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No more the laidback waters

DEEPA H. RAMAKRISHNAN

Floating restaurant, kayaking, parasailing, jumaring…Chunnambar could soon be a tourists’ favourite, writes

PHOTOS: T. SINGARAVELOU

GAME FOR SOME ADVENTURE? Chunnambar, bubbling with activity

Till that call on Friday afternoon, I didn’t know that the day would end on a picture perfect note. Someone from the Puducherry Tourism Development Corporation called up saying that Chief Minister N. Rangasamy and Tourism Minister Malladi Krish na Rao would be inaugurating a floating restaurant at Chunnambar Beach Resort.

When we landed at the resort on the Cuddalore Road, we realised that it had undergone a sea change since the last time we were there. The children’s play area had been spruced up with swings and slides, and one could see even adults swinging gleefully. And as we walked up to the waterfront, water-scooters zoomed past, speedboats splashed water, pedal boats zigzagged and the banana boat dunked the foursome seated on it.

The backwaters wore a colourful look with the crisscrossing boats, the festoons and the neon orange vests dotting the waterscape. The occasion was not just the launch of the floating restaurant but also of adventure sports at Chunnambar. Called Adventure Carnival, it was organised by the Puducherry Tourism Department in association with the National Adventure Foundation (Tamil Nadu and Puducherry chapters). Many tourists and locals watched kayaking, jumaring (climbing any tall structure without a hold) and parasailing with excitement.

Josephita, and her colleague Shrey from Chennai, tried their hand at rowing an inflated boat. “I have tried flying, but this is the first time that I was rowing a boat. I was jittery since I can’t swim. We were just going round and round and by the time we learnt to steer we were tired. I regretted not learning to swim,” said Josephita, as she intently watched a group of people getting ready to ride a banana boat.

On the banana boat was Anisha Jayshankar, a 13-year-old, who has been rock climbing since the age of nine and parasailing since she was three. “I know to swim so I have no problem being dunked in the water on a banana boat. The boat is pulled by a speed boat, and as the speeding boat takes a turn, the banana boat turns upside down. To hold on to the boat is the biggest thrill,” said this teenager, who had dried and changed several times over the day.

There was also Zorbing — a huge inflated ball inside which people are strapped, and the ball is rolled around. “Inside the ball, which can be used on land as well as water, you will feel different G-forces. When you walk on the ground you feel the force of gravity, which is your weight, which is one G. When you tilt or do some activity that changes your force of gravity then there is another G. When pilots fly and do aerobatics they feel upto 6G and the aircraft experiences 8G. When you go on a giant wheel and you feel a negative G, you don’t feel your weight. Inside this ball, you will feel both positive and negative Gs. It’s like the centrifuge,” explained Squadron Leader (retd.) Unni Nair, of the National Adventure Foundation (NAF).

“The tourism department is trying to promote Chunnambar as an adventure tourism destination and are working with NAF, which has been organising adventure carnivals here. We are also willing to teach those interested in adventure sports,” said Jayshankar and Shyamala Jayshankar, who put the show together.

The tourism department wants to reintroduce camping out on the island in Chunnambar. A group of adventure enthusiasts from Tamil Nadu and Puducherry stayed overnight on the island. They slept to the sounds of the sea and woke up to a marvellous sunrise.

At the moment, there are four speedboats, two scooters, about ten pedal boats and also other boats to take visitors to the island. The floating restaurant will take people on a slow ride while they can eat what they order from the restaurant.

While munching on snacks of chicken, prawn and cut fruits and dry fruits in the restaurant, we saw the sun hide behind the clouds, to leave a beautiful silver-gold lining on the sky. And suddenly the tree-lined Chunnambar backwaters and the bridge over the river looked different in the changing light. For those few minutes, one forgot all about work and deadlines.

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