BHUBANESWAR: The much awaited flagship adventure event of BCAC; the Coastal Trek Season-5, took place on January 27, 28, 2019 as 45 adventure enthusiasts from BCAC and public participated in this extravaganza and fathomed 31KMs long coastline from Puri (Jamindar Palace Sea Beach) to Chilika Sea-mouth at Arakuda.
The huge assembly of trekkers including kids, ladies and elders were taking quite an interest for the tourists on the beach. The group holding high the National Tricolour marched to the beats of Punjabi Dhol.
This year’s theme message “Save the Olive Ridley Turtles” was echoing in the air around the beach of Puri till the first 3 kms of the trek till the Light House and Hans Coco Palm. Almost 20 local nolias dressed in yellow jerseys and their signature hand-woven pointed hats joined the trek.
As planned, all participants of this year’s Coastal Trek, started assembling at the Hotel Jamindar Palace by 6:30 AM. The team of volunteers under the guidance of Sanjeeb started from VIR-22, Unit-6, Bhubaneswar well before so as to welcome the participants exactly at 7:00 AM at Puri. The participants were offered a sumptuous breakfast at Hotel Jamindar Palace and distributed kits filled with Trekking Badges, Stickers, Water, ORS, Tata Gluco, First-aid, chocolates and information sheets.
The trek was planned as per tidal calculations. The high-tide time was around 12:30 in the afternoon and by that time the team reached Dhaudia river, the water level was rising, but was around 2-3 ft only. Kids along with others crossed the river by foot while clicking snaps of every moment on the beach.
The group spotted a pod of Irrawaddy Dolphins near the coastline. The pod of Dolphins was in the deep water of the beach and continued along the line for almost 30 minutes, until they were disturbed with fishing boats along their swimming path.
Coastal trek aimed at saving turtles
