Ruins of Alampara Fort

Exploring new places that too without making any plans, rather like a nomad is the most exciting relaxation. After almost a year in Chennai, we went on a 'wild goose chase', well a rather calculated chase I'd say, because we already had a planned destination, but not the route or stops. Moreover, this was my first off beat experience on Indian roads. ECR (East Coast Road) reminded me of Kampung roads in and around Melaka, Malaysia, where I used to drive along the beach! After few stops for photo shoots, we chanced on an obscure board that directed to 'Amampara Fort'. Curiosity got the better of us and we decided to traverse on the unknown narrow road. And the reward was too good! 

 

As you can see in the above picture, that place was deserted and I was reminded of the climax chasing/fighting scenes in Indian Movies, where the hero/heroine would end up in desolate places amongst the gangsters. But, the sheer beauty was enough for us to get closer and check out that rusty boards, which might be boasting its glorious past.

Built by the Mughals in the 18th Century CE and gifted to the French. But, the fort was captured by and partially destroyed by the British.    

The most intriguing thing about this fort is that, it was a popular sea port in ancient India and was popularly known as Alamparai port. From here, silk, ghee and other exotic material were exported to distant lands. Come to think of it, the culture at that time was so advanced that this port had its own mint and the money was called as 'Alamparai kaasu/varahan'. Here is yet another view of this fort, which forms a mesmerizing silhouette.

The creaky wretched board at the site claims that this fort is maintained by 'The State Archaeology Department'. Just wondering, if they know the meaning of 'maintain'. It is pathetic to see that these impressions of power and identity of the past are not well preserved.

Wish we take care and cherish our treasures, which might help us to understand our past and probably shed some light on things that would eventually guide us in shaping our future!

Biking - Back to Nature

Cycling was the most cherished outdoor activity of my childhood. Outdoor, literally means out of the house door and on the road, but not in a natural surrounding! Those were the carefree days when I used to roam around the streets of my hometown during afternoons, that too without my dad's knowledge. The minute he finds out that am on roads, I would be grounded :(

Of late, the most enjoyable activity, was driving and exploring offbeat beaches and villages. But, during my last visit to Melaka my friends suggested that I could borrow a friend's cycle and join them for a ride in the neighborhood kampung (village in Malay). At that time I never knew what exactly was a bike ride. But, the passion to explore the unknown urged me to accept the offer, and I agreed to join them. When my friend commented that we take the simple route, it still didn't give me clue as to the distance or nature of the ride. I was in for a world of new and exciting experience.

Loaded for the ride! 

With great enthusiasm I packed my DSLR and the additional 70-300 mm lens too and assumed that the weight of the camera wouldn't matter, how naive of me!

After less than a KM in the kampung, we were trying to find the right direction to reach the river side and then frog farm, but we were lost in the fields.

Sky Watch

So we stopped by a traditional wooden Rumah Melayu (Malay house) to ask for directions.

As we went deeper, there was no road, we were riding in muddy paths and came by a river side and we were in for luck to see a stock of Storks!

Migratory Storks in transit!

Before I could think loud, my friend suggested that she clap so that I could catch them in flight!

By now, I started feeling the weight of my camera and requested my friend to carry it for me. After this, we came across a fenced building in the middle of nowhere...

Bird house

And we heard loud recorded chirps! I was told that this place was meant for birds to nest and that music was to attract them!!! Bird's nest is an expensive delicacy in Chinese cuisine. I can't begin to imagine why would people want to even destroy the nests:(
Within few meters was the frog farm, they are reared for food. Yes, frog is another Cantonese delicacy and frog leg soup is quiet popular! Well seeing them in large number in various stages of growth was something new and it was a feast for my camera:D

Tadpoles

  

Halfway from Tadpole to frog!

Babies (Shadow Shot Sunday)

Matured

Until I captured the above closeup, I never considered a frog to be a beauty!

After this, we headed deeper in the woods and stopped by a moderate hill. Now, my friend told that I could take my time and walk up the hill, while they ride up! I tried to test my limits..tripped and fell off the bike. But, I was giggling instead of getting shocked, I was totally carried away with the adventure. Well, except for minor bruises I was fine, so we went further to Pineapple farm and then rode through oil palm plantations...

Pineapple

Oil-palm plantation (SOOC)

On the way, we ran out of water supply, so we drove through village and stopped at a petty shop. Oh boy, I was so glad to see 100plus and just gulped it with greed. When we finished our ride, my friend checked her speed indicator and announced that we just completed 19KM ride and almost my jaw dropped at that!
If I was told about the distance before the ride, I'd have chickened out. Thank my lucky stars, and friends' patience, I did it!!! In fact, throughout the journey I had a silly grin like a child on a treasure hunt! Certainly, it is one of the most memorable trips.

