09 December,2010 06:41 AM IST | | FYI Team
The Trip went off the beaten track in sunny Goa and instead, discovered a fascinating spice farm homestay where you get to pick your own vanilla. Not from an ice-cream cup, but the real thing!
The story of Netravali is one of a forest that's healing itself. Till 1999, as many as 17 mines operated in these dense forests. Then, in a masterstroke that silenced the mining blasts, the Governor of Goa declared Netravali as a Sanctuary.
Morning sun rays inside Netravali's forests
Since Mollem National Park and Cotigao Sanctuary were already protected areas, the inclusion of Netravali made it a continuous evergreen forest running along the Western Ghats, north to south. This act threw open the corridor for tigers and leopards to cross over from Karnataka to Maharashtra, ignoring the artificial borders created by man.
A look at the mountains of Netravali from its foothills reveals that the red wounds of mining are healing. With suchu00a0 pleasant thoughts, we headed to a little-known spice farm inside Netravali. The private bus from Margao took the State Highway to Netravali, 50 kms away.
Two kms before Netravali village, the bus conductor asked us to get off, as we had reached Tanshikar Spice Farm. There was no signboard to follow or a soul to ask, for directions. Following our instinct we tread warily on the same road. Thankfully, it led us to the Spice Farm.
Walk into spice country
Chinmay and his wife Gauri, the owners of Tanshikar Spice Farm, offered us a welcome drink of buttermilk and then took us around their 200-year-old ancestral house. The Tanshikars have been living here for five generations, and the well-laid out cottages behind this house are given out to visitors. An hour later, our lunch was laid out in the dining area by this friendly couple: Goan Fish Curry and Rice, chapatis and a Coconut-based sabzi made from lady's fingers, Sol Kadhi, and Kheer. We savoured every dish at the table, only to realise that the main ingredient in their cooking was love.
We were woken up from our late afternoon siesta with the aroma of a steaming cuppa that was laced with farm-fresh vanilla. Refreshed, we were taken for a guided tour inside their spice farm. First up, Gauri took us to a vanilla plant, which looked like a giant orchid. The most amazing fact about this plant, she said, is that birds or bees cannot pollinate it.
It has to be done by human hands! Further, we were introduced to another amazing tree, the clove. Among them, we were told -- there are male trees, female trees, and some trees that are both male and female. And then there were these creepers of the pepper plant lovingly hugging the host tree for dear life.
All the spices at the farm -- clove, cardamom, nutmeg, vanilla, pepper and cashew, are grown organically. Since the quantities aren't huge, they are sold at the farm itself to visitors. Walks inside this spice farm throughout our stay proved most invigorating, the highlight being the the aroma of fresh spices in your own backyard.u00a0
Notes about Netravali
The quaint village of Netravali is situated in Sanguem Taluka. It's the kind of Goan village where one man sitting in the village square reads the lone newspaper and the others listen intently. Next morning, we set off into the exotic butterfly land that stretches along the Netravali River.
Half way up the Mainapi Mountain, we paused a while to take a sip of the cool river and to take a dip in its swirling waters. The sighting of the Oakleaf Butterfly perched on a nearby bush was the prelude of the feature film to follow.
Perfectly camouflaged, it pretended to be a dried up leaf and we believed it. That was till it fluttered away in one impatient moment. Then, as if acting on a giant 70 mm screen, over a hundred butterflies were flitting about in suspended animation. Butterflies with strange names and stranger colours: Plain Tiger, Common Migrant, Grass Jewel, Common Map, Southern Birdwing and Black Rajah, to name a few. Even the butterfly that normally glides, the Tree Nymph, appeared quicker than usual. Maybe all the excitement around it had rubbed off on its gossamer wings!
On our way back, we snatched a glimpse of the towering range behind, and a new reality stared down at us. The areca palms, the coconut palms and the cashew plantations of Netravali were slowly but steadily pushing the trees of the forest deeper and deeper into the sanctuary. And a question crossed the mind: How long can nature hold on to its last green bastions in Goa?
Only time will tell ufffd
OMGu00a0facts about vanilla
>> The first use of vanilla can be traced to Mexico, where the Aztecs used it to create a drink called Xoco-lall, made from cocoa and vanilla beans.
>> The plant produces one flower, which lasts for only one day. If it is not pollinated, it will be another year before it flowers again.
>> Vanilla beans grow to between 6 and 10 inches long and resemble a green string bean.
>> Madagascar produces the majority of the world's vanilla. Today, vanilla beans from Madagascar are the gold standard to which all others are compared.
>> The vanilla bean is the fruit of a tropical American species of orchid. It is one of the few orchids, which produces anything edible, and there are more than 20,000 orchid varieties.
Courtesy: Spice Board ofu00a0 Indiau00a0
Pepper-pedia
>> Pepper was so precious in ancient times that it was used as money to pay taxes, tributes, dowries, and rent. It was weighed like gold and used as a common medium of exchange.
>> Black pepper is the dried climbing perennial shrub mostly found in hot, moist region of Southern India.
>> Black pepper is an essential ingredient in Indian system of medicine. Piperine, the pungent principle in pepper oleoresin helps to enhance bio-availability and hence used in pharmaceuticals.
>> The fruit is a single seeded drupe often called berry. It is spherical in shape, green in colour, changing to red on ripping.
>> India is one of the largest producers of black pepper in the world, after China and Vietnam.
Courtesy: Spice Board of India
The real bubble bath
Beside the Krishna Temple at the edge of the farm is a lake, where a curious natural phenomenon occurs. It's called 'Budbudyachi Tali' (Lake of Infinite Bubbles). If you stand at the edge of this lake and clap your hands, within seconds, you will spot bubbles rising to the lake's surface. When you stop clapping, the bubbles disappear.
Three theories explain this: the first states that at the lake's bottom is a gigantic rotting root, which releases these bubbles when you clap. The second explains that it's because the limestone on the lakebed releases these bubbles when there is a vibration. The third was the the most poetic and far-fetched: When you clap, Krishna, the eternal flute player, plays his flute and bubbles emerge as a result of this.
How to reach
>> Netravali can be accessed by road, either from Panaji (70kms) or Margao (50kms).
Where to stay
' Tanshikar Spice Farm, Netravali, Goa.
' Call Chinmay: 09421184114 / 0832-2608358.
' Email: tanshikarsf @rediffmail.com
