Paadooru is my native village situated near Kaup, Udupi District of Karnataka. The blog is dedicated to beautiful landscape of KAUP Beach and my village Paadooru
Here are some highway landscapes shot during our drive back from Bangalore to Kaup. The roads are well paved from Nelamangala to Ballupet and the beautiful curvy, snaky roads tempted me to grab some pictures. These pictures were taken while driving and don't expect depth of field. Due to movement, to have steady shot, 1/200s or higher was required and hence DOF restricted to f/8.0. Unfortunately, the new highway numbering has been done only in re-constructed stretches. The 2 lane stretch from Hassan to Bantwal still carries the old name NH-48. There is plan to four lane this stretch even! There is proposal to linearize Shiraadi ghat road on similar lines as Mumbai-Pune highway by carving out tunnels along western ghats. Although, the stretch from Hassan to Bantwal seems to be tough ask for four laning, some construction companies have come forward to take up the work. The work may not commence in near future though ;-).
KUNIGAL BYPASS
YEDIYUR
My main attraction was to capture some footages from brand new Channarayapattana bypass. Surprisingly, the bypass road is only 2-laned. My initial guess was that land acquisition would have hit roadblock for constructing 4-laned bypass. However, the guard rails are already erected and restricted to two lane boundary. Also there was no sign of furthermore work progressing along the bypass road. Eventually its 2 laned highway and not 4 laned which may not be scalable for future. Since the interior road which passes through Channarayapattana town is 4 laned, NHAI would have restricted bypass road to 2 lane, just to facilitate truck traffic (or cost?). Nevertheless, the highway is evenly laid and can have smooth journey all along. Barring few stretches, the section is upgraded as per NHAI standards. The work is on in remaining sections (even at night) to finish the patch works so that tolls could be collected sooner!
THE NEW STRETCH STARTS!
HIRISAAVE TOLL GATE! AS OF NOW FREE ;-)
SNAKY NATIONAL HIGHWAY-75
A MILLION MILES BEHIND
BRAND NEW CR PATNA BYPASS BUT ONLY 2 LANE
WELL PAVED NH-75
VIEW TO THE FUTURE!
ALMOST HASSAN!
A BILLION MILES BEHIND :-)
The stretch from Nelamangala junction to Hassan is very good for driving ;-) except for toll booths! Everything comes at price ;-). Get ready to cough up 90 bucks if you wish to drive along the highway ;-). Also brand new toll gates are erected near Hirisaave & Hassan junctions and survey is on to fix up toll rates ;-). So the total bucks may ascend all the way upto 180 :D. Despite the toll rates, it is really worth driving along the stretch. Since my father was driving, I could grab many pictures and videos :D. Almost 10GB of data ;-). Will share small video if possible with good music :-). As of now, enjoy the short video of driving along brand new Channarayapattana bypass!
Back to caption :D. When looking at the horizon along the highway, it is difficult to judge distance beyond it. So as per calculus, road at the horizon is tending to infinity ;-). Instead of infinity, I say it as 'Million miles away' ;-). Speaking of million miles away, I remember the beautiful travel music by German musician Ulrich Schnauss "A Million Miles Away". My all time favorite travel music from past many years ;-). The music was featured in GT4 for PS2 gaming consoles and hence I am sharing same link. Hear, enjoy the ambiance and chill of music and experience brilliance of Ulrich Schnauss
From time to rest its now time to eat :-). Along our journey from
Bangalore to Kaup, we had glimpse of everything from beautiful roads to
nature and water spots all along. Also some humorous scenes too :-).
After finishing tasty South Indian meals at Aditya hotel near
Uppinangady , my eyes caught those cattle snatching hay from parked
truck :-). There was huge haystack on parked mini truck and it was so
much packed that lorry was almost invisible :D. The cows nearby truck
started dragging hay towards their mouth and they enjoyed chewing them.
The truck driver chased them away but the adamant cattle returned again
wagging their tail :D. Who can miss the tasty treat ;-). Perhaps even
truck driver would have realised later that there were only few of them
and would not affect overall quantity! [infinity-x=infinity ;-)]. Enjoy
the pictures ;-).
