Tuesday, August 7, 2007


Hey all I just had to blog this down.

My husband, 2 dogs (Magic& Laika) went to this awesome place in Talegaon on the Mumbai Pune Highway. Talegoan is just about 3 hour drive from Mumbai and with the Expressway its a pleasant drive (after Chembur).

Ok.. so getting to the place. It's called Japalouppe and is an Equestrian Center run by Rohan More. Rohan is a very fun and talkative personality and an animal lover... You will notice that as soon as you reach his farm as you will be greeted by atleast 4 of his 8 dogs!! Yup you heard that right, eight!! Being an equestrian center, Rohan also has about 27 horses... all wonderfully kept and well looked after. All the dogs there are friendly and eager to meet anyone who visits...

The cottage where we stayed at the farm was very sweet and cozy.. nothing fancy and posh.. but that's just how we like it... basic is the best... Being in a wheelchair, I was a bit disappointed when we got there because the entrance to the cottage had 2 steps.. which would have been difficult to go up with my heavy power chair... But that was magically taken care of too... Just minutes after our arrival, Rohan got his workers to start building a permanent cemented ramp. Before we got up from our evening siesta.. the ramp was ready!!! I wish more people in India would be like Rohan.. It doesn't take much of time, money or effort to make places more wheelchair accessible... Wish more people and our lethargic government realises that and does something about it..

We all had such a wonderful time.. Food was simple home-cooked meals.. vegetarian food in the afternoon and non-vegetarian at nights....Magic (our lab) just couldn't get enough of the farm. He wanted to play with the horses, chase the geese and of course harass the baby horses and run around with them... For four days he just wouldn't want to come back into the room...he wanted to play and we let him do just that!! He too got yummy meals of bowl fulls of beef and rice which he happily chomped down!!
Laika on the other hand has always been a daddy's' gurl... Although she did have her play with Magic; she just wanted to sit and enjoy the view most of the time. The weather was perfect, with the frequent rains and all the trees painted in hues of bright greens...it makes you just want to sit there and sip on some hot tea and eat hot and spicy freshly fried bhajiyas ;)

After 5 days at Japalouppe, I strongly recommend you all to visit... For all details regarding the stay visit their website http://www.japalouppe.com/