Payatalee….again!

Already late, I started to pedal at 7:15 a.m. towards Payatalee with camera and a botlle full of water. I caught up the highway track and entered the flat rode mode. But however, today I felt exhausted as compared to previous cycle rides on this tracks. I stopped for a while, drank some water and marched forward again. But still the feeling of exhaustion was not completely vanished from the body. I got down from the cycle and started to climb the road by walking. After reaching on slope I sat back and pedaled off.

As I stood by this climb 2-3 villagers passed some curious looks at me and my bike. I made my mind to climb up by cycle first. but than I realized it was not possible this climb and that too with help of already exhausted body. But Ohh! It was not even possible to climb it by walking…but I started walking against my body will. Finding some flat land, I parked my bike and laid on the ground for a while to give myself some rest so that I could climb some more.

And than, I reached the heaven…..The Lake stood as silent as it was before, guarding the surrounding environment. But camera gave me jerk as it was showing the display message “CHANGE THE BATTERIES”. Still I could get some of this pics, but I missed two near shots of Golden Oriole and Malabar Whistling Thrush. I resisted going inside the forest near the small spring as the camera was out of power.

I started off my back journey from Khandepar to Ponda with a sigh of freshness.

this is pied saish

19th Dec.2007!

Today too, I went cycling early morning! Not alone but with Saish. We rode to the same spot of yesterday, “The Piedy Kingfi Spot” as we call it for the lovely pied kingfishers living there. Today we had camera, so could do some photography. As we stopped, there were no pied Kingfishers sitting on the wire. They showed up bit late today as compared to yesterday. Checkered Keel back was also spotted swimming across the stream.
Meanwhile, we could find some spare time and road to perform small scale bike stunts on our octane. I am very bad at it.
We did less cycling today but more of bird watching but however it was refreshing. We moved back after spending some two hors there and pedaled to college canteen for refreshment.

Cycling again!

After a long break, I have now kicked….sorry peddled off with my new bicycle Hero Octane DTB 1.
I think it’s a great and paisa vasool bike (Rs. 5500/-). But it surely can’t beat a Trek bike…you can easily feel the difference between Desi & Pardesi…….
I started off from my home and started pedaling towards our college. Since I was riding after a long break, I had to wait 2-3 times to give myself some rest on the climb way to Farmagudi. But I think, 2-3 times is good, looking forward for continuous pedaling!
After reaching to college campus, I sat down on the steps in the college for some more rest watching vehicles pass by. To my surprise, I met Shaikh sir in college at 6:50 a.m. He parked his scooter besides my octane. gave his usual smile, and started walking towards Farmagudi.
I got up and pedaled forward, took a left turn and joined the Dhavali by-pass. Here I had nothing to do except sitting on bike because it was a slope. I waited untill I reached just near the road to Kavalem temple for some bird watching. The pair of Pied Kingfisher which I was eagerly waiting to watch, finally I met them sitting on a wire. To my surprise, I even saw a pair of wood pecker with other usual birds like Cormorants, Egrets, Kingfisher, Lapwing etc.etc.
I marched forward with a sigh of freshness & entered the noisy town back……
Note: I couldn’t upload any pics of this episode as I had no camera with me. But next time sure…..
sorry for t he inconvenience!

DEFEAT OF THOUGHTS......more than ever!

