Shola Heights – where Heaven and Earth meet
Day 21 (Day 8 of Wonder-Bike Adventure) – 10th May 2018
We are leaving our Fairy Tale Cabin today. It is 6 am and we
are ready to head to Shola Heights, once again a place we would not have been
to, had it not been for Atul’s insistent recommendation.
From where we are it is about 150 km and we start off early
in order not to catch the rain that the owner of Shola Heights informed us
usually starts in the afternoon. Also, of course, the heat is more bearable while
the sun is still gently rising in the sky.
We thank the special opportunity we were offered here at
Hoode Beach, with all of its peculiar details. We are sure this stretch of our
experience will remain vivid in our memories and will be recalled with much
love and joyous humour.
Thank you Atul, for absolutely everything.
We have so far met so many special people, shared so much
love... My choice for today is as always to keep on sharing love, in an open flow
of wise communication where giving and receiving are one and the same cycle,
just like each breath.
There is not too much traffic today.
We go past a lot of political campaigning, each party
connecting with their potential voters on the last leg of this democratic
journey. Elections are on Saturday. Just 2 more days to go.
Along the way our bike starts making a noise once again – it
is the motorbike’s chain needing to be tightened. It has happened already a few
times during our Wonder-Bike ride, but we have always found motorbike repair garages
where it has been taken care of.
We arrive at Karkala, quite a big town, and we ask around but
either we are not understood or there are no places to repair bikes around
here. Then a young man who does not speak English happens to understand what we
are looking for and hops on his bike, indicating that we must follow him.
That’s what we do. He takes us through town, turning and turning in an impossible
sequence of neighbourhoods that we would never have found our way through and
sure enough he brings us to a large Royal Enfield Garage!
We are so thankful to
this young man! He totally went out of his way to bring us here and
he does not leave until the bike is repaired. In the end we offer him some money but he refuses and lets us know that he is happy that our problem is
taken care of. All we can do is be extremely thankful.
It reminds me of this Wisdom Love has shown me often: when Life wants to offer you more, don't be
afraid to receive it - Life has no hidden agenda😊It's simply abundant!
Now it’s time to go towards Kudremukh National Park.
We are
asked where we are heading and get a ticket at the entrance, with the time of
entry and are told we only have 2 hours to cross the park to the other side.
We are not supposed to stop or make noise.
As we venture into the park we realize why. It is a tropical rainforest, magestically woven in shades of green, brown and bright colourful
flowers we have never seen before, perfuming the air with a powerful sweetness
that only tropical climes can create.
We are fascinated by the beauty of this nature
reserve. Animals roam free in the woods but they will of course be steering
clear from the roads so we only get to see some monkeys and birds, whose music completes
this gift our senses are genereously offered.
We do stop at a lookout spot, a place where one can behold
the vast valley below. And then again we stop at a village to buy some bananas.
People do live within this Park and street vendors take their chances at
selling fruit and cakes to passers-by. They ask us to please switch off the
motorbike engine while we are stopped and that’s how we understand that this
village is still within the Park.
Bananas in India are something else! As are mangoes. It’s
hard to eat just one. To the lady vendor’s delight we buy more than we intended
to initially, we take in the beautiful smiles the people sitting on the street side
offer us and we continue our journey towards Shola Heights which is not far
from here.
There is no internet connection so the GPS is off, but from the
kilometre count we estimate we’re almost there.
It’s around 11 am when we get to the foot of the hill where
Shola Heights is perched.
The owner had said the first time I called, that if needed we could call him to come
and fetch us in his jeep but we decide to venture up ourselves, not fully
realizing what we are getting ourselves into.
The first kilometre or so goes pretty well. The road is a
mix of tarmac and cement. Then comes a sign saying that the next 4,5 km are
very steep and the road is unsafe. I try to call but there is no coverage so we
just move on up on the bike. The road is now a mix of clay and stones, all
muddy from the night’s heavy rain.
The bike starts slipping and Pedro has a
hard time moving up without falling.We eventually fall sideways and I forget to lift my leg so
as not to burn it on the bike’s exhaust pipe. But then the pain reminds me and
I manage to jump off, though with some difficulty.
I have a huge burn on my inner right leg but at the moment
there is nothing I can do about it, so I try and walk up as Pedro moves on with
the bike. The road is steep and the heat is beating down hard, by now once again intensely humid.
With the pain in my leg starting to throb harder, I just focus on each step,
breathing and accepting the situation as it is. I know I have to reach the top
of the hill, somehow.