There is so much to eat, time to attack :-)
Hmmm. So yummy, let me pull some more :D
You had enough meals, now let me enjoy. Do not post this picture in News Paper :-)
I love such scenes and makes me happy too :D. Always be happy in life and enjoy such small things you come across :-). That will keep you always refreshed and healthy ;-).
It has been year long since we visited Aanegudde siddhi-vinayak temple near Kundapur. We do visit the temple every year. There were so many hurdles which prevented us to visit the temple. This time, father was adamant to visit and seek blessings of Lord vinayak. I requested him if we could extend till Murudeshwar :D. He agreed under condition that I alone would be driving. Thats fair deal except for I cannot shoot landscape while driving. We planned to start around 8AM from Kaup but as always turned out be late by an hour. Murudeshwara is 115kms from my hometown and really great place to visit. I love the ambiance, landscape, shiva statue as well roaring Arabian sea of Murudeshwara.
It all started with heavy monsoon rain early morning 6AM. It was so thick droplets and I enjoyed the rain with raincoat ;-). Also visited full flowing streams down coconut plantation. Good thing is myself and father are both experienced monsoon drivers and wipers of ritz add smoothness to journey by clearing windshield perfectly. Around 8:30AM, rains started receding but when I looked at Satellite pictures, thick clouds had covered entire coast which indicated further rains. Even father was OK to drive despite of heavy rains. We started exactly around 9AM and drove towards Kundapur.
Anegudde temple is around 40kms from our hometown. Wonderful temple site with beautiful nature. Also shiva temple beneath the hill is constructed around a lake which makes it delightful to watch. The journey was smooth however the uneven roads added delay. 10:30AM, we were in Anegudde temple and unexpectedly there was crowd despite being odd time. This temple is visited by many people from all over Karnataka and consequently is crowded most of the times. We had darshan of Lord Vinayaka and it started to rain heavily again. We also visited the Shiva temple beneath. Not many people are aware of this temple but it is really worth visiting the lake temple. Here are some pictures from both the temples.
AANEGUDDE VINAYAKA TEMPLE
LAKE TEMPLE BENEATH
We started our journey towards Murudeshwara around 11:30AM. There comes bad roads after Kundapur. They were really craters. It seemed like recently some meteor hit the highway :(. Also water filled pot-holes made it difficult to judge their depth. Still drove carefully and most of the time 1st or 2nd gear (too much fuel consumption). After nearly 5kms of hell, there starts the heaven :-). The beautiful rivulets along the highway were magnificent to watch. We could not stop anywhere due to time constraints and heavy traffic. Especially I missed Mabukala bridge and Hatti kudru. Both the rivulets were flowing with full vigor. Those sites were absolutely stunning to watch with full muddy water :-). Thats the real indication of heavy rains! After sometime, we reached Maravanthe beach :-). I requested father to drive till end of beach and he agreed to drive :-). I shot some videos and many pictures including panorama bracketing. It was also drizzling and Arabian sea was fully showing off with great energy. Also powerful winds tended to push us off the road to river :D. It seemed like Sea wanted to take revenge on river for teasing it ;-). Never dedicated time here, some day will spend full evening in this marvelous site. Enjoy some pictures!
THE UNIQUE BEACH OF INDIA ;-)
THE DELIGHTFUL SOUPARNIKA RIVER
After nearly 20 minutes of delight, I started driving again towards Murudeshwara. In contrast to what predicted, it seemed there was heavy overnight rain but not during day. It was only drizzling which was managable. After few kms of joyous ride along beautiful Uttara Kannada landscape, there starts one more stretch of hell :-(. The stretch between Shiroor to Bhatkal was completely tortured with craters bigger than the previous one. Our car again slowed down to 2nd gear most of the time. This time it was long tough drive which was around 12kms :-(. Both the stretches added almost 30 minutes of delay. After Bhatkal, the roads are once again smooth till Murudeshwara. At around 1:30AM, we reached Murudeshwara. The town is 2kms interior from main National Highway. We were aware that temple would be closed from 1PM to 3PM and hence I drove to apsarakonda waterfalls which is 17kms from here. The roads were again very good and we reached in matter of 10mins. It is believed that apsaras used to rest in this tiny waterfall site during mythological times. Last time we visited the place, it seemed like tap water but this time it was showing off with full glory ;-). The main source of water seems to be from nearby hillock and hence only alive during monsoon times. As we neared the place, the beautiful sight of Kasarkod beach attracted me. Few snaps here, we neared apsarakonda waterfalls. It started raining torrentially as we reached the waterfall site. Oh my god, that was so thick. I thought those droplets would pierce my old umbrella :D. I shot some videos under the heavy rains :-). After sometime, we reached the parking lot again. While downhilling, we came across many seasonal water streams which were beautiful to watch. This stretch of Uttara Kannada (Bhatkal to Gokarna) receives torrential rainfall during monsoon season. Despite the inclement weather, the sight looks so beautiful during monsoon season.
