Arvind Kamath Blog on Travel and Leisure

 

Home Stay experience at Heavenly Coorg This was my 5th visit to Coorg and 2nd to Palace Estates in just 2 years !! I had now experienced “home stay” after my initial stay at Palace Estate in October 2010. Palace Estate is located at Kakkabe, a small town about 30 kms from the capital of Coorg (a.k.a. Kodogu) called Mercara (a.k.a. Madikeri ). The local people called Kodavas still prefer to use anglicized version of these names. The distance from Bangalore to Kakkabe is about 280kms via Mysore/Madikeri and the journey time is approximately 6 hours with a short tea break. It took us long since the road at some stretches from Madikeri to Kakkabe was in pitiable condition fit only for bullock carts or hardened trekkers. Finally we reached the place just in time to savour the sumptuous lunch provided by our host, Prasad Apparanda of Palace Estate Home Stay. The advantages of staying at a home stay, which I realized, are many especially if you want to discover the lifestyle of the local peop...

I was invited to Doha, the capital of Qatar for a Sales related meeting and hence the duration of my stay was barely 2 days. What can one see in 2 days especially when you have a tight schedule? I was in the Hotel 90% of my time and the remaining 10% spent on the Road or inside the Airport. What I gathered from my colleagues in Qatar is that the country is blessed with tremendous reserves of Oil and Natural Gas and in fact it has the third largest gas reserves and the highest GDP per capita in the world. Qatar is an absolute monarchy ruled by the al-Thani family since the mid-1800s and has since transformed itself from a poor British colony noted mainly for pearls into an independent state with significant oil and natural gas revenues. The Doha Airport is beautiful and well managed although not as huge as Dubai Airport but larger compared to Bahrain Airport. I completed my Immigration formality in just 30 seconds although I expected more time assuming the stricter rules and regulations...

Times of India has started the "Love Pakistan" campaign starting today. These are the same guys, who were reluctant to post the article below in their publications, written just after the 26/11 incident. The article tries to articulate the 26/11 story from a different perspective. Our Press and Media typically goes with the Mass or Herd mentality and try not to look at an issue objectively. Now the same guys have started this campaign...... Isn't this Media or Press hypocrisy........ Thanks to The Week, which published the article as "Letter to the Editor" after editing the contents, in their issue dated 4thJan 2009. Please see left side of this Blog. FULL TEXT OF THE LETTER. It was also published in the NDTV website and The Times, London… Dated: 6th Dec 2008 Subject: 26/11 effect on UK Dear Sir: While I write this mail, I am in a place called Slough on the outskirts of London, UK. I landed here just after the 26/11 Mumbai carnage and am seeing an unprecedente...

This time my travelog looks through the eyes of a foreigner, who visits India for the first time. For the first time visitor from the western world, India is a very unique experience and I am sure this experience remains in their memory for a long long time. Recently I had the opportunity to take a client from the United Kingdom, on a road journey from Bangalore to Chennai. They wanted to experience India by not opting for the 30 minutes flight. Little did they know that a trip to Devanahalli from Electronics City is a journey in itself! We started in the afternoon to beat the traffic. The road to Chennai did not impress them at all since they felt being in a developed world. They expected some cows and dogs to cross the road ; elephants to pass by and some odd snake charmers seated beside the road. The road in fact beats any international standard and I was in awe since this was the first time I was travelling to Chennai by road after the dacoity incident that happened in the year 200...

The name Andaman conjures up images of freedom struggle and political prisoners suffering at the hands of the British rulers. Andaman derives its name from Hanuman (the Hindu Monkey God) and it was nicknamed Kaala Paani or Forbidden Land. Andaman Islands, does not immediately strike to us as a tourist destination, which could give the Maldives or Pattaya or Mauritius a run for its money!! Maybe we should start calling it The Great Coral Islands for the pristine clean coral beaches……. I had planned the journey from Chennai to Port Blair, the capital of Andaman and Nicobar Islands, by Indian Airlines (now called Air India) flight at 6am on 27th of September 2009, little realizing that the strike called by the Pilots would play havoc with the flight schedules. Just the previous day, the flight to Port Blair could not land due to bad weather conditions. At the check in counter, we got some good news that the flight to Port Blair would be operating that day, albeit delayed by about 90 minut...

We see people from towns and villages, following the herd mentality, crowding bigger cities and metros jostling for space with dreams of making it big and striking gold. Here I am, thinking in the reverse following Gandhi’s quote “India lives in its Villages”. When people from smaller towns sell their land and settle down in cities, I thought this is the right time to invest in land and fulfill my dream of setting up a farm house in the midst of Mother Nature. I set for a place called Horsley Hills near Madanapalle, close to the Andhra Pradesh and Karnataka border. I also took my family along, promising them a great weekend and was accompanied by a friend, who knew the place like the back of his hand. He had booked us in a Guest House at Horsley Hills so that we can take some rest before heading back home. Madanapalle was our first destination. It is 120 kms from Bangalore and I was surprised to encounter excellent road all through despite heavy rains this time of the year. The traffic...