A little further up, where it becomes temporarily less
steep, Pedro is waiting for me. I am torn between the impossible task of
walking up and the unsafe bike ride. I hop on. A few metres ahead we fall
again. This time I hold my right leg up high and almost bash my face into the
ground so as not to let my leg down. Seen from outside it is surely quite
comical and the amazing thing is that I picture myself in this hopeless
situation and see the humour in it. No point feeling despair. I couldn’t even
if I wanted to. We have a destination and until we reach it we are on the way.
These are definitely the longest 4 km I have ever gone
through in my life.
We are thoroughly relieved to get up there and my leg seems
to not be hurting so much. We are received with much appreciation by Master
Sukumar and his brother who gets us some refreshments.
They are surprised to
see us as they had not received my message confirming our booking but we are
welcome guests.
Sukumar looks at my leg and comments on the mighty burn it is.
I reply that “this too shall pass”. At the moment I am super happy to be here!
Fortunately they have something called Burnol, a gel to put on the burn so it
does not blister. Later on I realize how fortunate I am to have this relieving
gel, because as I relax and cool down, the pain makes its apprearance noticed.
Shortly after we arrive we are called in for lunch. An
exquisitely delicious home-made Indian rhapsody of vegetarian delicacies,
cooked with love. With the beauty of this place, its owners’ kindness, this
nourishing food and the warmth of a wise conversation, we both feel blessed to
be here and the tribulations of the journey up cannot dim the magnificence of
being here and now. Sukumar happens to be a very wise Master who teaches Yogic
Philosophy and this “tranquil abode” embraces us in the safety only Isness can
create.
After lunch we rest and the silence up here in the mountains
is simply bliss.
This is the kind of place I would choose to live at when
retreating completely from the woes of social interaction, just permanently
enjoying my inner stillness, sweetly and calmly observing the world go by.
With this feeling I drift off into a restful sleep and wake
up at around 5 pm, ready for a short walk to breathe in the green mountains and
the sun slowly settling in for the night.
When I put my foot on the ground and the blood flow pours
into the burnt area, I realize what Pedro had been trying to tell me – that it
would not be an easy thing to live with during the next weeks… Nevertheless, I
breathe and wait for the pain to become more bearable in order to move, taking
it moment to moment.
I walk down to a beautiful lookout spot and sit there,
seeping in my communion with my own Isness, feeling Love Whisper: When Heaven & Earth unite within us,
the clouds of illusion part.
I feel this so deeply, so strongly within myself, that tears
softly roll down my cheeks, tears of Acceptance that All is Well in All of Creation
and this is, indeed, the lifetime I have chosen to go past all of the Illusions
of Form to Ascend beyond limitation.
The burn on my leg brings up all of the times I was right at
the edge of Ascension, just like I am now at the edge of this mountain peak,
with a clear vision all around, and for some reason I fell back into oblivion,
which kept me coming to this amazingly seductive and beautiful planet over and
over again… Now it’s different. Now the time has come. I feel I have been
waiting for this exact time for centuries, milleniae even and now the shift is
definite. No more space for guilt or for any other of the Small Human Self’s
illusions, which I have long accepted, embraced and shed.
One of the greatest hurdles in Human life is accepting what
we perceive as error, letting go of the compulsive need to judge and allowing
reality the space to shape itself according to the perfect flow of Isness,
which is not necessarily what the Mind deems correct.
Accepting the fact that I have burnt myself, with no guilt
or judgement, no need for justification or correction, taking full
responsibility and kindly giving my body lease to heal and giving myself the
comfort of my Safe Space, feeling myself overflowing with Love no matter what,
being thankful for absolutely every single moment in my Life, is a beautiful
and peaceful realization that: All is Well in All of Creation. The solace of
letting go of what should be to embrace what Is, is a permanent recollection of
Home.
Later on at dinner time, once again we engage in a wise
conversation with Sukumar and Pedro finds out that this is the Master he has
been looking for ever since his first visit to India, the one who can lead him
in the direction of knowledge he wishes to pursue.
Yesterday we had been considering whether to come or not, because of the price of the accommodation being a bit more than we intended to spend, but as it included all meals and was so highly recommended we fortunately came.
We have come here to receive so much! And to think we didn’t
even know of the existence of this place before we met Atul, who himself was an
unexpected encounter on our fairly unplanned journey.
When the rain comes tonight, complete with its mighty thunderous
roar, we feel the Earth sigh, releasing the heat of the day to replenish itself
with the fresh sparkle of pure water falling on it – Heaven and Earth merging
as One.
💙💚💛💜
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