2008 MahaTrek

Final Plan:

Thursday, 25th Dec - 1st Day – Early morning Vai – Vyajwadi by Bus/Rickshaw – Climb Vairatgad – sight seeing – descend and come back to Vai have lunch there - Reach Menawali by ST bus – Climb Pandavgad à Descend at Dhom - Stay if it’s already late otherwise goto Jambhli and then Vasole, the base village of Kamalgad - Dinner

Friday, 26th Dec - 2nd Day – If not reached to Vasole 1st night then reach to Vasole then Climb Kamalgad – Lunch on Kamalgad - Descend to Jor village - If time permits, reach to Jor village on same day – Hault here

Saturday, 27th Dec - 3rd Day – Start climbing Chandragad from Jor village – See the fort and descend at Dhawale village – By Bus or tumtum go to Vadghar or any nearest place to Mangalgad - Climb Mangalgad and descend at Pimpalwandi – Hault here, if time permits go to Varandha or Mazeri village by Bus (route through Bhav village)

Sunday, 28th Dec - 4th Day – Kavlya darshan and proceed for Raigad and reach Raigad top before dusk.

Monday, 29th Dec - 5th Day – Raigad darshan

Tuesday, 30th Dec – 6th Day – Return to Pune/Mumbai by direct bus from Raigad or Mahad

Planned : Varandha region winter Trek

This is the email invite generated by purpletrail.com cool tool for planning events

Varandha region winter Trek Hello, The time for this event has been finalized. Please let me know if you will be able to attend. Thanks! Place Bhor Pune Time Thursday, December 25, 2008 Morning to Tuesday, December 30, 2008 Evening RSVP Yes | Maybe | No Host details Ketan Khairnar (ketan.khairnar@gmail.com))

Mahuli may 24 2008

When things don't move as you want; many trekkers head to mountains :-)Mahuli being nearest and still offering good enough climb for trekkers around mumbai; I headed there on this saturday. People cursed me for cancelling similar plans two times in last one month. I asked novix people to join me or rather they persuaded me to plan nice climb. I had visted same place 2/3 years back and that too in the same time of the year. Life had been cosy and work being dull; only things that kept me busy was internet(reddit/HN/delicious/stumbleupon) and IPL. Sometimes I started thinking only interestring discussion about technology I had were with totally strangers online or novix people. Treks,Mountains,Nature whips you hardest and at the same time provide you the cushion you want; a getway from stale views,perspectives and offers such grand views on your life that you start thinking what I could have been or rather what I could be. Let get me started :-)

Started with the first train to Kasara from Thane. Once we left Kalyan; it was the breeze I longed for so long. Titwala,khadawali and region around it looked so much changed. It used to be quite green or less human habitated when we were in school; I was telling Kunal and Lilesh about this. 5.55 AM and we were at Asangaon station. By 6.10 we were in Shahapur town. Early morning we enjoyed tea and Kunal managed to buy some fruits; that helped later on. There is a not so regular bus service from Shahapur Bus depot to Mahuli base and back. We finally reached Mahuli base by 7.15 or so. After bit of enquiry,photosession and confusion of the route we finally started the climb at 8.15 am. Sun was out and was treating us with heavdy dose of vitamin D as well as UV rays.

Me,Kunal,Lilesh and Sanket; we all started with good speed. We mananged to reach good height in 45-50 minutes. Sanket was on his first trek and I seriously thought what a pity for a guy; he dont know what lies ahead. I mean it wasnt easy to climb up in May on almost barren hills. Only thing that can move you up is your genuine interest in this kind of sport. Fitness wasnt much in question as it was max 3 hour trek. After 2 hours of climb we were almost on the finish line but Sanket was struggling because of the heat. He vomitted and then he felt better. We trudged him to the top in next 45-50 minutes. More than Half of the job was done. Soon we reached water hole and met some family out there enjoying their weekend.

Mahuli has dense cover of trees and is the right place to visit because of availibily of ripe fruits like mangoes and balck berries/jambhul etc. We had our share of fun while climbing up. Manged to see 5 ft long snake; some red ants building structures using leaves and some white excretion. Just thought then to put one placket there saying "ANTS at work". After reaching top and relaxing a bit; met group of local boys who had come there with full preparation to stay atop for next two days.We then headed away from the water hole and settled under a tree with huge shadow. Next 2 hours went in lunch,pulling each others legs and some rest. At 3 pm we decided to trek back as there was bus at 5 pm at base village. We reached base village in 75 minutes and then rested for some time after getting cleaned ourself at borewell.

Return journey was smooth and I reached home by 7.45 pm so it was much needed,quick,easy trek this time

MahaTrek : Salota-Salher-Mora-Mulher-Hargad-Mangi-Tungi-Nhavi(Ratangad)

MahaTrek: Salota-Salher-Mora-Mulher-Hargad-Mangi-Tungi-Nhavi(Ratangad)

Day 0:

Yes, being a programmer I always start counting from 0. I am writing this at the Nashik Central bus stand and time is 2.40 a.m. I had planned to write in detail about this trek; and now I got opportunity as I can’t sleep while travelling as well at the public places. Other trek mate Shailesh is already sleeping on my carry-mat and other guys are on their way from pune to Nashik. As we planned we will be visiting fort Salota and Salher later in the day. Once all people are here we will be taking bus(es) to reach base village waghambe via satana/taharabad/mulher. As per my guess this will be toughest day in our trek schedule. Lets see. Salher is the highest fort in Maharashtra. Kalasubai is the highest peak while fort Kulang offers the highest ascent when base height is taken into consideration. There may be some errata for above info J. The whole range we are visiting is called as selbari-dolbari range in baglan region. Shivaji followed the same route when he looted Surat. Salher was captured by Marathas in 1671 and was again attacked by Mughals in 1672. Shivaji fought the biggest battle on this soil and this lead to biggest win for Marathas in terms of money and armour. Around 10K soldiers lost their life from both sides. Marathas captured 50 mughal sardars; and got 700 camels,350 elephants, 3000 horses and lot of money as a result of the battle.

Well all Day1,2,3,4 were really busy to write anything. Here is the narration I wrote when back from trek.

Day1 :

We reached taharabad at around 8 a.m. and the bus which lead us to waghambe was scheduled half an hour later. After a quick breakfast we headed to waghambe. All of us were singing Marathi songs and then started Sandeep Khare songs like “Mi morcha nela naahi”, “kase saratil saye”, “nasates ghari tu jevha” Bus conductor as well as fellow travellers hardly knew these marathi songs. Hope they liked it. One of us just returned from Canada on Saturday and he was here on 4 day trek on Monday night. He carried a big bag with clothes for children. We called someone senior (may be sarapanch) from the village and told him to distribute it to school children. Neeraj and Chetan hats off to you for showing us how simply you guys told the person about the motive and then action to be taken. I mean ‘doing it’ was may be simple but while doing it you made sure that it is for right purpose and message gets conveyed to villagers and onlookers like me too. Our trek started a minute later. We enquired about the route and 3 or 4 children from village joined us for company. It took quite a while to reach salota-salher col ; as some of us were carrying really heavy haversacks. We put down our bags under a tree on the way to salota and asked one of the 4 children to wait there. It was a bit tricky to reach the top of the salota as there is no well trodden path also the whole terrain is without solid rocks. It looked quite simple to run up the way at some moments while at some other moments it was quite risky job. There is nothing to see atop on Salota but the rock cut path offers good views of Salher fort and way that leads to Salher from salota-salher col. We finished our luncheon on Salota itself. All guys carried excellent food from home e.g. god purya,dashmya,pickles etc. Some of us were exhausted because of the scorching sun. It took another 20-25 minutes to reach salher-salota col. We picked up the bags and started following the route to salher top. The way to salher leads on the east face of the Salher and then run upwards and connects to step –way carved in the rock on the edge of the pyramid shaped salher. We took our time to reach this steps. For some of us it was safe destination; the way ahead wont take more than 40-45 minutes. Once we reached steps spent lot of time chitchatting with each other. Finally decided to move up when chetan came back running to see if everything is alright. Once I reached the caves; thought most difficult part of the trek is done and that too before sun went down. Happy and exhausted we picked up cameras and went clicking the ranges around. After seeing DSLRs in action I felt really bad with my Canon A530. I need some more money to buy such goodies. Stalwarts or we can say seasoned trekkers ran back to task of cooking good dinner meal. Everybody helped the way they can. I had trekked with lot of different groups but this one particular gang carried lot of food and made no compromise about individual choices. We had 4-5 types of regular spices; 3 types of pickles and what not. Within 10 minutes whole mini kitchen came out of our bags. We carried cooker, mini cylinder, utensils, plates and some regular stuff. I thought we can go whole week with this if our stamina remains intact. I was carrying documentation for the whole range with maps etc so It was up to us what to cover and what not. After a tea and refreshments dinner preparation was in full swing. There is a lot of teamwork involved as no one cooks food on regular days back home. In my some of last treks guys only cooked food and female counterparts enjoyed the recipes. Regular trekkers do best what they can in this task. Their approach is to cook just enough food that everybody gets something and nothing wastes away. Also they have to keep mental calculation of what things are remaining and what we will need in next 3-4 days. This time story was absolutely different. We had enough choices and time to cook too. Anyways the point is regular trekkers could be good coordinators in life and also at work from their experience. I mean some of them are already are but hint for someone less fortunate.

