Jungle Retreat - Mudumalai Forest

It started as a hunt to find the perfect destination. It involved a lot of confusion and frustration because all good resorts we came across were over-booked. There was nothing out there for us, and this was when we were looking to book a month in advance! We spent nights on the net, searching for the perfect destination to celebrate our first anniversary. We wanted the place to be out of bangalore (most important), quiet, beautiful, confortable and mostly available for two days! We checked out many places, most of which were booked to capacity. We searched all around, starting with Coorg, then looking at Nagerhole, moving onto Banerghatta forest, scanning Yercaud and Yelagiri, but sadly either there was no place to stay, or it was not highly rated on HolidayIQ.

Then out of nowhere, someone suggested Jungle Retreat. They had just one Deluxe Cottage available for the period which we wanted to travel. Was this the making of the perfect anniversary? We believe so! We wanted to really relax, so we did something we have not done before. We took Monday off, so that we could enjoy our Sunday at Jungle Retreat! We decided to plan the trip properly, and hit a few "touristy" places on our way there. The route is quite straight-forward, head to Mysore, travel onto Nanjangud, go through Gundlupet and travel towards Ooty. See the travel map below for more clarity.

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So we set out on Saturday morning, map in hand. As has now become our custom, we set out at an unearthly hour of 5:00am and were in our favourite Cafe Coffee Day by 7! We had a nice heavy breakfast there (CCD now serves eggs and toast for breakfast!) and set out for Mysore. We had done our research well. The Mysore Zoo opened at 8:30am, and we were in the parking lot by 8:45! There was very little crowd, just as we had wanted to see it. The visit to Mysore Zoo was a memorable experience. We had a lot of fun walking through the 2.9km walk-way that has been designed in the Mysore Zoo.

At the very entrace of the Zoo, one comes across the gigantic girafee, which I must say are much taller than I had ever imagined. After walking past the birds, one reaches the tiger cages. After that are the monkeys, chimpanzees, deer and gorilla. Subsequently one comes across the bison, the elephants (both Indian and African), the lions and finally the exotic bird cage (through which one can walk!).
We enjoyed ourselves so much in the Zoo, that we picked up a t-shirt each :) and ended up spending so much time there that we would not have any time to visit the Mysore Palace. So we moved on, and decided to get to Jungle Retreat in time for lunch. In no time, we had passed through Mysore, driven through Nanjangud and reached Gundlupet. From here, there is a right turn which goes straight through Kerela onto Kozhikode. At this juncture, we went straight towards Ooty. Now we must warn you that the next 10km (it's exactly 10kms, we measured it!) stretch is a horrid piece of road. One cant go beyond second gear even.

Once past that, however, the road enters the jungle. The road is then majestic, meandering through the green jungle. If you are lucky, you might spot some deer or some elephants. We did come across a wild elephant on the side of the road, while driving through the Tamil Nadu side of the jungle. Once you cross the border into Tamil Nadu, you are into the Mudumalai forest. Driving for another half an hour, through thin meandering roads, we reached our destination.

At first sight, it looked like any other resort to us. We walked in to the reception area, and were quite in shock to see so many foreigners there, seated around the bar and on sofas. This suddenly looked like a very happening place to us. We were now a little skeptical because we just wanted to relax and have some quiet time alone. We decided to first see the room before we ate lunch. We were led away to a beautiful cottage, a fair distance from the reception area, which was very spacious on the inside, and had a beautful view of the Nilgiri mountain range on the outside. This was the perfect place to relax!

We went back to the reception area, which doubles up as the dinning area, and triples up as the bar, to have a taste of the cuisine. The food was decent. There was a nice buffet spread before us. On day one, the menu was Chinese. On day two, the menu was Continental and later Indian. At lunch, we were met by one of the caretakers of Jungle Retreat, who explained about the resort, some common rules and regulations (because after all we were in the Jungle!). Also during lunch, we were met by Daniel, the activities incharge. He told us about the various activities that were on offer and the cost of each. After much thought, we decided on the elephant camp trip coupled with the evening safari. This, we were told would take four hours in totality.

After relaxing a while outside our room, we set off at 4pm for the elephant camp. Now as part of that, we were given an open top mahindra jeep with an able driver and a guide with an excellent eye! The guide took us to a spot on a little river where three men (one aged above 50, one between 20 and 30 and one below 10) were ferociously scrubbing a 520 ton, 52 year old elephant! What a sight that was. Very curiously, the elephant seemed to be enjoying his bath a lot.

We snapped a lot of pictures and while the elephant was getting ready to get up, the jeep driver came and whispered something in the ears of the guide. Our guide was now excited. He turned to us, and told us that a horde of wild elephants had wandered near the highway and he wanted to show us the scene.

So we rushed off, towards the horde of wild elephants. On reaching the spot, we had a police jeep in front of us, guarding the animals, protecting them from trigger happy photographers. "No stopping". "No photography". After admiring the jungle animals for a while, and simultaneously avoiding the eye (or rather the hand) of the law, we headed back to the elephant camp. The camp now was abuzz with excitement. It was feeding time. The 24 tame elephants that are part of the camp are fed together. It is indeed a wonder sight to see the large animals enjoy their food. It is, however, quite a disgusting sight to see the mahout actually make the meal.

When we thought we had seen enough, we told the guide so. He seemed more excited than us to move on, as his main interest was in spotting the wild animals from the jeep and showing them to us. We spent nearly two hours on the main road, looking around to spot wild animals. We did come across a lot of wild elephants, some distant wild bison, a couple of wild boar and some spotted deer. After a very tiring, and eye-sore-making safari, we decided we had had enough and wanted to rest. We ate a quick dinner and decided to call it a night.

During the nights, the place gets very dark. Having been there and seen it, I now know what darkness means. Somehow we gathered up the courage to see beyond the curtain in the darkness, and the sight we saw was majestic. The sky was studded with brilliantly sparkling stars, the light of which made the Nilgiri range look eerie in the dark.

The next day we spent sitting in the deck chairs outside our cottage. Having spent a couple of hours on the deck, we looked to our right and saw a couple of monkeys jumping about in the trees, searching for food. We retreated into the cottage, so not to disturb them, and quietly observed their mannerisms. After lunch we went to sit by the pool, which is quite a sight! The pool is at a place, from where one can see jungle on one side and the Nilgiri range on the other side. It's a sight to be seen. We enjoyed watching the sun set from this vantage point, hearing the birds chirp all around us.

It was Monday soon, and time for us to pack up and leave. We wanted to leave a little early, so that we could visit the Mysore Palace on the way back to Bangalore. Immediately after breakfast, we said our byes to our hosts and began our journey back to Mysore, passing through the jungle, Gundlupet and finally Nanjangud. We asked around for directions and got to the Mysore Palace, but seeing the crowd there, we chickened out and rushed on by. We found our way back to the Bangalore highway, passing from in front of St. Philomena's Church.

We were back in Bangalore by about 5:00pm, enough time for us to relax and get ready for work the next day.