Nagarjunsagar and Ethipothala

My cell rings at about 5:00am . As I’m already awake by then, I recognize the person at the other end to be Gaurav Saxena. Just a wake up call he says! Gaurav’s been one of the most active members of Hydventura and today morning he’s taken the responsibility of spoiling everyone’s sleep just to see to it that things go as planned 🙂 ! A few minutes later I get a call from him informing that he just had a bad fall and would not be able to join us for the trip. A pity that that he couldn’t join us!

The earlier day we’d planned to start off from Infy campus by around 5:45 am. Nayan and Gaurav had arranged the Swaraj Mazda and Venkatesh happily donned the responsibility of being the treasurer for the trip. The group had decided on the route that the vehicle would take to pick up people as close as possible to their residence. As planned, everyone was ready at their respective pick up point more or less on time. We reached the city limits at about 7:15 am and from there started the three and a half hour journey to Nagarjunsagar.

We’d arranged for a quick breakfast right in the bus to avoid getting delayed any further. Gaurav and Co. had made arrangements for Bread-Butter-Jam, Frootie packs and Water. I’d got Chips packed from Hot Chips. We also had Haldiram’s namkeen and biscuits doing rounds 🙂 . Having spiked our energy levels we decided to have a brief introduction. We were 15 of us ( Gaurav having dropped ) , and not many of us knew each other prior to this. It was quite surprising to know we had an amateur photographer (Gourav Bhaduri ), Ace advenurers ( Abhishek Tiwari , Aishwarya) et al in our group.The only outfoscion 🙂 in our first Hydventura trip was Chaithanya – Sushyamala’s bro. As with any group outing we decided to play Dumb charades. Sandeep Sarda made the whole activity lot more peppy with his gyan and out of the blue 😉 thinking . By the time we’d reached Sagar, it was almost 10:45 am.

We’d decided to finish the NagarjunaKonda visit before lunch. The next launch ferry was at around 11:15. The launch was a Diesel boat capable of holding about 300 people. The close to 45 minutes ride and the beating sun did go a long way in helping the vendors sell cool drinks and other snacks. The ride was more or less monotonous and at times it was frustrating to move at that slow a speed. Yashawant and Nayan had a different experience though.They had kids who’d come for an excursion teaching them telugu! Reshma was no less in getting gyan from kids on the other side 🙂 . Things travel teach you 🙂 !

We reached the island by around 12:30pm thanks to the delayed start of the launch. Being given 1hr to get back to the launch, we started walking towards the Museum. The stupas and the Altars were pretty impressive. I’d been to the Museum a few years back so it wasn’t really that enthralling to me. But it is a must watch , for first timers. It gives you a brief glimpse on life in the early ages.

Done with this we moved over to the strategically placed canteen. From here you get to see the vastly spaced out reservoir totally devoid of any urban representations. The blue waters, seemingly flowing onwards to meet the blue hued sky and the rocky lands at a distance is a sight you need to see with your own eyes to admire. Truly breath taking! With a brief photo session here by our ace photographer,  we hunched back to the launch point.Again a 45 minute ride on the reservoir waters and we’re back to the main banks. About 2:30 pm now, All we needed was some food ( For thought 😉 ? ) ! We walked towards the closest hotel and ordered Thalis for everyone. I’m still not sure what to give credit to – the relishing meal or the gnarling rats in our stomachs. But whatever be the case, we did have one good sumptuous meal 🙂 !

It was about 4:00 pm now and we decided to move over to Ethipothalla falls. The 12kms drive took us about twenty minutes to get there. I was initially very keen on visiting this place but only the moment I was there did it loom on me that I’d actually been to this place before. The water then in the falls was pretty murky and the whole experience was pretty bad. But believe me, this time it was far far better. The flow was pretty good and the waters much cleaner. Varun , Sandeep, Abhishek Ramakant and Abhishek tiwari had brought their shorts and hence moved over closer to the falls. The stones were pretty slippery but why fear when we had an 80 year young lady to help us cross it 🙂 ? Most of us finally made it close to the falls when Suyshamala slipped over the algae and got her dead cells on one of her toes chipped out. It wasn’t a big hurt but then she couldn’t continue standing in the waters, so she had to get back to the other side. Just a few moments after we finish cleansing her wound, Aishwarya took the next seat 🙂 . Thanks to the old woman who stepped on her feet while she was getting back to the safer side 🙂 . Venki got so tempted by the crabs there that he asked the woman if she could catch some for him. How good would it have been had the woman accepted!

This falls is truly a must see if you’ve come to Nagarjunsagar. But wait! There’s more to Ethipothalla than just the falls. There’s a very small temple right beside the kutcha path to the falls. Next time you’re there be sure to catch a glimpse of goat and bird legs hanging by the tree branch at about your shoulder’s height :- ) . Divine Sacrifice huh! All of us finally got back to the vehicle with two hopping females giving company to the ever present monkeys there 🙂 .

We now had to find a small clinic to nurse Suysh’s wound. About seven kilometers from there we did find one and got the wound dressed. All of us had tea at a small tea stall and then moved over to the Broken bridge of Nagarjunsagar. But the moment we were there , we realised they’d blocked entrance to the bridge and we couldn’t move any further. Fortunately we found something else much more interesting. There was a temple right beside it and the path down the temple was really inviting! It was a rocky terrain and finally when we managed to reach the bank, it just loomed on us what good a decision we’d taken to come down there! Venki, Sandeep, Varun, Gourav Nayan and Yashwant tried their hands on Stone throwing while Vairav, Chaithu, Aishwarya , Reshma and I ventured into the slippery knee deep water flow.Slippery it pretty much was but not really dangerous. Chaithanya and I ventured almost half past the river flow. The sheer force with which the waters gush across you sort of revitalizes your fatigued body. Vishesh soon joined us along with the other folks. Spent quite some time here and finally left for the city at about 6:45pm.

The way back was pretty funny and interesting. We decided to play Truth or Dare to while away time. The peppy questions being put forth and the more so the answers made things all the more interesting. Chaitu with his cat walk, Gourav becoming a goat, Yahswant farting like an elephant and I enacting a cabiree were a few of the dare events 🙂 . Thanks to Nayan, Vairav and Reshma took revenge on each other with their mock proposals 🙂 All in all it was a wonderful time ! We then stopped over at a roadside restaurant at Ibrahimpatnam and had a decent dinner. It was almost 11:30 by the time we reached the city 🙂 .

The trip was definitely worth the money spent. It was great getting to know people and we did get to have a wonderful weekend! Do have a look at the pix in my Picasa.