The Untouched beauty of Kerala – Athirapally and Vazahal

This blog shares my travel experiences and my journey starts with KOLKATA
1st october-  Hello kolkata

    we got off to a happy start in kolkata ,we(me and my husband) reached Netaji Subhash Chandra bose international airport by time.The Indian Airlines flight was quite comfortable and we enjoyed the snacks offered by the airlines.Then by two hours we reached Mumbai airport.Their our next flight to cochin was delayed by 5 hrs ,it was quite irritating .Whole night  we spend roaming here and there in the airport .Finally at the early morning our cochin flight was called.

    2nd october- cochin

we arrived in cochin in the morning,stepping out of the terminal building we saw a tall man standing and holding a board named NITUN KUMAR (its my husband's name)  the tall man was the driver or you can say our guide for the whole trip.Thankfully the cab provided by the Travel agent was an AC vehicle ,which provide a great relief from the outer heat.Our driver mr Jeevan raj was good in english but he can't speak hindi much.but he can understand hindi,which was sum-how making us comfortable.we had to visit two waterfalls on the same day and mr jeevan suggested us to start early ,since both are situated on the edge of sholayar forest range and the entry is restricted after 5:30 pm as for safety of people.so firstly we went to the resort (The Villa Romantica)

which was quite near to the Cochin airport.we dumped our bags,get freshed...had coffee and get out for our first destination i.e Athirapally waterfalls.It was 10:00 clock morning,it was a sunny day when we start our journey but after sometime it become cloudy in the month of october ,its the perfect time to visit athirapally falls.Its also named as niagara Falls of India,this time the flow of the fall was at maximum.Athirapally water falls is approximately 60km from kochi airport and it took around 1 and half hours to reach there,the water fall is located 30 km from Chalakudy Town.The one hour drive through the forest of Chalakudy itself was enjoyable.The falls can be viewed from the top where one can see the chalakudy river flowing down the falls.

                                        Athirapally is the most loved and favorite shooting spot of director Mani ratnam and it can spotted in his movies like Dilse ,Raavan,Guru to name a few.The shooting of many Malayalam and bollywood movies have been done here .And the recent one is Bahubali which was quite popular .It was around 12:10 pm and we reached our first destination The Athirapally falls and after a walk of around 5 minutes with continuous sweating ,we had the first glance of the majestic waterfall  and we forgot all our tiredness and we were just amazed of seeing the natural beauty .My husband started taking some snaps of the lovely scenic and suddenly rain started and we could see the source of the waterfall before flowing down the  falls and witnessed a stunning atmosphere around the falls. To enjoy the waterfall at it best ,we walked across the forest through slippery steps.the area was hard to take any photographs,as the tiny droplets carried by wind just settled on the lens of my camera.One should take care not to cross the border lines marked by the security staff,which is the safety measures taken by the authorities to prevent accidents.
 After seeing the continuous rain we decided to have ice-cream and believe me ice-cream in rain was a awesome combination .After spending around 45-50 minutes we moved towards our    next waterfall i.e CHARPA and VAZHACHAL waterfall

                                In all the waterfalls you have to take entry fee ,which counter you can get on the sideways .One thing to remember that you have reach the by 5 pm as the counter get closed at 5pm.From  Athirapally .Vazhachal is 5km apart and it takes hardly 10-15 minutes by car.Charpa fall is close to Athirapally falls and it seems to be almost plunges on the road.Vazhachal was very nice and calm place.The place was surrounded by gardens,some benches were there to relax and enjoy the scenic beauty of waterfalls.

                              Vazhachal fall is close to dense green forests and is a part of the chalakudy river.This largest waterfall in Kerala is set at the entrace of the sholayar ranges and originaes from Anamudi mountains of the western ghats.The garden was monitored and administrated by Vazhachal Forest department as it was around 2pm ,so we were very much hungry then our
driver suggested that there is no good restaurant near by so its better to take lunch at cochin.so he took us a restaurant named Open kitchen,there we had chicken biryani which cost only rs 130.After lunch we were back to villa romantica,we were very much tired so just took a small nap.By By 8.30 they arranged a fantastic candle night dinner followed by very nice ice-cream.It was a pleasant stay.