Midnight day one: Am in a five star hotel, drinking Bacardi and eating kebabs
Midnight day two: Am somewhere on a mountain in absolute pitch darkness. Am wet, hungry and shivering.
This is the story of a spur of the moment trip – two people, a last minute plan and a memorable trek in the Sahyadri mountains.
This kind of timing and the sheer unconcern with which we were taking the trek was absolutely crazy. A night trek, in the monsoon –no light due to cloudy nights, little food, no sleeping bag, tent or mat, no light, no ropes, no first aid – and I, at least, had absolutely no idea of the route. But I was not bothered because I did not know the dangers, and Bharathi was not bothered, because she knew all the dangers.
As we started the trek, we had other things to occupy our mind – i.e. the wind. And boy! What a wind! When we got down from the rickety State transport bus, there wasn’t any sign of rain, but as soon as the bus trundled out of sight, the weather decided to have some fun. We had just started on the walk to the base camp and the rain started coming down in buckets. We didn’t mind that, the main point of a monsoon trek in the mountains is to get wet. But then the wind started in gale force. It whooshed and whistled, slammed the raindrops into us so hard, it felt like a thousand darts hitting on the skin and nearly blew the petite Bharathi into the neighboring lake. To add to the general atmosphere, a cloud enveloped the whole surroundings, so that you couldn’t see 10 feet around you.
Though Bharathi had done this route a couple of times before, even she was disoriented at times, as we just couldn’t see anything! We were due to see some buildings and a school on the way to the village, but they seemed to have vanished. Through the mist, we dimly saw a structure, but when we approached it, it turned out to be an abandoned building, totally broken down.
Just as I was thinking whether we would ever find this blessed village, an unlikely angel of mercy came along, in the shape of a portly villager on a scooter. He must have got a nasty shock as two ghostly figures suddenly jumped out of the mist and waved him down. But like a good sport, he stopped and it turned out that we were on the right track after all.
After an hour or so, we finally arrived at the village and were pleasantly surprised to see a “Hotel” board on one of the houses. We sloshed wetly into it and begged for a cup of tea and something to eat. I was not really hungry, but I suddenly realized at that time that I had not eaten anything for the past 24 hours. No breakfast, no lunch yesterday – heavy snacks in the evening, so no dinner, no breakfast and no lunch today either. Better eat something before we hit the mountain.
After we had some grub, I felt better, and it seemed that the weather felt the same too, for the fog lifted as if a switch had been pressed, and the mountain was visible in all its glory. Imposing black cliffs, lovely green cover and huge amounts of waterfalls. We started counting them, and there were 16 waterfalls visible from just where we stood.
Then suddenly the waterfalls, instead of falling down, started falling up! I stared at it, wondering whether I was demented!
I rubbed my eyes and stared at it again. It was still going up. But then reason intervened. It was not that the law of gravity had been repealed in parliament, but it was the gale force wind that was pushing the waterfall the wrong way. And as I watched, the wind must have died down, and the waterfall resumed its more conventional direction.
But, in spite of the logical explanation, it was still fascinating. A waterfall that pretends to be a geyser. Quite extraordinary.
We started on the way up by 6.00 PM and got to work on the small rocky path. It had been raining steadily and the way had been converted into a waterfall. We started walking up against a steady current of water, while I was wondering – a waterfall that thinks that it is a geyser, a path that thinks it’s a waterfall – confused countryside.
We kept pushing on, as the light kept getting lower and lower, and it was really a great experience. The water rushing and shining in the light, the pitter patter of the warm rain, the blackness of the rocks, the foliage putting itself in your face and shaking as it was pummeled by the rain, … it was a surreal surrounding. Reminded me of Bilbo's journey through the dark forests of the barrow downs, Tolkein must have actually done such trips to capture that state of mind so accurately. Soon the light became really low and we were lucky to have arrows painted by good Samaritan hiker groups to keep us on the right track.
And as we forded one rushing stream, the light failed totally.
