Digital Declutter

29-JUNE-2015

This self identified project lasted for three weeks. It took 2-3 hours a day during this period. I don’t remember being this intensely focused on a home project recently.  It was monotonous but demanded diligence of repairing a watch. This is about uncluttering of our digital shelves.  I would have planned my housekeeping differently if I ever predicted the ways technologies around us changed in last fifteen years.

Years back, unreliable PC hard drives demanded a reliable external backup. That’s how the files slowly started to accumulate. Writing files in to CDs were common fifteen years ago because external hard drives were heavy and expensive.  So we had about three dozen CDs with all kind of file folders- music, excel, word, pdf, pictures and videos of various formats. Files were smaller in those days and we kept only important ones because it took time to cut a CD with those 6x and 12x drives.  That changed when we bought our first external hard drive in 2006. A faster SCSI drive that duplicated files easier.  

A lot changed in the devices front too.  We owned four or five PCs/laptops, ranging from single user windows 3.1 to multi-user Windows 8.  It was nice to have own login and work areas for each member in the family but it also meant files stored in multiple locations. Applications like iTunes and Picasa work in user silos and helped to generate more duplicates. Smart phones with increased memory, pixels and video capabilities made capturing every moment easy.  Every time we connect these devices to back-up; we leave the downloaded files in the device, because that’s the default action.  Next time we download them all over again to a different folder thinking to clean them up later. The monster DSLR cameras with 1082 video capabilities contributed more to the folder size as the iPhones added more to the file counts.  

We watched social media revolution in terms of the files we received in our devices. Started with pictures from friends over the world, audio and video clips. They came through email, Viber, What’s App , Facebook and google plus . We kept local copies of some fearing these companies may die without a notice.

Digital paranoia was creeping on ever since we had our baby six years ago.  Volume of pictures and videos tripled compared to previous years. We saved them all to save every invaluable dot in the memory lane. Media prices dropped dramatically so there was no concern of storage so good or bad, every snap, and every video, stayed on.  The result was a clutter of CDs, flash drives, Laptops, and external hard drives with files piled up everywhere. 

It’s a relief that all my files are hoarded away somewhere. But when I really wanted something, retrieving was painful.  We always wanted to look at some older pictures or video from a trip or event, but the grind discouraged us from even trying. Finding a file meant I connect an external drive or load a CD and search them by dates or whatever and many times it simply did not work. With a large volume of pictures and video files, there was never enough time to go through each one of them.  Future looked grim and it was time to do a onetime clean-up and organize ourselves.

We assembled the CDS, flash drives, and external hard drives and sifted through the folders after folders.  Dump back-ups from the laptops were the worst and we owned four laptops.  I changed five jobs and there were documentations accumulated at each place – training materials, manuals, performance appraisals and more than anything immigration documents. Sheena had her share from her work too. Then we had bank statements and tax related documents. A lot of these documents were modified and copied over multiple times.  It took several hours to simply copy the files into a central location. At the end we had 4800 folders and 85,000 files totals 400 GB. Just eyeballing the folders and removing the obvious duplicates reduced the size to almost half.

Knowing that bulk of content is in duplicate, next search was for a program that identifies and remove duplicates. After trying a couple of freeware I settled on Auslogics Duplicate File Finder.  It had an intuitive interface, a checksum match feature that looks for similar content –regardless name or date created, and several useful options to delete as a batch. It also worked faster than many I tested.  While searching for the duplicates, soon I realized that we need to plan better. It was inefficient to scan several  folders  with a large number of files in one go as it could take hours and deleting slowed down exponentially  as the recycle bin filled up.  So it was important to start with one folder, search and delete duplicates, clean-up the recycle bin and add another folder into the duplicate search. So weeks later, we had about 27,000 files across a large number of folders.  

Dismantling the folders and grouping them to more logical folders was another major task. For the documents, we grouped them by employer, tax related, references etc. Initially music, video and picture files were grouped separately but later pictures and videos were sorted into yearly vintage- for instance, all the pictures and videos from year 2014 were lumped into one folder.  However, some major events deserved standalone folder –like our wedding or first birthday of Tara or our coast- to- coast road trip.  What I had in mind while creating this structure is the way Amazon Cloud organizes content. When uploaded, each of these folders becomes an album and it’s easier to browse them in the timeline.

