At Thekkady, We stayed at the KTDC operated Aranya Nivas. We were very impressed by the hotel and the way it was managed. Apparently, KTDC is different from Kerala Tourism Department. KTDC is operated as a corporation and is quite professional about it. KTDC also operates another hotel which is slightly cheaper - Periyar Forest lodge. Both of these are inside the sanctuary and therefore you have to enter before dusk. You are at the edge of the Periyar lake created by the reservoir of Periyar dam a few km from the hotel. The forest department and KTDC offer several activities including guided trekking in the forest and a boatride in the lake. During our morning walk to check things out at the lakeside, we saw three elephants cross the a narrow stretch of the lake. It coincided with the start of the morning boatride and people on the ride got a chance to see the elephants from close. Later in the morning, we went on a three hour guided trek on a nature walk. Very scenic especially in the grasslands part of it.
We saw a few birds, deer, lots of insects and lots of elephant droppings of different stages of decay. One could perhaps infer when the elephant passed by looking at that. We heard an elephant - probably one of those that crossed into that part of the forest in the morning. Fortunately, we did not have to meet one of them.
After generally sauntering in the open for about an hour or so, the guide took us into the thickets and for a while it was fun, looking at birds, camouflaged frogs and streams and then our nature watch turned into a leech watch. It was more than a watch - it was a vigil. All cameras went in and a stick came out and we were really glad to be out in the open. It was a true forest hike. We were warned sufficiently and were prepared. If you notice the funny looking khaki colored socks in the second picture, they were to prevent leeches from getting into your pants. still, the leeches could climb up and reach some other part of the body or could fall or rub from a branch.
After we hurriedly came out of the forest, we spent almost half an hour extracting leeches that were in our shoes. We did not have any contact with them, but they had gotten into the shoes though various openings. Needless to say, we did not wear those shoes for the next 48 hours in the hope that any residual leeches would creep out of our shoes either due to hunger, boredom or intolerance of bad foot odour.
Later in the afternoon we went on a 2hr boatride on lake Periyar. We found out that at the same time that KTDC has a scheduled boat ride, Kerala Department of Forestry also has two boats - at one quarter of the price. The explanation of KTDC was that need the extra money to pay their employees. Usually they do not tell their hotel customers about the cheaper boat option unless the guests are adventurous enough to seek out the other counter. The following picture shows the Great Periyar Boat race, five times a day.
During the boatride, we were asked to wear life jackets and not get out of our seats to watch rare animals such as the bison. Incidentally, a bison was cited as one of the causes of an accident on lake Periyar last year. A KTDC operated boat capsized when all the passengers moved to one side of a double decker boat to view a bison. More than a hundred people died because they had no life jackets on. All this for a bison? Since then all passengers must have life jacket on. This rule was enforced on the Forestry Dept boats as well. We also got to see human 'bisons' who threw plastic bottles into the lake water and remained nonchalant even after a verbal castigation from one of the crew members and several co-passengers.
We did not see any tigers, though we knew they existed in the reserve because of the name and the following signpost. I, for one, am glad I did not see one.
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