Saturday, February 27, 2016

Wayanad – 13 – 15.2.2016



Last December, my wife and kid stayed back at her parent’s house and I came back alone to Bangalore on 27th December 2015. Back to my bachelor days. Last week of December was practically empty so hardly went to office. On 31st night, had Hari and Ashok at my home with drinks and KFC chicken. Bandy joined us in the night. Planned for going somewhere and rooted for Pondicherry. All agreed and the plan was to go next weekend. HK and Ashok stayed in the night. Next day had breakfast at Udupi Park followed by a nice lunch at Plantain Leaf. Slept through the afternoon. In the evening they left with plans to get Praveen roped in as well so that all can go out for 3 days. That evening got hold of Ritesh and Vinay and had our New Year party. 

Following week, I checked with HK but Bandy and Praveen backed out so nothing worked. Then checked out my friends like Deepak and Sanjay but there were more in to Cubbon Park and Lalbagh.

So finally last week had called up HK on Thursday to enquire about plans. He was ready and so was Ashok. He said he will check with Bandy and confirm. By night it was like Bandy won’t come so it will be the 3 of us and it will be Pondicherry. Friday around noon, checked again with him but he was busy. I was back early to home by evening when he called back talking about some weekend work for the next weekend release. Was able to put some sense in his mind that work will always be there and no one really cares about work so he agreed. He said that Vikas from his team will also join in and Wayanad will be a better place to go at this time of the year. I agreed.

I asked them to pack some dinner and come to my house. They came in like 9:30 pm. Had dinner of roti and 2 chicken curries. Looked through places to stay but did not book it as the rates were negotiable and it’s better to check them on spot. So just made a list of top 5 stays. Also made a list of places to visit. HK was still like return on Sunday night but I knew I can convince him for Monday giving us a full day to see the place.



Saturday 13th Feb:

Woke up like 4:45 and started getting ready. Made some tea which we had with biscuits. Left home at 6. Drove till A2B before Mandya which was like 100 kms from home. Reached there like 7:45. Well on time. Had masala dosa. Left around 8:30. Bypassed Mysore on its outer ring road. The road from Mysore to Nanjagud was under construction so had to slow down a bit. From Gundlupet took a right and entered the Bandipur National Park. Road was good and mostly empty. In the national park faced a lot of humps at regular intervals. Stopped for a while inside the national park for some photos. When we moved out of Karnataka and into Kerala, the forest changed its colour. From the dried white and brown tree barks, it all turned green and full of leaves.

The first big town in Kerala was Sutlan Bathery. Finally stopped at Meenangudi just before Kalpetta which is the district headquarters of Wayanad. It was around 12. Started checking out the places to stay. Found a good one name Coffee Aroma Resort and got set for it. Started like 1 and reached there close to 2. We were welcomed with a nice sugarcane juice and then moved to our twin cottages.

It really had a mountain stream flowing next to it like the photos. We all decided to take a dip in to it. So just headed out. Found a place where you can lie at like 30’ as well a small waterfall when water was flowing down from say 10-12 feet. I settled for lying down with water gushing all over my body. HK and Vikas took shower in the small waterfall. The water was really cold but got used to it in some time. Then just laid there with eyes closed. Had trouble breathing as water flowing over my head and nose so had to sit up intermittently. But that was a 30-45 mins well spent.


The resort manager came looking for us and informed that lunch is ready. So we went back to our cottages and took a quick bath and then down to the dining area. Lunch was rice, chicken curry (Malabar style) and dal. Small menu but good taste. Had a stomach full of it and straight back to our cottages for sleep. It was already like 4 pm. Slept till 8. Woke up and went back to dining for some tea. Had asked chicken biryani (kerala style), roti, paneer makhni for dinner and some beer and chicken fry to start with. Called up home and buny. Back to cottages and things were ready by then. Lots of talk of office and general life. Had dinner. A group of boys had come to the resort and they partied late in to the night so was awake for quite some time. Finally got some sleep.


Sunday 14th Feb:

Woke up like 7 when the alarm was for 8!! Surprised at what nature can do to you as we were practically inside a coffee plantation surrounded by forest. There was dew on the window. So just headed out alone as rest were still asleep. Went down the river and then upstream. Took photographs and then sat of a rock over the stream for some time. **PEACE**. Came back.






