed to set high standards for luxury living in this desolate terrain. The Greek mansion, renovated to keep the original style, was packed with antiques and some beautiful hand-crafted furnishings.

As the manager, Abdullah, a nattily dressed old gentleman, showed us around the place, I took in the smell and sights of the hotel -all reminiscent of a bygone era. Old plump peasant ladies doing laundry the old fashioned way, the smell of freshly baked bread, the quaint hand pump, the sepia tinted family photographs. I felt as if any moment someone would turn on the gramophone and the air would be filled with the lilting voice of Dooney Wilson crooning the famous Casablanca number “As time goes by”. The rotary dial phone seemed less like a show piece and fit in perfectly next to the transistor which I expected to crackle with news of the World War II.

In a stone house across, was the breakfast hall with an adjoining kitchen and a larder well stocked with local fare all produced within the village – succulent tomatoes, fresh orange juice, feta cheese and marmalades.

Yunak Evleri definitely prides itself as a private exclusive romantic retreat. To reach to your cave you had to navigate through a labyrinth of narrow passageways and curved stone stairways. This was because all the rooms were spread across the gigantic cliff and had their own private patios overlooking the Turkish mesa.

Until I stepped into my room here, the only way I could describe caves were dark, spooky and damp holes filled with bats. My cave, on the other hand, had dark hardwood floors, creamy whitewashed walls, old kilim carpets and handcrafts, writing desk, and a rocking chair all decorated in warm ottoman style. And not just a functional bathroom but a spacious marble one, fitted with a Jacuzzi. The carefully chosen lightning lent a romantic air to the cave.

The planter’s chair on my terrace gave me an uninterrupted stunning view and I resolved to stay here for the rest of my stay in Turkey. But then there was the so much more to explore.

Time seemed to have stood still in the sleepy small town of Urgup, where three left turns take you back to square one. As I walked down the streets I noticed that all shops, restaurants and houses were built of the same material and hence the town had the monochromatic yellowish tinge. Urgup managed to strike a balance between preserving its Anatolian traditions and cultivating an unobtrusive yet irresistible tourist infrastructure.

Not everyone in Cappadocia was lucky enough to get a cave with a view. I discovered that on my next day’s tour to Kaymakli. While the idea of pre historic people seeking shelter in caves is not entirely unique, what struck me was the sheer magnitude involved here. Within the entire region of Cappadocia over two hundred underground cities have been discovered and forty of these had atleast four levels or more. As a largely barren and desolate area, central Cappadocia was bypassed by many armies making it the ideal refuge for early Christians who built these underground cities to take shelter from the oppression of the Roman soldiers. These hideouts were again used after 6th century to escape from the Arab armies. The entry to every secret underground passageway was camouflaged by a circular keystone, which once closed could only be opened from inside.
As I crouched down the passageways, which now are well lit, I could not help but wonder at the tenacity of those people who have had to stay in these dark environs for months at stretch. The air shafts which allowed for ventilation were a sheer engineering feat. The underground city of Kaymakli could at one time accommodate upto 15000 people and was complete with kitchens, stables and even a grape press to make wine.
On the way to the Goreme, we stopped at Guray Comlekcilik, a family owned pottery in Avanos .Avanos has a history of pottery making that dates back to the Hittite times. I tried my hand at the Potters wheel, and if you happen to visit that place and spot a ceramic plate, shaped more like the map of Australia, you know who the artist is.
Goreme Open Air Museum is a monastic complex composed of churches, rectories and dwellings. This is where the early Christians preachers spread the message of Christ far away from religious persecutors. The frescoes in the church depict narrations from the Bible including the Last Supper, Adoration of the Magi and the Nativity Scene. As the frescoes continue to chip off the cave walls, it reveals a layer of earlier paintings underneath. While the later day paintings were colorful, the earlier ones used only red dye and were more simplistic. During the Iconoclastic period many of the frescoes and paintings were damaged while the eyes of the images were scratched out by the local Turkish population scared of the evil eye.

All over the panoramic view of Cappadocia, one can see, on closer inspection, niches carved into the soft tufa. Expecting another tale of blood and gore behind these mysterious carvings, I was a bit let down when I learnt that they were pigeon lofts, painted white to attract the birds, and built to collect pigeon droppings, an excellent source of fertilizer. On the way back we stopped at Uchisar, which must have had one of the greatest collections of pigeon lofts in the world and hence given the name Pigeon Valley. They were carved wherever space allowed including abandoned caves and the walls of collapsed churches.
In Cappadocia it is difficult to get a bad hike when you are surrounded by such spectacular scenery. I picked the Red Valley hike. It was like walking through an open air structure chiseled by Mother Nature. We saw the fairy’s chimneys at close quarters, walked over pink and yellow earth which changed colors as the day progressed. As the sun set down over the horizon and painted the sky hues of blue and orange, the colors getting reflected in the valley below, I knew I will be back to my Eden again.

Club Mahindra announced a travelogue contest called ‘My Trip of a Lifetime’. The link was passed around quite a bit on Twitter and Facebook and managed to grab my attention on the last day of the contest. I sent in my write up of the Valparai trip along with the pictures I took there. Going by the track record of how my luck has fared in contests like these, I conveniently forgot about it until the results came out. I was pleasantly surprised and deliriously happy of course! This meant more travel, more photography and meeting more people. It also meant that I had to convince my manager to let me go for a full work week.

