Country side in the Suburbs of Paris

Its always worth while  moving away from places which are filled with the regular tourists,  limiting ourself to the city of lights-Paris, is a mistake most of us the make. A short distance from the main centre of attraction will take you to many places, which could turn out to be a beautiful experience.

Starting with the French countryside, I wanted to see how the rural ordinary people live, there life style etc. But after seeing much of the areas, I realised that in a Developed Nation, If I was trying to find the sort of poverty that exist in rural India, It is not to be. Having spent 16 years in Kerala, I suddenly realised, Kerala too is miles ahead in terms of Hygiene, cleanliness, standard of living etc. All this only due to the higher literacy rates.

A small village

Horse breeding farms

History stares at you in many locations, 


Old mansions....

Forts

A brook, very much like in a Enid Blyton story

This is beautiful-an ancient water wheel, in working condition

Parenting- A job indeed for birds too

For those of us who have undergone the travails of parenting would agree the great joy and at times the pain involved in parenting. I have always believed that we are as old as our kids as a parent.

Well Parenting is a task for all living beings. Have we not being chased by a ferocious dogs when we approach their litter, or a violent hen ready to peck, when the chick are approached. But what we have not seen is probably how the birds take pains to hygienically feed their young ones, just like we would sterilise the bowls, spoons, bottles etc. of our young ones

A mother River tern with her chicks patiently waiting for her mate to come with lunch.

One of the chick is a little docile may be because its younger, but the older one is quite brave and ventures out exploring the surrounding.

Pop Arrives with lunch, but the feed being big, the chick nibbles at it and in this process the feed is dropped

Guess what, Pop picks up the feed, flies to the stream, dips in the water to wash fish                          
                                                     

It now comes back with the feed, unfortunately the feed is big and again gets dropped, Pop dutifully carries the same drill of washing the feed

Meanwhile the daring kid ventures out further, and is now dangerously perched near the water. Pop comes and starts feeding his baby, probably unaware of the proximity of the water.

But alas, in the process our daring young one tumbles into the stream and the parents starts wailing and screaming.











 
well, no further photographs...........
 
 

There was a happy end though. We decided to intervene,  rightly or not we do not know? We rescued the chick to its parents. Nature  has its owns  laws should we intervene in the ways of nature ? Can we be a mute spectator? I know not. Rescuing seemed the right option. but then, people has other opinion too. 

The whole saga took about 20 minutes and was more of a delight  to watch than to photograph.

Ranganathittu_Revisited

Ranganathittu is  a birders and photographers paradise, and is a pleasure to keep visiting again and again. The park is full of bird in the seasom from December to March. You will find birds zipping around, Birds nesting, their full throated cry, fetching nesting material, food for their young ones ... my nest, sorry next post will bring in the story of parenting, which is just as important for birds too.

Painted Stork - aptly named in all its glory

An Egret with its babies

 Open bill Storks

The mud swallows- builds their nest in crevices of the rock above the water, and are extremely swift

Morning hues at Hessarghatta Lake

Hessarghatta lake just on the outskirts of Bangalore is a favorite haunt of many a photographers. Designed more than a century back to meet the water suppy to Bangalore city-this lake is home to many a variety of birds. The cacophony of the bird calls reaches a crescendo in the morning with the birds of all sizes zipping around is something to be experienced.
This area is also famous for the dance school started by the Odissi danseuse late  Protima Bedi.

However, here are some photographs of the wonderful hues the nature paints at Hessarghatta.

Nature's Pallette


Just before the sun emerges out of the clouds

Pathway leading to the lake, displays many a hue

Orange on a blue sky

BUNS at Karwar

The best  thing to do when you travel  is do what the locals do. So here I was in Karwar and landed up on the beach for a morning walk in the early hours-watching the sky change its colours, The fishermen untangle there nets to send their catch to the market. The lazy one setting out for to collect their share of nature's bounty.

Here is a group preparing for tommrow, mending their nets

After the walk we land up in a road side shop for coffee and we see the the morning rays on VADA and BUNS. Buns?  I had not heard of it it. It looks a bit like Puri and a bit like Kachori. Its normally eaten with vegetable curry, and is quite filling. I prefered to have it without the curry since it was a bit sweet- on account of the banana added to the dough. My cousin, passionate about food as I am, blogs profusely at  http://kannadacuisine.blogspot.com/
I am sure she would love to gather the recipe for buns. It would be so nice if somebody could do it.

