on the way to Medak

August 14, 2016

Medak is a small town 100 kilometers north of Hyderabad. There are two routes to Medak;

• Gummadidala > Narsapur jungle > Narsapur > Macharam > Medak
• Nizamabad road > Toopran > Chegunta > Medak

I chose to take the Narsapur route because road passes through a forest. I was in a mood to treat my eyes with greenery.

It was a cloudy day with good chances of rain. Once we crossed the Outer Ring Road, we are outside the city limits. The road was in fairly good condition.. it was good to see rural scenes again. Open fields, tiled roof houses, haystacks.. gradually the open fields gave way to wooded area and soon we had entered the jungle. The drive was uneventful until we saw a herd of monkeys.. there were lot of them.. they came in all sizes, including tiny infants clinging on tightly to their mums. The slightly grown up baby monkeys were musing.. they would hop on and off their mums' backs :)

One thing about these creatures caught my attention.. their tails weren't long like the monkeys I'd seen all my life. These monkeys were different.. their tails were short.. about one-third long compared to the monkeys in Karnataka. Here's one young handsome fella.

Loved the way he's posing for a picture. It seems he's watching out for a rival.

Yes, there are om the road. They are wary of the vehicular traffic but they have a don't care attitude. This is our jungle, we'll do what we wish to, that's it.

It was exciting to these wildlife, especially after a long gap. As we drove further into the forest, we many many more monkey groups.. much larger than the first group. It seems in these jungles only short tailed monkey live.

The jungle drive ended as we came close to Narsapur. Then it was mostly open fields and farm lands but hills were in sight at a distance. About 15 or 20 kilometers before Medak we stopped for a short break. The spot was on a high spot of a slope.. to the west, at a distance was low wooded hill. In the immediate foreground was a depression with a pond and an interesting rock formations. The look of these rocks gives a feeling this might have been a home long time back.

A monkey looking out of its mates.. notice the color of the rock and monkey's coat are so similar.

Commonly found cactus with one remaining flower. Four more flowers were shed few days back.. Now I wish I'd studied the sprouts closely.

This plant's leaves are similar to teak. This plant is pretty common in Botanical Garden at Karnatak University, Dharwad.

All plain land in the vicinity are used up for agriculture. A lonely hut sits amidst standing paddy crop. Medak is known for its rice production. There are lot of rice mills along Medak-Hyderabad road.

A very interesting drive indeed. There are some spots worth visiting such as Thirumala Ghatta near Kulcharam,
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