The toughest leg of the project started just after the consolidation of non-duplicates into folders.  Tossing the unnecessary documents out was rather easy. Pictures are a different story. Every folder had around 1500 images in it and there was this confusion of what to get rid of. It is clear by now that more pictures are not helping the very cause why we took this pictures for.  It’s quite unlikely that we will have time to sit through hours to see them all.  So the rule is everything that’s shaky, faded, near duplicate and the ones with no story to tell have to be deleted.

Picasa photo viewer software helped save some clicks. It’s possible to delete a picture from its slideshow mode so I had my one finger in forward arrow key and one in delete and started reviewing.  I stop two seconds on a picture and then make a keep/delete decision.  Say about 3000 pictures on a 2 hour session, over 5 days. At the end, the number of pictures was reduced to 40% of the initial size. Sheena took up the videos. Videos took more time to review and finished over several weeks.  So weeks later, we were in a better shape with 23,000 files; pictures, videos and other documents.  

We signed up with Amazon Prime cloud services and uploaded them all.  Our phones are now in sync with the amazon cloud so they are backed-up periodically. We also got an amazon fire stick so it helps stream videos and pictures in to our living room TV.  It’s a pleasure to watch our little one browsing through her own baby pictures and videos using a remote, effortlessly.

She walked and hiked with us in 2015. More than a 100 Miles!

Borrowing a line from ‘Inside Out’, we have been committing the ‘nature walk’ fun into Tara’s core memory recently.  The fun of watching plants, trees and flowers; bunnies, lizards, occasional snakes and coyotes; butterflies, variety insects  and birds; sea lions, dolphins, crabs and colorful anemones  are all alive in her  ‘wildlife island’ now .

There were occasions she realized that we are having more fun than her. That’s when we throw in ice-creams,TV times and play dates into her goodie bag to keep it going. Also a camelback backpack carried her favorite treats to eat – GOGO apple squeeze, fig bars, nuts and lychee jelly cups, to name a few.  Most part, she got busy exploring things on the trail.

We had a good family time settling issues, playing games, arguing and listening to everyone’s stories. We watch Tara’s personality unfolds and learnt new things from her. A typical Saturday morning hiking took 3-4 hours. After the hike we go for our lunch in a restaurant and then an ice-cream in Strickland’s.

We started the hike/trail in late January.  It’s a lot less tiring to hike in the winter. As we progress in to the spring, the hills turn green and then flowers come out. By June, the summer sets in and the sun exposure is unforgiving. Starting early in the morning and taking the trails that parallel a beach helps during this season to keep it cool.

We set a modest goal in the beginning of the year. 100 miles of nature trail in 2015 and we achieved that within seven months. Here is the list and a few pictures from each trip.

Laguna Coast Wilderness Park

Bommer Ridge Trail, City of Laguna Beach, OC, CA.
Date: 24th January 2015
Miles: 5.4 (8.7KM)
Note: Moderate in difficulty level, ocean view from the ridge and possible steep rocks to climb. Some matured trees and shade in canyons. $3 parking fee, trails are closed after a rain.

Peters Canyon Trail

City of Orange, OC, CA.
Date: 31st January 2015
Miles: 5 (8.1KM)
Note: A lake loop and camel back mountains are easy to moderate in difficulty level. Tara’s favorite elephant trunk is here – a steep incline that she loves to run. It’s a popular trail in city of Orange.  $3 parking fee, trails are closed just after a rain.

Crystal Cove State Park

Red Route.
City of New Port Beach, OC, CA.
Date: 7th February 2015
Miles: 6.8 (11 KM)
Note: Moderate.  Best time is spring and then it will be full of mustard flowers and covered in yellow. There is a $15 parking fee (Annual CA State park pass valid). Great views of the ocean and a mix of canyon trail and hikes. Breakfast in the nearby Ruby’s diner on Route 1 after a hike with ocean view is priceless.

Barbara Lake Trail- Laguna Coast Wilderness Park

City of Laguna Beach, OC, CA.

Date: 13th February 2015
Miles: 3.4 (5.5KM)
Note: An easy trail through   Barbara Lake and then hiking a hill and back. On Hwy 133 towards Laguna beach.  You could park at Nick’s nature center and then take the tunnel and it will add another mile. $3 parking fee.

