Sean and I decided to take a little road-trip. We had initially planned to go to a place called Pullicat Lake (in Andhra Pradesh), but because of the monsoon rains we decided to go someplace closer. Finally we agreed on Bheemeshwari, which is about 70km out of Bangalore. On the way we had a flat tyre - spent over an hour changing it and getting the punctured one repaired. When we finally got there it was a little crowded, but we went to our usual place - away from the fishing camp and the other common attractions of the place. A short hike took us to the “machaan”, and from the top we watched the Cauvery River flow silently as the winds noisily tried to move the mountains behind us.
On our way back we pulled over on the shoulder of the road and walked up a dried river bed of pink granite boulders. We saw the footprints of elephants, piles of their dung, and millions of tadpoles in the puddles that had formed in the recent rains. Then with a gust of wind, we saw looked like a million little pieces of colored paper thrown into the air – they were butterflies. Lots of them. Covering little areas of the ground, their colors highlighted by the background of dark, wet mud.
Wordsworth wrote in his poem From Tintern Abbey,
“While here I stand, not only with the sense of present pleasure, but with pleasing thoughts
That in this moment there is life and food for future years.”
Inspired and refreshed, we came back to the noisy, crowded and polluted streets of Bangalore.
