It was a regular day.

I was staring at my laptop screen, surrounded by an abundance of emails, filtering them by priority and wondering what to reply to first.

Then the phone rang.

It was Theju.

The call was casual, and somewhere during our conversation, we started talking about plans to fly to Bengaluru. There wasn’t really a plan, but I mentioned that I might fly on 13 March 2025.

And somehow, out of nothing, the plan was set.

Bengaluru had been my home for a good four years. Moving to a new city where you don’t have much to do and don’t know many people can be difficult. So I started a small chess club — BongCloud Chess Club.

Theju and Praveen, two of my dear friends, helped me with almost every aspect of it. Somewhere along the way, the chess club became less important than the friendships it gave me.

I landed in Bengaluru on the promised date and headed straight to Praveen’s home.

We had planned plenty for the evening.

Instead, the three of us spent more than four hours doing what we apparently considered a perfectly good Friday night — playing chess.

First on the board.

Then on Lichess.

Before we knew it, it was midnight.

We finally ordered biryani, ate, talked a little more and went to sleep.

The next day, completely unbeknownst to us, Praveen had booked tickets for a Holi party.

And that’s where the fun began.

Theju, Praveen and I rode our bikes, danced in the rain, had a few drinks and spent four or five wonderfully chaotic hours there. Once we were exhausted, we called it a day and went back to Praveen’s home.

Every evening, without fail, my mother calls me around 8 PM.

It’s her way of checking where I am and what I’m doing.

That evening was no different.

Somewhere during our conversation, I asked her if she would be interested in a small trip. We could meet in Bengaluru and travel to Coimbatore and Ooty together.

Unsurprisingly, she agreed.

My mother isn’t afraid of flying exactly. She simply finds the whole process of flying alone difficult. So she asked me to book her a train instead.

I booked the Bengaluru Rajdhani for her from Delhi, scheduled to arrive on the morning of 16 March.

And just like that, what had started as a completely ordinary conversation became a trip with Mom.

With that taken care of, the three of us went back to enjoying Bengaluru.

We went to a pub that evening. It was a nice place

Apart from that, nothing particularly exciting happened that evening. We spent a couple of good hours there, went back home and eventually went to sleep..

The next morning, my mother arrived in Bengaluru.

And that’s when the real journey began.

Chapter 1 — Bengaluru & Adiyogi

My mother arrived in Bengaluru in the early hours.

I went to pick her up, and before we began the actual journey, I checked us into the Renaissance Hotel in Bengaluru.

I wanted her to experience a little bit of luxury before we left the city and started travelling through Tamil Nadu.

After all, a trip with Mom should begin comfortably.

She seemed quite happy with the arrangement, and breakfast turned out to be the first memorable episode of our trip.

While helping herself to the breakfast spread, she casually put something on her plate, assuming it was malpua, the sweet dish particularly popular in Madhya Pradesh.

There was only one problem.

It wasn’t malpua.

It was bacon.

My mother is a pure vegetarian and follows Jain food habits, so watching her confidently place bacon on her plate without the slightest suspicion was absolutely hilarious.

I quickly stopped her and explained what she had picked up.

She was equally amused once she realised her mistake.

It took only a few seconds, but that little incident became one of those stories that somehow refuses to disappear.

Even today, the “Bacon-Malpua incident” remains famous in our family.

After breakfast and some much-needed rest, we decided to spend the day exploring Bengaluru.

My mother has always been quite religious, so I took her around to a few temples in the city.

For her, these weren’t just tourist stops.

She sat quietly, prayed and took her time at each place. Watching her find that little bit of peace in the middle of a busy city was, in its own way, part of the journey.

Bengaluru was familiar to me. I had lived there for years.

But walking around it with my mother made me notice a different side of the city — less about the places I knew and more about the places she wanted to see.

By the time the sun began bidding us goodbye, we were back at the hotel.

We were both tired from the day, so there wasn’t much conversation left in us.

We simply went back to our beds and slept.

The following morning, we were up early again.

This time, Bengaluru was only the starting point.

We started our journey towards Coimbatore, because my mother had one particular thing on her mind — she wanted to visit Adiyogi and experience the famous live light-and-sound show there.

It was her first visit.

Once we arrived, we entered the Adiyogi premises and, for a while, everything became noticeably quieter.

She spent some time sitting inside, listening to the chants, quietly chanting Om herself and meditating.

There was no rush to move from one place to another.

She simply sat there and took in the atmosphere.

And perhaps that was exactly what she had come looking for.

Later, we came out for the evening light show.

The atmosphere changed completely as the show began, and my mother watched it with genuine curiosity and wonder.

