Irshalgad..finally a trek for 2012

     Well as the topic suggests, this blog is all about my first trek for 2012. Before heading towards the whole description of the experience I would like to share a few boring stuffs that spill out of my decaying grey cells. Trekking is one of the most interesting activity and I would say that it is something that everyone should experience atleast once in the existence cycle, just give it one chance and I assure you it would change the way you look at things.
     For first timers its a very difficult task, especially where you are expected to walk/hike for kms and then there are things that u dont know or never expect coz mostly you are too far away from the concrete jungle and its limitations, now u r in the original jungle, almost in the form of how its meant to be...or how the almighty made it. The whole process is like capturing something thats almost been unknown to self, trying to tackle several challenges put up, testing self capacity, confidence and even facing the stark truth about our weaknesses.
     Trekking is also an activity taken in different ways by various people. There are different forms of trekkers, first of all the daredevils who take the whole activity as a challenge and believe in one thing to break away from all bounds and conquering each and every challenge or Pinnacle time after time and believing in capturing or conquering as much as possible, within the short time span of a lifetime, by any means, no matter how tough each challenge is and that does include spending few nights in the jungle with almost nothing but few essential stuffs thats available in the surroundings. Then there are the spoilers, the ones who utilize this opportunity to run away from all the responsibilities and rather preferring to spend the time enjoying the booze and other activities in the remotest areas. And then there are a few or aplenty of people like me, who enjoy it as a challenge to get away from the mundane dwelling of a social animal and trying out something that makes you feel alive, but doing all this within a set of boundaries and not trying out anything too extreme...may be not always.
     Its been a long time since my last trek...not that I am a vivid trekker or anything... but the idea of moving around on some unknown place, all away from the urban limits and its related nuisance...just yourself, the nature and its elements makes me feel lively and excited.

     Now back to the topic...
     Its been long since I had been to a trek. The last Trek I had been was to Rajgadh, around March last year, along with my colleagues, now ex-colleagues, of Piaggio. It was great fun and a very tiring trek, almost spending more than 12 hrs and covered nearly 18kms, still unable to cover the whole of Rajgadh. That left great respect for Rajgadh and its mightiness. So, with delayed rainfall or rather scanty rainfall, July was an ideal time for planning a trek. But, as usual the same hysterical problem repeated...with whom???and where???and how??? Finally came the ray of hope in form of an invite to one of my friend's trekking group. These enthusiastic group of CTS who have been actively arranging trek almost every weekend along with few more of their friends. With me being free  from all bounds for that weekend I was very much up for it.

     The trek was to Irshalgad, near Khopoli (Chowk/Chauk) very close to the Morbe Dam.

     The peculiarity of this place is the fact that there isnt any fort but this has a very unique Pinnacle which stands out and is probably the main reason why most people love visiting this place. Standing at just 1213ft it seemed to be not so difficult task either, but still any kinda break and enormous scope for photography would work for me.

     So finally D-day came in, 14th July, a Saturday, left Pune at around 7:30 and headed off to the Mumbai Pune Highway and post Khopoli took a left near Chowk. After a few kms we could see the Morbe dam, but were not clear about the route to the hill/ Pinnacle, especially due to rainfall and reduced visibility. Finally with some guidance from the locals we caught onto the right track and headed towards the village near Irshalgad.

At the base of the Village, on the right is the first step of the hike while the pinnacle stays hidden behind the clouds on the left of the frame

      Once out at the village at the footsteps of Irshalgad, we actually couldnot spot the pinnacle due to loads of clouds covering the whole epitome, and could only see the whole journey divided into two stages a small hill has to be climbed to get onto the actual footsteps of Irshal.

Just the start of the hike

a formation...me lagging a lot, somewhere at the mid of the first stage of trek, a comparatively simple and pleasant climb

     Consistent drizzle had led to completely covering the hill with lush green vegetation and also making the climb a bit too slippery. But once the ascent started there were startling scenery all around and that took off a lot of time from the trek time as most  of us were busy...either posing for photographs or capturing the naturally posed landscaped beauties.

