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| A part of the wall that overlooks the hills |
It was when we were Masters students at Mysore University that we decided to go on a trip to Gopalaswamy Betta, a quiet hilly retreat, far from the madding crowd.
This Betta (Hill in Kannada) was just around 80 kilometres away from the University so one Saturday we decided to ride all the way there. The ride through the Mysore – Gundlupet Road and the uphill road to Gopalaswamy Betta was a long one but it was fun too; what else would you expect when the company was a bunch of youngsters.
When we got there, we first walked into the temple atop the hill and then made our way to the back of the temple and down a hill and up another, where a friend of us had promised us a place that resembled the `Dil Chahta Hai wall.’ And Boy! it was like that, only with rolling hills on the other side instead of the sea as we see in the movie.
It was a feast to our eyes. We seated ourselves on that broken stone wall and stared at the hills beyond for I-don’t-know-how-long. A few hours of nature-watch later we saw another awesome sight: some elephants on one of the hills nearby. In the distance the pachyderms looked so tiny in comparison to their actual size.
Today when I think of how close to the wild and how far away from human beings and our vehicles we were, it sends a chill down my spine. But that day we were so intoxicated by the beauty of the scenery around that we didn’t feel like leaving there. I remember saying I could sit on that wall for days together just taking in the surroundings.
It was with such reluctance that we left the place; we just had to at some point because the sun was going to call it a day and we had a long ride back to urban Mysore.
