Another Unplanned Trip - Jog Falls & GoKarna Beach

Last year we went to DudhSagar without any planning. This year it was Gokarna beach and Jog falls. Again the only thing that was planned was return bus tickets.

Gagan, Vidhu, Sarat, Rafeeque, Kartik, Me & Arpit (Sameer is taking this snap)

Day-0 
Bus journey from Hyderabad to Hubali
After filling our selves with lots of Pav bhaji, we boarded the bus. Now if you are travelling by bus to or from Hyderabad and you are not a fan of telugu movies, carrying a music player is a must. And as soon as I switched on mine, it said Battery Exhausted. But to my relief and to everyone's surprise, 3 Idiots was played in the bus. A lot of noisy, funny discussions and leg pulling made the bus journey memorable.

Day-1
From Hubli to Gokarna
We reached hubli around 6 AM. Asked around and found out that we have to board another bus for Ankola (~3 hours) and from there another bus to Gokarna (~ 40 mins). The bus journey was beautiful. It slowly took us out from the busy city streets to beautiful landscapes. Some of the views were simply breathtaking.

No words

On the way to Gokarna

Beach Hopping

The moment we reached Om beach, we realized why its called so.

Om beach

The view there was beautiful, calm and serene. There were few eateries, tattoo parlors and cottages around. After a quick beer and some photography, we jumped inside the sea for some fun.

The Sea

Me

Sameer

And then we decided that we are going to trek our way through muddy and rocky terrains to other beaches (Half moon beach & Paradise beach).  We asked some people around, and they directed us to the trails that we need to follow to get to the other beaches. The trek provided some of the most beautiful views of the sea. And after sometime we arrived at the half moon beach.

Eye Candy

Soothing

Walk away from your daily routine

Relax, Recharge and Enjoy

We resumed our trek for Paradise beach after spending some time at the half moon beach. After walking for about an hour we realized that we are not reaching any where. And there came a point where all we wanted was to get out of the forest before it got dark. For the 1st time we realized trekking without a local or experienced person might be risky.

Luckily after some time, we met some people who told us we have missed the trail and actually heading towards Gokarna town rather than the Paradise beach. And we decided its better for us to go to the town as it was already getting late.  After walking for another 2 hrs (may be because we missed many more trails) finally we reached the town. And we realized, its a town with lots of temples and people live a very simple life here.

Preparation for Jog Falls
We wanted to spend the night as close to Jog falls as possible, so that we can spend the maximum time there. Hence we decided to board another bus to Kumta rather than spending the night at Gokarna.
Once we reached Kumta, we asked around and found out that buses for Jog falls leaves at 7 in the morning. We found a nice lodge near the bus station and spend the night there.

Day-2
Bus journey to Jog falls
Another beautiful and scenic journey took us to the mighty Jog falls. This kind of journey makes you think you should be travelling by a private cab rather than public transport. You feel like stopping every now and then and get lost in the nature's beauty. It was raining, there was mist. All you can see was green trees and cloud covered mountains at the horizon wherever the dense forest allowed.

 Jog falls
I was not expecting much from the Jog falls. But once I reached there I realized how beautiful it actually was. You have options of hiring cabs there who take you on a ride for 3 different view points along the falls.

View point at the top of the falls

The falls

As we were running short of time we decided to go to the base of the fall rather than on sight seeing. There are around 1500 steps that leads you to the the base. At the base, we plunged in ice cold water and had a great time. Its a very risky place, the stones are very slippery. And we were surprised to find no life guards there (they collect nominal charge of Rs 5 for entry). Climbing up those 1500 steps was a task in itself.

Bus journey to Shimoga
It started to rain heavily as soon as we were done with the steps. We boarded a bus to Shimoga (from here we had our return tickets to Hyderabad). The time spent in the water and our climb of 1500 steps had made us hungry. The bus stopped at a petrol pump for 5 mins and luckily we found a small hotel near by. In those 5 minutes we gulped down 6 plates of idily, 4 Parle-G biscuit packets and 13 teas.
The bus started playing some local bhajans, we all shifted ourselves to the last row, and had a blast there.

Return bus journey to Hyderabad
As soon as we boarded the last bus of our journey, we realized its going to be a tough one. And we decided we need to do something so that we can sleep in the bus. We ended up buying a Vodka bottle, mix it with Sprite and transfer it to a water bottle and carried it inside the bus. This helped us to sleep in the bus and when we got up in the morning we were in Hyderabad.

And thus another unplanned exciting weekend with a random trip came to its fitting conclusion.