Bhandardurg: One more to the list...

It was almost 6 months since we had gone for a trek. The last one was Ratangad which we did way back in september. Last winter was a total waste as everyone was busy with their life and no one was taking initiative. When Dipali pinged me a link from Maharashtra times about Bhandardurg i was thrilled after reading the article and was thinking of ripping this in the early monsoon this year. But Dips and gang planned it in this boiling heat, and that too @ Nasik. Initially i was a bit reluctant but i could hardly find any pages about Bhandardurg on the web. Eventually i decided that, no matter what, i am going to do this, even though the heat is pouring.

We started very late @ around 1 am from Mumbai. It was a group of 9 with 4 girls and 5 boys. Thanks to Amar for the Sumo, otherwise travelling by public transport in this summer vacations would have hell. By 5.30am we were at Trimbakeshwar. One of the 12 jyotirlings in India. Shri Trimbakeshwar Kshetra is covered by hills on three sides in a semicircle pattern and a long road which comes in from Mumbai - Nashik - Agra(NH2) highway. This placement of hills and considering the road which connects the kshetra to the highway makes it resemble a Lord shiva's Shivling if seen from a bird eye view. The hills covering the Trimbak are Anjaneri, which is also the birth place of Hanuman. Behind the Trimbakeshwar temple is the Huge mountain called Brahmagiri. They say its origin of the river Godavari. There is one more Lord shiva temple and also a Krishna mandir on the hill. All these three temples are at south end of the brahmagiri hill whereas at north end is the Shiva's Jata mandir.

We started from the base village at around 7 am and reached till the Jata Mandir by 11 am. We were in no hurry since we had ample time as the the route till Brahmagiri is very straight forward and one can find many small stalls of lime-water, cucumber and resting spots. There were also stalls which had flowers, rudraksha malas, empty bottles of bisleri costing from 2rs - 5rs, which poeple bought to carry godavari water back home. The decendants of Hanumanji or say human ancestors trouble a-lot in a small patch of steep steps. They steal anything which is in your hand and give stern looks if one tries to retaliate. One of them sat on my bag for quite some time until Runal who was behind me screamed when another one tried to pull her bag too. May he was thinking now since i am sitting on this sack, it belongs to me :D ... Somehow we were able to get out of that patch with less struggle since few of us had sticks in our hand. But there were other devotees who suffered because of these monkeys. Some of them also snatched purses of women. The really fun had now started. Till the Jata Mandir, things were normal as there were troops of people who accompanied us, but the place where we wanted to go was Bhandardurg, they call it Durga Bhandar. Its at a half kilometer distance from Jata Mandir. A a very narrow route behind the Jata mandir. On the way till Bhramagiri we asked many people about Bhandardurg, everyone said its very risky to go there. Not many people go there besides trekkers. (And why would one go? As there is no temple over there, if there had been one, people would have gone there as well). I saw people throwing 10 rupee notes in the godavari kund and even on the Shivling. God neva ask for money, and if you still want to give it then dont atleast throw it on him. It was disppointing to see people gathering around the pandit who was distributing the godavari tirth and creating chaos and hurting eachother and even fighting. For every spoonful of tirth every person used to drop a 10 rupee note in front of the pundit. There were a few foreigners as well who dropped 100 rupee notes each.

We started walking on the narrow route behind the Jata mandir. The route is very slippery because of the granular mud which has come down because of the land-slide. On our left was a valley and a small village of around 5-10 houses with farm fields around and goats and other pet animals running around and a few of those quietly trying to beat the heat by sitting under the shade of a huge tree next to a small well where a few females from the village were busy washing clothes and kids palying around. What a lyf! I mean this statement for each one of the living being i specified in the last couple of statements. There were places where we had to make our foot firm before placing the other foot. One slip and zuppppp.. in the valley.. We were approaching a pinnacle which looked dismantled at various places still standing tall. The pinnacle was linked to the brhamagiri hill with a very sleek and narrow wall like sructure-bridge. Until now, there was no clue how we are going to reach the dismantled pinnacle(Bhandardurg). With baby steps techinique at critical patches we reached a place where there was a 4 feet wide tunnel going down which had steps of uneven height ranging from 1/2 a feet to almost 2 feet. From top it looked like going no man's land. We started climbing down the slope. Eternal bliss it was. The sun was getting harsh minute by minute but the temperatue in this tunnel was as cool as cucumber's. The Rembrandt light entering the tunnel and hitting the rocks created beautiful reflections and amazing lighting conditions for photography. We spent nearly half an hour in that tunnel. At the end of the tunnel was a small window/ door of 2 feet height which lands you on the bridge i mentioned earlier. One will have to lie down and crawl and come out from the window. We enjoyed every moment of that experience. Finally we crossed that bridge and moved at the other end; the pinnacle(Bhandardurg). There was similar tunnel at the other end which we climbed and finally reached BhandarDurg. Yes its one more to my trekking list. Everyone of us was very happy. We were hoping if there is another route down to trimbakeshwar from Bhandardurg, but there wasnt one. It was a dead-end fulltoss at the other end of the durg. We wrapped our lunch right there at the second tunnel where a nice breeze was flowing-in and experienced a great bird-eye view of Trimbakeshwar village. Few of us also took a power-nap of 10 minutes with silent songs on mobile at the background. The blue sky pleasing the eyes and to complete the picture add a few snow white clouds. The clouds acted as an umbrella over the Trimbak village whereas some part was still bare with sun-strokes falling on it. It was an amazing view to distinguish the shadow part and the non-shadowed part of the village.