“When man started to think, it marked the end of world”, I said to Rohan as we sat discussing on man’s destruction of environment on the eve before our Marathi paper.
He replied, “How did you come to know that?” I kept quite as I could not answer his question. It was obvious I had thought over it. Once again, I put my head in text book to read the lessons & our discussion had come to an abrupt stop.
Defeat of my thoughts…is what I have experienced many times in my life but not as it happened just two days back.
Ever since I’ve joined nature club, things have changed for me. And after those long trails with other group members & endless discussion on the disturbance caused by man to the nature, I experienced reforms in my thinking processes. I understood that every little creature on this planet needs to be saved from getting extinct. Snakes, tigers, birds
& so many of them!!!!
The thing happened on Sunday 28th October, me & Rohan were walking to a cyber café 2 floors up in a building. As we entered, we saw a group of people were standing by wall, excitedly looking at a cardboard box in a corner. We came to know that there was a snake hidden behind it. We stopped and told the gurkha there who was with stick in his hand not to hit that snake at any cost. The man was simple and agreed. Others, too, agreed with us not to kill him. He needed to be rescued. I remembered Saish, but I could not remember his phone number. Best way was to call Ajay sir and I did the same & sir than further contacted Surel, a lawyer by profession who is in the animal rescue squad set up by Amrut Singh. I gave him the address of the building and I went down on the road to escort him to the place.
Meanwhile, as I was busy contacting everyone, a man had appeared there with no pleasant things. He was on to kill that snake. Rohan started persuading that man not to kill him as he had not done any harm to anybody out there. He didn’t take notice of it but was bit afraid too. He kept quite for a moment and again started blabbing about killing the snake. By the time Rohan too raised his voice little bit. But the man was firm on killing the snake. He had a cricket bat in his hand. Rohan tried to stop him again. He got very angry & pushed Rohan away and finally did the thing. He badly smashed snake’s head.
Rohan was speechless. The man, smiled at Rohan. Rohan went forward and thanked him angrily for doing a work of pride & came down to tell me what happened there.
By the time Surel reached the spot, the man had thrown the snake in a nearby pond. We told Surel about everything that happened. We sent him back as there was no snake left to rescue.
As we walked back to building, the man was coming down boasting to everybody about his killing. I said, “boss, don’t do the same mistake ever again!”
“Why?” The man asked.
“The number of snakes is day by day decreasing with the depletion of area under forest cover. They are as important as we, man are, on the earth.” Replied Rohan
“Don’t tell your useless knowledge to me. If it was so, we would have not been able to drive the cars and live like what we live today.” The man replied.
We had nothing more to speak as we already knew that it won’t serve the purpose by talking to a damn idiot.
We moved out, disturbed & depressed.
Again experiencing…defeat of thoughts!

पायतळी……(PAAYTALEE)

A heavenly beautiful place located while entering to Khandepar from Ponda….stopping near a small church, we climbed a half muddy road to reach this place. When I came here first time, I was stunned to see the beauty of this place.
This place was first visited by Saish, Omkar n Amey to search nesting sites for kingfisher. Than they informed us about this place & since then I have been a regular visitor of this place.
When I started my bird watching, my most memorable & beautiful bird watching has been at this place. Bee eaters, Kingfishers, Paradise Flycatcher, Whistling Thrush, Oriole, and Chloropsis etc were some of the sites I will never forget in my life.
More than a birding site, when you visit this place, you tend to forget all your frustrations, sorrows. This place gives you a new energy every time you visit it. A new thought to live your life.

My first long run cycling…..

Already excited about the plan, I woke up at 4:30 in the morning to get ready. Actually we were supposed to meet at Amigos Hotel at 6:30, but I, being over enthusiastic, woke up at 4:30. the day didn’t breed good as I found my cycle tyre was vacuum filled.
But hoping to see some garages open, I left my house at 6:00 to Hotel Amigos. Bad thing was that I had to walk till the hotel by taking the cycle in my hand. Hopefully, Ajay sir had brought his air pump, once again I refueled my tyres for the long cycling journey to Bondla.(about 22 kms from Ponda).

We were led by Ajay sir and me, Saish, Amey & Utkarsh were following him. It was a wonderful experience when we crossed all the slopes with breathtaking speeds. But it was sometimes tiring too specially near the E-Merck factory. The villagers seemed little surprised to see us on cycles and thought it was some kind of madness to travel on cycles from all the way from Ponda to Bondla cycling.

