Chapter 1, Page 1

My wife and I decided that we would travel the last weekend in October for a much-needed rest. Ever since our wedding, about a year ago, we've been constantly scrambling, at the office, or at home with hardly any time to catch our breath. We spent a week debating on the general direction this short weekend getaway should take; this debate, which started with strolling leisurely on the beaches of Goa, slowly made its way closer to home, to relaxing among the plantations of Coorg, and finally settled on taking in the royal sights of Mysore; we preferred something that was within driving distance. We decided to hit the road towards Mysore on Saturday afternoon staying in a hotel called the "Green Hotel" and proceed to BR hills the next day. The hotel itself was my wife's choice; after scrolling through the images from previous guests at the hotel, she found it to be the very embodiment of the rustic, ancient and regal architecture that she fancies above all. My wife had taken ill just the night before leaving and was running a bit of a fever and after some deliberation the next day we decided to go ahead as planned, or at least as much as plans go. And so we began our rather nondescript journey at around half past noon towards Mysore, stopping an hour for lunch on the way. We finally reached the hotel premises at around 4 pm. Our plan was to check in to the hotel, visit the Chamundi temple and seek the blessings of the mother goddess, something that I've wanted to do since we got married, leave for BR hills the next morning after breakfast and spend the night there.

As we turned into the hotel premises, we were in for quite the surprise. Images on Google didn't do justice to the building that stood so majestically in front of us. The entire compound was a throwback to those royal times when kings and queens once ruled, something that runs through the heart of the city; to see this in a hotel where we were about to stay, was quite the thrill. We drove through the open, inviting gates and entered the hotel premises, made our way up the short stretch of road towards the entrance; with an ancient building on the left, another one north-east of us and a beautiful garden restaurant to our right. My wife was quite certain that we missed the parking spot, a muddy path just beside the gate, and therefore, naturally I thought parking was further down the road at the opposite corner. As we drove slowly to a halt at the end of the road, sure enough we found that we indeed had missed the parking spot a bit earlier; disagreeing with the wife is never really a good idea; but well, what’s life without a bit of adventure?