Wandering Alone @ Gole Bazar

Again, I got a chance to wander alone! Well, this time it was in Kharagpur, West Bengal, which boasts longest railway platform in the world! On the first day, I was wandering within walkable distance from where we stayed. Later I was in for luck, and made friends with an inspiring personality. She suggested that I use rickshaws for exploring Gole Bazar, a place worth visiting to get a local feel of market and savour mishti (sweets in Bengali), from local's favorite shop.
Predominantly, the locals either spoke in Bengali or Hindi. English was hardly understood. Somehow, I managed to communicate with the rickshaw-wala (rickshaw-driver!) in my broken Hindi. The 5 KM ride cost me only Rs 60 (around RM 3.5!!!).

Shadow Shot Sunday

Though the ride was bumpy and slow, the open top helped me to capture life on the way to Gole Bazar.

Rickshaw wala was quite talkative. As we approached the bridge over Kharagpur railway station, he told that his son was working at the Eastern Railways garage. He added that 2 trains (with 20+ carriages each) can be parked back to back on this platform! Well, it could just be local lore, as I could not verify this information online.

Longest platform in the world - 1075m

My expectation of the bazar, was that of a crowded vibrant market, but When I reached Gole bazar around 11 AM, weather was a bit chilly and the bazar seemed to be lazy like this...

Gole Bazar

A push-cart with small earthen cups attracted me. He was just opening his business and I wanted to take a picture, but was not sure how the vendor would react, if I don't buy anything. So, I asked him for what purpose that cup was used and if I could just buy 1 cup. He replied that he sells tea in that cup for Rs 4. Surprised at that cheap rate, I asked again, if he was telling the rate of the cup or tea. He gave a weird look and told that the tea and cup together was Rs 4!!!

Matka Chai - Teh Tarik - Rs 4 or just around 20 sen per cup!

Then I understood that this cup was meant for one time use ONLY! What an environmental friendly disposable cup! I dared to take a sip, and fell in love with the tea as the flavor and fragrance was enhanced because of the earthenware:)

By now, slowly the market was coming alive and I bought a couple of duppattas.

When it was about time to leave, I stopped by the mithai (sweet) shop, which my friend recommended to.

Jamuns, rosgullas, sweet yogurt...

Later, I decided to take a 'share auto', as there was a lonely stretch on the way back. There I met two Midnapur university students (fellow passengers). I learned that one of them were married and continuing education! Well, marrying at young age is still prevalent, but at least education seems to have gained importance.

Altogether it was a lively experience.

Exploring with a Friend @ Fraser Hills

After initial hiccups in planning, we succeeded in going to Fraser Hills (Pahang, Malaysia) with a friend's family. This also happens to be my first experience in hill driving. I had to pull up my car seat to almost 90 degrees and sit straight to get a better view at the bends and drive at a terribly slow pace, otherwise it was quite smooth.

Just about 90 KM from Kuala Lumpur it is hard to believe that such a peaceful and beautiful hill station exists.
My crazy partner prefers to stay indoors instead of exploring new places. Therefore, I've always had misgivings when we travel, and wondered how good it would be to travel with someone with same interest and at the same time comfortable to talk to. I guess my wish has been so strong that this time, I was blessed with wonderful experience and do things without having to argue!

View from our suite

Chirpy visitor at daybreak

Never realized moths can be colorful!

Hill view reflection

In this trip, the men and kids decided to stay indoors, where as my good friend and myself decided to 'explore' using the map. Both of us were not good in reading the map, but the town is too small, so it was rather easy to find our way.

Golf Course

Compared to the KL Butterfly park, here the butterfly park looked small and uninviting. Then the water park too was closed, but the view through the gates was fantastic.

Allen's Water - disused reservoir 

Though I enjoy walking in the jungle or plains, I do not look forward to climbing as I start sweating and loose my stamina quickly. However, when my friend urged to go on trekking, I agreed halfheartedly to take the shortest trail, but did not complete it:(

Ferns, berries, morning glory

After this disastrous attempt, we decided to drive further and see if there was anything interesting or you could just call it as 'wild goose chase'. And, we came across a viewing deck, so we pulled up to see. We saw the sign board to a waterfall and while we were considering to go there, we noticed a Caucasian stopping a car that was headed downhill and warn them of a landslide ahead.

