This Is How It Felt To See My City From The Skies!

in india •  7 years ago 

I've spent about 25 years of my life spent in Mangalore-my hometown. Overtime, I may have flown out of here over a hundred times at the very least. This number may have been crossed as I fly frequently but I've never caught a bird's eye view of my city before. Luckily today I was able to do it by fluke and I have a few thoughts to share.

Mangalore is situated on the western coastline of India. It's a Southern city that is popular for many things. It is located just off the western ghats, a long mountain range that runs parallel to the western coast. These mountains are older the Himalaya itself and the city dates back historically as early as 3rd Century BC.

It's famous for being a great educational hub on the western seaboard and people come from all over the country and many foreigners also study here. Mangalorean cuisine is diverse and there's a whole variety of option available here. From vegans to non-vegetarians, everyone will find themselves at home quickly with a huge appetite here!

In all these years of flying with a window seat, I've missed a full viewing of my city. This is because the commonly used flight paths out of the city usually have the planes heading towards the Middle-East immediately after take-off or circle-clockwise to head North towards Mumbai or East towards Bangalore, Hyderabad or Chennai.

Today, I was on a SpiceJet ATR aircraft and on the window seat. Infact, I flew on the same flight 6 days ago and yet missed these views. However, today I got to view my beautiful city. Mangalore infact, had a massive green cover. In the past decade it has reduced a lot. Those days, it would seem as though we were landing in the midst of a full-blown rain-forest.

The city has a table-top runaway and we've had a major air crash (pilot error) once. It can seem a bit dangerous to land here during the monsoon season owing to heavy rains and turbulence. I've never really seen the length of the runway until today. When you look at the existing green cover, it does feel like we took off from middle of a forest!

A decade ago you could barely see any buildings around the airport, let alone any tall buildings in the city. The airport is only 15 minutes drive from the city and under 10 minutes from my home. The population has doubled here to over 700,000 residents and that shows in the increased number of construction activities in and around the city.

The two rivers that converge with the Arabian Sea are Nethravathi and Gurpur Rivers. But the highlight was seeing the entire length of the main portion of the city. You can view it below.

The best part was seeing the housing society I reside in. Infact if the same picture was shot with a hi-res DSLR, I would've been able to spot my rooftop in the picture below as we're at a low altitude here. My residence is in the lower portion of the picture, closer to where the two major roads converge.

But if you were to ask me about a favourite recent memory of flying into Mangalore, then it's from when we were descending over the western ghats on a A320 towards Mangalore from Bangalore. I caught a glimpse of the beautiful and rich green peaks of western ghats peaking out through the clouds!

They were all simply magnificent! Karnataka has two high peaks in Southern-India of around 1800-1950 mts and the greenery was just amazing to view even if from a distance. Flying can be quite interesting if you know what to do when you're stuck up there for a while I suppose!

This is how I felt when we landed in Bangalore and I couldn't wait to jot these thoughts down and share these pictures with you. If you have any pictures from flying in/out of your respective cities, feel free to post them in the comments below!

Here's a beautiful video on my city that deserves a watch!


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Its so amazing when you are at the top of the world overlooking the beauty beneath.

Beautiful, @firepower. It's interesting how a bird's eye view can really put things into perspective to help us see things we never saw really before.

@firepower your city is very beautiful to be seen, both from above and from below ,, I have resteem, I am proud to see the beauty of your city, hopefully I can get there

"I can see my house from here!" I usually prefer to sit on an aisle but it is a lot of fun to look out the plane window on a clear day.

now you have a new fresh perspective in your life...for greater things to come, cheers!

Omg !
Fabulous ...View from sky.
City looking so beautiful.

Wow! Haven't visited but It surely looks beautiful.

  ·  7 years ago (edited)

Sometimes, we get used to our environment that we forget to admire them more often.

These pictures just reminded me of how beautiful my city is even of have not taken time to enjoy the beauty within.. Thanks for sharing @firepower

Yes!! Your home town Mangalore is really beautiful.

Amazing view , nice shot sir

Nice view

Wow. That is beautiful. Mangalore looks huge. I would love to live on the ocean. I live on a little lake in Ohio but it's nothing like the ocean.

After reading through, I feel like flying right now. I can imagine the memory I would make flying.
@firepower I guess you were in a chopper or a kinda mini plane.

main-qimg-2010961fd614e2b257f0416ba2a9f2e0-c.jpg

Sir,@firepower your home town Mangalore is beautiful.

My favorite part of flying is always the approach as you land into whatever city you are flying into. I have lived in Phoenix, AZ for a few years now and I'm lucky that every time I fly into the city I get a great view of the valley. At one point I was living in a high rise building downtown that was directly under the normal flight path, which allowed me to get a nice overhead view of my neighborhood.

10276985_10152402003254965_5979039187806304988_n.jpg

One thing I still would love to do sometime is take a helicopter flight over some major U.S. cities like New York or San Francisco so I can take some photos. I know that some helicopter tours offer this where they will remove the doors and attach you to a harness that allows you to lean out of the helicopter to get the best shots possible.

It is really very beautiful sir,and it will became more beautiful at night when all the the lights of the city turn on's.Your hometown is really fabulous,hope i will visit it once in my life.Thanks for sharing sir.

Amazing view, the city is beautiful and Awesome @firepower.
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That is some shot from your plane. Such an incredibly beautiful looking place you live @firepower. Thanks for sharing

love to see this

I can read how much you are in love
with your city Mangalore. I had never been to Mangalore but have been to bengalooru twice before. Knowing no Kannada indeed caused me a lot of troubles. But since I'm good at both Malayalam, Tamil and partially good at somewhat Telugu it's not going to be that tough to learn Kannada if I put some efforts. Afterall it is a Dravidian language!

You have mentioned western ghats several times in this post. I feel excited because I live on the top of the western ghats itself. The area we live in comes under the reserved forests so it is unlikely to expect any developments here. But we are permitted to do agricultural activities. If you see our region from bird's eye you cannot expect anything beyond green colour! Irony is that people from my region lament about being rural whereas urban people crave for greenary!

It was a huge caption. |Woww so nice your city is beautiful. The shot was really amazing from side to side.

its an amazing view . i totally adore it. you are such a lucky guy to live in extremely beautiful city with full of greenery.

You got my proxy bruv, I love your work, take it easy..

Cheer$;)

Wooow .. beautiful city.. Loved the post

Resteemed

I hadn't seen it too! I wonder how it looks in the night now xD

Never gotten to see Mangalore from the sky. This is great

the city view is very beautiful