Some of us already started what they call a “StarParty” i.e. exploring the open sky in starry night and exchanging information about them. Yogesh sir was most knowledgeable person in this domain and he guided us to identify some of them e.g. hydra,kruttika,magha nakshatra. Suddenly everybody started discussing about gravity and stuff and its effects on the height of particular species. Then moon,aliens and then lot of jokes. We played lot of pranks on shailesh all these days but he outwitted each of us in his unique manner. Shailya is outrightly smart as well as foolish at the same time when he makes arguments on the topics for which he may or may not have any air. Great to discover you on trek J. Rohan was shivering with cold and had bit of fever too our onboard doctor Mr Sachin helped him with dose and advice. After a dinner and bit of a masti we hit sacks hmm carry-mats. Me, Krissh lead the snoring session then; other followed J

Day 2: We couldn’t catch the sunrise from the extreme top of Salher only sachin could take good snaps as he left early. The view from Parashuram temple was breathtaking. We could see complete selbari-dolbari range also the satmaL range which includes Dhodap,Saptashring,Ravalya-javalya etc and may be the Ajintha range (with the help of binocs). Rohan then narrated the salher battle in his unique style. Indeed very few people know about this battle thanks to our school textbooks. It must have been mentioned in great detail for its after effects on maratha kingdom. There is one mythological story too. Lord Parashuram the sixth incarnation of Lord Vishnu stayed atop salher and He created konkan region(reclaimed land from sea ) by shooting arrow from the very top we were sitting some hundred centuries back. I enjoyed the view and thought what better place than this to sit and speak you heart out to your friends, soulmates. We then headed back to caves where we stayed the earlier night. Our breakfast included khava-poli, cream rolls, Nan khataai, and milk too. We were running behind the schedule and it was already 11.30 and we were on Salher only. We decided to go down from the other side which leads us to village Salher. This is the proper route for fort but quite exhausting if you decide to reach salher from this side. It took around 2 hours to get down from this side. View of Shailkada from the bottom of Salher reminds you the beauty of kokan kada. En route to village we also stumbled upon the Samadhi of “Suryarao kakade”; the great warrior. We later came to know about this in village Mulher. We hired a jeep and listened the music from full bass/treble stereo. Sachin changed the lyrics of “aashik banaya “ to “naashik bulayaa”. It was fun ride via telyaa Ghaat to mulher. It was a market day for village and hence the main street was crowded. Local boys asked us in their typical ahirani tone “kathaain unaat? Gadavar jaai raahinaat kaa?” I understand this dialect fairly but failed in vain to answer to one of them J. After a quick enquiry we decided to put our bags in Uddhav Maharaj Ashram in mulher village and head to mulher fort. On the way we encountered very old house with wooden carvings and it was very beautiful. I met old man there and he explained the history of the village as well as the salher fort. He told me about the battle of salher and suryarao kakade Samadhi; parashuram story too. Mulher village is historic place with its name mentioned in Mahabharata etc. Udhhav Maharaj ashram gave us a small room to stay when we mentioned that we are trekkers and exploring the places around. We put our bags in the room and headed to visit mora-mulher immediately. The base point of this fort itself is 30 minutes walk from Mulher village and it was already 3.15 in the afternoon. Yogesh,Sachin and Chetan were already leading ahead and by the time we started the climb Krissh and rohit opted out of exhaustion and they returned back to village. So there left two groups one leading and ours was the second one. When we reached the Ganesh temple we saw the leading group following the route to Mora but suddenly quick calls with them confused us whether they are on right track or not. They told us to “come up” and we came up and followed the route to Mulher. It was clear after some time that first group is reaching Mora and we will be reaching Mulher. It took lot of efforts to reach Mulher top where we met the first group. They easily covered both the forts. It was not easy for us to go back to Mora and come back again on Mulher for descent. First gang headed back whereas we waited for sunset atop mulher. We saw carcass of some big animal buffalo or may be bull. Shailyaa said someone had really big feast there and we thought lets go back before some animal decides to make new kill J. We were bit disappointed due to fact we couldn’t cover the Mora. Things suddenly became dark and big task was ahead to reach Mulher village back in pinch darkness. We missed the way at 3-4 crucial spots and it was a bit dreary when torches put off. Add to that torch bulb of Neeraj’s torch went off. Thank god and pretzl he had the spare bulb too. At one point we headed into bushes after we lost way and trodded for around 15-20 meteres without knowing what lies ahead. The direction was the only criteria. We decided to head back but gave another thought to continue and it put us on our correct path. We called the way as highway then. Once we reached Ganesh Tenple it was clear we are out of danger and 45 minutes from that place we can reach the village easily. In pinch dark we spotted one injured bird and clicked some pics. Shailesh and rohan then decided to walk the remaining way without help of torch and it was sure fun. Seemed like college days are back we sat on the road clicked some pics and finally reached Uddhav Ashram. I had complete documentation for this forts and still we missed the point we could have covered all 3 forts in a single day if we had started early in the morning and started from mora. That lead us to dedicate a whole day to Hargad for which we have to reach again almost the same location we covered on the day 2. Krissh our bhaatMan cooked rice already. Sachin made a1 zunaka and we had best dinner that day.

Day 3:

Next day I got up and after the regular chores visited the temple and places around; clicked some pics and read the history mentioned in the premises of the temple. We got to know that there is a “Bal Sanskaar Kendra” as well as “Yuva Sanskaar Kendra” run by Temple trustee. It is really good initiative by temple trustee for school children and then started recollecting my school days and thought gone are the days to get this kind of education in metros like Mumbai and Pune. I suddenly became more observant and saw the innocent faces of the children there and thought how simple and beautiful is their life even in this rustic settings. I am sure if you want to take good photographs go to villages; faces of these people talk a lot and even their pics are refreshing which is missing in city life sometimes. We loose outlook of life in daily grind and suddenly discover new dimension to everything meaningful to you in small conversation with or without spoken words.

Hargad was not on my must do list but because of the earlier wrong decisions /time constraints we have to dedicate an entire day for it now and some of us also decided to reach the base of the Nhavi fort (which we anyway couldn’t do). Visiting Hargad was fun anyways. Rohan got injured and because of my upset stomach I was lagging initially by almost 30 minutes. I had to really pull myself to catch the other guys and while doing it I went all the way downhill on the traverse. Some lady from the fields called me up and asked me to go up as other guys were moving up. I don’t know whether I was correct or the group. We did mistakes here too. We traversed the whole hill to the extent that at one point I started thinking if we would continue for 30 minutes more we would reached the same point where we had started in the morning that day. Also we chose the way which generally herds follow. Rohit the youngest lad of the group had to pay the price. He slipped at one point and lost the balance and dived almost 20 feet downhill. Thank god he recovered very fast and terrain was easy. This was his first trek and he joined our group on insistence of his uncle. Hargad is not often visited place and we had hard time to get the correct way. By the time we reached col; we thought this is the same place where we could have come after visiting Mulher in hardly 10 minutes earlier day. Luckily we came across some villagers there and they told the further path. There was one shortcut too but it was really risky as it involved some free climbing. After yesterday's night trek and this long and boring traverse made me think to abandon further trek and head back and have decent bath and sleep. That didn’t happen though. I kept the lingering thought away and followed Neeraj. Just before we start the climb thought the col Krissh or somebody shouted "saap, saap". It was a Russel's viper (ghoNas) around 3-4 feet long. I had hard time in finding the camouflaged creature. The moment you loose the eye on it; it’s gone; very hard to find it again in bushes. I clicked in vain to get the pictures. Now only 1 picture out of 4 I clicked shows it; yeh Russel's viper not the computer language by Guido van Rossum :). No problems as such as my other friends do have really close up pictures. It made our day. Good things happen only when you don’t loose hope. That made my mood lighter and I was ready to trek ahead. We climbed almost for an hour or more to reach to the top of the Hargad. It is barren hill without any tree; just cactus and dry grass everywhere. There is one Hanuman temple and cannon on extreme end of the fort. I didn’t bother to run all the way; just asked the fellow trekkers who went and had clicked the pictures. To our dismay; the water on Hargad was not good and it will be really bad in the summer as there is no water source all the way till Hargad top from mulher village. The nearest spot is Ganesh temple on the way to Mulher fort. After resting for 10-15 minutes we started the return trek to mulher village. We have to move tonight to the base of Mangi-Tungi or Nhavi which is around 14 kms from Mulher village. This was the most pleasant walk on our 4 day trek. It took almost 2 hours to reach Ashram from Hargad top but clear sky, breeze and singing on the way made it look like a picnic walk. Just before the final descent somebody came across the Heart shape cut in the grass on the ground. We jumped to this opportunity and clicked some good pictures. On the way down I talked with Neeraj about his job etc and future plans. I broke the unwritten rule that you should not talk about office/work related things on trek/while traveling. After returning and resting for some time we packed our bags. We gave our contact nos and references to Temple trustee and listened to the story about the temple and importance of the place and local beliefs and traditions etc. Then started the lazy walk to mulher market and on the way entered roadside stall for tea and vada paav. We discovered the difference beween Vada pav and Pav vada that day. We hired a six-seater and started journey through darkness to Mangi base village Bhilawad. Dark Scene outside and mood was just correct. Starry night, 10 people in a six-seater, empty road with potholes but no lights. Chetan started singing "So gaya yeh Jahan ..." everybody enjoyed the melodies later on. Interesting thing happened then When Rohan was on call nobody budged to stop the singing but when auto driver got the call everybody stopped singing. What a strange reaction? How much we take granted for friends hehe :) It was like typical college crowd hitchhiking their way on the journey. We loved it. Like all good things this too came to an end in short while. Once we reached Mangi-tungi base; we got a place to stay at very nominal rate. Thanks to Jain community there. Sachin's battery charge once again put the lights off the room. Anyways it was some other problem. Our Bhatman Krissh agreed to cook his trademark recipe after lot of persuasion. Shailesh looked like helping people around but I still doubt how much work he actually did that day too :))