Luck still played along as I worked out my leaves and headed out on this journey. Also traveling from Bangalore were contest judges Lakshmi Sharath, a travel writer and Arun Bhat, a photographer and travel writer. The other two winners, Kanchuki and Kongkona joined us in the Delhi airport. Three other judges, Cdr. Satyabrata Dam, a renowned mountaineer, Arun Nair, the editor of Clay and Kiruba Shankar, a blogger and columnist joined us in the Delhi bus station where we boarded an overnight bus to Shimla.

The Club Mahindra Whispering Pines Gables resort is located on top of a vantage point with a lush view of the valley in Mashobra, 15 kms from Shimla. The sunrise that greeted us on the first morning there made sure that I woke up at 5.30 every chilly cold morning just to catch a glimpse of it. And shoot tons of pictures. And look for incredibly tiny, beautiful birds making merry in the golden light. And drool over the mesmerizing view.

This trip also turned out to be one where I ate. A lot. Starting from the delicious and mouth watering breakfast spread, proceeding to lunch and a scrumptious dinner, I only ate, ate and ate. The sous chef Vikas personally ensured that we were being over-fed and his able group of stewards never let a plate go empty or a cup run dry.

I particularly recall Balwinder, who was omnipresent. You just had to look up from your plate and he would appear out of nowhere, offering you more food. The resort manager Monish pulled all strings to ensure that our stay went well. Overnight camping trips, hosted dinners, barbeque in the lawn, packed breakfast boxes for an early morning outing, he took care of everything.
When I took breaks from eating, I did travel around Shimla. The group went to Kasauli the second day. A quiet little town, other than the customary mandir and market, there’s nothing else to do or see. The third day took us to Chail, which more than made up for the first day. Chail is a quaint little town with a very old-world charm, partly because there is a ban on new constructions. Long walks in the amazing weather, lunch at the Chail palace, some lovely bird sightings (Eurasian Jay in particular) and walking around the highest cricket ground in the world .. we did it all. We camped out one night. When sweaters, rugs and sleeping bags didn’t give any respite from the biting cold winds, we turned to raucous singing well into the wee morning hours. Tributes to Hemant Kumar, Rafi, Kishore and Lata ended with a grand finale of Govinda’s ‘Tujhe mirchi lagi to main kya karoo.’

We trekked back to the resort through the hills in the morning and met an old shepherd who sat with his sheep and a dog in a beautiful meadow. In the evenings we walked up and down the Mall road, eating corn and kulfi and also made a couple of trips to India Coffee House.

The return day journey from Shimla to Delhi gave me a first hand experience of road-travel up north. The lush landscapes of Punjab, massive highways, the lovely city of Chandigarh and New Delhi of course. I am yet to see a city as massive and well-planned as Delhi. The infrastructure took me by surprise and I inevitably kept comparing it to Bangalore.

So, this is how one trip led to another. The best memories of this trip will no doubt be the breathtaking landscapes of the Himalayas. However, I will mostly remember this trip for the people I met and spent time with.
The journey continues. Till we meet again…

Can you narrate your travel experiences or get philosophical about it – all in 125 characters ?!
If thats got your attention, welcome to the “Two Line Travelverse” contest. Here is an opportunity to share your travel verse with the world and also win prizes!

How do you participate in the contest…

1. If you don’t have a Twitter id, get yourself one!
2. Follow Club Mahindra on Twitter (twitter.com/clubmahindra)
3. Tweet your contribution to @clubmahindra.com.
   For e.g. refer to the image below.
   

 …there are also special prizes for retweeting (RT); the contestant with the most number of RTs also wins!

Whats in for the contestants?

Selected entries will win…

• Travel goodies which include books, travel gear etc.
• Featured in Clay, Facebook and Twitter!

The contest ends on March 14th, but early birds always have preference! So get started and let the verses flow.

2. It’s not often that people choose their first book to be about nondescript places which hardly features on any tourist maps…
Mine is a travel book and not a guidebook for tourists. It is a study of your own backyard, which you take for granted to the extent of ignoring it. But these are places, the small towns and the villages, where the real India lives. My book satisfies my own curiosity, and perhaps the curiosity of hundreds of others, about what lies outside the yard of these railway stations.

3. As a traveller, what catches your attention about a place?
Anonymity. Anonymity leads to curiosity, and curiosity makes you travel and discover.

4. The book is full of sights and sounds of a destination and anecdotes. Is there a specific sight or a sound that still remains with you.
The bustling markets in the evenings – people shopping for groceries, chaatwallahs doing brisk business, small-time bars full of people, men loitering around in paan shops or chaurahas. No one is ever in a hurry, they have all the time in the word. That’s the life we left behind 20 or 30 years ago.

5. What is your take on travel writing today?
Travel writing is yet to evolve, in the sense we still have a Paul Theroux giving us his take on India. But on the tourist-writing front, yes, Indians are discovering a lot of off-the-beaten-track places, which is heartening. Just about 10 years ago, no one was making such discoveries.

6. “Real India” today as it is portrayed seems to have become ironically a perspective of the foreigners only. Do you feel your book has broken that mould?
In a sense, yes. Because if you look up the internet, you will hardly find any information about a place like Mughal Sarai. But now you have a book that has an entire chapter devoted to Mughal Sarai. And the book has not been written by a foreigner, but an Indian.

7. What is your take on more opportunities to aspiring travel writers today?
The idea is not to be blind to your own backyard just because you live there. Questions need to be asked all the time: how did your backyard come into being, why is it the way it is today, what it means to other people, and so on. A traveller and a tourist are two different people. A tourist usually looks for a bed of grass to walk on, while for a traveller it can often be a bed of thorns.