Have you actually felt utter blackness? When you strain your eyes to the utmost, but can’t see a thing? I was holding my hand at one inch from my eyes, but I couldn’t see it.
I was reminded of Jerome K Jerome’s words, “We are creatures of the sun, we men and women. We love light and life. In the sunlight – in the daytime, when nature is alive and busy all around us, we like the open hill side and the deep woods well enough: but in the night, when our mother earth has gone to sleep and left us waking, oh! The world seems so lonesome, and we get frightened like children in a silent house. We feel so helpless, and so little in the great stillness, when the great trees rustle in the night wind. There are so many ghosts about, and their silent sighs make us sad.”
Going on was out of the question, so we just sat down in the middle of the road. There was no fear in us – there were no wild animals in the mountains, this was not a flash flood area, and hungry as we were, it was unlikely that we would die of hunger before the night was out. But, all the same, it is a strange feeling to be so blinded. The only thing we could see was a vague shine of the stream we had just crossed, and some “witch light” from some luminescent moss and lichens.
We just sat there, waiting for the moon to show itself. But there was no sign of it happening. The clouds were too thick for any light to show through. Due to the spur of the moment planning, we were not carrying a torch or material to light a fire. Anyway, it was too wet to light a fire; every now and then a cloudburst would drench us. And then the wind would come and chill us to the bones.
I was sitting there and shivering like crazy, while Bharathi was totally comfortable, making me wonder what was the value of so much blubber around my middle if it cant even keep me warm. Luckily we didn’t go through hunger pangs, in spite of my erratic eating over the past two days
The long night wore on, with me shivering and shuddering, and she singing Tamil songs to herself after she got bored of relating her adventures. Incredibly, I even managed to fall asleep for an hour or two, though I was sitting in wet, cold and stinking mud.
Finally, the dawn came. I got up slowly, inch by inch like an old man, as my bones warmed up and started moving. What a difference the sun makes – the warmth and light. Makes you understand why the ancient civilizations worshipped the sun, fire etc.
But as we moved on I realized that all said and done, we were lucky in our resting place for the night. We had managed to get past the waterfall and were in the comparative shelter of the forest. A little further on the forest thinned out to an exposed plateau, where the wind would have frozen us and further to that was a crossing over a waterfall which would have been suicidal in the blind night. It was a sheer cliff with a tiny path below a waterfall. Though it was easier since someone had cut handholds in the rock, and the government had put railings. (The railings were academic though, as in many places there were only the holes, showing where someone had stolen the railings from). After that was an even more difficult climb over a slippery rock face, where a missed step would mean a high dive down the mountain. Luckily, as it was still early in the monsoon, the moss had not yet developed.
Finally, we reached the outer walls of the old fort and started on the broad plateau of the top, which Bharathi promptly celebrated by slipping and falling on her backside in a stream. But since we were wet through anyway, it didn’t make much difference.
Every now and then the clouds would lift and we were able to see the majestic views down below. The mountain would tantalize us with a glimpse and promptly hide themselves again in the cloud.
After a long walk, we finally reached the summit by 7.30 AM, and we were in top form, our moods completely reinvigorated by the exercise and the sheer beauty of the place. Sahyadris in the rains are the most beautiful places on earth, as nature reacts with amazing vitality to the life giving rain. The greenery is so vivid and electrifying, I have not seen this shade of green anywhere else in India.
As we reached there, a one-handed figure came out of seemingly nowhere and challenged us, giving us a bit of a start. It turned out to be the guy who maintains a food stall at the summit. He was also quite surprised to see us arrive so early, having thought that it was the guys who had stayed overnight who were trying to leave without paying him for last night’s food. On hearing of our overnight vigil on the mountains he was impressed and invited us into his hut.
