Family Trip To Sakleshpur With Jeepers Of Bangalore

It goes without saying that if your family supports the group that you belong to, life can become a lot easier when you need permissions for OTRs and camping nights. So in order to get our families acquainted with the Jeepers of Bangalore group, we had planned out a family event to Sakleshpur. Although not everyone could come because of schedule and other logistics, we had enough participation to have a superb two-day vacation with wives, kids, jeeps and jeepers together.

6 families, 5 Jeeps + 1 Duster, is what we were as we started our journey from Bangalore towards the western ghats. The roads till Hassan are pretty good while the last 30-40 kms are reasonably okay. We were all booked at Ibbani resorts near Hanbal, about 20 kms from the Sakleshpur town. The place was very basic and had a nice rustic feel to it. Food was pretty decent and was included in the package. There were multiple spots to setup a bonfire and sit around in the evenings, you could even ask for tents to spend the night in the open. The best part was that they had a private pond with quite a few of those rope activities including a trolley that dropped you right inside the water. Without a doubt, that's where all of us spent our time on the second day time playing around in the water like kids.

The highlight of the trip was the jeep trail that took us to a really nice mountain top with panoramic views of the western ghats. The lush green mountains are a sight to behold, I'm sure the place looks even more beautiful in the monsoons.

The jeep trail itself was quite a nice one with some nice climbs and small streams running through. Gozu got her chance to try some off-road trail driving and navigate through the narrow trail with steep drops on one side. Given that the monsoons were yet to arrive, it was mostly dry and it wasn't too difficult for the jeeps. However, I'm sure that the whole place just transforms itself once the rains arrive. 

There was this big rope swing at the resort which swept you at least 20 feet off the ground at the farthest point. Honestly, I couldn't remember how long it has been since we I've had butterflies in my stomach. Kids and adults alike, all of us were seen standing in queue to get their turns almost every time we used to cross through the path to go down to our rooms. A simple setup, but yet so joyful!