B R HILLS 2015

 

Not many people have heard about this place which is a part of western ghats.  The place is about 220 kms from Bangalore.  We stayed in K Gudi Wilderness Camp which belongs to Jungle Lodges & Resorts.  The website for booking is junglelodges.com.   The service, the hospitality and the food are so good in all Jungle Lodges so far we have been to.  We stayed in the tented cottage. The Accommodation cost of course is on the higher side especially in Bandipur & Kabini, but I think its worth it, especially cause of the game drives that you get, very good food and the service.

 

We travelled on the 8 April 2015 reached B R Hills at around noon via Kanakapura Route. Unfortunately, we didn't find any proper place to have breakfast in this route. Only a few bakeries, we had some Tea and Bun. The route was going thru a lot of villages and hence very narrow roads. A Bridge was under constrn, we changed the route and just followed our GPS. A better route might be to take Mysore road- Channapatna-Halaguru-Narasipura-BR Hills or Mysore-Najangud-Charmrajnagar-BRHills-this of course is a bit longer. Please check the roads before you leave, as many roads are under construction now, this side of Karnataka.

Immediately after the check post we started climbing.  This is our second trip to B R Hills.  There is a famous temple by the name Biligiri Ranganatha swamy temple, so the hill is named after this Diety.  Through our drive we did not see any wildlife until we reached the camp.

Same schedule as in any other Jungle Lodges, had our lunch at 1.30pm and waited for the evening drive which starts at 3.30pm.  While waiting in our tent we saw few birds like White Throated Thrush just above our tent making beautiful whistling noise as in the video:http://youtu.be/wv9fajIbBgw.

The place was awesome as though we were in the middle of the forest with the chirping sounds of various birds and spotted deer coming to graze almost in front of our tent, we both really enjoyed the camp.  Few other birds that we spotted sitting outside our tent for your view:

Drongos, Scarlet Minivet, Jungle Owlet,  Spotted Dove are some of them.

 

In the afternoon safari we spotted few more birds like Racket Tailed Drongo and Brown Fish Owl.

We sighted some Indian Gaurs, took a few pics and went around. Suddenly on a curve we saw the Sloth Bear, coming towards the road from the nearby bush, ahead of us. He started walking along the track in front of us for while, sniffing and digging the ground every now and then. He rubbed his back on some trees and enjoyed it so much.

 

We just kept following him on the track for about ten minutes. He was just glancing at us very often. After this long walk, he moved into the bush. The guide explained that its very rare to get such a sighting of the bear for such a long time. We have had sightings of bear before but not such a fantastic one. Please watch this video of the Bear sighting: http://youtu.be/7aFC4Gnttqk

On our way back to the resort we sighted a Barking Deer, which is also not a very common sight. The Bear sighting made our day.

The next day we went for the morning drive. We spotted a few birds-Indian Cuckoo also known as Brain Fever Bird, Coucal.. Then we spotted a few Indian Gaurs. That was it for the whole morning trip and nothing else. We came back, had lunch and rested. The Coucal's call can be seen in the video.http://youtu.be/lcn8WGIPSJg

We left at 3.30 in the afternoon after tea for the drive. We again sighted a bear on the track, which went in front of our jeep for quite some time.

After the Bear sighting, We were on the way back and another safari jeep informed us about the Leopard sighting. We rushed to the spot and WOW a Leopard was sitting on the branch very near the track, but it was getting a bit dark. We watched it for over ten minutes, not satisfied, we had to leave as it was getting late. It was a fantastic sighting and we really enjoyed it.

The leopard can be seen in the video: http://youtu.be/Y3yYAXte2R0

On the next day morning drive, we spotted a few Indian Gaurs and a Streak Throated Woodpecker, a rear sighting............

 

and nothing else we saw.

There is a small Bird bath next to Golghar in the property, where you can have good sighting/Photos of some birds. A picture of Oriental White Eye Bird in the bird bath.

 It was a fantastic trip to BR Hills which we had planned for a long time.



 

B R HILLS {Biligiri Ranganathaswamy Hills}

B R Hills connects Western & Eastern ghats, Biligiri Rangana Hills belongs to Chamarajnagar district of Karnataka state.  We visited during Aug 2011.  We drove from Bangalore through Kanakapura for about 185kms in our Ford Figo.  The roads were good all thru drive.  http://maps.google.com/maps?f=q&source=s_q&hl=en&geocode=&q=Bangalore,+Karnataka,+India+to+B+R+Hills,+Karnataka,+India&aq=0&sll=11.290335,77.665805&sspn=5.48179,7.064209&vpsrc=0&ie=UTF8&t=m&z=9

We stayed in Gorukana Resort. http://gorukana.org/. We took around 4 hours to reach from Bangalore.  Our trip was for 3 days/2nights.  The resort was ideal place to stay if you are really serious in animals and also to relax.  The resort helped us with a guide (Jadeya) who is a tribal conversant in English.  More than to say that he knows the place, he is fast in spotting the animals.  August, the weather was little rainy but pleasant. 