THE BEAUTIFUL KASARKOD BEACH
APSARAKONDA AT ITS BEST!
THE MILKY WAY ;-)
THERE ARE LOT SUCH EN-ROUTE :D
It is now time to head back towards Murudeshwara. There was fierceful rain for about 30 mins and I enjoyed the drive in heavy monsoon rains for sometime. The rains receded after some distance. On the way, we prayed lord vinayaka of idagunji from distance itself. We did not have time and hence skipped the temple visit. 2:30PM, we were in Murudeshwara town. We had lunch in one of the hotel and by that time temple had opened. The best thing during this time of year is absence of crowd. Due to heavy rains, people barely visit the place and people like me enjoy to full extent ;-). We easily had darshan of Lord Murudeshwara in matter of few minutes. We skipped walk to hill statue instead went all the way to 18th floor of pinnacle to have aerial view of town and shiva statue. A nominal fee of 10Rs is levied to reach the top floor of pinnacle. Having had good glimpse of aerial view, we started back to Udupi.
THE PINNACLE!
OM NAMAH SHIVAYA
VIEW FROM TOP OF PINNACLE
THE GLORIOUS MURUDESHWARA BEACH
It was required to start early due to bad roads. We encountered Mangalore-Mumbai Matsyagandha express near National Highway. I felt like boarding the train and travel all the way to Karwar :-). Konkan Railway as well as Sakaleshpur-Subramanya train journeys are the most beautiful train journey I ever had but I do not have snaps of former one. Never miss the mesmerizing Konkan railway journey from Mangalore to Goa during Monsoon season! My next target is travelling along the Briganza ghats from Castle-Rock to Panaji which passes through the Dudhsagar waterfalls. On the way we enjoyed the beautiful sight nearby shiroor where one could see Sea and western ghats closeby. Due to lack of time, I had to skip many places :-(. We again enjoyed energetic Maravanthe beach and rivulets nearby Kundapur. Also to our luck, the rains had receded completely but there was thick cloud cover. At around 7PM, we reached our home. We could not visit many places including Idagunji temple, the glorious sharavati river basin, top of apsarakonda hills as well as could not stop nearby beautiful rivulets all along. Still, a great day of travel it was :-).
The routes to these places are mentioned in my 2 year old blog.
There is bunch of HDR and panorama trials done which documented here.
There were lot things to capture as timelapse especially the storm raising from Kasarkod Beach. No time and no timelapse eventually this time :-(.
Two videos this time and full HD too ;-). One is aerial view of Murudeshwara temple and other is from apsarakonda waterfalls. Watch and Enjoy!
My parents were here in Bangalore for 2 weeks and hence bit of break from kitchen ;-) It was time to drop them back to native village :-(. Never felt 2 weeks would pass so early :-(. Nevertheless, they love the native village than city life for obvious reasons. This Saturday, the return long drive from Bangalore to Kaup with too much luggage :D. Effectively we were 5 instead of 3 :-). This time, father drove from Nelamangala junction till Gundya forest gate. I had lot of room to grab videos and pictures :D. One of the battery drained and other battery almost half used ;-). This time there are drive videos along Shiraadi ghat too! Even though the roads were not good, it was delightful to watch sahyaadri ranges with tons of waterfalls and not to miss gundya river. For few kms, the river follows the highway too!
