Cheetal walk - Masinagudi

Cheetal walk - Mark Davidar's place. I had never heard of it until Pinky mentioned it one evening. Apparently her uncle, who is now settled in Australia used to go to this place some decades back(!) and had a lot to say about the place. And so, as Pinky was about to leave for the US (its been a month and she is still here :D), she says she has got one weekend free and really wants to go to the place. Some people who were interested backed out, some broke their legs and others had other plans. So we had to make frantic last minute calls, somehow try to get four people because the bloke (Davidar) says four people only. Nothing more. Nothing less. With some last minute calls, we manage get four people on board.The team: Pinky, Adithya the Jadoo, Arvind and yours truly.

How to get there?
The place is about 8 kms from Masinagudi. Continue from Masinagudi towards Ooty. After crossing a village called Mavinhalla, there is a road to the left (there is a sign board saying Wild-Haven). Continue on that road and u'll reach Mark Davidar's place. Book in advance. His no. is : 0423-2526256.

The place is good for armchair naturalists. The place is right in the midst of the corridor for wild-animals. Hence, wild animal spotting is a sure thing here, most prominent ones being elephants. He doesnt let u go out of the verandah, and rightly so, there are wild animals all around the place. You cannot go out even if you want to. We spotted a wild elephant (which kept visiting the place), wild boars, a huge sloth-bear, deers, sambars, snakes, bysons etc. The elephant came just outside the verandah. Davidar says he can "connect" to the elephants there and has named them after Brazilian footballers and the elephant who kept visiting us during the weekend was a bloke named "Roberto Carlos".

Roberto Carlos


What a figure! :D

While there, be prepared to listen to his rants also. The guy is perpetually drunk and keeps saying shitty things. Also, when we were there, he used to keep jackfruits for the elephant. Although he doesnt do it regularly, I dont know if its a good thing to feed wild animals.

The rate is about 1000 per head per day, but dont expect any luxury at the place. Be informed that you'll get a good enough discount if there is a chick in the group :-)

There is nothing much to do there for more than a day (unless you are a very keen naturalist) and we decided to head back the next morning. Since we had the whole of Sunday, we took a small detour to Gopalaswamy Betta, where the wind and the mist have always fascinated me.

Atop Gopalaswamy Betta

Stopping for lunch at the now customary Fish Land Mysore, we realized we had enough time to kill and went to Kokkarebellur. Unfortunately, it was off-season and we hardly got to see any birds (season is from January to June). And we headed back to Bangalore. End of the story.
A few photos are here.

Thus continues the quest...