Myakka river park

The Myakka river State park is a lovely looking , well maintained ,wild life sanctuary. It hosts a gang of Alligators that reside in the banks of the river Myakka. We parked our car and set off to walk. Hire bikes were available but, we chose to walk .One part of the park was closed to the public, due to floods . That was where we could have seen a cluster of alligators, missed it though. The stream was more like backwaters, stagnant at a few places, by the centre of which stood a beautiful wood house. Walking through the woods , it seemed as though, everything built with wood was alluring. On our way to the alligator bank , I saw another simple , neat , beautiful wood house , which I thought was a rest area. I started wondering who the architect was , when suddenly my eyes caught this board nailed to the simple and neat wood house - "LADIES". Hope u wud have guessed by now , what the board on the other side of the house read.

We went to the fishing spot, which resembled a wooden bridge with wooden benches alongside . I was a bit scared, seeing an alligator upclose, almost near my feet. I dont know if he was hungry, but sure was he , staying still to catch his prey. The 'gator was not more than 5 ft long but was quite scary.They position themselves in the water in such a way that only their eyes are visible from a distance of about 50 m, horizontally. I was shaken by the wiggle of a half alive fish that jumped out of the bucket nearby. An old lady standing next to me was fishing and one of the fishes she had caught jumped out of the bucket. She caught about 4 fishes with a single rod in 5 minutes. A lotto of kids were around with fishing rods. Fishing teaches patience and the power of listening, in case , you dint know before.

The sight was pleasant, relaxing with the grass ,green on both sides. The river was flooded with fresh clean water streaming silently across a 100 m ( only for this alligator bank) wide canal .The vista kinda reminded me of Windows XP wall paper. The State forest made a very nice camping spot with Barbeque grills and dining benches almost everywhere. We saw a group of about 8 vultures sitting on the high branches of some wild tree , similar to a banyan tree. The hanging roots of the trees only added to the beauty of the sight. The vultures were silent until the smoke from a grill reached the sky. Only two members of the vulture group were giving away noise while the rest of the group were resting , watching over people like us. The sight of the vultures was not scary as I was expecting it to be.

Boatrides were available and we could see two boats in the waters, occupied.There is a 40 minutes stress buster , nature trail - the real walk in the woods. But the rule is strictly , 'No talking' for we might disturb the birds. With me and the two kids around we knew it was impossible. We might see a deer or a turkey n a few other wild species.But the idea is to relax our mind , walking thru the woods. Nevertheless we saw a deer on our way to the nature trail, already and we were pretty much in tranquility , just being there.So, skipped it. We saw a long stretch of cattle grazing fields on our way to the park. We saw a herd of the cattle grazing happily , when the player in our car went, "Senbagame... senbagame.." a song from the movie 'Enga ooru (m)Paatukaran '.

One thing ,I believe every one enjoys in this park is that, wild life is undisturbed. People visit this place for camping, fishing, birdwatching,nature photography,canoeing. The stature and texture of the trees tell tales of their age. At sunset ,the trees are adorned and they look more gorgeous than ever. If I were a painter/poetess/photographer, I cud have captured the sight of these trees at sunset better. Alas! the indelible memory of such unmatched beauty is mere words now.