We started moving back at 2.15pm from Bhandardurg. The confidence level was slightly higher this time while walking on the edge. The story was not different even at this other side of the hill, the clouds had quite nicely covered the village from the suns harsh strokes and to add to it a gentle breeze was flowing as well. With couple of halts we reached the base again by 4.45pm. The sumo had come till the base of Brahmagiri. While returning we were caught by nice cooling shower in the Kasara ghat. And at the very moment the song playing on the FM was "Give me some sun-shine, gimme some rain" from 3 idiots. At the west, the sun was signing-off who was accompanied by heavy breeze with showers and thunder lightning. The fragrance after the first rain mesmerized each one of us.

Bhandardurg is a one of the undiscovered, unexplored fort from Maharashtra. Although there is nuthing much on the fort but the route to bhandardurg and the two tunnels makes it interesting and fantasizes any avid trekker. Except at a few place where there was slippery sand, the trek is a normal trek with no experience needed. The view around Bhandardurg from top pleases your eyes. The only threat here is the monkeys but if taken proper care it can also be countered. Do visit this amazing place once for sure.

K-series continues...

K-Series continues... Last couple of months had been very adventurous and thrilling for me.. Reason is the frequency with which i have been going on treks. 5th trek in 6th week. This time it was the Bhandup group and not Urja. I came to kno about this group coza Tillu, one of my gud frnd. This was my third trek wd them. Kulang, Kalwantin and now Kalsubai. One of the highest peak in Maharashtra Sahyardis, 5500 feet from sea level and 3500 from base village Bari. I was a bit nervous since my colleague Sarika had joined me for this trek and she was a first timer. Still i tried my best to keep my nervousness aside till that moment..
We decided to meet @ Dadar station @ 5.45 pm. I wud have luvd if Tillu had joined, but he had some other commitments, still he confirmed me that he will come to meet me @ Dadar station, coz he was anyways in Dadar area that evening. But his plan somehow tumbled and he decided to join us at the last moment, His friend Satkar and Sachin also quite easily agreed. Since he was running late by 10-15 mins we cud only be a spectator watching Panchavati express leaving Dadar platform 5 and wait for the Vidarbha express which was scheduled @ 730pm @ Dadar. Meanwhile i also informed the Bhandup guys that there are 3 more ppl joining us. Bhandup guys had planned to catch the train from Kalyan station. There were around 10-12 guys waiting for us @ Kalyan. We had to get down @ Igatpuri which is approximately 120 kms from Mumbai and takes around 3 to 3 and 1/2 hrs by rail. The journey was something new for Tillu and Sarika. The general compartment was jam packed. Ppl slept on the floor of the train. Few managed to set their bed under the seats, few in the corridor. Teenagers and desi dudes occupied the gate. After a small fight we managed to get couple of seats on the upper deck. The general compartments in Indian Railways has its own rule. If you step on someone's hand or foot by mistake while passing thro' the corridor then u wl get a immediate reaction.. "Abey oye dikhta nahi kya tujhe??" and if u are standing @ some place and somehow trying to balance your weight in the fast moving express and accidently ur feet touches the head of a lady who is sleeping ryt next to u, you will get a gift on ur foot, .. yea a hit! not only this you will also get couple of complimentary local badwords. "Aandhla aahes ka melya??" And all you can do is jus say sorry, coz its not their fault that they are sleeping in the corridor, but its ur fault that u can't adjust to the situation.
After an entertaining journey, we got down @ Igatpuri station @ 1030pm. It wasnt taht much cold as i had expected to be. The fun part was, Satkar and Sachin were not able to find Bhandup guys(Rakesh and team) @ Kalyan station. So they got in to another compartment. Rakesh and team got into some other compartment. So, we were split into three teams. Finally @ Igatpuri station we all were able to identify everyone's faces. Tillu and I exchanged handshakes with the guys whom we already knew and introductory smiles with the new faces, there were quite a few new faces. The group count was 18 now. After coming outa Igatpuri station we started moving towards Igatpur bus station. Rakesh and Suresh (Rakesh's colleague) went to arrange the dinner. We had missed the last bus to Bari station so we were left with an option of spending our nyt @ Igatpuri bus depo. Meanwhile Sarika had become quite friendly with Prajakta and my worry of, will she be able to adjust wd the ppl? had vanished. Soon after few minutes Rakesh and Suresh returned with our dinner. The dinner menu was mostly non-veg and all of them were non-veggie except Sarika. Luckily Rakesh had brought a veg item as well. After the bus-stand hosted special dinner, we