Day 4:

At 4 a.m. a person called us from outside to wake up as the bus to Magi-tungi base leaves quite early and you have to get ready for darshan. We ignored it and slept till 5.30. I finally got bath on the last day and waited for other people to get ready. Four of us were ready by 6.30 and thought lets lead trek today. Reaching to the base of Mangi tungi was pleasant walk in the early morning. But climbing those 2000+ steps was heavy workout for legs. I am still in awe of some of the elderly people there who did all the onus bare footed. I had to remove my shoes too as it was smelling really bad and it needed some fresh air as well as sun. View from the ridge was amazing. We had the best pics at this location. Pilgrimage is the age old concept in India and building those steps had really helped lot of people to reach there. Without them it would be daunting task for lot of people. There are lot of carvings and structures related to Jain tirthankars. I have to read about them on net now or ask some Jain friends. We started Mangi-tungi as any other trek without any information but now I am more curious about this stuff. From my guess this work like buddhist caves have must have been started long back but it was not complete as there is lot of discontinuity in the whole architecture. I was stunned by willpower of so many people who in general sense were not physically fit to do the task. They exhausted themselves just to visit pilgrimage and offer prayers. Belief makes a man stronger. Day before Sachin and Chetan also commented that they are not best trekkers amongst us or more fit physically in the group but it’s just a mental block in each of us that whether we can do it or not. True; we all know these things but when a picture becomes clear after some experience then only it makes sense to you. Human body is amazing machine. It responds to your mind and you can stretch and develop the stamina. You feel exhausted only when your mind says "No, Its enough now!” Later you give up; stronger you come up each time subsequently. You throw yourself out of regular box while traveling or on trek. Different people with disparate experiences some times; new places/surroundings; even a simple conversation can initiate a lot of thought process. While climbing the last patch on Mangi a gentleman told me to breathe deep and slowly from nose and not mouth and I obliged immediately. You always know right ways. You lack right company; right mental setup and the urge to do it. You keep your ego out when such things happen.

On the way to tungi we met other teammates; after lot of clicks and sightseeing we moved to tungi. Rohan was taking lots of snaps of old idols. Some lady enquired him why he was taking pictures and what would he do with them? Is it for selling? Rohan made clear that it is for his own sake; nothing commercial but that made clear how people are finicky about little things. Here everybody has the strong opinions about the things which don’t fit in dos and don’ts defined by stereotypes. Photographer/Trekker-Traveler/Dancers are generally not appreciated much. Who cares?

It was time to go back to base village now. On the way back we met very old Jain lady and her son. We asked her whether she need water or anything else. Her son told us that she would get down first; offer her prayers in temple below and then only take water or food. We have to learn a lot about belief and most importantly discipline. I imagined what I could do if I believe in myself even 10% of what she shown to us. On the way back Rohan told us about his EB camp, last years coastal bike ride; korlai forts; Portuguese home in goa,andaman trip etc. Then came the topic of nasty things like rave parties and such growing culture in Pune.

After reaching base we packed our bags and got ready for Lunch. Lunch was good in bhojanshalaa there. While returning from there I saw staunch naked digambar Munis. Most ascetic form a man can be in. just before leaving the Mangi-tungi chetan told me about one more interesting experience about jain sadhvi. She beat seasoned trekkers bare footed while climbing all those steps. Chetan said that they are glad that hare and turtle story remained true for this occasion too.

Well I wrote lot of other things here. Trekking is physical activity at the start but when you are get used to it; it becomes part of your thinking too and you do both these things while walking/climbing/traveling around the places with few friends.

To reach Nhavi one has to reach village vadakhal by crossing small riverbed. It would take around 90 minutes to reach there. From there one can take a route to Nhavi village and stepway to the top of the forts. After this I was not really exhausted like earlier days but thought I had enough fun and Nhavi(ratangad) trek wasn’t enticing enough. Also coming back to routine life will take at least one day after rest. I told my decision to head back home to fellow team mates. Everybody asked me to finish the last one too but I said lets meet on the next trek now. Something at the back of my mind kept calling me away from the mountains. I owe a great time to you guys; thanks for organizing this wonderful trek and including me there. I wish you; just like my Che Guevara Tee says "Grow Change Evolve"

Happy Trekking and best luck at everything you do!

PrabalGad 23rd September 2006

Prabalgad: near panvel

participants: Ketan,Sudeep, Aniket and Kshitij

After a long hiatus I finally returned back to Trekking. I thought I will be way behind the stalwarts like aniket and Sudeep.I did, but not much thats good news for me. We headed for Prabalgad near panvel on bikes saturday morning. Frankly I had never drove more than 40 Kms in one stretch and add to that road conditions between airoli and nerul; it was diffrent experince altogether.

We took small brek at datta snacks near JNPT junction after panvel.
We were able to see Prabal and kalavantin from that spot.We took another 30-40 minutes to reach the base of the fort and then parked our bikesunder banyan tree. Prabalgad is the place where many people had lost their ways before. Aniket himself had dont this till prabal machi but couldnt find the way in earlier attempt. Guide from prabalmachi is MUST; otherwise you will lose important time to explore prabal. we took around 1 hour to reach prabala machi. The way is simple and this could be very good trek fro beginners or for the people who just want to chill out there. There is no way to miss the route till prabal machi. There are two small villages (aadivaasi pada). Prabal machi is very nice plateu and extended for another 1/1.5 kms in length. Prabala and kalavantin are two forts and kalavantin looks like temple top from the base. There are steps all the way to top; bit slippery in monsson and famous 26 th July has done some damage on that route too.

We had small banana break and snaps session at prabal machi. We met our guide; negotiated for his fee :). We are really bad at that. I know one enterpreuner friend; must get hold of this NEGOTIATION issue; am sure he can teach me some fundas about them. anyways where were we..The started trek for prabal from prabal machi. This climb is quite tough. at some places we had climbed for around 60/70 degrees angle. I started lagging :). Soon after 25-30 minutes we reached the spot where a CAVE was found some years back. I dont know the exact details. We started to explore it; but found its full of mud and we love our LOOKS. Kalluram informed us that it can accommodate 200 people inside and you can also stand up..need not crawl once you are through first 20 fts (if we had tried that it would have been absolute makeover for each one of us :d) yeh Kalluram was our guide from prabal machi.

It took heavy toll on my body to reach the peak up there. we took around 70 minues to reach the top of the fort. There were many bifurcations on the way to prabal and one could easily get lost on this way. Also it was really good steep climb. I was still walking and asked Kshitij how much more and then realized we have arrived on top :D. To all readers..there is hardly anything to see up there;but its a big big plateu and there is a way that leads to matheran too.We visited ancient ganesh Mandir there.

We had planned to visit kalavantin fort after reaching machi but aniket and sudeep had meeting to attend at 5 in the evening. we started our descent to prabal machi; finished good lunch (courtesy Aniket's mom) and reached the base in nother 40 minutes. Headed back to return route on bikes and on the way lost the company. Kshitij muct have reached home before than us; thanks to his skilled rash driving. Somehow I feel one day trek are better than 2-3 days. am back to business...wait for next story soon

Rajgad torna 26-27 Jan 2006

An account of the trek

Participants (7) :

Sanket Sangwikar, Ketan Khairnar, Manoj Pawar, Mayuresh Jog, Aniket Kate, Mahesh Shinde, Neelesh Sawant.