Bommer Canyon Trail

City of Irvine, OC, CA.
Date: 1st March 2015
Miles: 4 (6.4 KM)
Note: Easy and nothing special trail. City conducts guided full moon watch nature walks in this trail. Parking is free at the trail-head.   It is possible to extend this trail all the way to Laguna Beach and add lot more miles. We hit this trail on a rainy day and that added some fun.

Boat Canyon Trail

City of Laguna Beach, OC, CA.
Date: 7th March 2015
Miles: 6.5 (10.5 KM)
Note:  Moderate to strenuous. Our favorite trail of all. Excellent view of Ocean most of the time. Great canyons and mountains for a good cardio workout.  Free parking near the Laguna residential areas in Dartmoore street.

Irvine Cove/El Moro Trail

City of Newport  Beach, OC, CA.
Date: 14th  March 2015
Miles: 3 (4.8 KM)
Note:  Moderate. This is EL More Canyon in Crystal Cove Park.  Beach access is shortest from this trail head. We normally take the canyon, hike up and come down and rest in the beach. $15 Parking.

Run for Cure -PCRF

Pediatric Cancer Research Foundation 5K Run, Irvine Valley College,Irvine, OC, CA.
Date: 29th March 2015
Miles: 3.1 (5 KM)
Note:  Tara’s first 5K run just after her 6th birthday, for Pediatric Cancer Research Foundation. She also raised $300 from friends and it was quite an experience. Sheena’s first 5K too.

Crystal Cove Beach Walk

City of Newport Beach, OC, CA.
Date: 12th April 2015
Miles: 2.8 (4.5 KM)
Note:  Easy. Crystal Cove beach has trail that runs parallel to the beach through the nature preserves and you could step down at where the cottages are and make a loop of 3 or a lollipop of 5 miles. Extremely relaxing and needs a light jacket most of the time.

Reef Point/Trail- Crystal Cove

City of Newport Beach, OC, CA.
Date: 16th April 2015
Miles: 2.4 (3.9 KM)
Note:  Easy. Reef Point is in between the cottages and EL Moro. Step hike down to the beach.

Boat Canyon Trail

City of Laguna Beach, OC, CA.
Date: 18th April 2015
Miles: 6.5 (10.5 KM)
Note:  Second time with some friends accompanied this time. We took an unofficial canyon route this time and it was a great escape from the sun.

Point Lobos Trail-Monterey

City of Carmel-By-The-Sea, CA.
Date: 27th April 2015
Miles: 3.5 (5.6 KM)
Note: Easy.  Part of our Monterey visit. A scenic trail around the pacific rims. It has rock formations, cliffs, sea otters and great photo opportunities.

Big Sur - Waterfall trail

City of Big Sur, CA.
Date: 28th April 2015
Miles: 3.2 (5 KM)
Note: Easy.  The amazing Big Sur stop and a walk to the strips to see the waterfall and back in to the picnic areas.

Crystal Cove Blue Route

City of Newport beach, OC, CA.
Date: 9th May 2015
Miles: 5 (8 KM)
Note: Moderate. Another trail in Crystal Cove with Rattlesnake and East Cut trails combined.

Camarillo Loop- Nix Nature Center 

City of Laguna Beach, OC, CA.
Date: 30th May 2015
Miles: 6 (9.7 KM)
Note: Moderate. Park at the Nix Nature center and it was quite an exhausting walk at this point tin time. Evenings recommended on a sunny warm day.

Boat Canyon Trail 

City of Laguna Beach, OC, CA.
Date: 21st June 2015
Miles: 6.5 (10.5 KM)
Note:  Third time with friends.

San Clemente Surf Beach/Pier Trail

City of San Clemente, OC, CA.
Date: 14th June 2015
Miles: 4 (6.4 KM)
Note: Easy. Starting at the State beach and walk north towards Dana point.  Dunes and Pier are attractions. $15 parking.

Quail Hill Trail

City of Irvine, OC, CA.
Date: Many .
Miles: 3 (4.8 KM)
Note:  Easy. Rain or shine , this is our favorite backyard  trail with friends and family.

Phoenix Vacation Trails

Camel Back-Cholla Trail, Phoenix, AZ.
Date: 23rd July 2015
Miles: 3.5 (5.6 KM)
Note: Moderate. Part of our Phoenix trip. Waited until the sun to set and the hike was steep. Tara says this is the first rock climbing she did without a rope. A popular trail enjoyed watching the locals.

