For a long time we’ve wanted to visit K.gudi wilderness camp run by Jungle lodges and resorts at B R hills. The opportunity presented itself while we had to drive up to Bangalore from Calicut in late March 2013.This was to be a brief interlude as we could only spend one night at K.gudi, but what a memorable night it turned out to be !!!
K.gudi has been rated by many to be the best JLR property,ranking even higher than the Kabini river lodge. Now while Kabini is likely to be more rewarding in terms of big cat sightings, K.gudi and B R hills offer a more wholesome jungle experience.The location of the camp is the most attractive feature…Bang in the middle of the jungle, no fences, no walls…In my opinion this is like being in paradise for any nature lover.
We started from Calicut early saturday morning hoping to reach k.gudi before lunch. As we had never driven to that part of the state we were unsure about the road condition/restaurants etc. The route taken was Calicut-Sultan Bathery-Gundlupet-Chamrajnagar-K.Gudi. 
From experience I would suggest taking a slight detour and stopping at Cafe Coffee Day at Gundlupet for the bathroom break and maybe light refreshments.A word of caution while driving through Gundlupet and Chamrajnagar…Cows/buffalos/goats, cyclists/bikers and pedestrians generally love using the middle of the road, exercising extreme caution and liberal use of the vehicle horn is highly recommended.
The transition from village to jungle is abrupt when you approach from chamrajnagar side. I wished i was driving in an open jeep. A few kms drive through some ghat sections brings you to K.gudi. The location is to die for,just the location would bring back nature lovers to this camp again and again.
We were welcomed warmly and shown our log hut ( Bilgiri) which is the farthest accommodation in the property.The jungle lodges schedule is well-known to us and we went to the Ghol Ghar for a simple but delicious lunch.I regretted not taking my camera to the ghol ghar as there were Velvet fronted nuthatches,Asian Paradise flycatchers,Spangled Drongos,Black hooded orioles and many more birds just flitting outside the Ghol Ghar.Needless to say we spent sometime birdwatching post lunch.
My friend Phillip Ross, an acclaimed wildlife photographer was visiting K.gudi with a few friends from Bangalore. It was good to catch up and we ended up sharing the same jeep for our evening safari. Reshma and me were totally smitten by the jungles of B R hills…It was different, and it was lovely.This place is a birding paradise…not to mention Barking deer Headquarters !!! In Bandipur and Kabini, a barking deer sighting could be counted as a rare one…here they are found in plenty.Barking deer,Sambhar and Gaur. Surprisingly, while B R Hills is known as elephant central, we encountered only a lone tusker during our safari.While we saw a lot of wildlife, the evening safari did not yield a glimpse of any big cat.
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Phillip had volunteered as a naturalist here a few years ago and it was great to hear a lot of info about this area from him. Post safari we had tea and headed off to our hut for a shower before dinner. It was getting dark and i was out in the balcony with my torch.I started shining my torch out into the jungle to scan for some nightlife. My light caught a pair of gleaming eyes, and i initially dismissed it for a wild boar. To my shock and surprise , what i thought was a wild boar turned out to be a young female Leopard !!! Called out Reshma, and she thought I’d lost my mind…but as the leopard came closer she too got the thrill of her life. Called up Phillip, and he too didn’t believe me.But I urged him to come quickly with his gear, and he too was stunned.Very soon the entire resort was in our room( some 20 odd people) savouring this amazing sighting.This is the magic of K.gudi. This the best part about staying in the jungle. a leopard sighting from our cottage !!! She spent a good 30 mins with us and left all of us satisfied and thrilled. The resort staff also mentioned sighting a young Tiger from the same area three days ago….So I would highly recommend the log hut Bilgiri for some great sightings in the camp.
Post dinner the lights are out by 10 30 pm and the jungle takes over.Alarm calls frequently pierced the night , signifying predator activity.Nightjars and owls too kept us company for the night. The cool night and the pleasant breeze finally overpowered my will to stay awake and i finally went to bed setting my alarm for 5 am.
I woke up well before my alarm….couldnt sleep much because i was too excited to be here. The deer and wild boar were roaming around the property and the birds hadn’t started their day yet. 5:30 am the generator is turned on and we are woken up with a steaming cup of coffee/tea. We got ready and boarded the jeep for our morning safari. One of the hotspots for big cat sighting is the Annikere road, and we headed off in that direction. I was just happy to be here and was enjoying the forest.It was teeming with birds and other wildlife. Besides yesterday evenings super sighting was still fresh in our minds.The safari’s did not yield anymore cats,and we returned to the camp for breakfast and some more birding.
After a super heavy delicious breakfast , we went to our hut to shower and pack and get ready to drive on to bangalore.Both ous us were so enamoured by the forest that we decided we will come back here soon…very soon.
Very soon happened the very next month….yup hectic work schedules and family commitments, plus the super hot summer made us desperate and we wanted to escape from hot and humid calicut. Surprisingly both of us agreed on K.gudi (my wife generally hates visiting the same place over and over again, unlike me ). So we booked for two nights this time, packed our bags and headed off to the beloved Jungles.