Destination: Rajgad to Torna trek

1. Climb Rajgad and Rajgad darshan
2. Rajgad to Torna walk
3. Climb Torna and Torna darshan
4. Get down from Torna

Journey: Kayan – Pune (by bus) – Nasrapur (by bus) – Gunjavne (Jeep) – Rajgad (Trek) – Torna (Trek) – Velhe (Trek) – Pune (bus)

An account by Sanket Sangwikar

Planning for the First time

For the first time in the trekking history we planned a trek three week before and yet the plan was executed. 4 of us confirmed, 2 joined at last moment, and 1 surprise addition from Ketan’s orkut contacts (Mahesh) reached Nasrapur at 4.00am. There was sudden wave of cold all over Maharashtra and Pune went down to 4 degrees, so you could imagine! We waited in chilled open space, negotiated with jeep drivers, took snaps, ate and finally agreed with a jeep driver to reach the base of Rajgad.

View of Rajgad wad really breathtaking from Gunjvne village. We could see the Indian flag on the fort. (It was 26^th Jan!) The first timers of Rajgad – Aniket, Mayuresh and Manoj – were all excited. In spite of me, Ketan and Neelesh been here before, without breaking our tradition, we went along the wrong path and then searched the correct one through water streams.

Aniket was carrying more than 3 kgs of fruits and cucumber and everybody was calling him ‘phalwala’. The rate of clicking snaps was directly proportional to the height we were climbing. Of course I managed to get some of my solos clicked. I was enjoying this route for the third time but still it was exciting.

Rajgad stay

After we claimed the space in Padmavati temple, Rajgad darshan started. We visited some places like Gunjavne Darwaja, tunnels of Suvela Machi, which were unseen last time. The fort is really amazing – the more you see, more you love it. Mayuresh – visitor of Raigad for many times – was also astonished to see the defense mechanism on the fort. The ‘Raju guide’ (that is me) was constantly speaking something. And Aniket was not finding any “application” of those things.

Evening was lot boring for me and Ketan while we were not able see anything new and were just waiting for the other people who had gone to see most magnificent part of the fort – Balekilla or citadel.

Dinner was literally a fast for Neelesh while we had only one slice bread and some parathas. (sorry Manoj! Not parathas but ‘theple’) Thanks that Ketan got the MTR packet boiled from the fellow trekkers. Neelesh was so hungry that he ate half of raw half boiled rice that no body else was touching. Ketan for the first time in his treks had brought enough food. Aniket was frustrated and counting jocks ++ for every PJ cracked by Mahesh.

Rajgad to Torna

Decision to leave Rajgad by 6.30am was scrapped by the chilling cold outside and we finally left at 8.30am. Manoj fully ‘enjoyed’ the freezing water and open space for his morning rituals. We left Rajgad from deeply hidden Alu darwaja of Sanjivani Machi. 4 of us drank the last glasses of buttermilk of Rajgad and of course lagged behind. We walked and walked along the hills appreciating the view of Rajgad behind and reached a tar road after crossing 7-8 hills. While everybody was tired, the board said we had just crossed 1 km and Torna is 10km ahead. But thanks that is was instruction for the tar road and not the trek route.

With very low morale, tired legs, time running to 11.00am, we started rethinking of Torna. Fortunately we found a hut on top of a hill, where we got water, buttemilk and morale; so we continued. Next 4-5 hills were crossed in one go with that energy in spite of losing the way twice. 5 more trekkers joined us on the way and twelve of headed for the first patch of Budhla Machi of Torna.

Rock patches of Budhla Machi

Mahesh was horribly tired due to his inappropriate trekking bag. Ketan was bravely fighting his heavy sack, torn at one of the belts. View of fortification of Torna was really amazing. The first rock patch was 60 degree steep but with loose sand on the rocks. The second one was horrible. If I had gone first, I would have dropped the idea of climbing it. Mayuresh though crossed that 90-degree steep patch and entered Torna; so did we.

Ah! We were on the fort finally. Now we just had to reach the Balekilla. But things are never simple. I got cramp in my leg, which had bone crack two moths back. It pained like hell. I thought the trek is over. I will have stay here for the night. But thanks to relispray and painkillers, I could do the trek ahead. I was praying for the easy route with my injured leg. But soon everybody was speechless to see the rock patch ahead.

The second one was nothing before this. This one was horizontal where you cannot tie a rope, 90 degree steep at both side and rocks of the width of less than1 foot below your feet. Everybody prayed for life and started for there was no return back on the second rock patch also. We had to go ahead. The environment was really tensed for us. Aniket was yelling at everyone who interrupted him with some question on the rock patch. He yelled at the other trek group also. But nobody was in the state of paying heed to it. Of course I cannot forget that he carried my heavy sack with the huge carry mat all over the rock patch to reduce my load.

We formed a chain where next person used to instruct the behind one where to keep feet and hands. We crossed rocks, turned around them, crawled, sat on the rocks, jumped but everybody crossed successfully. Affection for life is so strong that any of the feet did not slip, any hand did not let the rock leave.

We were frightened to cross the rock path of Harishchandragad in deep monsoon of July. But this rock patch was like doing Harishchandragad 4 times. The line “Zinda hoon main” held true for us as we entered the huge gate of Balekilla of Torna.

Getting down

No body was in the state of looking at Torna fort, but actually the fort had all its fortification in place. It had a nasty ambience where you do not want to stay much. After all it was effect of the superstition that Torna bears a ghost. Mayuresh was particular about leaving the fort before sunset.

We finished all he reaming parathas (this time it was not a fast!), drank lot of water and headed down to Velhe by another route of course. No body bothered clicking a single snap on Torna. Though this route is also steep, we felt it nothing before Budhla Machi rock patch. After all Torna is the highest fort in Pune district named as ‘Prachadgad’ by Shivaji. Throughout the trek Aniket was either speaking or yelling. He did not break that tradition while getting down also. He was the most enthusiastic in our group and literally ran ahead of us.

Misinformation conveyed

We all abused the Internet pages, which did not convey the proper information or rather conveyed misinformation about the rock patches. We will not recommend Rajgad to Torna trek for ant trek group unless you are experience with rock climbing. Doing Rajgad and Torna separately is the best way for general trek groups, that is what one of the wiser trek groups we met were going to follow.

Of course we enjoyed every moment of the trek. The fear at that time has turned into thrill now. While we say we will never do this trek again, we do not know what lies ahead.

Koraigad 18th June 2005

Well guys as sanket wrote abt last trek I eagerly want to pen down abt our trek on 18th june to koraigad.
Destination: Koraigad (23 kms from Lonavala exactly above amby valley)
Participants: Ketan,Sanket,Sushant,Janmajeya and Sandeep(first trek) Read on diff parts as : Twin-Spin, Dudes -1,Lal dabba journey,Lost and Found, Lunch with Sahyadri Mountains, Trek down, Rain and Dudes(ohhh again), Lal Dabba-2, TMC vs KDMC
highlihgts: total cost 180 Rs per head, Much of sightseeing in Lonavala, amby valley, bird watching from truck on return journey

Twin Spin: I woke up at 4.45am and reached Thane station and bought ticket to lonavala and was waiting for Indrayani.Bit nostalgic bcoz I used to go by same train every monday morn to pune 2 months back.There came one of my old buddies from my Pune trekker gang. I surmised as I talked with same guy 2 days back abt some plans.
How come this guy from in thane and what the hell he is doing in thane at tghis hour.He ignored me and went straight on.am bit frenzied went straight on to ask(why am not apply same attitude to gals :D)" Hello Mr Kedar, do u know me?" He gathered his thoughts and told me " Well, I am Mandar Kedar's twin bro". We boarded Indrayani, rest all joined at Kalyan. Afetr small round of intro to newbies we started discussing our fav topics Treks and affairs of school buddies, their know hows. This is becoz me and sanket being from same town and diff school we have enough topics to chew on. Well then i expressed my concern that korigad is not the dest for us if we wanaa do somes serious trek. No one was interested in Tung-Tikonaa(but that could have been much much better what say Jay, sandy ;P read on to read real story)

Dudes -1 : we alighted at Lonavala stn. kedar went on to catch lcoal train to chinchvad. Lonavala air already had done its magic on Sandy and sushant's mood. New to this and being excited. quite of course! Janmajeya(jay) insisted on breakfast after our packing of sandwitches in his fav hotel. meanwhile I bargained and got good deal for sandwitches. quite weird but it happened. well I enquired and bus was at 9.15. so we had abt 40 mins spare. In jay's fav hotel I bumped into my old buddies from Pune Infy.All of them in rockstar appearance with their mean m/c Pulsar 150 and 180 DTSi. One of them actually ditched our plan 1 day earlier. They were interested to join for ride but somewhat hesitant for trek. we parted our ways and again met at Koraigad base villege ambavane.
I being aware of eccentricities of my infy friends was ok but rest trek group shattered with thought that this drool brats actually do work for India's most fav company Infosys. This group must have njoyed their bike ride till amby valley. Much thanks to Mr. subrato shara for best roads in Maharshtra till amby valley and what scenic beauty this region has no one can imagine.Well its par Malshej and not famous.