Day 1:  We reached our resort around lunch time, had good food,rested for some time and started on our evening drive into the forest area.  We drove towards B R Hills road.  It was a nice evening with little sunshine, lucky no rain, cool & breezy.  Few kms of driving Jadeya spotted couple of elephants on the other hill side, bit far, since we had binoculars we had a good view.  It was a mother & a baby elephant, once we stopped our car to have a good look they started hiding behind the bushes/scrubs.  A long wait there was not much interesting but few mtrs ahead in the same hill Jadeya happened to sight a lone Sambar Deer.  Continued our drive in the same route, got lucky spotted a heard of Bisons so close to the road grazing, one was the giant male who was staring at us, we were admiring their muscular body and was shining in the sunlight.  By then a group of labourers with loud noise traveling in a tractor approached our sighting and started shouting as though there was nobody except them.  This noise was so scary for the heard of Bisons they started moving inside the bush, hardly giving us a chance to admire them any longer.  Almost we approached the entry gate of the forest area in the BR Hills road on the left side we spotted one more lone Tusker not a huge one, feeding himself on the trees by the side of the road.   No snaps this time since Jadeya was scared thinking we are too close to the tusker and also a guy on the opposite side driving a bike insisting that we leave that area right away.  The sun was setting, and the sky was clear but no drive after 6.00 in the evening as per rules and so we started driving back to our resort enjoying the sun set. 

After a nice drive reached the resort enjoyed a cup of hot tea with snacks leisurely talking about our sightings to the manager & the Chief of the guides Jadeyaswamy.

Day 2:  Early morning at 6.00 got into our Figo along with Jadeya who was prompt and erutook off, no humans or vehicles in the road,peaceful, unpolluted air and greenery was making us feel so energetic and fresh.  We took the opposite road from previus evening called K.Gudi road, where the gate opens at 6.00 and we were the first to cross and go.  Few kms we saw nothing, it was quiet and the weather was still misty not much view ahead while driving.  Driving slowly along the road curving to the right we spotted a Sloth Bear just out of the bush by the road side, hahahah it just saw/heard our vehicle and moved back into the bush.  We waited for a while in the same place switching off our engine thinking it will cross the road to go the otherside, but no luck we moved further but our eyes were still looking back to get the surprise again.  By then more cars and even BMTC bus started honking.  One point Jadeya said we will go back to resort.  On the way back we spotted a Nilgiri Langur and few birds -Crested Sepent Eagle, Brown fish owl, White throated Kingfisher.  Came back to resort and discussed about our sightings with the manager about the Sloth Bear and few Langurs, while having our breakfast, so were more thrilled to go back in the same road that evening. 

Evening drive, we left at 4.30pm after a hot cup of black tea to the same K Gudi Road.  This time no luck at all nothing we sighted.  Since the gate will close at 6.00 in the evening, Jadeya requested we will go back.  So we were back in the resort watching our snap etc.,

Day 3:  Early morning again we left at 6.00 for K Gudi road as previous day was not lucky.  As we crossed the gate we saw few Spotted Deers out of the group 1 female & 1 baby was giving us the pose for a nice picture, we didn’t stop there ,started driving further few kms Jadeya realized some movement in the bush to our right and told us to stop & switch off the engine.  We waited few seconds realizing something is behind those bushes opened our binoculars trying to see close to the bush when a Sloth Bear walked out, just few metres away we saw it very close.  There was a slight movement inside the car that the bear started moving into the bush in seconds before we could capture a snap of that lovely huge Bear.  That was a great sighting we were thrilled and excited, waiting few more minutes then realized that nothing will come out unless we move out of that area.  So we moved and again saw few birds-Malabar whistling thrush, Rocket tailed drongo ……. On the way driving slowly without much noise enjoying the greenery and suddenly we spotted  a pack of WILD DOG on the road. 

There were 11 of them in the pack just trying to cross, wow !! what a sighting it was . since we have been longing to see wild dogs in wild.  No words to express as we were silently watching them, we captured the video for few seconds.  This was something great for us.  Anyway, time came to say bye to them as well since one BMTC bus was honking behind us. we had  leave way for them to overtake & go the same road where the dogs were still smelling and gazing at something.  The bus driver didn’t bother to wait,.After the bus crossed them and went , a few minutes later, some of the wild dogs started coming out to the road again, but this time only 4 or 5 of them came out just smelling  something on the road, inspite of us watching  from the car they were not bothered at all.  This we can  talk about for a long time.  We were so happy talking to  Jadeyaswamy, the manager  and everybody in the resort.  In the same mood we started packing our baggage and checked out of the resort to take the BR Hills road to drive back to Bangalore.  We thoughtthe drive back would have more in store for us, but luck dosen't knock the doors again and again.  We reached the gate in ½ hour and drove back 185 kms home. It was one of the best trips we ever had.