Cathedral Rock Hike, Sedona, AZ
Date: 24th July 2015
Miles: 2.5 (4 KM)
Note: Moderate.  Rangers encouraged us. Mostly rocks to climb and we stopped halfway. Tara wanted to climb all the way up but we discouraged her because it was hard to keep-up with her. These are a couple of best spent hours in Phoenix.

McDowell Sonoran Preserve, Scottsdale, AZ
Date: 25th July 2015
Miles: 3 (4.8 KM)
Note: Easy.  Great Cacti preserve with miles of trail.  Very impressive collection of desert plants, wonderful sunset and evening. It’s free!

Caspers Wilderness Park, OC, CA

Date: 18th Sep 2015
Miles: 6
Note: Moderate to difficult . A great park with lot of cacti fruits to much . Nice camping grounds as well. With this one we crossed over 100 miles this year. So it was a nice finish.

Noushad and the Plum Cake

Published in the Christmas issue of India Currents Magazine. Available online.

 As a child, one thing I distinctly remember pursuing was a Christmas cake. A plum cake with an inviting dark caramel tone and the lingering aroma of ginger, cardamom, cinnamon, nutmeg and vanilla. Each piece resembles a mosaic wedge. Raisins, cashew nuts, dates, candied red papaya, cherry and orange peels adorn each piece. A bite makes you an instant convert and eventually an addict. I used to dream of a day I ate plum cake for all meals.

My folks in Kerala ate plum cake ritually during Christmas. Christians celebrated Christmas, but the cake travelled to all homes and became a custom. Baking a cake at home can be difficult for most, so the bakeries had roaring success. In December, cakes of all shapes, sizes and decorations took over the glass shelves of local sweet shops. Anyone who stopped by our home during this time could expect a slice of cake next to their tea cup. Cake dominated small talk. Bakers were challenged to bake the biggest possible cake. Artistic sugar renditions on the cake were made to look like tropical fruits, animals or buildings. Kids begged and reasoned with their parents to bring a well-decorated cake home. When our uncle got us a pineapple shaped cake, it made him a hero at our local school.

Noushad became my close friend during high school, which opened the doors to his family bakery. They supplied bread and pastries to local retail shops. The traditional oven – they called it a bormba – was inside a one-room structure next to their home. The family had a reverence for it. It was always kept tidy and no one was allowed to enter the room with shoes on. They baked everything using this traditional brick oven. Noushad once told me that when they reconstructed the baking chamber, they collected empty glass bottles from the neighborhood, crushed them and mixed them with concrete, which helped to retain heat for several hours.

When the bakery is busy, Noushad’s home smells of sweet milk buns and butter biscuits. When you enter the bakery, the wooden racks are stacked with bread loaves and cookies. There is no machinery. Instead Noushad’s brothers knead the dough into long braids using their bare hands. Kneading is like   fighting a big snake. They have muscular biceps and forearms that show off their hard work. Noushad’s dad is in charge of the oven. He spreads coconut shells in the chamber and fires it up to make charcoal. He says coconut shells are better because they generate less ash and have the aroma of burning coconut oil. Once the charcoal is red hot and the bed is ready, he inserts the batter filled pans with a shovel like a spatula. With the shovel’s long wooden handle, cakes are pushed to the back of the oven since they are the last to come out.  

During Christmas time the focus is to get as many cakes out as possible that are sure to sell. That’s when close friends get invited to help out at the bakery. Crushing the nuts and chopping the raisins, preparing the pans with butter and packing cakes in wax paper are all the tasks we got to do. My favorite task was to trim and level the sides of a cake before it’s decorated so the icing looks even. This meant handfuls of cake crumbs and tidbits to munch on at the end of every cake dressing. The serrated knife worked harder in the beginning for a better yield but waned as the stomach got full. At the end of a batch the head almost starts spinning because of a sugar rush, and I would bite a ginger root for a relief.

