Talakona Forest and Horsley Hills

This is gonna be a very very quick update. Loads of work piling up so…

The GANG got together and hatched a plan to attend a friend’s wedding. We were a huge group of 18 and created ruckus wherever we went. In the restaurant, the marriage hall, the hotel room. Practically everywhere we went, we took with us a tornado of sorts.

Most of the first day went in travelling to Talakona Forest. We had almost given up the idea as we had to attend the reception from 7PM. But the boys were not ready to put there foot down. So we went ahead and reached Talakona forest area at 5 in the evening. From the gate we had to walk for 2.5 kms to reach the waterfall. Everyone was exhausted and looking forward to have a splash in the water. We walked and walked and walked and finally reached the waterfall. I couldn’t believe what I was seeing in front of me. It was a thin layer of water falling as if it was coming from a tap!!!

talakona falls

And some people were literally bathing there. Yuck. I refrained from going anywhere I could even get some droplets sprinkled on my skin. So I had to hold the bags and baggage of others who went to play in the (dirty) water. And there waiting for me was a monkey! Yes, it was staring at me and the bags and was preparing to attack me with a background noise of ‘grrrrrr’. I was scared out of my wits and started yelling at people to come back.
I didn’t stop until they actually stepped out of the water. The walk back to the vehicle was superb. It was dark and there were a complete group of monkeys waiting for us in the path. There were hoardings indicating it was leopard territory so I was expecting one to jump on us any minute.

We walked back, out of the gates and thought we were safe. We were mistaken, the people in the nearby huts warned us of jungle elephants. And we did spot two of them on our way back to the town. That was eventful.

We had to attend the wedding at 7PM but it was late when we reached there. As late as 10PM. Shamelessly we got ready and headed for dinner, praying at least we get some food.

The next day the ceremony was at 5-6AM and we somehow made there by 5:50AM. Then we left for Horsley hills at 11AM. After a brief journey we were there but it was just like a park in the city with some caged birds and animals. I was mighty disappointed. View point wasn’t exciting so me and a friend climed down to the unsafe territory to take a view. It was good enough. I wanted to trek further but the others started shouting at our backs to come back. Huh!

Then we just travelled back. Playing antakshari, dumb charades and dancing and some memory games etc. It was fun with the GANG but the trip wasn’t as exciting as I thought it would be. The Andhra heat almost killed me. Ok I’m exaggerating. But it was pretty hot alright.

Reached home at 9:30 in the night and promptly slept through the weekend.

Edited to add: Can anyone see the picture above? I cannot see it here from office, some browser problem. Pls let me know.

Update: yay!! finally I’m able to see the pic in my own blog.