There are so many places and occasions where you can sit back, relax and rethink on your strategy and future course in life. I wonder why it’s always the other way round for me. Above 450m from the ground, where you have no control on yourself and have vested your dear life to the hands of some unknown person is definitely not a place to plan your next move!

I’d been to Bangalore yesterday and it turned out to be just for Para-sailing! I left from Hyderabad on Saturday evening at about 3:30 pm. I was fortunate enough to get tickets by the state bus service, which by itself was quite surprising given the short notice that I had. Shekar, Shilpa and Vairavan were to join me in Bangalore. Next day at about 6:00 am, I reached the Majestic bus stand in Bangalore and from there proceeded to the Infosys Electronics city campus by around 7:30 am. Vairavan had come down from Chennai the previous day and had arranged an accommodation. He, his friend Sharada and I left for silk board by 8:00 am. Sharada had to pick up some stuff from her house so both of them got down midway and promised to get back as early as possible. I’d asked Shilpa and Shekar to be there at the Silk board bus stop by 7:30. Shekar was well before time! You should have seen the reaction on their faces the moment I was there! Not finding the other two added just some more adrenalin in their bodies. I’m not to be blamed for that!

Shekar, Shilpa and I left for KR Puram by the 500D bus service and reached the Cable bridge bus stop in about half an hour. This is just a few stops after Marathalli. It was already quarter past nine and both of us were desperately looking for a hotel to grab a bite before we left for Hoskote where the Para sailing was to take place. All we could find was a guy selling hot idlis on a push cart. Each got a plate and gobbled all that we could. I bet even a three star hotel can’t beat that taste!

None of us really knew how to get to Hoskote, so we placed a call to Anand who was handling the event that day and got the requisite directions. We had to board a 317 bus from the KR Puram cable bridge bus stand and get down at a bus stop called Koti. This place is about 12kms from KR Puram and you get to find quite a few buses. The most prominent landmark ( at least all of what I noticed ) of this place is a BP Petrol bunk and a Punjabi shack dhabha on either side of the road. We thought it would be wise to wait for Vairavan and Sharada and then move together.

They did end up coming in about twenty minutes and all five of us started walking to the main parasailing area. You need to walk over a short bridge, take the immediate left and keep walking in the direction where you get to see Parasails in the air! – These are the directions that were given to us by Anand. Hell! I don’t blame him. That was the best he could provide! Topographically, locating our destination was pretty interesting! The river bed was almost dry and we had beautiful black and white buffaloes to guide us all through the path. Reached a place where the path ceased to take us any further. Fortunately this is where we caught a glimpse of one of the Para-sails in the air and in a matter of about ten minutes we reached the place where the remaining folks from AdVentura were seated.

We had to fill declaration forms before we could get the gear on us and shoot up in the air. Well, that’s just a formality that comes with any adventure activity. Shilpa was the first to get hooked with the sail. She’d done it before so she was pretty cool with that. Next, was my turn. I’m not particularly afraid of heights, but then butterflies somehow manage to create a flutter once a while. That’s where the real thrill is! There’s nothing to be afraid of , given the expertise of the team that was conducting the event but then emotions is something that is not under your control! Anyways, this is how it works; you are given a proper gear to hook yourself up with the para-sail. A long strong chord is tethered to the sail to which you are hooked and the other end is jacked on to a car. Once you’re all set, the guy accelerates forward and you’re up in the air even before you realise what’s happening!

The real fun is in living every moment of your flight! Keep your eyes wide open , stare into the sky, look at people down there , shout even if you are not scared or the best thing to do would be to fancy having to jump from that height if nothing else scares you! The initial tug that you get when the vehicle accelerates is just fabulous. The very feeling of helplessness and total sense of your surroundings at a height of about 400m is something which just cannot be explained.You need to experience it! Once in air, it’s not much of a scare. So as i told you, the best thing to do would be to visualize the chord to suddenly break loose.The rest is your imagination! Vairavan, Shekar and Sharada soon were done with. It was real fun to watch Sharada. Poor female, real light that she was had lots of trouble trying to come down. Heavy gusts of wind added to her misery! She was defying gravity in the real sense!

The journey back home to Hyderabad was as much good. Subash managed to get a ticket booked for me. It happened to be one right in the front. Watching the driver zip on the roads at high speeds, skillfully maneuvering through the night traffic was just great. It kept me awake for the most part of the journey. I’ve traveled quite a few times by bus but was always seated somewhere at the last.

All in all, it was a fabulous weekend. Thanks to Adventura, Anand and Suma in particular for organizing the whole event. One thing off my checklist of things to do. Gotta try river rafting next!

Shall upload the pics and videos as and when Vairavan or Shilpz zips them to me!