Enjoy this Buns with vada

The Sajjeshwara Temple at Karwar - One of the Panchaliga

Mythology is always intersting-irrespective of facts. Heres another - the Mythology of Ravana handing over the Shiva Linga to Ganesh to perform his evening rituals and Ganesh grounding it in Gokarna is well known. In a fit of rage, Ravana is supposed to have tried to wrench out the Linga from ground and in this process flew out four fragments, the main remaining at Gokarna - The four other locations where the fragments flew out are purported to be, the Sajjeshwara, Gunavanteshwar, Murudeshwar and Dhareshwar ,

While Gokarna is a famous pilgrim centre – This temple - Sajjeshwara is nondescript and almost lost, with the maintenance much to be desired. Easily accessible from Karwar, its only a few Kilometres away.

A Jain Basidi in Ammanagi

Travel places and bet to find something to knock you down. Here we were on the way to Hukkeri (in Belguam District of Karnataka) and we learn of a ancient Jain temple unearthed in the year 1993. This is Ammanagi village in Hukkeri Taluk.

A magnificent temple, all black dedicated to Thirthankara Parasvanath - look as if it is cut of some soft material and not stone. Even a knock on the wall does not sound like stone. Purported to have been built in the ninth century during the Chalukyan period by their Chieftain who were Jains, this village has some dilapidated remains of buildings which points to Ammanagi being an important settlement those days.

The Basidi

Inner View of the temple

Chitradurga fort

Finaly I got to see the fort; on a trip organised  by Youth Photographic Society, Bangalore.

A massive one spread over miles and miles of many mountains, Chitradurga fort is a photographers delight, apart from being a nice place to trek, rock climb.

The best of the forts that I have seen until now, one needs to spend at least a day, trekking, photographing and of course visiting the fame Obavan Kindi (crevice) - The brave lady, single handedly killed scores of Hyder Ali's soldiers emerging out of a crevice with a pestle.
Legend has it that Bhima had a duel with the Raksha Hidamba here, and then went on to marry Hidambi, thats the beauty of India, most of the places you visit have some association with mythology.

The Gali Gopura and the hindambeshwar temple are such beauty and charm to photograph at different periods of the day, I could get it in the morning and evening light but would love to get on a full moon day.

The Gali-Gupura - Hidambeshwara temple in the morning light

The Gali-Gupura - Hidambeshwara temple in the setting sun- light

This is the ancient Murga Matha

The fort has an excellent system of rain water, harvesting at different levels of the fort- seven if I get it right. It is told Hyder Ali lifted the siege on the fort when he learnt that the fort could  sustain on its own water suppy for atleast 12 years.

This is one of the rain water harvesting tank

Pondicheery

Pondicheery or Puduchery as its called now has diverse views of people on tourism potential. Whats there to see here is what people say and then flock to it. I have always believed that any place has much more to experience than see. You can see the monuments in TV, Photographs, Experiencing is what make the place lovable.
Well, the Sri. Aurobindo's samadi is a great place to experience, especially the silence. So is the sprawling Auroville-an experiment in international community living. The matri mandir at aurovile, My friend says, has a meditation hall, wherein you could literally experience deafening silence (unfortunately is not open to common public).
So, Puducherry is all about the ashram, Auroville, the broad Promenade in the french quarters, the beautiful buildings in the Tamil quarters, and enjoying french food in few of the restaurants.
INTACH, has done some excellent work here in restoring the old colonial structures. They take on a heritage walk in the french quarters of the city on week end.


Interiors of a refurbished buildings which houses the INTACH office today. The yellow Oxide floor in this building is exquisite to see.

Rows of Old houses in the Tamil quarters

Wonderful to walk, on the beach front
Gateway to the many french building
Streets bear the french names even today

Facade of a Hotel typically french

Hotel de Ville being refurbished-houses the State Govt. offices

The magnificent interiors of the Alliance Francaise buildings

Ranganathittu and Bandipur

The Youth Photographic Society, Bangalore brings together Professionals and rookies like me together and arranges trip all over the country.
My first trip with this wonderful group of people to Ranganathittu bird sanctuary and Bandipur wild life sanctuary in Karnataka.
A River Tern

Stone Plover

A flock of white ibis in animated conversation

I live in towns too

Serious Introspection

A cute one