Mudamalai and Ooty Weekend

Ganeesh (the elephant) and his Mahout
Monkey in a Tree
Wild Elephant
Peacock
Danny - the Nauturalist at Jungle Retreat

Ganeesh getting a bath from his Mahout

Ganeesh

Monkey Family including Babies
Momma Monkey and her Baby
Monkey Family

Wild Boar

Spotted Baby Deer
Monkey

Monkey

My Bed in the Bamboo Hut
Gunda - one of the domesticated dogs at Jungle Retreat

Duke - another domesticated dog at Jungle Retreat

My Bamboo Hut
Masimi the 15 month baby elephant
Masimi the 15 month old baby elephant giving me a Kiss

On Friday I started my journey to Jungle Retreat in Mudamalai in the misty rain. Just me and my driver Sentheil. It wasn't as bad as I thought it would be - only 5 and1/2 hours. Thank goodness I had the presence of mind to grab one of the pillows from bed in the hotel because I just curled up in the back seat and went to sleep for most of the journey. Until we entered the Forest that is. There were monkeys everywhere. I got out of the car and was able to get really close and take pictures. I had also brought some bananas with me so we stopped and I threw those out the window to the monkeys. Did you know monkeys don't peel bananas - they just bite into them - peel and all. One of the monkeys almost jumped in the window which silly me had rolled all the way down.

Anyway, we made it to Jungle Retreat and let me tell you this place is in the middle of nowhere. We had to ask 4 times how to find it. We pulled up and I immediately fell in love with the place. It's set on 35 acres of land in the jungle. I didn't know what to expect with the bamboo hut but it wasn't bad as you can tell from the pictures. A little primitive but it did have lights, a ceiling fan and an attached bathroom. However there was no phone reception, no TV and not even a phone for a wake-up call. They actually came and knocked on your door when you wanted to get up. I went for a walk around the property and saw wild deer, all kinds of birds, some really trippy plants.

At 4pm I went on safari. I was so disappointed the elephant camp was closed but I was very lucky and had a really special treat the next day but more about that later. So the first stop on the safari ride was the river where you could see the Mahouts giving their elephants a bath. A Mahout is the man (never a woman) who trains and takes care of the elephants. One must be born into a family of mahouts. This tradition is passed down generation through generation. Now the elephants we saw being bathed were either abandoned or rogue elephants that had been brought to camp and rehabilitated and are now working elephants - logging elephants. They get bathed twice a day. The one elephant you see here in the pictures is Ganeesh. Ganeesh was a rogue elephant who killed 17 people but they were able to capture him, bring him to camp and rehabilitate him. He looked like he was in heaven getting that bath. And at this elephant camp they do all the training with voice commands and a stick. There are some elephant camps where they use a hook which is quite painful and something I would not want to see.

After seeing the elephants we went riding through the jungle and saw deer, wild boar, peacocks, pea hens, woodpeckers and most exciting a family of wild elephants. We really wanted to see a tiger or leopard but the tiger family in India is rapidly becoming extinct so it is quite rare to see them.

Got back to Jungle Retreat around 8pm and washed up and went for dinner. Danny, the naturalist, had introduced me to another woman - an Indian woman who lives in London, who was also traveling alone so we had gone on the safari ride together. As we were having dinner Danny came over and we excitedly told him about seeing Ganeesh getting a bath. He told us although the elephant camp was closed to tourists if we wanted he would bring us the next morning because there was a baby elephant, Masimi, at the camp. Naturally after finding this out we said forget the walk and let's go to the camp.

Went back to my hut around 10:30pm and went to sleep all the time praying when I woke up I wouldn't see any bugs in the mosquito netting. At 6am they knocked on my door and I opened my eyes to no bugs - thank god. I am not a fan of the insect world.

On the way to the elephant camp to see Masimi Danny told us her story. She had been abandoned in the jungle when she was 15 days old. She was so small they were able to put her in the back of a jeep to bring her to the camp. Now she is 15 months old. As she is still a baby she has not been put to work - she gets her bottle, her bath and socializes with the other elephants. The mahout and his wife actually live in the hut with the elephant. They sleep on a mat on the floor and do nothing but take of her round the clock. I found out the way to greet an elephant is to put your hand in its mouth and that's exactly what I did. It was a trip. And then I just kept petting her. Elephant hair is like the wire on a brush - not soft at all. She was so cute - what an experience. You can take all the cities in India with the billion people, the noise, the pollution, the traffic- put me in the jungle with the animals.
Danny asked if I wanted to bathe the elephant but after watching the elephant piss in the river while he was having his bath I decided against it.

Went back to the Retreat and had breakfast. It was not a nice day - misty and rainy but I didn't care. It was just nice being able to listen to nothing but birds and play with the dogs Gunda and Duke.

Around 1pm Sentheil and I took off for Ooty. Now Ooty is 6,000 feet up in the Niligiri mountain range otherwise known as the Western Ghats. The road to Ooty has 37 hairpin turns and the scenery even with the rain and mist was pretty spectacular. We reached Ooty about 2:30pm and went to the hotel. And let me tell you it is cold outside. It was like being in San Francisco on a rainy day in January. But the room in my hotel is awesome. It has a wood burning fireplace, 16 foot ceilings and a flat screen TV. Quite a difference from my bamboo hut. I dry out my shoes from the muddy trek I had taken earlier, wash my face and go back to the car. I had Sentheil take me to the Tibettan marketplace where I bought a wool cap for 40 rupees and a wool shawl for 170 rupees. That's how cold it was. Seeing as the weather was so miserable -although it is cool in Ooty the rain was most unusual - I really wasn't much up for doing anything. In Ooty the big thing is to go trekking and if was just cold and not raining I would have been totally up for doing that but not in the rain. So off I went back to the hotel, built a really big fire and watched Rocky IV on my flat screen TV.

Got up around 9am - had breakfast and met Sentheil the next morning. Although it wasn't raining it was threatening. I went searching for a couple of places in Ooty where there was suppossedly good shopping but I did not find that to be true. And seeing as it was so crappy there was no point in going to the lookout because all you would see is fog. So I said let's just go back to Bangalore. So off we went.

So Mudumalai - two thumps up - I'd back there in a heartbeat. Ooty - big deal - I really wouldn't recommend it unless the weather was going to be awesome and you could do a lot of trekking.