Leh & Ladakh by Pixel Factory

Ahhhhh , Leh and Ladakh. Seems everybody is visiting the place except me (and i am reallly hating it) . My college friend send me the picasa link of her "girl gang "adventourous trip there . Monika also posted about her visit and i am eagerly waiting for her travelougue.One of my collegue (and the best budding photographer i have ever seen )has just returned from Leh and shared few of his awsome pictures with us. His photography comes under the name "Pixel Factory" and you can just get a glimpse of his photography skills by the pictures below .

Here is his short travelogue :

Ladakh Landscapes

It was a wonderful road trip and that i can remember forever. We left for Delhi ...on 25th evening and on 26th to Leh by flight.

Day 1 : We visited Shanthi StupaDay

Day 2 : All the monasteries near by leh. Starting with Hemis followed by Thiksey, Shey palace, Sindhu Nadi and Stok.

Day 3 : Start of an adventurous road trip by bikes. We rented 2 bullets, 1 Thunderbird, 1 Avenger and a Pulsar. This was the day we all experienced altitude sickness at Khardunga Pass, the highest motor-able road in the World. Our journey continued towards Nubra Valley(Near Indo-Pack LOC)

Day 4 : Back to Leh from Nubra Valley.


Day 5 : Pangong Tso Lake(Near Indo-China LOC). This lake is of 135kms long and 2 Kms wide. 45Kms of it is in India and rest is in China. In winter it will be frozen and no one except indian army is allowed to be at that place. Stargazing in the night near the lake was an unforgettable experience.


Day 6 : Back to Leh from Pangong Tso Lake. We passed through the Third Highest motor-able road on the way.

Day 7 : Journey towards Tsomo-riri Lake (Near Indo-China LOC). Beautiful place near the border. We had a wonder tea time with nomads near this place for half an hour.

Day 8 : Back to Leh from Tsomo-riri. This time it was Second highest motor-able road on the way.

Day 9 : The best and scary experience of Rafting in Indus river. Many whirlpools, hot sun and finally ended with raining experience while rafting :D :)This is gist of our 9 day Leh Trip. Once our travel log is well written will share it soon :) Thanks guys :)

Disclaimer: All the pics above are the copyright of Pixel factoryand clicked by Karthik Vn.

Kathakali

On my vacation to Kerala in February this year I got an opportunity to watch “ kathakali” , the traditional dance form of Kerala. It was indeed a very heartening experience for me as I always wanted to see this dance form which I have only seen either in TV or during republic day parade in New Delhi . The best part with the performance was that they allowed us to see the live makeup for the artists and also narrated the history of its origination along with the nitty gritty of dance form. Kathakali derives its meaning from “ Katha” meaning story and “ kali” meaning dance, that is telling a story through a dance. The dance form has five elements:natya meaning dramatics; nritta meaning pure dance; nrithya meaning dance with expressions: geetha meaning vocals and vadyameaning instrument .The dance are based on mythological stories expressed through dance in various mudras and bhaav.

The performance which I watched in Munnar was “ Naraktundhi ko mila dand” (Punishment to Naraktundi). There was a brief narration before the show about the story , which goes as: Naraktundhi was a demon and fall in love with incarnation of Lord Vishnu . She disguises as a beautiful lady and tries to attract Lord Vishnu. Lord Vishnu however rejects her offer and asks her to leave. This make Narakthundi very angry and she comes to her original form of demon. She start the fight with Lord Vishnu and gets killed in the end. After the narration of the story the character played by narakthundi showed us various bhaav and the meaning of each one of them. After this narration the performance started.

The Performance poster of Kathakali and Punjarani :

The makeup :

Vadya at the starting of the show:

The character explaining Bhaav : Surprise:

Happiness:

Sorrow:

Anger:

Pain:

Various Mudras:

The performance starts:

Entry of Narakthundi:

Entry of Lord Vishnu Incarnation:

Narakthundi in disguise as a beautiful women perusing Lord Vishnu for marriage:

Narakthundi gets angry and comes in her original form leading to a fight:

Lord Vishnu finally kills Narakthundi :

Close up of the artist :

The artists after the show:

Yercaud Trip

Yercaud is a hill station near Salem, Tamil Nadu. It is at an altitude of 1,500 meters from mean sea level. Yercaud has lot of silver oak trees and is famous for it’s coffee plantations and orange groves. It’s around 180 kms from Bangalore and 30 kms from Salem.

Yercaud is also known as “poor man’s Ooty” and you can easily make this out when you reach there. The temperature difference from very hot Salem and a lake just at the center of the city instantly reminds you of Ooty . After that try not find any other comparisons, you will be disheartened for sure. You won’t find as good hotels, eatery and places to visit as you find in Ooty. Infact, you can cover the entire Yercaud in just few hours if you want to visit just “must see” places. There is a lake similar to our sankey tank. A garden and a horticulture which nowhere can be compared to Lal bagh, few viewpoints which are poorly maintained and a fall which has very less water. So then you will think that what exactly you should do there? Yes, there is nothing to do there and that is the charm of the place. The place has nothing similar to the commercial Ooty , neither do it boast of many “ must see” places. It’s just the place to run off and spend some time in the lap of nature. You can trek and cover the entire place on foot among the groves of white silver oak trees and with the feel of fresh air. Putting some pics from the trip:

Aerial view of Salem from Yercaud ( remind me of Dehradun from Mussorrie)

The route from Salem to Yercaud boasts of 20 hairpin bends:

Shevaroy temple:

Kiliyur waterfall:

Nature trails:

Seen coffee plant for the first time :)

On the way to Montfort school:

The only good cafe in Yercaud !Bang opposite to Montfort gate :

The must visit place of Yercaud , mainly for the architecture:

Emos:

The lucky lone peacock and peahen ;)

You scared me :-x :

Te laziest fella :)