Lal Dabba / Loast and Found: we started with state transport ST(lala dabba) from lonavala to Sahara lake city. We passed on empty bushy dam and its silly visitors.(damn silly, whats point in visiting dam which has no water) We moved on to reach INS shivaji and Air force juncture and entered ghats. Sanket with his digcam ready to take snaps.
But he being novice cant take pics of moving objects and was in same situation as hunter aiming for his pray.
This thing amused our fellow passengers nad villegers. We knew peth shahahpur is simplest route and from ambavane its steep climb. So we passed on Peth shahapur and alighted at Ambavane-Bhamburde juncture.
Infy dudes do reached here at same time. I hate them being called as dudes (" duh attitude") as they are as normal as any one fo us in workplace just trying o be different! they moved on to amby vally entrance.
we started on our way and reached a gate and realised Sahara grp had blocked this way. somehow we persuaded watchman and get ourself inside actiual territory.but after 30 mins also we aren;t able to get actual route. each time we reahced some exotic locations. Rocky patches, bamboo densities. oh my god we took almost 20 snapa there.A true heaven one could imagine. We asked neighboring watchemen and workers on the other side of fence that how to go up. NO one had done this.I thought why sahara emplyed these outsiders to look after a fort of Maratha King. well quite illogcal that one has reached till summit.
well sanket some how found our beloved " trekker arrow" on one rock. This is fav tricku used by trekers to make marks ont their way so that fellow trekkers can follow.This thing has been useful fro night treks especially.I was charged and covered 30% of total hike in one go. rest alsof followed and then just two breaks at some of relly difficut patches. They were quite risky one mistake. one slippage and one would doen direct 600-800 feet. I had some bitter exp at Lohgad-Vinchukata so I told them to follow steadily and everyone is now 5 mins away from summit. we climbed the rest with confidance nad we are on top ar 12.15 PM.Sandy,jay,sushant managed evrything in good spirit and confidance.

Lunch with sahyadri Mountains: We started to look around for familiar peaks and forts. I rather correctly identified Lohagad and Visapur. Sanket identified karnala peak(the famous thums up).This peak is such a dstinct peak.Not much height(1100 ft) but can be seen from most of the ranges being not a single range to hide it. Its almost 80-90 kms from where we were standing.God! sky was clear and we could see so many ranges of sahyadri.This very picture after long toll on body is real thing acts as a kick for me any future treks.
We moved on to side facing Amby valley. we just reached the edge and oh god is this posiible ? Am i in India?
This being rather straight fal down I told sandy come slowly nad please have a absolute surprising shock!
wow! Even one thought gone through mind, that I dont mind buying this home in partenership with 10 other guys.
Every bunglow is priced at 2.5 crores. This valley has helipad, runway for chartered flights and so mnay swimming pools.My eyes glued on those little huts for Indian cricket team and had a envy abt Parthhiv patel.whay there is so much economical gap in india? I felt poor whole day.
Moved on to Korai devi temple where we kept our bags started taking bites of packed veg s/w (sandwiches and not softwares). Finished our lunch and time for small nap now. well we actually avoided this and now praing for Rain.Clouds gathereed and every time moved on Lohagad.Me and sandy already out with wind-cheeters but rain didn't come.
Then we moved on to other part of fort where we saw some water reservoir and around thousands of frogs!(well its true) after lot of time we saw some gujju couple on fort who must have cme up from stairs a way from peth-shahapur.By this time we reached 100 snpas target. nad then started to climb down through stairs way t peth shahapur.

Trek Down:

We had bus to lonavala at 5.00pm but weren't aware that this is last bus.On the way sushnat pointed out that as famous marathi writer PuLa syas that maharshtra has 3 distinguishing comon traits as Mumbaikar,punekar and Nagpurkar he added one more as trekker. and their common trits as 1. trekker dont like stairs on fort 2. trekker never likes to reach top along with some other group or second to any other.
3. trekker hates totake gals with them for summit.(I am exception here) 4. trekker never leaves any plastic on fort and if possible collects prev scrap and dumps in his bag.
(myself follows first clause and dump those plastic bags in sankets bag :)) well there more traits, join the gang and explore...
We almost cursed sahara group for building those stairs.but much to kudos that is the only fort so much clean than any other forts.This whole fort gets in lights bcoz of floddlight at its base by sahara group. At the base we managed to find hand-mump("nalika-vihir" to sanket) then moved on to village peth-shahapur and we saw a bus going towards amabavane. so same bus is going to come back we ordered some tea nad oh god rain starts pouring me, sandy , sushant ,janmajeya already on road to enjoy that. finally our carrying wind cheeter was real worth.meand sandy enjoyed for 10 more minutes and saw the bus coming. me hinted jay, sandy that let it go. sanket realised that later after we hinted driver to do not wait. he almost started runnig carrying his bag. chhay wala told us that this was the last bus to lonavala but dont worry you wlil get somehtig till 1000 pm. it was 6pm and i dont know how weird it was saying you will get something in next four hours.
but bus was gone and so the rains ...... :( :(
Dudes-2:
we were waiting for some trnsport to take us bak to lonvala. their were pajeros,scorpios,tata safaris.but as I said we were poor ppl there. then we saw some trkeers were comig towards peth shahapur carriyng proper tre bags rucksags and drenched in rains. sanket w=enquired whats their plan. we were baffeled by fellow mumbaite's accent.Now I felt we are not mumbaikars. after bit of eye-hinting we decided to march towards lonavala and reach ghosalkhamb fataa. well trekkers weren't alone they did have their female friends with them too. we had quick eye on them and sandy.jay thouhgt it was worth leaving bus.sanket was cribing as he have to go to seepz next morn anyhow.well we stil on our way and no one is cared abt our sitiation.then there came lal dabaa but it wasnt st bus it was red colored truck. we were reay to give any amt to him but he insisted on only Rs 50 (5ppl for 22 kms ) so one more good deal.
Jay,Sandy still lost in thoughts of better halves of mumbai dudes.well this truck has peculiar thing.one extra wheel-tier has been placed at the back of drivers cabin. Jay quickly climbed up and soon all three were standing and enjoying everything on our way back.jay had very good eye but he missed one scene which we enjoyed on Lions point.Well now suddenly ppl on road in their accents,esttems,scodas felt envy abt our innovating way of enjoying truck ride.
soon we are back to lonavla. on our way to stn we got bus to kalyan-dombivali.Yeh we got stuck around sheel phataa but that price was negligible in front of what we enjoyed in daylight.

that was the story and u can join next trek on 17th July

MahuliGad 5th June 2005

An account of the trek

An account by Sanket Sangwikar

Date: 5^th June 2005

Destination: Mahuligad near Shahapur (Dist Thane).

Participants: Sanket Sangwikar, Ketan Khairnar, Aniket Kate, Aniket Lonkar, Sourabh Sil, Mandar Date, Abhijit Jawdekar

We all left for Mahuligad after getting our bags packed with food and most important WATER. We didn’t want to make this similar to our Karnala trek, when we would have paid twice if someone was ready to give us even drops of water, but no one turned up. So everyone was having two liter of water each.

But it was all in vain! The fort was so huge, lengthy and exhaustive that by the time we reached half the height, we had finished 70% of Water.

The way was excellent, passing through dense forests, tall tress and large rocks. The architecture was reminding us Rajgad again and again. The fort seemed to be miles away even if you are 80% done with the trek. The last 20% was damn fast and wickedly rocky.

Mandar gave off after first half an hour only. Abhijit persuaded him to go further and they form a small negotiation team, which was coming up with an ant’s speed. We could watch hem coming from the top of the fort. Every five minutes Mandar would say to Abhijit, “Enough, this is my final destination. I will sleep here. You go ahead.” He had finished all the food and water, they both had in their bags, by the time he reached the top.

The fort had remains of Entrance door, caves, walls of fortification. The top of the fort is flat, wide, exceptionally large and covered with dense forest of Jambul trees. Mahuligad has two more neighboring forts, connected with its top, called as bhndargad and palasgad. We couldn’t visit them though. It would have taken one more day of trek to see all the three forts completely.

We searched and searched for the water on the fort, and finally got a tank of clean drinking water, which was like an energy tonic for us. After we found water, everybody realized how much hungry he was and all food was finished within next 15 minutes. After their stomach was full of food and throats wet with fresh cool water, Mandar and Sourabh started again with their typical jokes and comments. Aniket K was speaking continuously as usual irrespective scarcity of water.

Abijit got a cramp in his leg so we got down from the fort a little late. Bless Ketan for he could arrange an auto direct to Asangaon station packed with all 7 of us. In all, the trek was excellent and magnificent though a little more exhaustive.

