Chikmagular Plantation

This weekend I was invited by my friends to stay at their coffee plantation in Chikmagular. My first thought was that I wanted to be alone for the weekend. It was a trying week, and I needed a break from things. But I know that I'll also need a base of friends here in Bangalore if I'm going to make things work, so I decided to go anyway. I signed up to go with no idea what I was in store for, and a vague sense that I need to socialize to survive.

We left late at night, after midnight, in order to beat the crazy Bangalore traffic. After a four-hour drive we arrived in Chikmagular. It's a sleepy village where donkeys and cows roam the streets. It's also home to - shock and surprise - a nine-hole golf course. I played five holes and then, when we were swinging back by the clubhouse, we broke for lunch. We never finished the round because old army jeeps came by to pick us up. A veritable Mr. Toad's Wild Ride ensued through winding mountain roads. Imagine sliding around muddy, hairpin turns with no guard rails, and the wheels finally getting a grip only inches from a 500-foot drop. And that goes on for 45 minutes. "By my math," I said at the end, "we should be dead." Someone responded, "It's a good thing you're not good at math."

<-- Before the road got rough

The coffee plantation, it turns out, is not a resort by another name. It is in fact a working coffee plantation that was started by the family three generations ago. Life there is very simple and very slow. There are no phone lines, there's no cell phone service, there are no city sounds (cars, horns, music, etc) and electrical power comes and goes. And it is breath-takingly beautiful. Imagine a valley, filled with mist, and ringed by lush mountains. But prettier.

above left: scenic view, above right: the actual coffee plantation, below: mist-filled valley