For her, it wasn’t simply another attraction to tick off the itinerary. She had wanted to come here, and now she was finally experiencing it.

By the time everything was over, we were ready to call it a day.

We checked into the Fairfield in Coimbatore, had some rest and finally settled down for the night.

Two cities, a little luxury, one very memorable bacon incident, a few temples, a long drive and an evening spent at Adiyogi.

The trip with Mom had officially begun.

Chapter 2 — Ooty

The next station was Ooty.

I had been to Ooty several times before, mostly with friends, so the destination itself wasn’t new to me.

But travelling with my mother made it feel completely different.

The same roads, the same mountains and the same familiar landscapes suddenly looked a little different when I was seeing them through her eyes.

There is something special about travelling with your parents.

They may have more years behind them and far more life experience than you do, but the moment they enter a place they have never seen before, there is a certain childlike curiosity that comes back.

My mother had that curiosity throughout this journey.

Every new view seemed to interest her, and every stop became something worth looking at.

Around 10 AM, we left the Fairfield in Coimbatore and began our journey towards Ooty.

She wasn’t particularly hungry that morning, so rather than having a heavy breakfast at the hotel, we decided to stop somewhere on the way for brunch.

We eventually found a small café-cum-restaurant along the route.

It was a rather sophisticated little place, although the menu was surprisingly small.

There wasn’t much to think about.

Dosa.

Simple, familiar and easy.

We ate, had some rest and continued towards the Nilgiris.

The drive from Coimbatore towards Ooty was itself becoming part of the experience.

The landscape changed gradually.

The roads began climbing, the air became cooler and the mountains started appearing around us.

And this is where our driver deserves a special mention.

He wasn’t just driving us from Coimbatore to Ooty; he somehow understood the pace at which my mother wanted to travel.

There was no unnecessary rush, no speeding and no pressure to reach Ooty quickly.

We were simply moving through the mountains, slowly, with the sound of the wind accompanying us.

Every now and then, he would stop.

Sometimes it was because he had found a beautiful viewpoint and wanted us to take some pictures.

At other times, he seemed to notice that my mother might be getting tired and suggested a small break.

He couldn’t speak Hindi, and our conversations were therefore limited, but his understanding of the situation was remarkable.

He somehow knew when she wanted to stop, when she wanted to look around and when she simply needed a few minutes to sit quietly.

As we climbed higher into the Nilgiri Mountains, the scenery began changing dramatically.

The busy surroundings of Coimbatore slowly disappeared.

The air became cooler and fresher, and the roads began winding through the hills.

We passed through stretches of tea and coffee plantations, with green landscapes spreading across the mountain slopes.

For my mother, these stops were as important as reaching Ooty itself.

She would get out of the car, breathe in the fresh mountain air, look around and take a few pictures.

There was no elaborate sightseeing plan at those moments.

We were simply enjoying being there.

By evening, we finally reached Ooty.

After checking into Fortune Resort Sullivan Court, my mother had one important mission left.

Tea.

She had been looking for a proper cup of tea throughout the journey, and now, finally, she had found it.

After a long day of driving through the mountains, stopping at plantations and navigating endless curves, she was ready to slow down.

We had dinner at the hotel, returned to our room and decided not to over-plan the next day.

We would wake up and decide.

And that’s exactly what we did.

The next morning — Ooty

The next day became our proper Ooty exploration day.

We started with the Botanical Garden, where the greenery and open spaces gave us a completely different view of the hill station.

My mother enjoyed walking around, stopping whenever something caught her attention and, naturally, taking photographs.

One of my favourite moments was when she posed with a butterfly.

It was one of those simple photographs that probably wouldn’t mean much to anyone else, but for me it captured the mood of the entire trip — my mother enjoying herself, away from her usual routine, discovering something new.

From there, we continued exploring Ooty.

We visited Lovedale Lake, spent time around the town and explored some of the museums.

Each stop had something different to offer, and rather than trying to rush through everything, we allowed the day to unfold at its own pace.

Then came one of the more unusual stops — the Ghost House.

My mother, who had been perfectly composed throughout the temples, mountains and museums, suddenly became quite playful here.

We took photographs, made some funny poses and laughed at the whole idea of it.

It was one of those moments when the age difference between us simply disappeared.

For a while, we weren’t mother and son travelling through Tamil Nadu.

We were just two people having fun on a trip.

Later, we also took the toy train ride.

It was pleasant and certainly had its charm, although, if I’m being completely honest, it felt a little too kiddish for the two of us.

Still, it was part of the Ooty experience, and we enjoyed it for what it was.

By the time we finished everything, the day had almost disappeared.