Around 12PM, we reached Gundya forest gate. Prior to that I had lot of photo shoot as mentioned above along shiraadi ghat! There was slight drizzle at shiraadi ghat and as we neared Mangalore, the clouds opened up with pounding rain. The road was almost invisible for some time. Overall it was smooth journey and we covered in 9hrs (including 90 minutes cumulative break).
Coming back, the dreadful national (notional?) highway along shiraadi ghat was more than compensated by captivating western ghats and gundya river. Father was tired driving and it was time to rest near by this beautiful gundya river and hence the title ;-). Here are two HDRs; one from western ghats and other Gundya river with western ghats at backdrop. Both are 5 exposure bracketed HDRs.
This picture was featured in incredible india g+ page. I am really honored to have my picture in their page :-). That was shared unknowingly among 200,000 followers of incredible india g+ page. Hope you will also enjoy the same.
CAPTIVATING GUNDYA RIVER WITH BEAUTIFUL WESTERN GHATS IN BACKDROP
THE WESTERN GHATS!
The shiraadi ghat road stretch is beautiful than Kuduremukh stretch due to many seasonal waterfalls and Gundya river. I am not debasing Kuduremukh ghats, only difference is that road along Kuduremukh ghats does not contain as many water spots as shiraadi ghat. Also do not miss magnificent train journey along Sakaleshpur-Subramanya railway track. One of the memorable journey you will ever have during monsoon season. Also water spots are more along railway stretch than highway ;-).
Finally one of the water spot! There were many but we stopped at only few places. Felt like taking bath but no time :-(.
ONE OF SEASONAL WATERFALL ALONG HIGHWAY
Two musics this time. 'Time to Rest' by Andy Blueman and the chill-down remix of same by Magdelayna. Both are very good but latter is slightly more soothing than original version. So rest yourself for 18 mins enjoying beautiful music but not more than that ;-).
After small rest, it was time to drive for me before father could lose patience. Consequently drove all the way to our village from here.
So, why take pain of self driving? We have never felt it as pain ;-) It is really joyous to drive CRDi ;-). Apart from this, there are many reasons. It gives lot of flexibility to halt anywhere you wish. Secondly, we can fill in ample luggage compared to traveling by public transport. Last but not the least, traveling by car has proven to be far more cheaper than even Rajahamsa bus for 3 of us. If we include, luggage we had carried, the difference is even more. Only requirement is at-least two drivers are required. Many people have presumption that driving along ghats is cumbersome. But thats not case ;-). Once you experience driving along ghats, you will feel like driving repeatedly :-). Do not miss any chance if you have opportunity to drive along western ghats!
Here are some HDR and panorama shots taken during our yearly visit to Mantralaya temple. Few years back, torrential rains and floods from Tungabhadra river, had ruined the temple very badly. Later, many volunteers thronged to help in reconstruction of the town including temple. As a result of many years of work, the temple has beautiful look now. This panorama stitch is of temple front view. Of-course one could see barrel distortion and it is expected when you grab panorama shots non-linearly. Even some UWL lenses exhibit this nature but not noticeable as below. Enjoy the full front view of temple.
MANTRALAYA TEMPLE
Evening time, we spent considerable amount of time in Tungabhadra river basin. I wanted to stay till the Sunset and achieved it too ;-). Before sunset, I wanted to grab landscape picture with coracle. As expected, the high energy SUN eats up all the luminosity in picture consequently under-exposing the surroundings. Hence time to grab HDR shot. 5 exposure shot gave me perfect image exposing both coracle and Sun eventually :-).
CORACLE AND SUN ;-)
Next is golden hour picture just before sunset. We were expecting beautiful Sunset, however clouds suddenly turned up and spoiled our enthusiasm :-(. Nevertheless, the nature never betrays. The Sun behind clouds was waving rays through the clouds :-). That created some beautiful colors too! This is perfect for HDR shot. Here is one more 5 image bracketed HDR. I am really happy with the image. The clouds, colors and rocks are perfectly exposed. Also my one more intention was to expose those distant power masts which was achieved in image. The only problematic part is the distant landscape did not come up with good colors. After inspecting all 5 images, I realized more dynamic was required. This is the case where one needs 7 exposures to have great dynamic range. Eventually, I am happy with the result.