The forest had received some rains and was looking much greener and livelier than in march. After a pleasant drive, we checked into a tented cottage this time. Basic, neat, clean and comfortable with a clean bathroom…luxurious when you are camping in the middle of the forest.But i’d recommend the log huts any day if you can afford to pay the 1000 or so rs per head extra.
Bird activity as usual was very high in and around the camp.The One more bottle bird and the brain fever bird and the grey jungle fowl were especially vocal, with the one more bottle bird almost keeping me awake the whole night !!!
Anyways, post a heavy lunch at ghol ghar and a power nap later, we were all set for the evening safari. Rajesh was our driver.He is a nice guy but his driving style sometimes resembles that of Sebastian Loeb 🙂 . So we set out to the Annikere road, on the first of our four safaris. On the way we met the usual suspects….barking deer, sambhar, hanuman langurs, Gaur, spotted deer, peafowl,wild board and a few elephants…
Also saw painted bush quails for the first time.
Another bonanza sighting was that of a Changeable Hawk Eagle with a palm squirrel catch.The many ladies in the jeep did not want to watch the jungle in all its raw brutal beauty and we moved on.
We waited for a while at the annikere waterhole, where many have sighted a tigress and her four cubs. Construction of a concrete pool/waterhole seems to have disturbed the wildlife and there was not much activity there.Suitably frustrated as it was almost time for us to return, we started our trip back when suddenly…stripes !!! 
She was a huge tigress and Rajesh told us she has raised four really healthy cubs.She was calling out to her cubs and going back to where they were sheltering. We managed to follow her for a while till she decided to cross the road and disappear among the grass and rocks.
Elated, we sped back to our camp. Rajesh’s driving would have shamed Loeb into retirement.Most of us did not care, we had just had a one on one session with the chief deity of this fabulous temple.Some of us were seeing a tiger in the wild for the first time…
Hot tea and pakodas at the camp followed by a nature documentary as is the norm in most JLR properties. We headed of for a quick shower and then proceeded for an early dinner. We hit the bed early as we had started really early from Calicut. Sometime into the night a sharp alarm call and sound of scurrying animals woke us up. Well they must have woken many an excited person who was camping there.The dozen or so flashlights did not succeed in spotting the predator and slowly the camp settled in for a sound sleep..or so we thought. The Indian Cuckoo had different plans for me and many others…One more bottle, one more bottle it kept calling into the night and was joined by some of its friends too…I too ended up wishing that I had a bottle, to help me doze off.
Apparently we had many others who did not sleep well that night as was evident from some of the grumpy looking fellow wildlifers…Going into the jungle in the morning is a special feeling….there is that nip in the air and the jungle smells and feels different.
We saw the fame Madras(Indian) Tree Shrew this time.Not one but a pair, and they posed on a tree for us.Now sighting a Madras tree shrew is a big deal as they are found only here in southern India. Rajesh might not be the best of drivers but we had some fabulous sightings with him.Plus he is a nice guy and takes time to talk to people about the region,and its flora and fauna.
Post breakfast,we headed off toward the Ranganathaswamy temple after which BR hills or Biligiri Rangana hills gets its name. as it was the local festival here, the place was crowded, and dirty.There was some construction going on at the temple.We both paid our respects to the deity and made a quick getaway from the temple and headed back to the camp.At he camp, we met Narayan, one of the main naturalists, and a local.Now we had met up during our last visit and it was nice seeing him again. He was just recounting how he and his wife saw a tigress crossing the main road at around 11 am while they were coming here on a bike !!! Bloody hell it was around 11 00 am and we too wanted to try our luck…So we hopped into our car and drove slowly towards the checkpost on the Chamarajnagar side. 
The birdwatching was good…at one point we saw a white rumped shama ( a lifer for both of us ) and were trying to photograph it from the car (getting out of your vehicle is prohibited and punishable inside the jungle), when a group of guys in a scorpio thought we had spotted some big cat and were scanning the area in vain. We stopped outside the checkpost and chatted with the guards there for sometime. Reshma was amused to see the antics of a white browed fantail, but she never got it to pose with its tail flared. The sun was getting hot and we returned in time for lunch.
Evening safari was with Narayan.The driving style is totally different, spots and then kills the engine for everyone to view/photograph.Narayan is an amazing spotter….incredible how he spots and id’s a bird from so far away, that we can barely even see it. Oh by the way, a pair of binoculars are a must, we were happy with our olympus 8 x 40. We saw lots of birds and our usual suspects.
On the way back we heard some alarm calls and headed off in that direction to find another jeep waiting by the road…they had just seen a leopard cross the road and cross back again and head into the bushes. We waited there patiently till it was time for us to get back.
Day three, I was up before sunrise.Reshma was feeling lazy and wanted to sleep…it was a lovely cool morning.The night had been awesome with distant thunder, lightning and a cool breeze as it had rained in the vicinity.Finally Reshma woke up and we boarded the jeep for our last trip into the jungle.While we did not see anymore big cats, we spent an amazing time with a pair of Blue Bearded Bee Eaters. They gave us super poses, and we did not stay there for long because Narayan said there might be a nest nearby.So we took off and headed back to the camp for one last heavy breakfast.
Finally we headed to our tented hut, showered and packed our bags and bid goodbye to the staff and friends we made at K.Gudi wilderness camp…promising to be back very soon.
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The Lazy Traveller 