Weekend Getaway to Coorg

I got the opportunity to travel again to Coorg this weekend. Coorg is about 230km from Bangalore and takes about 6hrs to get there if you’re traveling in a bus. By car, it shouldn’t take more than 4-5hrs in my opinion. Coorg is also known as the Scotland of India.

From Wikipedia:

Kodagu is a district of Karnataka state in southern India. It is often called by the anglicised name of Coorg. It occupies about 4,100 km in the Western Ghats of southwestern Karnataka. It has a population of 548,561 as of 2001, 13.74% of which is urbanised. It is bordered by Dakshina Kannada to the northwest, Hassan District to the north, Mysore District to the east, Kannur District of Kerala state to the southwest and Wayanad district of Kerala to the south. The district headquarters is located at Madikeri.

This was an “adventure holiday” with boating, trekking, and a night drive in a jeep in pitch darkness thrown in for good measure.

We were a group of 20 and stayed at “Base Camp 1″ of Jungle Mount Adventures, close to Virajpet.

Day 1 (Saturday) was more of a chilled-out day with leisurely boating and multiple rounds of cricket played. Can you think of anyone scoring 12 runs in 6 overs (a team of 7 a-side), and defending it! Well…that’s how good we were at cricket

In the evening, we had a camp fire with drinks flowing all around. Just prior to the camp fire, we had an awesome experience of taking a drive in an open jump, standing at the back with Sagar (the owner of the camp), ripping the jeep at high speeds up the hill with all lights turned off. And yes, there were no street lights, so he was driving in pitch darkness. The was an unbelievable experience. It beat the hell out of all roller coaster rides I took at Six Flags Magic Mountain at Los Angeles.

Day 2 (Sunday), we had more boating!! We also, went to the Chelavara Waterfalls. This being the rainy season, the waterfall was a sight to see. We also did trekking up a hill for about an hour.

More photographs from this trip is available at Coorg - The Scotland of India.

Sunday evening, we packed our bags and headed back to Bangalore. This was 2 days of great fun for all.

For those planning a weekend gateway from Bangalore, visit Coorg, if you haven’t done so already. For a list of hotels in and around Coorg, visit HolidayIQ.com. If you’re interested in staying at the Jungle Mount Adventure Camp, do drop a comment below and I’ll send you the contact details.