Addendum by Sanket Sangwikar

The Great I, brought the digicam with me and forgot to bring the cells. Soon whole Asangaon town came to know that there exist some 6V batteries in the world. But after a lot of abuses and taunts from the kind fellow trekkers, I had to convey the bitter fact that we cannot take any photo on this trek.

Comments

Comment by Mandar Date

This was little exaggerated. Abhijit and I did not finish all water and food in our bags. I had spared a 1ltr water, which we used after meals. I also had biscuits and bakarwadi. Abhijit spared 5 ladu and some water

Mandar.

Comment by Sourabh Sil

Really very well written..

How cld you forget to mention the 7 people in one rick ride(Bajaj Test ride)!!! :-) And also your wisdom to bring the Digicam but not the batteries. And how even the Panwala was trying to help us with the Batteries he must have never heard of.

We can also add the climbing down in 3 groups..

One of Ketan and Aniket to find a Vehicle so that others did not need to walk another 2 kms to find one. They really did cover good ground to come down quickly and luckily Ketan got a bike ride once they reached the Ganpati Mandir situated at the base of the Fort.

The second of Aniket.K and Sourabh.. These 2 were really interested to climb down really fast, specially Aniket.K.. Sourabh was hardly able to keep pace with him since his natural instinct was to run, irrespective of the steep slope or barren flat land!! At one point he told Sourabh that he will slow down a bit and then in the next moment he was running to the Bemusement of Sourabh. And Due to this company Anilket.K was able to learn the typical jokes!! They were also able to find the Echo point on the Slope which was a bit wayward from the actual path to the fort.

The Third and not the least were Sanket, Mandar and Abhijit. Kudos to Abhijit for he braved his cramps to climb down the rocky and treacherous paths of the Fort, where probably one wrong step wld have meant the last step of life. And the only job that Sanket did was to give indication that they were safe for the second group who were blowing there hearts out every now and then with his name to get some communication going between the second and the third group.

Ya, Mandar even I feel it is a bit exaggerated.. Kya kare woh jo tum loggo ne kiya woh to papi pet ke liye tha.. :-)) and also y you were able to get the 30 mins sleep before climbing the rest of the fort!!

Thanks and Regards,

Sourabh Sil.

Purandar,vajragad,malhargad 24-25 June

An account of the trek

Date: 24^th and 25^th June 2005

Destination: Malhargad, Purandar and Vajragad (Taluka Purandar, Dist Pune.)

An account by Sanket Sangwikar

The fuzzy plans as usual

The trek plans were fuzzy till Friday. People in the list were dropping for offices on Saturday. So we had some final calls to each other and took a poll but decided to go ahead. Manoj was quite determined this time. Though we were just 3 from here, 4 new guys from Pune joined for Purandar trek on Sunday.

Mandar had gone to Pune on Friday night. So I called him at 6.25am and you can imagine what I would have heard from the other side. Journey by Indrayani Express was quite enjoyable as we got two seats and luckily the two unknown guys reserving those seats didn’t appear at all.

At Shivaji-nagar, Monoj made me go mad, when he called his friend from iFlex, Pune for a visit in a hotel. We were supposed to be there for the trek!! But she took only half an hour and we were soon at swargate to get a bus for Saswad. Mandar had brought a raincoat cap and it was looking quite comedy. We took that opportunity to the fullest to make fun of him.

The easiest Malhargad, but we made it difficult!

Date: 24^th June 2005

Destination: Malhargad near Saswad (taluka Purandar, Dist Pune).

Participants: Sanket Sangwikar, Manoj Pawar, Mandar Date

After we reached Saswad we decided to put our bags in a hotel room. We enquired and got 3 names. But the name Mohini was tempting Mandar. “It looks it would be a good hotel” The mohini of Hotel Mohini made us stay there. It was ok for one or two day stay but you cannot eat anywhere in Saswad without keeping a glass of water ready beside.

We took an auto for village Sonori to visit Malhargad. The road was horrible. We understood why the rickshaw-wala took Rs. 120 for just 6km. Only a real brave could drive along the way. To our surprise Sonori village was looking rich enough and historic also. It had many huge old temples made up of in black-stone. The palace of Sardar Panse is a miniature of Shaniwar-wada. It has 6 bastions and a huge temple inside. The remains are quite enormous to tell the real glory of the palace. Sardar Panse was admiral of the army of Madhavro Peshwe. He built a fort near sonori to keep watch on Dive-ghat which leads to Pune. This is Malhargad. The fort is not a real mountain fort like those of Shivaji. But it looked like a check post. It has been built in red and black-stone with bastions and fortification clearly in place. The fort is recent (built in 1757 to 1760) and has two large temples and huge entrance doors.

From the bottom it looked so simple to climb that hill but the entrance was on other side. So we took a turn for it and soon got lost. For such a simple trek it was really annoying for us to get lost. We could see the doors at the top but the way was making rounds around the fort at the bottom. So we decided to climb up the hill and it was really tough as we went up. Finally after 15-20 minutes, we jumped into the fort from the fort walls. “Tanaji nantar aamhich”!!

On reaching the top we did investigation and found that we had climbed by the only toughest part of the fort. All other sides were so simple!! We spent 2-3 hours there in photo sessions and exploring the secret entrances and other things. We were trying and finally managed to take photos of Mandar with that comedy cap. He was trying to delete them but we took the cam from his hands. At about 4.00pm we started going down. We took last 5.00pm bus to Saswad and reached hotel room. The fort and the photos J both were worth a look.

Stroll in Saswad

I was feeling very uneasy due to acidity since I had had very little since morning and was waiting eagerly to vomit so that I will feel better. After I did we went to see Saswad. It looked like a large town with its village like appearance intact. Saswad was long time Peshwa residence before Bajirao Peshwe moved to Pune at about 1719 or so. After that it was given to Sardar Purandare for control. The centre of the city has 3-4 huge palatial “wada”, (buildings with wide protecting walls) built by Purandare. The largest of them is Purandare Wada - really monstrous with 3 story walls for protection and thousands of holes in it for firing through guns. The entrance door is larger than even Shaniwar-wada.

The backside of this wada has equally large Bhairavnath temple with ample amount of open space inside. We could witness a great show of ropes there. 10-12 people were holding each end of the set of ropes tied 12 feet high. They were having a patterned dance to weave the ropes and then reverse pattern to unweave it. The unweaving was really tough and even if a single guy misses his step the ropes would have started weaving again. The dance was going on with an inviting music being played on Puneri Dhol, but it was unlike we play in Ganpati.

By the time we reached back my acidity had gone so bad, that I slept in the room while the other two went to see the Sopandev temple. It was also quite good, I heard later. Finally I took Eno and ate in the hotel. Felt really better.

Night in there

This was first time in my 2-day treks’ history, when I was not staying on the fort but in a hotel. The night was quite eventful with

• Mandar trying to delete those snaps of comedy cap. But he didn’t know how to delete them.
• I changed the camera menu to Japanese so that he couldn’t do anything.
• Manoj had set the alarm in his mobile and royally revealed the fact he had never hears it.
• For half an hour, Manoj and I had conversation on different mobile models and Mandar was really frustrated since he wanted to sleep (or wanted us asleep to get his hand over the camera.)

Kille Purandar and Vajragad

Date: 25^th June 2005

Destination: Purandar and Vajragad near narayanpur (Dist Pune).

Participants: Sanket, Manoj Mandar, Amal, Vivek, Shital (he is a guy), Amit

For very long I had wished to see this one - One of the favorite forts of Shivaji. Every stone of Purandar speaks some history. 1000-1200 years old temples, Shivaji’s first war after he started creating a new kingdom, Murarbaji’s war with Diler Khan, Sambhaji’s (Shivaji’s son) birth place, Private fort of Peshwe, Peshwa Sawai Madhavrao’s birth place, British and Indian Army training Camps, NCC Camps… Purandar has been a centre of army movements for centuries till 1985.

We reached the base by 9.00 and started by the trek route. There is also vehicle route, which takes 2 hours on foot. The trek route was easy enough and soon we were at Bini Darwaja, which is the first one at Purandar Mountains. This leads to two forts – Vajragad at left hand and Real Purandar fort in front. Weather was very cool and rain had blessed us and did not turn up any time. First time we were without any food stock and a single water bottle but it was working fine for us. We headed ahead to balekilla, but I soon discovered I had again forgot the printouts of the information in the bags put at base of the fort. I had to recollect what I had read. The route to kedareshwar temple in balekilla was a bit tiring but gave view of the whole valley at both sides. We were agape to see the vast area, which can be controlled by this vast fort. Purandar is really vast and there is so much to see here. Since bikes can come up to Bini Darwaja, you get to see some youth from Pune and Saswad too.

After chanting some hymns in the temple’s cool stony echoing insides, the seven of us headed for Vajragad. Amal was singing Marathi song “vedhat marathe veer daudale saat” which was fitting to the incident. As usual I misguided the lot and took a longer route but we were on the fort in 20-25 minutes. Vajragad was also interesting with large rocks here and there. We had a short photo session here. Mandar’s attempts to delete snaps were still going on unsuccessfully.