moved out to take a night walk in the Igatpuri village whereas few of them opted to stay back @ the bus-depo and book their beds for the short nap of 3hrs since we had planned to take the first bus to Pune which goes through Bari village scheduled @ 5 am. The sky was a treat to watch since there was no infiltration of light. I started giving gyan to Sarika whatever i knew about the stars and whatever i had heard from the sky-gazing programme which takes place @ Vangni village situtated in the outskirts of Kalyan. If tonite i wudnt have been @ Igatpuri for Kalsubai trek, i wud have been @ Vangni since there was one similar sky-gazing programme organized by Nat-Geo Mumbai team. And few of our trek members had already registered for the same so they dint turn up for the trek. We kept on walking through the otherwise crowded market road till the street light stop guiding us. We were not feeling sleepy at all.
The two-three storied old houses on market raod had their own story. I felt as if those windows and balconies had been watching Igatpuri growing for not less than 100 yrs. They witness the horn of railway engines which keep on moving in and out of the workshop near the Igatpuri station from years when the entire Igatpuri sleeps. None of us slept that nyt. Two hours passed like twenty minutes. All set to go @ 5am. There were few villagers who were going for their routine work. They were surprised when they heard that we spent our entire nyt @ the bus-station. But it was nuthing gr8 for us since we normally spend our nyts either @ station or bus-depots when go for treks. We reached Bari village @ 630 am. The atmos was amazing and was slightly cold out there. We tuk our mrng tea @ a small tapri and started uphill march @ 7 am.
Though Kalsubai is the highest peak in Sahyradris, half of your work is done by the transport system. The only distance which now remains is to climb through the tiny hills next to the bari village. We were told by the villagers to fill our water bottles since there was no water available @ top. Female villagers had come to fill up water with all possible sized vessels available @ their home. We wanted to clear as much height as we cud before the temperature cud increase. After a climb of 10 mins or so, my nervousness creeped back into my mind when i saw Sarika counting her steps. I cud straight away see a feeling of forfeit on her face, but i knew she is a strong girl, she wont give up so easily. Honestly speaking my worry wasnt Sarika not able to climb any more but i wud miss this trek, since if she decides to stay back in the village till others return from top i wud have had to wait with her. I dont feel ashamed being selfish and openly speaking this since i m passionate when it comes to trekking. I nervousness was increasing with Sarika's halts. Till that time, the rest of the group had reached @ a small shed or a refreshment place built by a villager. He offered nibbu-paani @ Rs5/ glass. All of us had one glass each. When we reached that place, everyone clapped for Sarika which was more intented towards pulling her leg. Sarika's problem was she dint had proper dinner the nyt before and all those things she was experiencing for the first time. The train journey, the sleepless night, the early mrng bus ride, and after all this climb the hill and that too for the first time. She was struck with acidity. She threw out everything from her stomach and felt relaxed after that. By that time everyone was familiar with eachother and had started craking jokes on eachother. At that rest point, i told Tillu to stay wd me and told Sarika to go ahead. I dint wanted to be with Sarika, since i knew she wud have given excuses if i wud have accompanied her. We left from that point after 10 mins and i was surprised to see no one till lon long. I was expecting Sarika must have sat somewhere for her mini-break but i was wrong. She somehow was feeling much much relaxed after the puke of hers. I was happy to not to see her sitting. But still a gr8 exprience for her. Though we were the last group to reach the top we enjoyed every bit of it. Along with Sarika, Atish the fatso also takes many halts during all his treks. Our group of 18 got split into three mini groups with uneven headcounts. We were the tailenders and enjoyed the optimum. There were 5-6 metal ladders on the way to the temple. couple of them were very long. The problem with the ladders was they were custom made for the rocky patchs. The legs of the ladder were rested on the rocks and if the weight on the ladder increases then the ladder used to bend. That was actually risky. We reached top by 1130 am. My memories from Kulang trek became fresh as i cud clearly see the fort from the top. It was a gr8 experience to see Kulang from top of Kalsubai and especially when i had seen the later from top of the former and had a wish, someday i l climb Kalsubai and watch Kulan from there. I had neva thought my wish wud come true so early. There was a temple of Kalsubai @ the top. The kiddo pujari told us the story of Kalsubai. There