After sailing through Kuduremukh western ghats, we reached Shringeri on 21-09-2013. It was hardly 2hrs journey mainly due to ghat section. It is really mesmerizing experience driving through western ghats during monsoon season. Rolling back to mainstream, father wanted to visit Shringeri to spend some time in temple town. Despite, being only 2hr journey, lot of hurdles made us to refrain from visiting the beautiful Malnad temple. This time the visit was pre-planned and we made it too. As always, I did some experiments with my favorite partner ;-). I did not try much except for some HDR and panorama. Last time, I did shoot a HDR of preserved ancient temple which is documented here. This time, there were thick clouds over sky which tempted me to grab a HDR with Tunga River. So here is HDR bracketed with 3 exposures. I happy with clouds, vegetation and water being exposed in image except for the colors which would have been more greener if there were more bracketed shots (may be 5).
TUNGA RIVER BASIN, SHRINGERI
Settings:
Camera: Canon EOS 550D Lens: 18-55mm kit lens Focal Length: 18mm Focus Point: Auto Aperture: f/9.0 ISO: 100 Picture Style: Landscape White Balance: Cloudy Metering: Center weighted average No of images:3 Exposures: --2,0,+2(1/200s for middle one) ML Firmware: v2.3 Softwares: Luminance HDR (Fatal operator), GIMP
From this blog onwards, I am modifying setting details slightly. HDRs are always bracketed in 'Manual focus' mode and hence I am shifting from Focus to Focus point. Sometimes we will have to make manual focus points to concentrate on subject of interest. I will mention the focus point explicitly if set to manual
Next is panorama of Tunga river nearby temple. Since the monsoon has almost ended, not much water could be seen. My intention was to grab wider image of the river with hillocks. Here is 5 image stitch of sweet Tunga river of Shringeri!
The time when flower blossoms; as simple as that. When looking into those flowers, the florescence caption flashed onto my head even though none of them were taken early morning ;-). Here are some pictures (mainly flowers) taken during my recent visit to native village. Not much text but more pictures!
BUNCH OF FLOWERS
PADDY FIELD
COLLECTION OF FLOWERS
DANGLING FLOWERS NOT POINTER ;-)
And some with flash at night.
LEAF
GRASS
SHY THORN FLOWER ;-)
PUMPKIN PLANT FLOWER
Finally I bought macro lens and all above pictures were taken with new lens ;-). The lens is Tamron 90mm f/2.8 Di 1:1 macro lens. It is really great lens for its price. I wanted to buy Canon 100mm f/2.8 USM macro lens but it was way out of my budget :D. This lens had good review and was reasonably cheap (not much!). It has very good auto focus during broad daylight but makes too much noise. Also sometimes hunts for focus. The lack of image stabilization is negative point. Hence 1/30s or less you must use tripod. The sharpness is good f/4.0 or higher but not below that value. Some say with f/2.8, you don't need image stabilization but f/2.8 gives you very less detail. Most of the pictures at-least require f/4.0 or higher to have greater detail. Slight chromatic aberration around high contrast regions but not appealing. Even good for single portraits (not group). I am yet to explore it more. Once done, my blogs will be full of insects, butterflies, flowers and may be even snakes ;-). Overall wonderful lens to have in my kitty.
Speaking of florescence, I recall the beautiful florescence album of Slovenian musician Andy Blueman. Really great piece of work. It is so true that music requires awesomeness more than singing and Andy's music is perfect example for it. Just pure instrumental music but never you get bored! As I repeatedly mention, his work involves intelligent blending of orchestral music and synthesizers with soothing bass (not severe). His music has melodious breakdowns and one can feel the theme of the album. It is very much uplifting to hear such kind of musics. The brief retirement he announced from making uplifting musics has finally broken and he is back making great music again :-). That has really made his fans very happy including me. I wish he continues producing such everlasting music forever.
Florescence mainly consists of 4 musical tracks. Most of them seem similar but their compositions and breakdowns are unique. One can feel his musical intelligence in every track. Hear and enjoy. My favorite is the last one which is emotional mix!