Riding down

After some rest we headed down and the route was now very easy unlike while climbing. Mandar and I were almost running down as if we were riding a horse and soon it started showing the result. Our legs were badly aching, while “slow and steady” Monoj reached the bottom quite comfortably. During the whole trek, Mandar was after taking his solo photos. May be, he wanted a perfect photo to show it while arranging the marriage J. After we reached Pune station, we felt the emptiness in the stomach and filled it with some snacks.

The trek was really great. We would have really missed a great fun had we cancelled it.

harishchandraGad 4-5 March 2006

Participants: Ketan, Mandar, Nikash, Rohit, Sandeep, Sanket (alphabetical order J )

1) To go or not to go

After our last trek to Rajgad-Torna (26-27 Jan 2k6) I was bit reluctant to visit the places I have been before. It’s like listening to same song again with lyrics on your lips. But like some musical symphony, this recent trek also made us feel light and gave us sense of some achievement. It won’t be good to say this was just like every other trek we did in last 2-3 years. Sanket said most of us are now on the new juncture of our careers and in very much possibility we will take different paths may be 6-7 months from now and this trek gang won’t be the same at that time. We decided about this trek and almost sealed this as the last trek for us this season. Manoj dropped out at the very last moment and

We (me and Rohit) decided to join this trip. Finished packing bag and food within 45 minutes and called Rohit. Me and Rohit reached Kalyan by 11.30 a.m. as decided.

2) Bus and walk till Khireshwar at night

Finally all of us headed to Khubi phata by 12.30 am bus. Me and Sanket were talking on myriad topics throughout the journey. I guess that’s why we have lot of enthusiasm to arrange such awkward treks which most of the normal guys and our parents didn't comprehend. When we say we are going to trek; there are lot of different reactions to that. Some people say it as rubbish idea. Some say just ‘well’ and ignore the whole thing. Some are enthusiastic to join us but will never do so. They themselves know this and we tooJ. Some are interested in reading our trek accounts and pictures onlyJ. Let it be. We don't care as we our self don't know what drives us to mountains. It makes us calm; helps to strengthen friendship. Somehow it also makes us pure in thoughts and makes us bold to take decisions in split second in real life too. I agree that Trek is not the only thing for that but for some of us it is and it will be. Bored ;) Ok We reached Khubi phata at 3.30 am. After searching for 5 minutes using torch we started walking on road beside Kukdi-dam. This walk itself takes around 45 min- 1 hour. We reached at around 4.15a.m. /4.30 a.m. to Khireshwar. We slept outside one of the house cum Hotel. Rohit forgot to bring bed-sheets/sleeping bag. I opened my sleeping bag fully and then all of us had a small nap till 6.30 in the morning.

Please add meanwhile stories. I was fast asleep and didn’t heard any of those screams and running helter-skelter by Mandar. It was quite cold and it was good after humid Mumbai weather and dripping sweat.

3) Climb

We started Climb after tea and Pohe at Hotel Tejas at Khireshwar. Khireshwar is the base village for Harishchandragad. Original Khireshwar village is now under dam and this new village is relocated Khireshwar village (Courtesy: Sanket). Five of us were there for our last visit to Harishchandragad in July 2006. We realized that we slept at some other place. Last time we had our tea in Hotel Aishwarya whose owner had told us at that time that there is no danger as rain had stopped since last night. But he had also refused to accompany us at that time. He knew that we are the same people who had had terrible night on Harishchandragad in July. I waved hand to him in anticipation. We then started walking to our destination. Everyone seemed to be validating the path we lead at that time. The way till Rock patch is very dense so didn’t faced any problems from scorching sun. We had enough water with us. That also helped a lot. We reached halfway to Tolar Khind. This is the fantasy spot of Sandeep where he wants to do romance with his would-be. It is a good location and you can see whole dam from there. In our last visit one school picnic was arranged till this spot. Good idea and really good location especially in monsoon where you can enjoy lot of waterfalls on the way till and in scenery till this spot. We took another 15 minutes to reach Tolar Khind. Khind is the place where two mountains are connected. We had long halt there. Enjoyed cucumber/carrot with water J. We had good photo session there. This khind also connects to Kalsubai Sanctuary and way through it leads to some village called “KotuL”.

After 5 minutes we reached first rock patch. We finished it quite easily and then reached to the base of second rock patch. This one is more dangerous than first. Everyone recollected where Manya and vinu had there date with destiny in last visit. They were survivors or victims. That is the point of major discussionJ. We will take that offline.

We reached top of Harishchandragad in flat 2 hours and another 15 minutes.

4) Old Memories

We knew mistakes we did last time. Every time you reach to top of the fort you are relived and can enjoy some time. In case of Harishchandragad it is quite different. The game is not finished yet mate. You have to cross another 6 small hillocks to reach shelter. We recalled the last photo of our last visit. That was there at that very spot. No one had pleasant memories after that. This time there was no danger of Rain and it was 10.30 a.m. We started walking after 15 minutes break and crossed around 3 small hillocks. Memories started to gather about those dreaded moments where we were clueless and nothing seemed to be helping us. Last time we were there at that spot but had barely 30 odd minutes before it gets dark. We walked and walked then but no obvious sign of shelter. At last we had reached one small temple (ghumaTi) then, we debated a lot and decided that we have lost our way. It would be better; if we go to some place where we could hide our self from raining sky. This time we reached the same place where we sat whole night for first ray of sun. We also took some snapshots there. I guess that was longest night for all of us. And now we realized that we were actually only 50 meters away from temple last time. We laughed at ourselves now. But such was the nature’s show that time. It showed us the cruelty of nature. So Man is not a man as he is now without nature. Protect nature and it will protect you sometime. That was the lesson

5) Temple and stay

We soon reached temple at around 11.45 a.m. One group has reached there earlier. We decided to stay in one of the rooms opposite to Harishchandreshwar temple. We offered our prayers after coconut breaking ceremony which we could not do last time. It was good choice to stay there as it was quite warm in the night also. We had 2-3 hour nap in till 4 in the evening. The temple was really marvelous piece of architecture and is the gem of the old era. It had survived centuries for now.

6) Evening at Kokankada

In the evening at around 4.45 we stared marching towards Kokankada. It was the only motivation for me to climb 3500 feet from base of Harishchandragad. When we reached Kokankada everyone was speechless to see the wonder of nature. It is completely concave semispherical structure. It has spellbound height of around 1500 ft and circumference of around 3 quarters of kilometer. One of the mavericks of Kokankada threw himself down from that place some years back. That was sad but true. Some one for other trek gang started talking about other accidents on such peaks. Everyone was listening to him. Actually it was quite disgusting for that moment to listen and talk such things. We walked on one side till the place where “nalichi vaat” connects Kokankada at its top. We had lot of solo pictures to remember this visit at that spot. Some one threw water down the kokankada. It went around 15-20 meters high above our heads and came back as rainJ.

Go and visit this place and enjoy the sunset there. It depicts the true picture of beautiful nature in your mind. We said bye to sun and headed back towards temple.

7) Night dinner and some songs

We settled soon in our room opposite to temple. Also finished whatever we had brought for dinner. We also ordered Pithala-Bhaalari for 2 of us. That was good really for my appetite. Soon we started singing all melodies. It started with Sandeep Khare songs then to Sonu Nigam then Shaan, Euphoria. Meanwhile one Powada from Sanket also some oldies like “Kisaka rastaa dekhe”. It was fun singing together. Later we shifted to other place where camp-fire was lit by other group. One of them had such a good command over his voice; he left everyone spellbound by his singing.” Myanaatun UsaLe taravaarichi paat, veDaat maraThe veer douDale saat” then he also sang ons “shetakari geet” (farmer folk song). It was sort of really good mehfil of all unknown buddies having common interest “trekking”.

8) Climb down

We had good nights sleep. I woke up at around 6.15 with first ray of sun. Finished my chores in open air J. By 7.15 everyone was up and everyone was happy for coming for this trek. We had tea and biscuits and then started to pack up our bags. Finally we left temple at 8.15 and reached the starting point of HarishchandraGad by 9.10 or so. Descent was simple and less toll-taking on our bodies. After rock patches it was routine job to walk and walk down the descent. We reached Hotel Aishwarya by 11 or so. Sanket discussed with hotel owner about different way which is shorter and reaches temple faster. We had Upma and tea there and after that regular “Joy” session.

9) Khireshwar temple and walk back to Khubi phata

This time we decided to visit another temple in Khireshwar village which is also centuries old. Everyone was happy about mission accomplishment and hence quite lazy to reach khubi phata. On the way to Khubi Phata after visiting temple Mandar went to complete some regular assignement. We had nice time in nearby water bodies which rejuvenated all of us. Soon Mandar and Sanket started talking about climbing “Hadasar” fort in front of us. We reached Khubi Phata by 1 p.m and got a bus to Kalyan.