Back then we had a neighbor, auntie Leela, who worked in Europe but chose our town to retire. She and her two dachshund dogs lived in a hilltop villa next to an all-girls boarding school. It had a patio with a view of the paddy field in the foothills and I always saw her sitting there holding a tea mug. It was strange, so I assumed that’s how the English enjoyed their tea. She was also into baking. Every year she meticulously prepared the Christmas cake batter with cocoa and brandy soaked dry fruits and brought it to Noushad’s oven, baking several cakes in a single batch. Those special cakes were then wrapped in wax paper and sent to her friends in far places as a holiday gift. Brandy was haram (forbidden) in Noushad’s family so they never tasted it. He sometimes managed to sneak a small cake out for us friends and after the gorging, I described it to my siblings how special it was. Once we even made a plan to raid auntie Leela’s pantry while she was out at the post office, but the frightening dachshunds weakened the idea.

The award for best cake in our town probably goes to Thompson’s bakery, a quaint shop near the railway station. Its owner and baker Tommy is timid but for over fifty years, he provided a bold point of reference for locals when it comes to cakes. Many upscale sweet shops sprung up in our town that sold sweets from the North and the Middle East. He also sold other things like ladoos, barley biscuits and mutton puffs. But it was for the cakes that people came back to this one-man shop. 

Tommy works to his capacity every year but still runs out of cakes before Christmas. Locals know better so they buy and store them early on. Timid Tommy’s secret is a mystery to the five star sweet shop owners, and I once asked him what it was. He thinks it’s the right proportions that balance the taste. He did not think it’s a big deal to get it right. Then he said something strange: new bakers throw in everything in excess hoping to get it better and richer. But just like life, excess complicates.

When I started living in other cities for work, I acquired cakes from Thompson’s to share with my favorite teachers and my team at the office. Many of my colleagues were new to this kind of cake so they took a small piece and walked back to their desks. One cautious bite and most of them would come back to get another serving. It was Christmas when a beautiful young lady from another team came to me and asked a taste of the cake. She said her friend texted her about it and she was curious. This was when I thought maybe I should bake my own cake and take the full credit. One with dried fruits soaked in brandy like auntie Leela did.

When I got married to Sheena, my mother insisted that we take her oven, a Glen brand with a baking unit, to our newly bought home in Bangalore. She never used it for baking and also complained that it used up too much gas. Those days a full cylinder of cooking gas was a luxury, so homemakers even gave up cooking dishes that took longer. The following December we baked our first cake. A lot of work went into chopping the raisins and mixing the ingredients. The cake came out lopsided with a big crack in the middle. Noushad said baking powder ruined it but we later learned that a lot of things had gone wrong. It took a while for us to be brave enough to bake again, and by then we had moved to the U.S.A where home baking is ingrained in the local culture.

The grandeur of Christmas here in the US is revealed throughout December. A million lights and bright ornaments breathe new life into the neighborhood at night. Santa Clause springs up in shopping malls and children line up to talk to him and take pictures with him. Radio channels play nonstop Christmas songs all month long and you listen to them without feeling silly. Parties at the office and home centered on food and overeating are acceptable. Everything on earth goes on sale and malls serve warm apple cider and cookies to cheer up the snow-drenched shoppers. It’s hard to avoid this festival frenzy, so everyone goes with the flow. But I still missed two things: a Christmas star in every home and plum cakes.

We first lived in Des Moines, a small Midwestern city in the USA. Janet Hobbs, a woman in her fifties, became our guide to America. Jan took us around, introduced us to places and people and explained things to us. She often baked at home and invited us over to watch. Pat, Jan’s musician boyfriend, had a day job as a bakery manager so they experimented with food quite a bit. For instance, they made a rhubarb tart when Sheena was pregnant and craving sour food.  When Tara’s – our daughter – first birthday arrived, Pat baked an enormous star shaped chocolate cake with sinful expanse of cocoa and cream. Standing on the sidelines, we also learned the ways to deal with dough, yeast and butter. When Sheena ventured into baking all kinds of goods, I focused on getting the plum cake right for Christmas.

It surprised me that plum cake is not easily accessible here during Christmas. The cake in Kerala had origins in the West, but here the closest thing available is a fruitcake. A fruitcake is the butt of many jokes and may be the most ridiculed holiday food. I once bought a heavy fruit cake from a European bakery and it had an authentic appeal with festive wrapping. The cake was dense with dried fruits and nuts and it smelled of sugar syrup. It felt gooey in the mouth with lumps of very sweet oversized fruits and missed the essential spices. A comedian once said that there is only one fruitcake in the world that gets passed from household to household. The jokes made more sense as we ate.