was a young female staying in the village Bari. Her father used to harrass her alot. She used to wash utensils and wash villagers clothes. She was pissed off of her daily routine and fathers harassment. One day she decided to go the the top of the hill and stay there. People saw her on the hill for few days and after a few days she vanished from there. No one saw her after that. Some people say she left the village, some say she did a suicide. But Kalsubai is still an unsolved mystery for all of them and for us too. We did our brunch @ that place. Boiled egg is always a hot selling item on treks. We started out downhill march @ 1pm. Sarika was the first one to reach down along with Rakesh, Sachin and Prajakta. Her acidity was the main culprit in her uphill march. Everyone reached @ the Bari bus stop by 2:45pm. Satkar and Sachin had to reach Mumbai b4 730pm since they wanted to attend a bachelor's party. All our struggle to come early so that we can reach home early was in vain since there were no Public Transport available and all the jeeps and sumo's were jam packed. Satkar and Sachin managed to get place in a Mahindra pickup van which was ready to drop them till Ambewadi phata. The van was vacant, the driver suggested us to join Satkar and Sachin, and he was ready to drop us till Ambewadi phata. Apart from marketing strategy, he was willing to help us explained us that there are more options for us to reach Ghoti. So we joined them. In few minutes we reached Ambewadi phata. Ambewadi phata was the same place from where we had gone to Kulang a month back. I was the most happiest person on the earth and very excited since i knew i had added one more major name to my trek list. We waited for nearly 30 mins not even a single ST bus came which wud take us to Kasara, Igatpuri or even Ghoti. Satkar and Sachin managed to get a pickup van till Ghoti. I explained them the way from Ghoti to Kasara. There were two options open in front of us. One was anyhow reaching Ghoti and take a cab from Ghoti till Kasara which i had done last month and other option was reaching Igatpuri and catch any express/ mail towards Mumbai. Since everyone was tired the first option was most loved. We decided to go till Kasara anyhow and catch the 6.12 Kasara-CST local. Luckily we saw one Igatpuri bus coming from the zigzag Ambewadi ghat. Everyone got inside the bus ASAP. That journey of one hour was chucking crowded. Reached Ghoti @ 5.30pm. Now i was very sure that we gonna miss the 6.12pm Kasara local. Thanks to the ST officials and the local villagers who called up @ Igatpuri station and told the depo manager to stop the 5.30 Ghoti-Kasara ST @ Igatpuri until we reach Igatpuri. That was surprising decision for us, coz most of the time we listen and watch from media about the mismanagement of PTS. Well, there was a fight for a seat in that ST between me and a drunked person. He pushed me down from the seat. When Rakesh and Sarika saw this, everyone came running to fight with that person. Sarika was watching all the drama when the oral battle was between me and the drunked. But when the man pushed me outa the seat Sarika furiously controverted and almost ran over the person. His wife pulled him back and poked her pallu in her saree and showed her willingness to fight. She was bit afraid since by that time Suresh and Rakesh also had started arguing with that man. A lady sitting behind Sarika suggested me to keep quite as he was drunk, she was accompanying that drunked person's family. His daughter was continuously tugging his shirt and started crying. After a lotta hash out finally the fight calmed down. By the time we reach Kasara it was 630pm. Rakesh and Suresh went to get some snacks whereas rest all of us ran to catch the train. We occupied two rows and the extreme end of a compartment. Satkar and Sachin missed the 6.12 local and joined us. There was ample time for the train to depart. 7.25pm train left from Kasara station. Enjoying the batawada and bhaji paav from a mini-hotel outside kasara station, we started out journey back home. What game would have been better than Antakshari. Usually i get pumped up towards the end of any trek. During the onward journey i was mostly quite. Enjoyed the antakshari to the optimum. It continued till Bhandup station until Rakesh and company got down @ Bhandup. A short lil girl Rupali(i actually thought she studies in some school and i did ask Rakesh, in which std. is she studying, on which Rakesh laughed crazily) from Rakesh's office, Amey, Sarika and me got down @ Dadar. By 1130pm i think everyone reached home. Thanks to Sarika, that she dint give up in the beginning, as a result i cud complete my wish. Its always fun trekking with this Bhandup group.
Though we missed David, the perfectionist who usually arrange trek for Bhandup group. This time cudnt join us but glad that he transferred all his GYAN
to Rakesh and we cud complete it in a proper way, rather an organized way. Besides him, thanks to Sachin and Satkar as well, only for them we started our march downhill early.