A midnight meal??? A cute little drenched Goat

Loved the way this single shrub had been positioned on the inclined plane

Time for some rest and so is the time for some poses... (from L to R) Ganesh, Amod and Amol:)

'Ata Pude kay karu???' Aniruddha in deep thought or is it???

Few more smiles :)

Photographing a Photographer...a rare moment ;)

Refreshingly greeeeen

Irshalgad ka Jumperman...or a scared Acrophobic???

A snap of me too :) :) :)..Special thanks to Aniruddha

Nice cut to the mossy scene

Most Enthusiastic Tamil :)

The pinnacle covered in clouds

Can it get any greeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeener???

Loads of Butterflies around, but very tough to capture them...A Danaid Eggfly

A close up of it

Soiled around

Few wild growths

The toughest frame ever captured in this trek

      The second base, on top of the hill, was again a astounding scene. Situated a few meters above the base village, a small locality of villagers settled in and utilizing the fertile high ground for rice/paddy farming. From this point the Pinnacle was very prominently visible and we started to realize the crux of this trek. We spent some time at this village just to get a bit refreshed and get ourselves ready for the further task. We came across two chaps who had been deputed to keep an account of the visitors to this place and realized that there is an association or group of people deputed for all/ most of the forts or treking spots who could help as a guide and also keep in check with the visitors and may be also as a Moral Police???

     So finally we took off from the village following the path that we could track along the base of the hill. Below are the various shot taken during this stage of the trek.

The Pinnacle from the second base village

Close up of the Pinnacle, in clouds again

Finally few less clouds

Shot of the whole width of the Pinncle from the other side of the hill

Few more close shots

Close encounters of the clouds

The rocky path :)

Interesting structure

     After few moments of leaving the village we came across a temple and had been following the adjoined trail, but later realized that we had missed some track and ended up almost covering 180° of the Hill and no further visual track to follow. Confused and a bit too tired of the hike few of the group members headed out in search of alternative routes. Finally after spending quite some time we could trace another trail and hoping it to take us up to the pinnalce we followed it, only to realize we were just moving along the perifferiy of the hill and almost were ending up just a  few meters above the village we had left and almsot lost as no further route could be seen. Out of despair and tiredness all stalled along a flatland and few adventerous chaps of our gang headed off taking any vertical route basically to get an aerial view of the area so as to be able to track any alternative routes for getting up to the hill/ pinnacle.

In search of the further route...trying to catch aerial view

Mr. Communicator...'Arey aageka rasta dikhai diya???'

    Unfortunately all went in vain and after giving some desperate calls for help could hear some return calls from some villagers who had been come over for some farming work. Finally with their vocal help we could search out a path to reach upto them and with some request few of them agreed to guide us to the top.

     So finally we were back on track thanks to some help from the villagers and again we started the trek right from scratch, well almost scratch, i.e., same old track. Later we came to the point where we actually had lost the trail and this brought in some form of relief and a bit of embarressment for the mistake we had done earlier.

Finally getting the correct route and busy following it(Courtesy Aniket Bidkar)

     The further route was a bit difficult as compared to the journey covered up by now and consistent patch of flying drizzle proved it an up-hill task as climbing along the muddy track seemed to be a bit too slippery.

Finally crossing the rocky patch and a bit more closer to pinnacle

'Ok now we can enjoy some Pose time'

'Chalo bahut timepass hua...ab aage badte hain'

     Finally we reached a spot which was something like a corridor with steep slope on either side of the pathway and wind blew with fullest of its intensity making the experience truly breathtaking. This also aided us in the further journey as the other side of the hill was forming a barricade for the winds and while climbing, high humidity and high temperature had weared us out.

Few breath-taking sights towards the narrow path-way

Other side of the view

The whole journey, the miniature huts at the extreme end of the base of the hill isthe starting point

     The further trail led us to even narrower path and even more slippery, but also came along were few astonishing sights one of which is seen below as we could see the start of rainfall at some far away distance and we could easily see the march of it towards us.

Approach of the rainfall

Top of the Prabhalgad, all covered in clouds

     Later came in a section which almost swept the ground below us, well atleast for me. This was a rocky section from where we had to climb almost vertically up, though the whole section was broken into small stages, but with consistent rainfall there was formation of algae on the rocks and water was dripping off from various points making it damn slippery. 