Humor aside, there are many ethnic communities that pursue the art of making a Christmas cake in different ways. All of them have a European influence and the basic ingredients – dried fruits, nuts and spices. Caribbean black cake is an annual baking ritual where the dry fruits are soaked in rum for months and baked with dark brown sugar. Just like Caribbean nations, it is lavish with sugar and rum. Christstollen is a fifteenth century German cake low in sugar but has distinct rum infused fruits with little bread surrounding them. Italian panettone has more bread than fruits and the ingredients are not soaked in rum or brandy. Scottish Dundee cake stands out by using currants and sultanas, and the flavor is distinct. Obviously the scotch whiskey takes over as the liqueur of choice. A classic British Christmas cake has ingredients closest to the recipe we followed from Kerala, but it still missed the nutty flavor, heavy spices and burnt caramel taste that I was used to.

Hence we baked our Christmas cakes every year with mixed results. None of the cakes from the last eight years came even close to the Bangalore disaster, but there were high points that tricked us into keeping it going.

The preparation for baking a plum cake starts a month before Christmas. That’s when the currants, sultanas, dates and cherries are chopped and socked in a pint of brandy. A strenuous baking day comes two weeks later and by then the spirited fruits develop an aroma of port wine. Candied ginger, orange and lemon peels are then added to the mix. An assortment of spices produced in Kerala gives the cake its aroma to please the senses. Small heaps of cinnamon, cardamom, clove, cocoa, nutmeg, dry ginger and a few drops of vanilla are added. Creaming the butter by beating it with sugar and eggs is a critical step as it traps the air bubbles that leaven the cake in the oven. Burning sugar into to caramel syrup is precision engineering but its hue and bittersweet taste justifies the effort. Sifted dry ingredients – flour, spices and baking powder – are gradually combined with the creamed butter. Then the moist fruits and candied peels go in. Plenty of crushed cashew nuts and small chunks of candied papayas are added at the end.

This year, it took about four hours to prepare the cake batter and at the end the kitchen was an indescribable mess. Tara was having a sugar rush from eating all that creamed butter. The floor was sticky and cake batter was all over her. The cake went in the oven and we all gathered to watch it rise. In about thirty minutes, the sweet smell of cardamom and cinnamon filled the room and made the waiting even harder. Two more tantalizing hours later, the cake had risen and turned dark brown. The bamboo skewer came out clean and it was transferred to a cooling rack. It’s 3:30 A.M and Tara slept on the couch. We made some black tea and cut a thick piece for ourselves. As the blade squeezed in, it released a fragrance that reminded me of my childhood. The buttery fruits clasped in sweet caramel bread melted in my mouth and offered no resistance. As I ate it, I started hearing a song from another time and my folks were in it. 

I thought about a Christmas without a plum cake and it made no sense.

Donigal to Yedakumeri Trek in Western Ghats - A story from 2003

It started with Sujay searching for the trekking opportunities in Western Ghats as a weekend getaway from Bangalore.  What got us interested was this adventurous story posted by Sanjiv Jain.  Their long trek from Donigal to Yedakumeri that tracks an abandoned meter gauge railroad appeared quite challenging.  We formed a team of four- Jeo, Sujay,Anil and Rajarshi. As the planning progressed, Gaurav, his visiting cousin Sidharth, and Nipun have joined the adventure team.
We knew quite a bit about what to expect on our way from the blog post. Our trail head, Donigal station, is about 5 hours bus drive-220 kilometers- from Bangalore on NH 48 towards Mangalore. The place is
near the spice hub city Hassan and 10 Kms from a small town called Sakleshpur. The 26 Kms trek  tracks an abandoned railway line to Yedekumeri, an abandoned railway station. On our way across  a jungle, there are 23 shaky bridges that are built over rocky gorges deep enough to kill;  15 bat invaded  tunnels of various lengths ; Several waterfalls and streams and may encounter wild life including snakes. There are no lodges to stay at our destination and the nearest village to Yedekumeri  is Kaginahare, which is another five kilometers trek from Yedekumeri.  The story had warning for weak hearted and offered a mix of adventure and physical workout. Therefore we packed our backpacks.

Start: Friday, 14th November 2003. Bangalore to Donigal.

