Before I begin, a small warning, this is going to be a long post, so read at your own peril.
I’ve been stuck in the regular grind of getting to work and back (6 days a week!!) of late and desperately needed a short vacation. Since I could take a few days off, I toyed with the idea of taking an extended weekend to go visit Hampi, the fabulous ancient temple complex in Karnataka. At around the same time, Rohit, who organizes treks at Nisarga Bhraman, told me of his plans to head to Bangalore (or Bengaluru as it is now known) and cover some places near the city. His plan included covering some temple complexes as well doing a short hike to a hill fort called Madhugiri. The plan looked very appealing, and in no time leave was sanctioned, tickets bought and bags packed. We planned to leave Mumbai by train on the 2nd December. The train would reach Bengaluru on the 3rd evening, which would effectively give me two days in the city, before I flew back to Mumbai on the 6th. (more…)
Posts Tagged ‘Trekking’
The Bangalore Trip
Tuesday, December 8th, 2009Naneghat Trek
Saturday, October 24th, 2009
About a month ago, a couple of my friends suggested that we needed to get out of city and go trekking to someplace. After much thought, we decided on trekking to Naneghat, in the Malshej Ghat Region.
Naneghat is a mountain pass in the Western ghats near Junnar, in the Pune district. The trail is a popular one, with many trekking groups heading there on the weekends. The highlight of the trek is a set of caves with inscriptions dating back to about 180 BC and the mountain pass. Both are a legacy of the Satavahana kings, who ruled the region and came into prominence after the fall of the Mauryan Empire. The trail is generally considered to vary in difficulty from easy to medium and as such has no cliff exposure, which also makes it relatively safe. You can see the distinctive thumb shaped formation of Naneghat on the way to Malshej Ghat, and the trail begins from the same road.
Initially, we had decided to go on the trek on the 13th of September but postponed it for the following week. Next week, it so happened that a number of people happened to have last minute obligations and it was scrapped once again. After losing out on two weekends and not being sure if my friends would be really free on the next weekend, I decided to go on my own. However heavy rains lashed the city on that weekend and I had to cancel plans a third time. I then decided to postpone the trip to the Diwali weekend, hoping that my fourth attempt to get there would indeed be successful.
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Amboli
Sunday, October 19th, 2008
I just got back from a trip to Amboli near Sawantwadi. Amboli is a less well known hill station in Maharashtra. Situated at an altitude of 690 m, the hill station is cool all year round. I took the night Konkan Kanya Express to reach Sawantwadi the next day at around 11:00 in the morning. From Sawantwadi, it took about 45 minutes by a ST bus to reach Amboli. At Amboli, I stayed the MTDC Green Valley resort. The rooms were clean and airy.
On the evening of the first day we went on a little trip to the famous Amboli waterfalls which are about 3 Km from Amboli. The waterfalls were reduced to just a trickle, but must have been awesome during the peak season. In spite of the low flow, several picnickers were enjoying themselves under the waterfall. From the falls, we watched the sunset at the Sunset point. (more…)
Trekking to Ratangad – Day 2
Friday, October 10th, 2008We woke up early in the morning at about 5:30 and got ready to head out at about 6:30. On the way we stopped for some tea, before hitting the road to Ratangad. The journey took about an hour to the base village of Ratanwadi. Along the road we passed by small villages, green hills and dozens of waterfalls of all shapes and sizes. There seemed to be a waterfall at almost every corner. I guess the previous day’s heavy rain had helped increase the waterflow in several of these seasonal waterfalls. Once we got to the village, our driver introduced us to a villager who agreed to guide us to the fort. While I’ve never really required the services of a guide on previous trails (usually the route is well marked by small arrows along the trail), on this one it was definitely necessary. (more…)
Return to Bhandardara – Day 1
Thursday, October 9th, 2008
I’ve been wanting to return to Bhandardara and trek to Ratangad ever since I had been there earlier this year. Bhandardara is about 180 km by road from Mumbai. The easiest way to reach there is by taking a train to Igatpuri and then catching some alternative transportation from there. However, like the last time round, I decided that we would go there using only the local trains. We left at about 6:30 in the morning to catch the 7:30 (or was that 7:40) fast to Kasara from Ghatkopar. The train took about 2 odd hours to reach the station. From Kasara you can either catch an ST bus directly to Bhandardara (whose frequency is very low) or take the many taxis that ply towards Nashik and get off along the way at Igatpuri or Ghoti. (more…)
Return to Mahuli
Thursday, October 2nd, 2008Well, I’ve been dying to return to Mahuli after I had to abandon the last trip there so this trip with my classmates was a nice way to accomplish this little dream. There were about 20 odd people on the trip. We had booked a mini-bus for the trip, so reaching the place was not going to be a problem or so I thought.
Mahuli
Monday, September 1st, 2008After my plans to go to Torna got scrapped, thanks to a three letter word called SFM, I decided to head to Mahuli instead. Mahuli is situated near Asangoan, in Thane district. Originally, I had planned to go to some waterfalls in Karjat, but this place seemed quite intresting and so I decided at the last minute to go here instead.
The trip began quite late, as I managed to shut off my alarm and go back to sleep instead of waking up. The end result – left a whole hour later than intended. At the station too we had to wait for almost 45 minutes for a train heading towards Asangaon. However, once I reached Asangoan, all misgivings about the trip vanished and soon the cloud shoruded hills were beckoning. (more…)
Trek to Torna
Monday, August 18th, 2008Trekster’s first trek has been announced. I am planning a trip to Torna fort sometime towards the end of the month. If you can make it, please do join in. All details for the trek can be found here.
Trekster
Saturday, August 16th, 2008Launched a new blog called “Trekster” yesterday. Plan to use the blog to post my proposed trekking trips on the weekends, so that any of my interested friends can join along. Do take a look at the blog. The first trek ought to be in a week or two. If you are in Mumbai then and want to join the trip, please drop me a line at trekster.
Trekking to Kothligad
Tuesday, July 1st, 2008
Finally at long last got a chance to head out for a trek. We went to Kothligad which is near Peth village, Karjat. Five of us viz. Me, Antonio, Glen, Hansel and Mandar decided to head off on this trek over the weekend.
On all the treks that I have been on previously we have never really started on time. However for a change, we started on time. At about 5:30 am most of us had gathered at Dadar station. Somehow we managed to just about catch the 5:58 am local to Karjat. We reached Karjat about 2 hours later.After alighting from the station we went to see if we could get one of the “tumtums”, those long 6 seater auto rickshaws. We managed to find one pretty easily, and after haggling on the price we were on the second leg of our journey. We finally reached the point where the trail starts after about an hours ride.
From there the trail climbed up a small hill, snaking it’s way around it to the top. The trail was moderately steep when the climb began and eventually tapered off at the top. At the top, there was a small plateau with a majestic view of the valley below. In the distance we could clearly see the fort.
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I'm Elroy Serrao, a technologist, photographer, and part time blogger from India.
I love to design web sites, program in php and rails in my free time and of course go trekking and clicking pictures in the great outdoors.
I'm from Mumbai, and am an alumnus of Mumbai University and NMIMS.