தொலைநோக்கியை நோக்கி ....kalpakkam 2 kavalur

Hello world,
Welcome once again to the world of hakuna mataata. Here there are no worries, only trek, travel and enjoyment.
This blog would take you on a journey to one of asia's largest telescopes- The Vainu Bappu telescope.

The telescope is situated on the picturesque javadi hills of north tamil nadu. Our journey started at our present home right at the land's end -The beach side enclaves of kalpakkam atomic energy township. Though the day of the visit was chosen to be the weekend, the preparation for it started a week before. we (I,Nandha,and Kalyan) had invited many of our fellow researchers for the trip and we had also asked for special permission from one Mr. muthumaariappan of the observatory for a full night sky watching session. But finally none turned up, so only we three decided to enjoy the exotic experience.
we started from our enclave at around 4:30 early in the morning. We had planned to catch the train from chennai central to bangalore -the bangalore express via vaniyampadi to reach kavalur but right from the start we started tweaking our plans for good. once we began to realise that time was running out and the possibility of reaching chennai central by 7 a.m. was converting itself into a probability, we changed our plan and decided to board the kalpakkam to vellore bus which was already tempting us, groaning in the take off mode. so finally we were into the bus.
it was a long travel from kalpakkam to vellore- around 4 hours of gruelling bus ride. Our sleep kept us busy upto some distance but when we reached chengalpet we started to come out from our deep slumber and started to think of what would lie ahead. Throughout this leg of the journey the river palar accompanied us with its dry river bed forming the main part of our discussions. even at this point nandha was fully involved in his sleep.
By the time we reached vellore, the city was fully active. the time was 9:30. as we got out of the bus our hungry stomachs demanded breakfast. There was a hotel aaryas classic right in front of us so we immediately got inside and got energized. The food was satisfactory. Our next destination was alangayam. both government buses and private ones ply from vellore to vaniyampadi. We had to get into a private bus as it was about to start at that time. This time it took around one and a half hours to reach vaniyampadi. from there we had to take a bus to alangayam which is the nearest town to kavalur. actually we had planned to have our lunch in alangayam but when we reached alangayam at 12:40 we came to know that the observatory will be opened to the public only after 15:30, so we decide not to waste our time having lunch and hanging around alangayam, instead we decided to head to the heart of the javadi hills-The village called jamunamarathur.

excellent speech by bill gates...

from hubble site

kalpakkam beach...

hi all, had a nice weekend this time with friends at the kalpakkam beach, known as the exotic casuarina beach among nature lovers(like me :)).
We started around 3.30pm from thiruvanmiyur, boarded a puduchery bus and within minutes we all were into a fantastic siesta, after all who could resist the sleep with the lullaby of the east coast wind around and that too after fighting with a heavy weight lunch at the lakshmi andhra mess. Half an hour later we woke up to a view of the majestic atomic power plant of kalpakkam.
On the suggestion of the bus conductor we all got down at the kalpakkam pudhuppatinam village. When we were out of the bus it was already 4.30pm. Someone suggested to take a share auto to reach the beach. so we took it,the auto went into the IGCAR township ,through a nicely wooded campus it took us to the periphery-the tsunami protection walls, only at this point we realised that the beach is just at a walkable distance. after settling the bills we proceeded towards the beach. The casuarinas which were already visible over the walls welcomed us with their graceful dance. There were stairs over the wall to provide the township people with easy access to the beach . Once we were up the stairs we were deeply enthralled by the grandeur that danced before us, yes! here it was -the bay of bengal!.
what a view!. I bet no one could resist the temptation to take a dip in the crystal clear waters of this great sea. Everyone of us rushed to the sea to satisfy the adventurers inside us. The rest is pure fantasy. words fall short to describe that experience. so here are the pictures...