4500 feet experience!!!

4500 feet experience! One of the best treks so far. Kulang! Not many groups opt for this trek since its in a very remote area where PTS is not available very easily.
Fri-10:30 PM We started @ around 1030 Friday nyt from Dadar station. It was my first trek wd Urja group, and that too coza Shantanu. Thanks Shantanu. But it was very unfortunate that u dint turn up. As a result all the faces ver new to me and vice versa. The plan was changed @ the last moment. Instead of Dadar-Amritsar express, Yatin (65 treks- the Lead) surprised us by telling that weel be going to Ghoti(Igatpuri) by ST. We waited for bus @ Dadar TT for an hour but cudnt find a vacant bus. To travel standing was not an issue but we dint want to loose our enery ryt from the first hour.
Sat-1:00 AM So we moved to Bombay Central ST depo and tuk a 1 o'clock ST to Nashik. By that time everyone had become familiar wd eachother and guys who already knew eachother were sharing their past experiences. We purposely opted the last seat, so by the time we reached half way mark over ass had got a very gud massage. Courtesy : National Highway's :P.
Sat-5.45 AM Reached Ghoti. It was very dark and quite cold out there. Yatin knew all the shortcuts. We followed him till Ghoti bus depot. But unfortunately we were late by few minutes and we had missed our bus to Ambewadi which is the only bus early morning. A local chai-tapriwala told us that the next bus will be @ 8am. But everyone knew, if we wait for this bus it wud be pretty difficult for us to hike in the afternoon. Luckily Yatin managed to pataofy (convince) a goods carrier to drop us till Ambewadi. Thanks to him! He took us through the shortcuts and man! i tell u it was so foggy out there and these local drivers are gr8! They have amazing skills driving in such a climate. That Schumi dropped us as much close to Kulang fort as he cud.
Sat-9:00 AM We then started marching to Kurangwadi through the tiny tops. We hired two local heroes (Kashinath whom we called Tere Naam for his Sallu ishtlye haircut and his brother from Kurangwadi) to guide us till the top. It was a very tempting view from the bottom but a tough one too, i must say. We started following them. They were moving really very fast. There were couple of reasons for that. Firstly they were from the same village and quite often go to the same forest to get fuel. Secondly, they dint had heavy hump(sacks) on their back and these light-weighted kids had amazing stamina. I am sure they must have got pissed off coz of our regular haults and drink-breaks and must be laughing at us. Anyways, it was fun walking through the forest. After some time we unknowingly got split up into two groups the under 25 and over 25. thats wat we named our groups. :D :D Even after walking and climbing the small patches for about two hours the top was still @ the same height it felt like. Still a long way to go! baby!.. keep moving.. throat had dried up. Biscuits, glucose powder, apples. we tried to keep up the enery level high. After around three hours of marching, we cud see rocky steps and i sighed with relief that its closer now. Those 3 rocky patches gave us a lead of around 500 feet in few minutes. We cud see a gr8 view of Kurangwadi and Ambewadi from that point. Those patches were bit difficult since if one looses his balance @ that point he will straight away fall into the valley and even Tere Naam and his brother wont be able to find out the remains :O
Sat-1:30 PM : It was 1.30pm we reached @ the top. Every fort in Maharashtra has a special Maha-Darwaza (Entry Gate). But this fort was missing the maha-darwaza. I think it must have broken down and someone might have removed it. We removed our tiffins and finished it ASAP like hungry dogs. Those kids who guided us till the top ate few chapatis and returned to their home. We promised them to pay their balance amount when they return the next morning to pick us up.