We were just about to enter Bondla forest gate….Utkarsh’s cycle’s pedal isolated itself from the whole cycle body. We thought it would have been a minor problem and fixed it somehow till we reached Bondla.
We did some dangerous cycling on the rough surface in the forest and thought of returning. But the thing was the pedal continued to separate from the cycle.
We halted near a tea stall cum garage. The mechanic tried several tricks to fix it. But it refused.
We tried 3 different garages and handful of mechanics, but nobody could cure it to 100 percent….
And finally we reached in main city of Usgaon. We decided to take a rickshaw for rent which would drop us back to Ponda. Me, along with Amey and our cycles & Utkarsh along with his “the broken one” sat in carrier rickshaw, while Ajay sir decided to pedal back to Ponda & Saish was made to sit with the driver of the rickshaw.
Disappointedly, our first long run cycling was not successful…..but we enjoyed it.!!!!

HORNBILL EXPEDITION

HORNBIL! PIED HORNBIL! IT’S HERE, ON THIS TREE! OH, IT’S THERE TOO...OH ON THAT COCONUT TREE...OH THEY ARE FLYING….SEE THEIR BEAK…WOW!

DATE: 27TH AUGUST 2007
SACORDA…A BEAUTY LAND WEARING THE GREEN ORNAMENT CREATED BY THE MIGHTY NATURE…..
AS TOLD BY ANIKET, IT WAS A PLACE FOR HORNBILL SPOTTING….
SO WE DECIDED TO LEAVE TO SACORDA FOR SPOTTING HORNBILLS….

HORNBILL IS A BEAUTIFUL BIRD WITH HIS UNIQUE BEAK & HAS BEEN A CENTRE OF ATTRACTION FOR EVERY BIRDWATCHER…

WE HAD RECENTLY SPOTTED MALABAR GREY HORNBILL IN SOME AREAS OF PONDA, BUT PIED HORNBILL WAS SOMETHING WORTH WATCHING HUNDRED TIMES, & ON OUR PART….WE HAD NEVER SPOTTED THIS GUY SINCE WE HAD STARTED BIRDWATCHING!
SO WE ALL WERE EXCITED…..

WE LEFT FROM PONDA…STILL EVERYBODY WAS DOUBTFUL TO SEE THEM BECAUSE OF WEATHER…& WE HAD LEFT LITTLE BIT LATE….ALL OF US WERE EXPECTING TO SEE SOME 2-3 PIED HORNBILLS…

WE REACHED THE DESTINATION….THE PLACE WAS A PLANTATION OWNED BY A NON-GOAN…..WE OPENED THE GATE & STEPPED INSIDE…
A BIRD TOOK FLIGHT….IT WAS A PIED HORNBILL…WE WERE OVERJOYED…BUT WAIT…..IT WAS HERE….IT WAS THERE TOO…THEY WERE EVERYWHERE……BELIVE IT OR NOT…..WE WERE SURROUNDED BY MORE THAN 50 PIED HORNBILLS OVERHEAD…..
THEY WERE EVERYWHERE…WE COULDN’T BELIEVE OUR EYES…WE KEPT ROAMING IN THE FARM CLICKING PHOTOGRAPHS, COUNTING THE HORNBILLS& OF COURSE…ENJOYING THE WHOLE SCENE.

AFTER THAT, WE WENT FOR A STROLL IN ANIKET’S FARM & ALSO TO THE MINI WATREFALL BEHIND HIS HOUSE……

HORNBILLS…..THEY MADE THE DAY WORTH!!!!!


REPORT BY KAUSTUBH NAIK (12TH SCIENCE)

hi....once again
my nature diaries......
i and my group carry out nature trails, trekks, birdwatching etc. the following posts will be followed by a series of my experiences about the treks n trails..so keep visiting!!!!

hi...the blog is revived....
past few days i have been experincing the true meaning of revival....so i thought to revive my blog too!!!
keep visiting for some intelligent stuff!!!!
keep rocking.....