Fish tailed palm

Watching us, a lady who was sitting nearby pointed at the Caucasian and told, 'my husband just walked to that waterfalls in the morning and he says that the roads are not good, but still the cars keep going!'. Now, I had to ask if he had taken any pictures. She assured that her husband would show us the pictures.
While taking out his camera, he told with a lighthearted banter that it took him 1 hour to go to the waterfall and 2 hrs to walk back! Soon, we learned that they were Australians and were on Malaysian roads for the past two weeks. Within few minutes we touched on various subjects such as Indian arranged marriages, waterfalls in Australia, 'grayed nomads' who cause traffic jams with their huge caravans, comparatively cheap Malaysian food price, peculiar habit of Malaysian bikers who wear the jackets as seen in the pic below (1st biker from right), lazy attitude of the staff at the resort where they were staying etc. It felt good to talk to strangers, without being stared at by my family.

Finally, we had to drag ourselves back to the resort, in the hope of coming back after a short break. But, later we were too tired and it was also rainy and getting dark, so we had to call it a day.Since childhood, going to hill stations has always been fun. Cool weather, smell of fresh grass, chillness in the air, curvy roads or um...whatever I've always felt romantic about hill stations. But, after this trip I would certainly vouch that traveling with a like-minded and understanding friend to a hill station is substantially gratifying without any romantic inclinations!

Port Supai

Our plan was to take our friends from Singapore to Penglan Balak beach and then to Gadek Hot Spring. But, I missed to turn at a junction towards the destination.
As a long drive freak, I took it as a chance to explore that country side and ended up in Port Supai, somewhere near Kuala Linggi, which is about 50KM from Melaka!

Am not sure if the trees were submerged due to heavy rains. We just walked around the coastal guard house by the beach and saw this lovely bridge leading to a hilly jungle.

SOOC

As we neared the jungle, we realized that it was actually a rubber plantation.

Latex collector in a rubber tree!

Here is a beautiful view of the guard house from the plantation.

From here, a lone tree by the guard house caught my attention, so on the way back, I stopped and captured this!

Skywatch and SSS2

Pleasant things happen when you least expect it, and this was one such experience!

Wild Goose Chase - Random Search

My all time favorite activity - wild goose chase, this time did it with my daughter. In fact she was the one who proposed it, after an unsatisfied lunch outing. Her first question was, 'you don't have the GPS with you now, anyways do you think we could go for a long drive to somewhere new?' for which I said, 'thatz the fun part, letz go'. Without target, we started our trip on a road that I have seldom driven. After about 20 KM we saw a signboard, 'Anjung Jetty'. I've been there once to check out the boat timings to Pulau Besar, but by then I had used GPS. I thought, I might be able to find the route, but we ended up in a small fishermen jetty instead!

Unknown Jetty in a small fishing village near Melaka

Few young chaps were lazing around, and we were uncomfortable to get down and ask for directions...better to be safe than regrets, right? So, we just made a u-turn from there and within few mts, we saw this...

Monkey pet!?

It was a very narrow road and I didn't realize that I was blocking the way until an old man slowed down in front of us and tried to cross us. It gave me a chance to wind down the car window and ask for directions. We were in for luck, he told that we were about 1 KM away from Anjung jetty, if we took that unkempt road ahead of us. He added that he was on the way to that place and we could just follow him.

After driving for about a minute, the road was getting worst, but the scenery was breath taking, no-mans land on one side and beautiful sea on the other side. I couldn't enjoy the view, I was a bit apprehensive and wondered if I had made the right decision by following a stranger. What if something terrible happens, like a flat tire or someone stops us midway with a knife etc..My daughter too voiced out similar concerns. But then, we calmed ourselves by telling that we would NOT open the door or STOP the car until we reached civilization.
That 5 mins of nerve-wracking drive felt like we were driving forever. We reached the jetty safely and parked the car to get down for some fresh air and clicked these shots...

SOOC and Shadow Shot Sunday2

Scenic Sunday

Going on an unplanned long drive is always fun and at times a bit of tension as well, but that adds up the thrill!

Adventures on road

In Kuching, on my first drive, I was in the middle lane and a car in front of me was too slow! Out of irritation, I honked and then only I realized that few of the drivers were looking at me.
Yea, the major difference between home and Kuching was that there are no honks on road! Drivers are very polite and give way. What a way to live:)

But the life style is a bit too slow for me and in few months it started getting on my nerves as there was nothing much I could do.

Getting lost
Usually on Fridays therez a long lunch break, and on the second Friday after I started working, I went out to do some shopping on my own, assuming that I can come back to work using the regular route. It so happened that there was a road block on the way back and I had to take diversion. Here starts the adventure!

Am not very good in directions, so with guess work I started driving and went up a bukit (hill) imagining that I would reach office. To my surprise it led me to a high way and the sign boards were not familiar. I kept driving in the hope of finding my way. By then, I was lost for almost 45 minutes and suddenly I saw a sign board Ke Kuching (To Kuching)!! Yea, just then realized that  I was out of the city.