Trip to Dandeli

Last week Saturday morning I landed at Dandeli on a VRL bus from Bangalore. I had heard about Dandeli as a tourist destination but this was my first visit there. It is a small town and its population is heavily dependent on the West Coast Paper Mill for their livelihood. It is located in the Uttara Kannada (North Canara) district of Karnataka, India. North Canara district has a unique distinction of having 90 percent forest land.

Most of the lodging facilities are located little away from the town center. So a car had to pick me up from near KSRTC bus stand. The destination was Jungle Camp where I was supposed to stay. The early morning drive to Jungle Camp crossing river Kali and amidst of forest was very refreshing. The accommodation at Jungle Camp is very basic and given that it is located inside a reserved forest, much tinkering with its structure is not allowed. Nevertheless it is clean and filled with nature. Unless you are too demanding on luxury, I recommend this place.

After breakfast, headed to Syntheri rocks with some other members at the camp. It took around 3 hours time and we were back to Jungle Camp for lunch by 1 pm. It was a hot sunny day. Even though Dandeli is located on a decent elevation and in a forested area, it is pretty hot during summer. After lunch, I went to my room with nature walk in mind at 4 pm. I slightly dozed of but the heavy drops of rain on the tin roof woke me up. I lazily opened the door and went outside. It was bliss! I whispered – Dandeli loves me. The heavy dose rain along with strong cool breeze brought back nature around Jungle Camp to life. I made a small basic video trying to capture that moment.

Watch it!

Though my planned nature walk got washed away but I am not complaining.

As dusk proceeded, the true rawness of nature at Jungle Camp came to fore. The chirping of frogs, cricket and other insects became prominent. But Jungle Camp also adds little bit of glamour to evenings there by lighting camp fire. One can spend some fun time around the camp fire with some chilled beer. I created a small video to capture the night life at Jungle Camp.

Watch it

More coming soon on the second day rafting adventure.

For enquires on Dandeli resorts and tour packages you can check on Dandeli.com. They do a pretty good service.