The High Life

Yercaud.

The bird song that woke me on Sunday was a little too loud. I blinked as my eyes adjusted to the pre-dawn light and tried to remember where I was. "Ah, yes... the weekend in a tree house!" The bird sang again and I crawled across the creaking floor to the doorway and peered out at the leaves silhouetted against the grey of the morning. Covering myself with a blanket, I sat and listened as the chorus of birds greeted the rising sun.

It was still too dark to distinguish between the birds and the leaves, so I shook off the cobwebs in my head and tiptoed back into the room, washed my face in the alga-green water, grabbed my binoculars and headed down the ladder and out. I'm sure the others were awake but didn't share my feathery obsession.

As I walked through the coffee shrubs to the road, a little Jungle Owlet silently glided out of the leaves and alighted on a twig in front of me. A glance over his shoulder and he was off again. Just past the gate of the estate, an Asian Fairy Bluebird was hunting from his post on the tree by the road. The deep red eyes, in sharp contrast to his blue and black coat, ignored me as I watched him shuttle to and fro across the road.

Up the road I went, towards Pagoda Point (or Pakoda Point, depending on which sign you choose to believe) smiling happily at all I met on the road, stray dogs and humans alike. Anjali had mentioned that she'd seen some woodpeckers near the check dam that we'd walked to the day before, that's where my footsteps turned. A crowd of Jungle Babblers babbled noisily in the clump of trees caught in the turn of the road. Among them, a Brown-fronted Pygmy Woodpecker made his way up the trunk of a silver oak. A pair of Gold-fronted Leafbirds flew from tree to tree near the check dam.

By this time, my stomach was crying out for breakfast, so reluctantly I turned back. A Crested Serpent Eagle sat watching me watching him, and then regally spread his wings a flew over the valley and into the distance. The White-cheeked Barbets sang a loud chorus and the Plum-headed Parakeets screamed along. As I walked through the gate to the estate, I spotted three Greater Flameback Woodpeckers getting breakfast and I was reminded to go get my own.

'Twas quite a morning with Magpie Robins, Scarlet Minivets, Ashy Woodswallows, Coppersmith Barbets and Rufous Treepies added to my list.

After breakfast and a guided hike to the edge of the Shevaroy Hills, we drove down to Yercaud town, found some bicycles and rode some way around the lake. After lunch, we left Glenrock Estates and Yercaud behind and drove back to Bangalore. The tree house stay was too short; high in a banyan tree, it was surprisingly large, easily holding all five of us, though the bamboo partition for the bathroom is not for the shy. Perhaps I'll visit again some day and listen to the Racket-tailed drongos scream outside the window once more. And perhaps I'll pay more attention to the many butterflies that flitted through the trees.