HarishchandraGad 23 July 2005

Participants (10) :

Sanket, Sandeep, Ketan, Manoj, Shrikant, Rohit, Aashay, Harish, Vinayak, Pallav.

Destination: Harishchandragad near Malshej ghat

Base Village: Kheereshwar

Journey: Kayan - KhubiPhata (by bus to Nagar) – Kheereshwar (walk 5 km)

The good start

The start of the trek project was excellent. Planning, analysis, design phases were initiated and performed well by Manoj. This time neither Ketan nor me were among the organizers. Manoj scanned all the information, mailed them and kept track of the people who are coming and a team of 7-8 trekkers rose up for the Trek to Harishchandragad.

I was rather surprised to see that the participants were ready for this exhaustive trek even in the successive week of our Sarasgad trek. An enthusiasm really worth appreciation!

Manoj had sent a mail to everybody to be on Kalyan ST-stand at “sharp” 6.30am. But he himself was there 15 minutes late. And by the time we were ready to get into the bus, everybody was abusing by the name of Pallav, who had given a good news that he was in Dadar and will take one more hour to reach. Finally everybody came and we headed towards Khubu Phata at sharp 8.15am. But we thought not to worry. We had two whole days of the trek this time. Ketan, who could not suppress the urge for Harishchandragad and feared that there would be nobody to go with him again, was a surprise addition to the trek-team.

The journey was quite uneventful with Vinayak and Shrikant fast asleep at yhe back. Even the amazing greenery and waterfalls of Malshej ghat could not hamper their sleep. Harish and me were busy trying to take snaps but in vain!

Weather and the motivation ahead

At khubi phata, we were really astonished to see huge dam of Kheereshwar on which we had to walk for about 1 and ½ hours. Though the walk was very boring, we didn’t at all feel it because of so many motivations walking ahead of us. There was a large group of youngsters of High school came for a one day picnic and those Chembur girls provided quite an inspiration for us to reach them fast. Sandy was especially obsessed for it with his sunglasses on. (Surprisingly this time ‘tall dark and handsome’ comment was not passed by anybody)

As we kept on walking, weather started becoming worse. There was strong winds, heavy rains and clouds everywhere. None of the mountains ahead was visible. The wind was trying to blow those girls away and Sandy was seriously thinking of giving them hand.

By the time we reached Kheereshwar, I was totally demoraled by the weather and trying to convince Ketan to return back and do Naneghat instead. I was afraid whether all 10 of us will have that guts to erach the top in those clouds and mighty winds. But the villager at whose place we had Pohe and Tea told that the weather is better than yesterday night and a group has already gone ahead. So my plans were crossed off and we headed towards Tolar Khind.

Tolar Khind

We climbed for about 1 and ½ hours with out usual photo sessions. Aashay, Pallav and Ketan were far ahead. I kept on bobbling about the team spirit and all to Ketan. So to avoid this constant trouble, he started walking with us. Soon we found Aashay and Pallav coming back and saying there is huge rock path to cross and let us return back. Everybody was appalled at the site and the arrow saying we have to cross this. We were almost done with the decision when Harish and Shrikant started getting down along a water stream and found that there was a detour, which was easier. This also had arrow marks. We should have understood here that those arrows are misguiding at many places and should have acted accordingly but then the whole history up on the fort would have happened.

As we kept walking for half an hour more we found a board saying that was Tolar Khind surrounded by Harishchandragad-Kalsubai Forest sanctuary. This is where the 600 feet steep rock patch starts. We found 2-3 villagers coming but they were pretty fast to keep out pace with them. They accompanied us for 1/3 of the patch where railings were present. Manoj had continued his pace of slipping throughout till here. Thank God! he did not slip on the rock patch heading into deep valley.

The 600 feet Rock Patch

This was an experience of life. Everybody remembered how they loved their family and prayed God to save. We had to think where to keep the foot before heading ahead. The rope we had was falling short by feet or so. So Ketan, Aashay or me were holding it at one end. Shrikant was helping people to cross the patches. Vinayak had literally slipped at the last crossing and was shivering. “I am hugging my mum as soon as I get down there” “I love my parents… I want to meet them again” Everybody was thinking of Life and God. And of course it was true. The place was so amazing and beautiful…deep valley down, a rock at your feet…clouds below you…harsh sounds of winds…dripping rain…when a person reaches the limit of natural beauty he can not think of anything else but God and death. There is nothing so truthful…so pure than this.

The fright and tension suddenly turned to thrill, excitement and relief as soon as we reached the top. Everybody cheered, shouted, hugged and clicked the snaps. A great sense of achievement filled out heart.

In search of the temple

It was 5.30 by the time we reached the top. We had to find the temple before dark otherwise we would have been screwed badly. But in vain! We were in the clouds and could not see 10 feet ahead. Aashay and me searched for the temple ahead very fast but were afraid to go much ahead since both of us were not having torches. The fort is so vast, that it can bear 3-4 big cities on its top. There are large mountains and thousands of water streams no the top. We had a nasty feeling that we were yet at the base and every surrounding mountain is separate fort. The way went on and on till eternity and those arrows still present giving us directions. (I am going to kill that person marking arrows.)

Soon it was so dark that we formed a line and rules as to how to proceed. Aashay and me were ahead and Harish and Ketan at back. The rock patch was nothing as compared to tension of what will happen if we don’t find the temple or caves.

The unforgettable night

We found old remains, small temples of shiva and a pons and got more confused whether we are heading to Harishchandreswar temple or Taramati Mountain. The maps were all out and being referred every now and then. They were all wet and so did us. At last we lost our patience and decided to head back. Aashay and me had thought of a place in such emergency while coming. It was a thicket with less wind blow. We built a small tent like pitiable thing with out bed sheets and crept in to have dinner. Everybody was hungry and soon a big lot of Puri, shrikhand, bread and butter etc. vanished. Rain had blessed us for an hour. And we prayed it to bless us for the rest of the night too.

It was hardly 8.00pm and clock was suddenly running like a speed of tortoise. We sung prayers, aartis, stotras…couldn’t think of Hindi film songs. Ketan started for it but no body responded much. Nothing proved useful. God had decided to punish us badly. Because just after we relaxed in that dry, windless tent, rains started pouring again and soon the bed sheets started leaking drop by drop. A stream of water started flowing from the higher end towards out place and we had to sit in the water.

Condition of everybody was really bad. Legs folded…sleep in the eyes…cold and rains…wet windcheaters…leaking bed sheets above…rattling frogs and birds…fear of some animal or snake (everybody feared for it but nobody mentioned). Ketan had shrewdly moved to the centre with the view that is some animal comes… and we were howling at him. Of course he was the only one to think of singing any song or speaking. He was the only dry person throughout the night. Condition of Rohit was the worst. He and Harish were holding plastic bags to collect the leaking water and throw away. In spite of all this fiasco, Vinayak was sleeping and, to our envy, snoring loudly. Aashay’s battery instruments and torches proved useful, since matchboxes were wet and wind was putting out by the candles.

10.00…10.20 …10.40…we were trying to sleep…12.00 …12.05 …12.06…wind is so strong…put some more bed sheets in all the 4 directions …1.10 …1.30 … … 5.30 …Shrikant, Pallav were out in the rain on the insulator sheet…6.00…hey, get up…darkness is fading…finally everybody lifted their numb, cramped, aching body parts, stretched and got ready.

We formed 2 large ropes by putting knots at the end of 6 bed sheets. Those served well while getting down, except that they were wet and heavy. We threw many food items, bed sheets, napkins, towels, all wet and increasing weight in out bags… everybody was frightened but not speaking of it. We started at 7.00am and reached the entrance of the fort by 8.30am. Manoj crossed all his records of slipping and the morale was so down by the time we reached entrance that Sandy was asking us with sadness if there was another way to get down from the fort.

God saved us!!

We started with the coconut ceremony with the coconut we had brought for the God Harishchandreshwar (He didn’t turn up to us). Getting down the rock patch was quite eventful with out new heavy ropes tied at the two ends. People got the morale back as we crossed 2-3 rock patches. We met a group of 6-7 trekkers [They must be professional trekkers], who were climbing the rock patch as if they are strolling in the garden. Within an hour we were back in Tolar Khind and thanked God to get us down alive.

Once again everybody remembered of their organ called stomach and filled it with Puti and Kachori. Harish and me were so afraid of the water already dripped in our digicam that we had not taken them out since we reached the top. we reached back to Kheereshwar at 11.30 and rested their for an hour with Pohe and tea. There was not a single part of the body, which was not aching. And the walk on the dam seemed impossible and infinite. After we get the bus back to Kalyan, all of us were asleep even before Malshej ghat came.

In the end…

The fort was really amazing and vast, just that we had chosen wrong time and headed into the clouds. We were so fascinated by the variety of natural beauty there that everybody was ready to come once again to Harishchandragad (but not in monsoon). We are surely going there again…to find the temple of Harishchandreshwar and worship him with the coconut.