He lighted the fire to help us warm up and shocked the hell out of Bharathi by recognizing her. “You came here earlier didn’t you? About 6 years ago?” She was totally taken aback, and we were impressed with his memory. So many years back, and so many trekkers ago. We complimented him, but he just shrugged it off. “Nothing else to do, so I remember things.” He made us some fresh tea and that really felt like the ultimate in hedonism! There’s nothing like a hot and spicy cup of tea to warm the cockles of your heart when you are cold and wet. After warming up with the tea and the fire, we decided to check out the temple and the surroundings. So we asked him to make breakfast and again ventured out of the warm and smoky hut, where the cold and rain hit at us like a body blow.
Actually the temple at Harishchandragad is a real heritage piece, more than a thousand years old. But the government and the Archeological Survey of India (ASI) totally ignore it, so it lies there like Shelley’s Ozymandias. “My name is Ozymandias, king of kings! See my works, ye mighty, and despair!”
There is also a huge subterranean Shiva temple with a sunken lingam in a perennial pool of ice-cold water, but unfortunately we couldn’t see it, as it was totally underwater due to the rains.
Even the other amazing sight of the Konkankada cliff could not be seen due to the fog and mist. This was a real pity, as many people climb up here specifically to see that majestic sight. The cliff is actually concave, and the wind is so strong, that if you throw a small pebble down, the wind blows it back up. Lately One person had committed suicide from that point. Bharathi couldn’t understand it, how can someone decide to kill himself after seeing so much beauty?
There are 3 peaks on the top which you can climb, but we didn’t have the time, and anyway we couldn’t even see them, so we decided to give them a miss and head back for hot breakfast of “kanda poha” and tea.
Unfortunately, no breakfast was in sight – only our host sitting with a “chillum”! In the dim light and smoky atmosphere, with the sound of the wind howling outside, the sight of our host quietly puffing on a chillum was surreal. It turned out that he was enjoying some ganja (cannabis), which he offered to me as well. I took a couple a puffs and gave it back, not wanting to be stoned on the way down! He made some hot poha for us, while I was admiring how he managed to do it with only one hand. Soft hearted Bharathi wouldn’t let him cut the onion, and did it herself.
I tell you, nothing tasted as good as that steaming hot poha after that long wet night!
After breakfast, I happily opened my backpack, as I had been wise enough to pack a towel and a change of clothes. Unfortunately, I hadn’t been wise enough to pack them in plastic bags, so I discovered that I had been lugging along a totally soaked set of clothes and towel all the way up, and would be doing the same all the way down, wearing the same wet clothes and socks.
Another cup of tea to top off breakfast and we were on our way.
In the light of day, the trip down seemed to be much easier and we enjoyed the vibrant greenery and the champagne like air all the way down. Any waterfall on the way, we would dump our bags and take a shower in pure, cold mountain water. Once we found a natural dam before the stream becomes a waterfall and spent 10 minutes just soaking in the powerful current. The waterfalls were really amazing; one was really huge, falling over 3 kilometers!
Finally came all the way down, had a late lunch (again poha! 3 times continuously. I was beginning to get a bit sick of it.) in the village and trekked back to the road head. No wind, rain or fog this time – seemed like a different path altogether. The path was the wall of a recently constructed dam, and the lake formed by that dam was absolutely beautiful. It had changed the geography of the place and nature seemed to reacting fast to change the flora and fauna as well. It had attracted a lot of aquatic birds – we saw kingfishers, black ducks, swans, mallards and quite a few we did not recognize. The dam seemed to have fish too, as there were some farmers fishing on the shore.
The only problem was with me, as the wetness of my clothes and skin combined to chafe me terribly around the thighs. I had adopted a system of walking with my legs wide apart, as if I had hernia! Finally we got to the road head, and after a longish wait, got a bus for Kalyan.
On the way back, we saw lots of picnickers wetting themselves in crowded waterfalls on the highway. Bharathi turned to me and said, “Why should anyone want to bathe in this waterfall when we had a waterfall all to ourselves?”.
That is true – the real fun is in a long climb, a night in the open, a cup of hot tea on a cold mountaintop and absolutely private waterfalls all the way down.
Vive la Sahyadri! Vive la Harishchandragad! |