Folks were up by then. Got ready and headed for breakfast. Vikas had headache so he ate little. Talked to the manager who said we can go upstream to a bigger waterfall. So we went for it after breakfast. It was like a 20-25 mins climb upstream jumping over rocks as we moved ahead. In a short time, it became tiring as we were like jumping rocks of size 2 or 3 steps each time. But all of us reached. The water volume was less still it formed a good waterfall. Just wondered how it will like during monsoons when it will be full of water. Caught my breath for some time and then headed up the spot when the water was rushing vertically down.

I was followed by HK. Ashok had a corn is his foot which was troubling him but he followed a little later. Vikas was literally sick and he threw up and sat at the base of the pool of the waterfall. The water was now chilling and since it fell from some 30 feet, it was like needles hitting the skin. It took some time to adjust but thoroughly loved it. Slowly I moved out at sat on a rock between the spot and the pool. I was still getting splashed by water but it was not directly over me. HK joined first followed by Ashok. After lie 45 mins, went back to the rocks by the pool and dried ourselves in the sun. On the way back, took a different route via the tea plantation. They had tea at the higher levels and coffee at lower levels. It was an easy stroll down.





Back to our cottages, took bath and got ready. The jeep was ready to take us down. Back to the car we headed for Kalpetta first to get Saridon for Vikas. After having it he felt better. Then on way to Banasura Sagar Dam, had lunch close to the dam itself. It was already around 2. Finally reached the dam. It was the largest earthen dam in India and since it’s a hilly region, there were a lot of island which were formerly hill tops before the dam submerged dam. They had a park and play are by the dam. Vikas looked for getting tickets for speed boating but we were late.


Left the dam at 4 for Lakkidi View Point. Wow. It’s the place where the road leaves for the Ghats and it was like a drop from Wayanad towards Kozhikode. The road snaked down one and then came up the opposite hill at a much lower level.


Took some photographs and left it for Pookot Lake which was close by. Took a stroll around the lake with Ashok and took some rest on the benches on it periphery. It was evening and it was good to take a leisurely stroll in the woods surrounding the lake.


When it started getting dark, headed back to the resort. Reaching there, called up the Jeep. In the resort had tea. Thereafter played TT with HK. I had played it after quite a long time. For dinner, asked for rice, dal, fish fry and aaloo fry with some beer and chicken fry. Back to our cottage, had the drinks and back to dining for dinner. Vikas and Ashok went to sleep. HK and I talked about office and life well till midnight. Then called it a day and went to sleep.


Monday 15th Feb:

Today as well woke up early around 7. Just walked around the resort. Went for breakfast at around 8 but breakfast won’t be server till 830. So had tea and waited. Had chowmein and poori-sabzi. Came back and got ready for departure. Were ready to leave at 1030. The plan was to go to Edakkal caves. On reaching there, we were told that it’s closed on Monday. So moved ahead. Drove non-stop till Gundlupet where stopped at a CCD and had a fruit drink. It was hot today. It was already 2 o’clock and did not feel like eating. So drove to KR Sagar Dam bypassing Mysore. Reached there by 4. Had some snacks at the shops at the entrance and then shared fried rice with Ashok in the Karanataka Government eatery in there and it was really bad. Sat at the head of Brindavan Gardens. Still after 100 years, the view is simply great. Strolled with Ashok through the gardens and then up to the musical fountain area.


Left at 630 and we were closing Kengeri around 9 when we stopped for Dinner. Had Chole Bature followed by ice-cream. Left around 10 and reached home by 11. Pretty drowsy so went for sleep. HK and Ashok stayed back but Vikas left. Next day HK and Ashok left before I awoke.

Overall a nice drive of around 750 kms where I was the driver. Nice scenes. It will be way better post monsoon when it’s all green. Still this was better than staying home at weekend :)

Photos at : https://goo.gl/photos/xxrDtQQxrq6y1jQh8

Tuesday, February 16, 2016

Rename Image File Name to Date-Time format

Earlier I had tried the command line tool like exiv2 to rename image file name. I had put down the steps to do so in this blog itself at Picasa: Renaming File Names to Picasa Captions.
Now I see a nice option in IrfanView to do so easily using GUI.
In Irfanview:
  1. Press B or File -> Batch Conversion/Rename
  2. On the top left menu, under Work As, select Batch Rename 
  3. In the name pattern textbox, put in $T(%Y%m%d_%H%M%S) to get image names in standard format of YYYYMMDD_HHMMSS. You can try other formats as well.
  4. Select files to be renamed and do Start Batch

Irfanview Batch Rename






































And its done :)