Trip to Destiny, the Farm Stay @ Avalanche, Ooty

I wrote about this resort - Destiny, Farm Stay resort by the Little Earth Group in 2008, but only now I did get an opportunity to visit the resort. To put things short - this place is a paradise on the earth. If you love lazy vacations to just relax and enjoy the mother nature, this is the best one could ask for.

Chennai to Ooty and the morning refreshment @ Mettupalayam:

Since this trip was planned in a short duration, we couldn't get the train tickets for the big group. Hence, we chose the AC sleeper buses from KPN Travels to Mettupalayam. This was the first time I was travelling in a sleeper bus and I liked it. Except for the last berth, all other berths in the bus were comfortable. We reached coimbatore by 7 in the morning and from there we took the vans we had booked earlier.

Since we would reach the resort only by the afternoon, we planned to refresh ourselves and complete the breakfast at Mettupalayam. All arrangements for this were made at the Surya International Hotel at Mettupalayam. The rooms and food were good for the amount paid.

The Resort :

Destiny Farm stay resort is located near Avalanche which is 25 kms away from Ooty. We reached there by 1pm in the afternoon. Our vans could go only till the parking area of the resort - which was actually 4-5 kms away from  the resort. From there we were boarded into two military trucks operated by the resort. The next 4-5 kms ride was a good experience. The road was very bumpy but everyone in the group enjoyed the ride.

The Resort is surrounded by green mountains all around and the beautiful Emerald lake in the front. Since this was the beginning of the monsoon, it was drizzling lightly and the wind that was blowing for 24 hours made it an awesome climate.

The Activities:

As a part of the package, they have a short 1 hour trek which starts by 7:45 in the morning. There is a fishing pond where we can  enjoy catching fishes. They have few horses for ride. There is also a small ground. If you take your bat and ball, then you can have a fantastic cricket game in that green lawn.

There is a good games room (TT, table football, chess) and a nice dance floor. The DJ played some of the best musics and we all really had a wonderful time dancing for them. They will arrange for camp fire and barbecue near that. The kids will enjoy the farm visits where they have plenty of cows, sheep and rabbits. They also have a library which the kids in the group liked a lot.

In addition they also have other activities like long trek,  rock climbing, hanging in ropes, etc for additional payments. They also have a spa within the resort.

The not so good things:

The food in the resort is too costly and also I felt the service in the restaurant was also not upto the mark - might be because we were a big group and there were only few people to help in the resturant.

Except for this we all really enjoyed the trip this time. Since there was no hurry burry as other trips, everyone in the trip had a relaxed vacation this time. 

Note this if you are planning for a group trip to this wonderful place:

1. This place is far away from Ooty - so you cannot expect to visit places like botanical garden, Ooty Lake, etc from this resort.

2. Take necessary medicines needed for the group.

Website: http://www.destinyfarmstay.com/destiny-home.html

Gmail + Snipping tool : adding screenshot to report bugs made easy

If you are a one like me who waste a plenty of time with the Print Scrn + MS Paint + Email attachment approach to add a screenshot for a bug during the validations cycles, then the below combination can save tons of time for you:

Snipping Tool in Windows + Gmail in Chrome/Firefox 

The snipping tool will handle the cropping of the error portion and the doodling if needed. It will also copy the image directly to the clipboard. Gmail in Chrome/Firefox supports pasting images from clipboards which means we can paste the image directly in the compose box.

Here are step by step procedure about how to do this:

1. Do this once : Click Windows icon > Type 'Snipping Tool'  to search for it  >  pin this tool to the task bar

2. Next time when you want to take a screenshot of some bug / error message, click on this snipping tool icon in the ask bar.

3. You will see a cropping tool using which you can select only the portion needed to be captured.

4. Once the portion is captured, it will be shown in a mini-editor where we can add texts, doodle , etc.

5. As we edit the captured image, it automatically gets copied to the clipboard.

6. Open Gmail in Chrome (or) Firefox > keep the cursor in the compose area and press Ctrl+V to paste the image from clipboard. Now the email can be sent to the bug tracker.

7. We can also create a bookmark to open a gmail composer, add to email address , add subject and description, etc.  in a single click.

Operation Weight Loss - May 2012

In the first week of May 2012, I was 87 kgs in weight and with no change in that I weigh the same 87 kgs today. I know this is really bad comparing the progress I had in the first two months - but I am also happy that there isn't any increase like the previous month :)

I hope at least in the coming days, I will start the physical activities again to showcase some success in the next month.

Screens - Welcome page, Blog and Home page

Here are the screenshot of the welcome page, blog and the new home page I put for shortcrunch.com:

the welcome page

the blog

new home screen

As I was travelling a lot during the last month for official purpose, I couldn't spend time for shortcrunch.com. I hope to coverup for that in the coming days.

"Operation Weight Loss" - April 2012 update

By the end of March 2012, I was 85 kg and now after the first week of May of 2012, I am 87 kg. thanks to my recent US trip and laziness, I have gained 2 kgs :(

1. all food in US had meat and high calories. never made an attempt to do some physical activity to compensate for the high calories intake.

2. this should be a good lesson for the future.