The sightseeing, walking, photographs, train ride and constant movement had taken its toll.

My mother was happy, but she was also clearly tired.

And I was beginning to realise something about travelling with her.

The destination wasn’t the priority anymore.

It was about making sure she enjoyed the journey without feeling exhausted by it.

We returned to the hotel, rested for a while and then started talking about the next part of our journey.

Mysuru was waiting.

Ooty had given us mountains, tea plantations, butterflies, a ghost house, a toy train and plenty of laughter.

Now it was time to move on.

Chapter 3 — Mysuru & The Journey Home

After three long days of travelling, sightseeing, driving through the mountains and constantly moving from one place to another, I felt it was time to slow things down.

The trip was never meant to become a race to tick destinations off a list.

I wanted my mother to enjoy the journey rather than return home exhausted from it.

So, for Mysuru, we decided to keep the plan deliberately simple:

Just two or three places, plenty of time and no unnecessary rushing.

As we left Ooty and started descending towards Mysuru, the landscape changed again.

The cool mountain air gave way to a warmer, flatter landscape.

After spending so much time in the hills, the drive itself felt like another transition in our journey.

On the way, we stopped at Nanjangud.

My mother wanted to visit the temple and take blessings, so we spent some time there before continuing towards Mysuru.

It wasn’t about rushing in, taking a photograph and leaving.

She wanted to sit, pray and spend a little time there.

And that was really the rhythm of this entire trip.

Whenever there was something she genuinely wanted to do, we made time for it.

By the time we reached Mysuru, we were both ready for some rest.

We checked into the Grand Mercure Mysuru.

After several days of moving around, the hotel felt like a welcome pause.

We had some food, settled into the room and, without much discussion, went to sleep.

The next morning, we woke up, had breakfast and began our final day of exploration.

Our first destination was Chamundi Hills.

This was another place my mother had particularly wanted to visit.

The journey up the hill took some time, but for her, visiting the temple and taking blessings was almost non-negotiable.

So we went.

Once we reached the temple, she took her time.

There was no hurry to finish the visit and move to the next attraction.

She prayed, spent some quiet moments there and seemed genuinely happy.

For me, that was enough.

Sometimes, when you travel with your parents, you realise that the places they remember from a trip aren’t necessarily the ones you expect.

You might remember a beautiful road, a hotel or a spectacular view.

They may remember a temple where they sat quietly for ten minutes.

And that’s perfectly fine.

After Chamundi Hills, we continued our sightseeing at a much easier pace.

We visited the Big Aquarium, walked around, looked at the different exhibits and, of course, took photographs.

But there was one place that my mother was particularly looking forward to.

Mysore Palace.

We reached the palace and spent a considerable amount of time exploring it.

My mother wasn’t interested in rushing through the rooms just to say that we had been there.

She walked slowly, looked at the architecture, observed the details and took everything in at her own pace.

And I let her.

There was no itinerary breathing down our necks anymore.

No “we have to leave in twenty minutes.”

No “we still have three more places.”

We had reached the final stretch of the journey, and I wanted her to enjoy it.

By the time we finished exploring Mysore Palace, our trip had effectively come to an end.

We had travelled through Bengaluru, Coimbatore, Ooty and Mysuru, with temples, mountains, plantations, hotels, long drives, photographs, a toy train, a ghost house, Adiyogi and, of course, the legendary bacon-that-looked-like-malpua incident.

From Mysuru, we headed back towards Bengaluru Airport.

Our driver, who had been with us through the entire journey, finally dropped us at the airport.

He had driven patiently through the mountains, waited for us at countless stops and understood my mother’s pace without needing many words.

We said our goodbyes.

Then we checked in, boarded our Vistara flight and finally began our journey back home.

As the aircraft took off, I looked back at the few days we had just spent together.

It wasn’t the longest trip.

It wasn’t the most ambitious itinerary.

And we certainly didn’t see everything that these places had to offer.

But perhaps that was the beauty of it.

It was never really about Bengaluru, Ooty, Coimbatore or Mysuru.

It was about taking my mother somewhere new, giving her a few days away from her usual routine, and discovering these places again through her eyes.

And somewhere between a cup of tea in Ooty, a prayer at Chamundi Hills and a plate of almost-malpua in Bengaluru, the trip became a memory that neither of us was likely to forget.

Because sometimes, the best trips aren’t the ones where you cover the most distance or visit the most places.

They are the ones where you return home with a few more stories to tell, a few more photographs to remember, and someone beside you with whom those memories will always belong.

And perhaps that is what this trip really gave me.

Not four destinations.

Four places I can now remember through my mother’s eyes.