At Coschen Tower #1

A short way away from Top Station was the start of the 80 km road to Kodai. All the locals concurred on one thing. The road was NOT navigable, and further, the road was blocked up at the Kerala - TN border 9 km away. We were planning to do this route, and things weren’t looking up. We decided to do a reconnoitre ride, up to the border, and take it from there.

Vipin (and Arun), Easha and I started off from the deserted log cabin which was the "forest check-post". The first 2 km was smooth, 2 metre wide road through thick vegetation. We hit one very muddy patch where we had to wade through, and that was a turning point. After that we just had rocks and stones.

This wasn’t a road, it was barely even a path. Motocross bikes would have had trouble here. A couple of km more and we stop to let our clutches cool, and that’s when we were introduced to our slimy pets - Leeches! Apparently picked up in the muddy patch. Couple of kms more, and Vipin gave up. He didn’t want to melt his clutch so far from civilisation. Easha and I carried on.

Often we were at places where it seemed as though the only way was back, but we persisted. It paid off, the road got better after a few kms. Presently we reached a wireless telegraph relay station. The operators were very friendly and gave us the guided tour. A km more and we were at the border - A 25m tall fire lookout tower, a chain link fence with a notice stating that the road was closed to traffic (No really!) and an iron railing a little further on, reassuring the stodgy notice.

And ONE HELLUVA View from atop the lookout tower. I emptied half a roll here.

From atop the tower, Shot 1.

From atop the tower, Shot 2. This was taken roughly about 45-50 degrees to the right of shot 1. If it seems like the photograph was taken from inside a cloud, you better believe it. Every few seconds we’d get completely engulfed and had to wait till it cleared a bit.

From atop the tower, Shot 3. 45-50 more degrees. I was actually planning to take a series of shots covering all 360 degrees, and stick-em all together to get a panoramic photograph of sorts. Didn’t quite work that way, because for one thing, I had no tripod. And them damn clouds didn’t help either.