Sat-2:30 PM : v finished our lunch. It was a pleasant atmosphere on top. And most of us opted to take a short nap. Few of us moved out to check out the scenes around the fort. Me too accompanied them along wd my cam hoping to capture few clicks for my photoblog. Yatin told us, this is the only fort in Sahyadris from which you will be able to spot out maximum forts in Sahyadris, yes offcourse on a clear day with clear atmosphere. You need to have a gud binocs wd you for that. Yatin did show us Ratangad, Harishchandra gad, Kalsubai, Alang, Madan and Harihar. Actually Alang and Madan are right next to Kulang. There is a route to climb Alang but as per Yatin's information the only way to reach Madan's peak is using a rope way since the base of Madan was destroyed by Britishers and this is not only wd Madan but many other forts in Sahyadri region, since they were skeptical about the Maratha Empire might use these forts to attack Britishers and re-establish its dynasty. It was an amazing experience standing @ the top of tallest fort in the Sahyadris. After we finished exploring the fort and view of its neighbouring forts we started returning to our base camp. We had reached around a km away from our base camp. Our expectations of a sunset cudnt be fulfilled since the blackies had already gathered around the fort and were about to burst. yea.. the rain-clouds. The sun-rays were still piercing from these black snow-balls, portraid an amazing view in the sky. We ran to the cave as fast as we cud. But it neva rained. the clouds just passed away.. leaving back an orange-reddish shade at the horizon. Yatin and Prem started preparing the dinner whereas few of us started collecting fuel for our campfire. It was justa matter of few hours and the blue sky had turned into a dark with twinkling stars which looked a bit saddy saddy since their friend moon was on leave. yeah! it was a no-moon night.
Sat- 8:30 PM : our dinner was ready. The main topic of camp-fire was non-veg jokes.. :P. I too attempted one. But no one laughed on it.. Succha big popat.. :(.. Everyone busy eating the common dish-dinner except Kiran who was trying hard to keep the fire alive. Thanx mate.. :P ...
Sat-10 PM : We decided to go to bed early. The weather becoming more and more cold as the night became younger... Even one slept lika dead body. I was second from the entrance of the cave so you can imagine my condition. Glad that Sharad was the first one. But i remember throughout the entire night Sharad was very uneasy. Continuosly changing his positions and trying to cover his body as much as he cud.
Sun-5:00 AM : Yatin's alarm started ringing. I covered my ears with my bag and again went back to sleep. Suddenly after few minutes i heard someone shouting "Guys come out, Its beautiful view outside." I thought i m dreaming but someone stepped on my hand and tahdaaakk!!! i woke up.. and saw everyone running outa the base camp with their digicams.. My nose had become an ice cream cone. I too ran wd my digicam. Clicked as many clicks as possible of the beautiful sunrise.. But the clouds which had gathered over the Ambewadi village for their morning meeting was a treat to watch. Simply fantabulous... Slowly slowly as the time passed the clouds disappeared.. We had our morning tea and hot Maggi breakfast and prepared our body for the day ahead.
Sun-10:30 AM : Started down hill. The kids dint turn up. Now it was really risky since, now we cud actually see the valley whereas while climbing, the valley was behind us, so we neva noticed that @ what height we are from the base. After reaching the half way mark, we met those kids, they came to take us downhill.. These kids dropped us till the (so called) main road which connects Kurangwadi to Ambewadi.
Sun-2:30 PM : After almost 3-4 kms of walk we reached Ambewadi. waiting for 3 o'clock bus @ the bus stand. Managed to get a glass full of tea from a local villagers house, which was very sweet. But reminded me of tea made in houses in konkan region. As soon as the bus reached the stop we ran towards the bus, which was unnecessary actually coz that was the starting point of the bus so no one was gonna get into the bus apart from us.. :D .. Lil bita of photo session and keeping intact the memories of Kulang in our mind we left Ambewadi and reached Ghoti depo @ around 5 pm..
Sun 5:10PM : Ankush and Yatin managed to arrange a jeep till Kasara. Man!! these guys had amazing bargaining skills.. ;)... that jeep had a broken back door which opened with remote control i guess or with a swipe card as Sid said. :D The handle was missing.. The driver opened the door for us. He touched the jeep @ kasara station @ 5.45pm..
Sun-6:12PM : Kasara local.. By the time Yatin brought vadapaav and bhaji paav as snacks. since we were feeling very very hungry.. Every one got down @ their respective stations starting wd Yatin @ Kalyan, few @ vikhroli, vidyavihar and Ghatkopar, Rohit and i got down @ Dadar. Kishore and Sharad were going till Byculla and Curry road. Reached home @ 10pm. This was one of the best treks in all of my trek's till date. Thankyou all and special thanx to Shantanu. But missed u a lot dude...!!! Waiting for Kulwantini.. somewhere in October.. Rock On!!!!