     This was my first encounter with rock-climbing sorta challenge, especially during the rains, and just the feeling of climbing up and most importantly getting down this stretch had thrown jitters into my spine. Finally after pulling in some confidence and a lotsa help from our guide, a villager, one by one we started getting up and taking brief halts at stages. There was a particular section where a ladder had been put up for crossing/climbing up and the most interesting/shocking thing was, this ladder was tied on at the top...with.....A SHOE LACE.The below image shows the entire scene, us trying to climb up, the stair and the bonding element for the stair.

The terrifying scene...check the lace holding the ladder (Courtesy Aniket Bidkar)

The view of the half of the rocky climb...can u spot three heads at the extreme to end of the hill??? Thats where all were trying to reach (Courtesy Aniruddha Kadam)

Scene from the tough rocky patch of climb...one of the toughest ones

     The further climb was even more difficult and we had to have serious trust in our strength of grip from our finger and shoe. Also the time taken for tackling it was way longer making me rethink about it as imagining myself getting down the section we just climbed itself made me weak by my knees and hence took the toughest decision of giving up. Lack of confidence due to first monsoon trek, no reliable aids for climbing and lack in confidence in the grip of my Woodlands made me take such a severe decision. This was along with few more members of the team and after few more daring enthusiasts decided to continue the climb and cleared the path below us we started the shameful descent, atleast for me, down the slippery rocks which again wasnt easy enough.

     After reaching a flat portion just before the narrow path way, we all rested and then I realized that it wasnt that embarising for deciding to discontinue the climb. What if I actually couldnt manage getting up? What if I could get up but couldnt manage getting down or slip off while descending as in rock-climbing the most toughest task is getting down as you have no idea whats below you and in a quest to check the next step there is high amount of chance of losing the grip of your palms/fingers. And I didnt wanna end up as Kumar Prakash Durve, who had lost his life on January 23, 1972 while trying to reach the pinnacle. To pay tribute to his task a group of trekkers assemble at this place and climb upto the pinnacle.

     Finally after almost an hour or so the Adventerous, Enthusiasts and Daredevils of our group finally returned from the pinnacle and spent some time resting at the place where we had been waiting so started the posing and shooting session.

Wild growth, even on the rocks

Blown with the wind!!! No worries, just trying some flying skills... A good profile pic for FB or G+

 

Enjoying the wind on the rocks ;)

Shooting each other

Few group photos???

The Rock man

Mr. Smiley :)

All Ismailes

One for the Colgate ad ;)

Seeking shelther from sudden outburst of rain

Amod on to posing mode

Ganesh on the rocks

Amol on and in between the rocks ;P

Mama/ Guide...posing in for an awesome frame...well atleast I felt that way

     And eventually after exploring almost all the poses at various pints we all decided to pose for a group photo, probably an essential thing...but how to capture all the members??? Someone has to take the photo...then an idea struck in how bout asking our Guide/ Mama to take the photo??? So finally here I am providing a brief training and getting all the settigns correct.

Training session in progress ;P(Courtesy Aniruddha Kadam)

     So finally here we are...all 29 of us in a single frame....Almost all seemed to be a prospective contender/ model for any toothpaste ad...

Group photo by Mama/Guide...Trained by me ;P

     And so came to an end to the whole journey, an unsuccessful one for me, of Irshal the Pinnacle. Another place which I have generated great respect and hope to get back to this place sometime post monsoon so as to get upto the epitome of the Pinnacle. So here we were, heading back to Pune wit, broken bruised and almost completely drained off the water content, but still with a big or atleast a hint of a smile. A Saturday well wasted...not on cozying around in the bed or lying on a couch in front of a T.V. or Laptop but away from all the modern day omen and enjoying the things done away form Urban Jungle. A trek where I realized what I probably am not capable of doing, a trek where I realized what a team spirit was and also an important thing, again for me, that my Woodlands do provide ample grip no matter how bad the terrain is...Its just that I need to prepare myself to keep on delaying the thought of giving up and rather enjoy the adventure that is A TREK...

P.S. Would love to enjoy your thoughts about this Blog...