Sujay had the booking for all of us in a KSRTC ultra deluxe bus which was going to  Mangalore. We boarded the bus at 11:45 PM from Majestic station and it was raining quite heavy in Bangalore. We had some bottles of water, cup noodles, biscuits, bread-butter and some fried chicken in our backpacks to eat during the trekking. We talked to the driver about getting down a kilometer before Donigal Railway station near a roadside tea shop and he recognized the landmark. The web site instructions mentioned that it is the only place opens by 4 AM for us get some hot tea and snacks to kick-off  the trek. We reached the Donigal  by 4 in the morning the bus dropped us near the tea shop. After a refreshing tea, we walked about 1.5 Kilometers and located the temple mentioned in our directions. Then we crossed a bridge and took an immediate right  to arrive at Donigal railway station. Our trail started from there and about six kilometers later we saw a farmhouse in the middle of a plantation and decided to make a stop for breakfast. 

 

Sulaiman, the owner of the farm, spoke Malayalam and he was generous to prepare some tea for us. He had this 10 acre farm with a lean waterfall in his backyard and grew  coffee and other spices for a living. Sulaiman warned us that there are long tunnels and dangerous bridges ahead of us on our way to  Yedkumari village so it is safer to take another road. The access to this road is about three kilometers walk by crossing a field and a mountain. When I told him that we are doing this to experience the adventure, he asked us to carry torch lights.

Shaky Bridges and open river bath

Thegravel trail up to the first bridge was easy .We watched spice plantations, small streams and chirping morning birds on the way.  It took one kilometer to the first bridge which crosses a river that flows about 200 meters below it. The bridge had no handrails and the wooden planks were loosely laid across with scary gaps.  Some of us needed help when we reached the middle as it was terrifying to take the next step.  Like that we crossed about 23 bridges and the longest one was about 400 meters long.  

These bridges had ruined wooden planks and corroded structure so appeared shaky. However, as we progressed one after another, we developed a new level of  confidence.  Though we could not measure the depth below each bridge, some of them appeared to be more than 500 meters deep. Rajarshi often came to my rescue as I could not decide whether to take the longer steps or not, at several places where wooden planks were missing.

We have passed through a number of short waterfalls and thin streams on our way. When we crossed one of the killer bridges, the river below appeared quite furious and we could see it rushes to form a water fall at a distance.   The depth to reach the riverbed was about 400 meters but we hiked down the canyon ridges with the support of trees.  When we arrived at the river side, everyone wanted to take a dip in the river and so we did.  It was an hour long bath playing with water. We collected firewood and boiled water to cook some cup noodles for lunch.  When we tried to cross the rive, the water flow was fierce so we dropped that plan. That’s when we spotted a big snake moving on rocks in the middle of the river, luckily at a safe distance.

Bat Battles in Tunnels

We crossed sixteen tunnels and the longest was about half a kilometer. We carried torchlights to stay clear in the dark. The longer tunnels were made home to bats, that are small in size and there were thousands of them flying across the tunnel when disturbed. We covered our face with jackets to protect us from their droppings from the ceiling. Crossing the tunnels was not hard but there was this lingering uncertainty of spotting a snake or other wildlife in the dark. Also there was this story of bats flying out all in one go when disturbed and destroying everything on their way. None of the scary things happened. So we hiked up to reach the top of one of the tunnels for a photo opportunity and it was quite tricky to get there though the ridges.

Arrived at the destination – Yedakumeri Railway Station

We reached the Yedkumari station, a place surrounded by a jungle; we saw age old equipment and discarded stuffs there. We looked for someone to guide us to the nearby village mentioned in the blog but found none. Anil joined me in search to find a villager while the other started sleeping or taking rest in the railway platform. We walked about a kilometer further down the station and noticed some smoke in the air at far. 

We crossed another bridge to get there and it was yet another abandoned shed of railway. Three guys cooking some food and they looked like hunters. The leader, Mahesh, told us in Kannada and broken Tamil that they are preparing food before they enter the jungle for hunting. I asked him about Kaginahare village and offered him money to lead us to the place. It took efforts to persuade Mahesh to make his subordinates (Suresh Senior and Jr.) to accompany us to show the route. We came back to the platform and woke up the team and started walking towards Kaginahare with our new found guides. The Suresh’s carried some of their accessories along-a big torchlight and a long knife. They appeared quite impatient to get back to their base to go for hunting.