Photographic day

We tend to overlook things which are closer to us. Thats what i realized when i saw SagarUpvan @ churchgate. This place is a storehouse for photographers, nature lovers; ppl who need peace; love to spent time @ sea shore, who love silence, etc,etc... Friday we planned to visit this place about which we had heard lotta things and experienced it when we actually spent nearly 3-4 hours there. It is located just opposite to colaba bus stop behind BPT dockyard, Colaba. I was lil bit reluctant to go there since i dint had my cam wd me but thanx to megz that she had brought her canon along wd her and i could try my hand @ it. Though i love photography but i m more of a galli ka photographer who dont bother much about the focusing, the aperture and composition :O and blah blah blah. Well meguzu taught me lotta things this sunde and now i can spell these words more confidently :P. There were many small insects, different species of two medium sized hens which quack like a duck but are not. They keep on roaming around the garden with their quack quack sound. U wud feel that they might bite u but they wont. There were tiny grasshoppers who gave us quite gr8 poses so that we can capture those. There ver quiverring butterflies which dint even give us a single chance to capture their beautiful n delicate wings. There ver fluoroscent colored mosquitoes and bees, there ver snails which had a rounded shell on top of their plasmatic body. There were flars which u wud have neva seen and each of them had a placards next to it which displayed its name which was so difficult to pronounce that we might lock our tounge between our teeth :P. The best experience for me was that i learnt lotta thing and look @ any object closely meaning, have u eva seen tissues on a snail's body? have u eva seen how does a spider actually weaves it web?? Yeah, we saw these things over there. A must must visit place, especially if u bugged up wd ur busy schedule and boring office work, this is a gr8 place to experience the silence of nature. We left from there @ arnd 11 and went to a wild photography exhibition @ ravindra Natya Mandir. Wow! it was! This was the first time i have been to some photography exhibition. Since m a newbie, all those stills captured by Vilas, Kaustubh, Gaurav were very encouraging for me and making my interest in photography a more rigid one. Megz keeps on giving me pointers offline a-w-a online and i keep on trying implementing em. All this diggaj photographer mandali are doing a gr8 job since they do it not only in their personal interest but they have a noble cause behind it. They run an organization names "Jungle lore" which conducts trekking camps, weekend hiking, fort cleaning activities, etc. The fund that is raised from these activities is used for fort maintenance. I dont know exactly what they mean by fort maintenance, but i m really interested to know more about it. The exhibition mainly displayed their best captures from wild life of Ranathambore forest. Deers, Langurs, Tigers, various birds which i dint even knew exists! Butterflies were wow! This exhibition is open to everyone till 13th of september from 11am to 8pm. Moreover, if you wish to register yourself and stay updated with the activities of Jungle lore group, simply fill up a membership form and they will mail u, or give u a call wheneva the next activity is planned. I was curious to talk to one of the photographers. And thanks to Gaurav that he shared with me all this info when i told him, i wud love to write about this exhibition. I m pretty excited about the events these guys organize and appreciate their love towards the nature and our historical monuments. Whenever we go for a trek we crib about the government not doing anything for the renovating the old forts. At the max what we do is we dont loiter place and tell others not to do so. But hats off to Jungle lore team that they have gone one step ahead and showed that, if we wish to do something then we can do it; dont need to wait for others. Gud work guys keep it up. Moreover, when i asked him abt any training for photography, he replied "No formal classes as such, but informally we keep on giving pointers and suggestions". Well it was a gr8 experience overall. Please do visit this exhibition if u are a nature savvy or even if u r nt..

Dahi Handi Special....

SagarGad : 13-07-2008

Hands and legs are aching. I am literally dosing. But dont have any other option to stay awake than writing this post about my yesterdays' trek. Right on the first day of my new job i m sitting idle on my desk with no work since my TL is onleave today.

