Tag: Pigeon Forge

Of the Ocean and the Beach!

Day 10:

All the four of us are lazy souls, so we wake up late, at every possible chance we get! We don’t have exams to prepare for or have a flight to catch, so yes, waking up at leisure is not that bad. (Warning; Don’t try this at home! If you get beatings from your parents for waking up late, it is not my fault!)

As we were lazing on the beds, watching Insta reels and FB posts, the caretaker assigned for us at the resort came up to our door, begging us to come have our breakfast! It was hardly 8 A.M. (Either he had other stuff to do or is a punctual guy!)

That’s when I took the matters into my hands, woke up both the kiddos, gave them baths. All of us were ready by approximately 8:40 A.M.

Our caretaker brought us 4 thalis filled with neer dosa, onion poha and slices of ice cold watermelon, along with yellow coloured kesar. I don’t know if people in Mangalore ate sweet for breakfast, but I hardly eat sweet 10 times throughout the year. I prefer sinful chocolates and sinful is not a brand name!

Anyway, breakfast was a bust. What is this Neer Dosa? I couldn’t eat it, even if my life depended on it. It was bland and soft to touch. I like dosa which is crunchy and crispy and nothing could change my prejudice against neer dosa, not even the chutney or the sambar. (I had to wash it down my throat with huge sips of water or neer, maybe that’s why it is called Neer Dosa!)

neither crispy nor crunchy – no second chances! – pic source: Google

The breakfast menu sucked big time, mostly because I am also not a fan of poha, but if it were batata poha, the breakfast would have been in my tummy in a jiffy, thanks to the potato, but onion poha was a no-no. (It seems, the caretaker is not a specialist when it came to making breakfast!) Interestingly, this caretaker guy thought that both my kids, who are less than 7 years old combined, would eat as much as us, adults. Their plates were exactly plated like ours, in adult portions! Such wastage of food, that too, the food which none of us like!

After our not-so-satisfactory breakfast, we rushed to the beach, applying 2mm thick sunscreen and continued playing till black spots began appearing before our eyes. (Playing under the scorching Sun can do that to your eyes!)

Three to Tango!

We returned to the resort, showered under the shower head and got into the pool.  We continued our fun in the swimming pool for more than half an hour, before returning to the room, taking baths again and changing into fresh dry clothes. It is hard to make the kiddos come out of the pool. Their favourite pass time is playing with water and they love swimming pool, more than anything.

The Ocean meets the sky in the background while the foreground has a cutesy pool.

For lunch, we had Veg Fried Rice, Paneer Sabzi and a foot long glass filled upto brim with masala buttermilk.

After an hour or two, we returned to the beach, with the plastic tools bought in Subrahmanya, to make the sand castles. I would make a sand castle and the baby KBee would have a hearty laugh after stamping and razing the buckets of sand, every single time. He would laugh out loud and once he is in his fits of laughter, he ends up with hiccups. So ya, its interesting watching him laugh between hiccups! (I know who he takes after!)

We also fought each other in the sand, took some pictures and again had brief fun at the swimming pool before calling it a day.

Baby with an Umbrella as a shield – KBee after a sand fight!

I took loads of pictures of Sunset and one Mr.X, an uncle of a close friend advised us that it is not a good omen to take pictures of ourselves with the setting Sun. So, there goes our beach photo session in vain! (We decided not to show them to others, lest they pass any such comments!)

Morning to noon – empty beach

Another click from my cellphone….

Coconut trees on a beach have a charm of their own.

We ate paper thin pulkas, dal tadka and had fresh watermelon juice to finish off the dinner. Both the kids are extremely picky, so the only juice they like having is that of watermelon and I too order watermelon juice if mosambi is unavailable.

With a completely satisfied stomach, we ended our day, with the background music of the rising tides of the ocean waves. Another day of leisure comes to an end.

P.S:

  1. Sorry folks if I offended anyone about the neer dosa, but honesty is the best policy and I follow it everyday of my life.  Andddd, people do have varied tastes and thank God for that!
  2. Even if Mangalore is a beach city, we didn’t feel the humidity at all, maybe because we dressed appropriately for the beach. Food for thought!
  3. The caretaker looked like a pukka South Indian, but turns out, he is from Assam and had relocated to Mangalore during the pandemic! That maybe the reason why his South dishes failed to impress us, whereas, pulkas and rotis were fabulous! I still can’t understand, how anyone can make a paper thin pulka! I am not giving neer dosa another chance though. It is completely opposite of everything I like, it is a no-go!
  4. Visiting a beach on weekday, from morning to noon is the best thing one can do. No human traffic, which means, we can have the beach to ourselves. Beach at Mangalore felt like a private beach for a whole day!
  5. Like I mentioned in previous post, never miss the masala buttermilk in any city or town of Karnataka. It is the best.
  6. Sometimes, when Mr.Bee and I drive to far off locations, with mountains and hills, we remember Charlotte and miss those beautiful mountains, we would frequently visit, every month! I miss you GrandFather Mountain, Gatlinburg and Mt.Soma! I miss you too, Pigeon Forge and Chimney Rock!

Cheerio, till the next post.

Flying Kites

Do you like flying kites? Have you ever wondered who invented a kite and when!

Let’s learn more about K for Kite Flying.

Kites were invented in Asia and kite flying and kite fighting are both good hobby ideas. There are many benefits in kite flying, one of them being, we get to spend more time outdoors!

A girl learning to fly a kite

Usually, the kites with a long flowy tail is used for kite flying. But if you want to win in a kite fight, you need a kite, who has no tail and whose control line is abrasive (called manja), so that it can cut the control lines of other kites.

Manja and kites for kite flying

The above said kite fighting takes place mostly during Makar Sankranthi, as most Telugites know! (Sometimes, there is also music in the background, snacks overflowing on the terrace, when two gangs from opposite terraces have their kite fights, trying to cut each other’s kites off.  Youngest in the gang will generally be the chemcha, carrying the Manja reel around, for the main kite flier)

Makar Sankranthi – A kite flier’s dream festival!

There are many different kinds of kites.  The octagonal Bermuda Kite, bow shaped Bowed kite, box kites which can also be used as flying lanterns and man- lifting kites.

Types of Kites

Man lifting kites are the ones mostly used during para gliding and para sailing.

Para gliding and Para sailing

What are you waiting for? Go ahead, get into some kite fights during the festival season. If not, go to a tourist location and use the man lifting kites and enjoy para gliding and para sailing!

P.S:

  1. During our January 2018 trip to Gujarat, a kite festival was underway at Ahmedabad. The two wheeler drivers had special contraption on their vehicles to stop the manja kites from getting their necks! At first we didn’t understand its usage. But then the cab driver enlightened us of its uses and that is one hell of a jugaad technique!

Avoid Manja – Jugaad

Manja of the fighter kite tend to cut deep and cause severe injury and in rare cases, death. The contraption is a brilliant add on for the two wheelers.

2.  Though Hot Air Balloon rides don’t come under kite flying, it is still a pleasant experience. Mr.Bee and I flew in gas balloons twice. Once at Pigeon Forge,USA and  our second was at Hunter valley, Australia, when we flew above valley full of Kangaroos.

3. The other hobbies starting with K are Kayaking, Karate, Karaoking and Kick Boxing. Till the next post, cheerio!

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