Extended trek in search of Kaginahare Village

Suresh’s led us to the diversion to Kaginahare village and we started hiking a steep hill through a wild trail.  everyone was exhausted so made frequent stops to rest and that delayed us more. There was no water left and it made situation worse.  Idea was to reach the village before night sets in so that it is easier to find a place to eat and stay overnight.   It was a relief to reach the top of the hill but soon we realized that hiking down is harder with our rubber legs. 

As we approached the valley, agriculture and signs of life were visible.  So we paid Suresh’s some money and thanked them for their help in leading us. When some farm workers passed by speaking Tamil, we checked with them about a place to eat nearby. They mentioned there is one about two kilometers away in the village. A stream in the valley looked crystal clean so without thoughts all of us had our filling of water.  When we reached an intersection in the trail, a tractor was collecting the farm workers to transport them to their villages,after work.

Tractor Voyage –felt every rock on our way

The tractor had an attached steel cart with a flat bed and the workers were sitting and chatting on it. When we mentioned Kaginahare, one said the village is about two kilometers far but in the opposite direction of where the tractor is going. This got us tensed so we persuaded the driver to take us to Kaginahare. We offered him money and when that did not work, we pleaded mercy but there was little response. At that point, the supervisor who was watching this scene probably sensed that some of us are in the verge of collapsing so came up and offered us a ride. The road to Kaginahare through a trail with gutters was no fun. The cart had steel bed and no suspension so we felt every rock it rolls over in our already irritated bottom. No one complained as it was better than walking.

 Arrived at Kaginahare !

It was dark when we reached Kaginahare  and the time was  6:30 PM. We saw the bus stop where we could get the only bus to Sakleshpur at 6:30 AM next morning.  We met a friendly local named Madhan and he told us that we could probably sleep overnight in a public primary school and get some food close to where the school is.  As we walked to the food place everyone had lot of questions for Madhan about kind of food and possibility of getting some booze or chicken. 

The food place was a shed with a group of people chatting around a kerosene lamp. This was a mess intended for the agricultural workers but there was no much activity after the sun set.  The caretaker, Gopal- a Maharashtra native, was the first person we met during the trip who could speak Hindi. Throughout the trail we were conversing in Tamil, Malayalam, English and Hindi and obviously no one understood any one language properly (neither we spoke). Gopal offered a vegetarian meal with Sambar and a vegetable as a side and ruled out many other possibilities we suggested. Also he prepared some good tea before the meal. Gopal spread a mat outside the shed in the open air and served us the meals. Eating plain rice with sambar never tasted that good before!

The school was close to Gopal’s mess and he also provided us a couple of mats to lay on. School was a single roof building and there was just enough space for seven of us in the veranda in the front.  We were dog tired so it took no time to fall asleep. Temperature dropped in the early morning and a cozy blanket was desirable but it was only a minor disturbance to the sleep.

Way Back home-Sakleshpur–Hassan -Bangalore

The 6:30 am bus was waiting for us and there were more goods than people going to the markets in Sakleshpur.  The ride through the high range  was scenic and refreshing. Kaginahare and the nearby villages are rich with spices. We could see cardamom, ginger, pepper, coffee and tea plantations and a variety of other crops being cultivated. It took about three hours to cover 60 Kms distance through these winding roads. We ate our breakfast  in Sakleshpur and  also bought some coffee, honey, tea leaves and dry ginger to take home. We took another bus to Hassan, the spice hub, and from there we got a semi-luxury KSRTC bus to Bangalore. The final leg bus was comfortable so we could catchup some sleep as well.

A Side Story

 

There is this one side story I never mentioned to anyone in the group at the time of trekking. Also,  I am not sure I mentioned this to anyone later. During our last leg  trek from Yedakumari to Kaginahare, we ran out of water and all of us were thirsty . When we reached the valley, we saw this stream and every one happily drank the water,washed their face and simply relished their moments with pristine water.  As we continued our walk from there, I noticed a man washing his butt in the stream, upstream in the tree shades. Then I wished I did not drink that water and at that point I did not want to admit to anyone that I drank that water.  So I never mentioned it.  Later when we arrived at the village, we realized that there were no toilets and the villagers attend their nature calls in the wilderness and use the mineral rich stream water to wash.  We just followed them next day morning!