After a long break of 7 months, we managed to go on a trek. The monsoon drops have already hit the floor last month and have gone for a vacation now. Even though the Mr. Bright was pouring heat and rays over the entire week we were hoping for heavy rains
atleast on this Sunday. Unfortunately, it dint turn up. Started early morning 630 am we gathered with old memories of last Harishchandra gad trek but as fresh as a rose. Every one was excited to meet eachother and more than that about the trek. Every
one turned up on time. We took a Dadar- Panvel ST from Dadar. Few of them were first-timers out of the total bunch of 13 with only 2 girls :((... Neways, neva mind.. We got down @ Panvel stand @ around 8 am. Just to fuel up the engine we did lil bita
nashta-pashta @ the Visawa hotel opp. Panvel ST stand. The best item was KANDE-POHE. it was too good. But i cud jus eat couple of spoons from my frnz plate since i dint want ti have the weekly sunde special breakfast on this trekky sunde. But i regretted
after i tasted it. The canteen guys took out as much info from us as he can about where we are going and when weel be returning back so that he can have a pretty handsome bill in the evening as well but unfortunately it dint happen for him, u l come to
know the reason later. From there we took a local Panvel-Alibaug bus to continue our journey After loads of maara-mari and smartness of reserving our seats by pusing our bags inside from the bus windows we managed to reserve around 10 seats. BTW, this style of reservation is call as Desi booking that too on current ticket. lolz... You just kwwp any of your belongings on the bus seat thro the window and that seat is wours before you get into the bus. THere is another way as well, u can also get into the bus using the emergency backdoor. Cool isnt it?? One of our teammate who was the last person to get into the bus told everyone that "Khandale" our destination is just 20 mins far. So few of our smarties gave their seats to other ppl who were standing.. But that was a sheer misunderstanding since he mispelled "Khandale" as "Karnale". "Khandale" is 2 hrs from Panvel. So all those smarties had to travel standing. At around 1030 we reached "Khandale". The road from "Khandale" to base point of Sagargad was a typical village road which is half concrete and half mud. You notice this when start heading deeper into the village. With my Sabbon ki tikiya (digicam) in my hand and along wd two photographer frnz of mine we started clicking snaps of the local kids, the farmers in the field along wd Sarja-Raja (Cow-pair) and their wife assisting them. It is a delight to see this view. Apart from this, there was a lot in that village to click... beautiful butterflies hoping around from one flar to another collecting nectar. Some of them were ready to pose for the photo shoot, some shy and some of them very proud of their beauty who made us run behind them to get thir best pose. There were crabs (tiny one) trying to get outa the mud. All we were hoping see a big one so that we can have a big round of photo shoot over him and luckily Atish found one big yellow crab. All of three of us (so called pohtographers) clicked as many stils of that crab as we can and his killer looks were cursing us as if why the hell did u catch me and how dare u to do that?? Enjoying the nature and trying to percolate it in our eyes we kept on moving. After walking almost 5kms we reached at the base point of Sagargad, where the steps start. This point actually is the base of Siddeshwar temple which is around 1000feet high from sea-level and there is a big waterfall @ a height of around 700 feet from sea-level. We started marching but Sun was shining so bright that he had decided to pull out as much glucose as he can from us with the support of these monsoon clouds who have taken bribe from Sun and have gone for a vacation. Since it was almost 7 months back we had went for a trek all out stamina had gone for a toss! Initially i thought its happening only wd me. But everyone started feeling it slowly. Somehow taking small halts we reached Siddeshwar temple. That temple was looking like a dharmashala or a pre-primary school of secondary students. Yep around 100 ppl of all age groups had made it as their base-camp. They had come for a picnic . We did a lil bita photosession even over there of the almighty God who was quitely sitting inside his cabin with no electricity. Load Shedding had affected God as well.. Huh!! I didnt know this.. ;) Shekhar took three bananas from there and came out. He said its "Prasad", but guess what our ancestors (monkey family) saw this and snatched those bananas from his hand immediately and started teasing him. That moment was hillarious. After a small break, we started our rest of the journey. Marching through the tiny tops and small(Adivasi) villages we started getting closer to our destination. In those villages, we saw a different life. Those kids did not have teddies, remote control toys to play wd but still there was 100 times moew happiness and contentment on their face. Their toys are grass, trees, goats, dogs, hens. I ma sure these kids must not be knowing there is a world outside their village. Their faces had a charm which we cant have even after applying the costliest of the cosmetics or having everyday the best of the tonics. These people dont need anything they are happy with what God has given them.
Finally we managed to reach at the topmost position of Sagargad we did our lunch over there. By that time it was 3.30pm. We were already late by an hour and half. At Sagargad, there is a point from where you can stand at the tip of the mountain and you can see another spike which is actually part of the same hill but its slightly isolated. Its a delight to see that spot. We did lotta photography at that point. No one of us was willing to leave that spot. But there were ppl waiting for us @ our home and more importantly our boss in office after the weekend.
While returning, right from that point we got split into two groups unfortunately. I was in the first one. Singing along, pulling eachother legs we reached at a point where we noticed that we are moving in a wrong way. Just to get everyone together we called the other group. Yhanks to the mobile networks. The groups told us that they are near Siddheshwar temple and will wait for us. We didnt wanted to inform them that we have lost our way since they ight go in a panic mode. With the help of village people, we somehow came back on track. Everyone met @ Siddeshwar temple. After a halt of 20 mins we started marching towards the waterfall. Few of us also tuk a bath under it. We were late by 2 hours by then. It was already night time. Sun onccle had signed off for the day. Thanks to moon uncle who was showering his limelight over us and guiding us. At 2020hrs we reached at the Panvel- Alibaug road. Everyone was worried since none of the vehicles were ready to drop us @ Panvel. ST buses were crowded and none of them stopped. We went to Alibaug so that we can catch the bus from starting point itself. Few of them decided to stay back at Panvel at their relatives place. Some went through other buses. I took a Bombay Asiad bus. Lucky enuf to get a seat in the crowded bus.
Reached home safely @ 01:15hrs. Ouch! my legs are aching like hell. But now finallly i have got some work to do right from fresh installation of XP. Guys wish me luck on this first day of new job.