Ghumakkar's Diary

Kalavnatin in clouds, as we looked at it from Prabalgad I have been to Prabalgad twice, but for some reasons (reasonable/non-reasonable!) I couldn't write about it.  So, going easy way - I am re-posting a very comprehensive post written by my fellow trekker Kranti . Also, I will update the post soon with trekking route for Prabalgad, which you can use with your Navigation app to "easily" navigate to the Top, else "getting lost and finding the way" is still the Best Way :) Prabalgad - A beautiful Day Trek in Monsoons :  “Pahad chadne ki kya Jarurat hai?” – Mom “Tumhara beta pagal ho gaya hai” – Dad “Mama/Uncle you are damn cool, man” -  Nephews/Nieces “Gaadi se jaana, bike se nahi” – Loved ones “Pahad chadna mere liye sirf ek trek nahi balki ek nasha hai, meditation hai” – Me #filmy Okay, so with all of these above, finally started our much-awaited Trek to Prabalgad/Kalavantin. We have been planning for this trek for more than a week n...

Have you ever appreciated that visiting few places becomes a religion for you? Like, visiting that particular chae wala shop around the corner in Kolkata or that old movie theater that has stopped screening new movies in Old Delhi since a long time or that particular CCD in Lucknow where you had coffee with your soul mate? Nostalgic, isn't it! I find this theory true to our travelling too. Just a view of Vishwanath Temple of BHU, idling at Assi and Dashaswamedh Ghats of Banaras, trekking every year at Naneghat, bathing at Nagaon - Alibaug are the few of the travelling things that I do almost every year. The new entrant to this annual travelling pilgrimage list is Kas Plateau. Just like the last year we rode to this place again and were happier than ever. Trivia Kas (Kaas) Pathaar or Kaas Plateau is located in the Satara District, some 30 kilometers off NH-4 (now NH 48) towards West. Plateau is about 300 kilometers from Mumbai via NH-4 and 375km via NH 17. We took...

Rajmachi has been one eluding dream ride for me. Every time it had been planned by the Inddiethumpers , the guys I ride with, for a reason or two - I couldn’t make it. So, this time when it was planned on a Saturday night, I took no time to confirm my attendance! Map to Rajmachi Rajmachi is a small village, some 15 km from Lonavala – a famous tourist destination. It’s a well-known 15km easy trek. But, the real adventure is to ride to the village, and so Ride to Rajmachi has always been a dream ride for the Riders.

Naneghat has been like an annual pilgrimage for me. So, when I planned for the ride and trek this year, I was sure I wouldn’t be blogging about it. But the way it turned out to be – I couldn’t resist jotting it down and share. On just a few days’ notice three Decide&Ride TM Bullet guys agreed for the ride and trek along with a colleague and my roommate. Plan was simple - Ride/ Food/ Trek/ Food/ Trek down/ Food/ Ride back. Itinerary included Heavy to moderate Rain and Fatigue with Directions, misdirection, lot of fresh pahadi water, scenery and slips. We started it at around 6 AM morning. It was raining since last evening, and when we started it was still raining. Josh took Ashutosh as pillion and Abhishek hoped on to my pillion seat, Sandy was to join us at Kalyan naka with Monty – who found his bull not ready for ride and had to cancel it ( though he rushed and did power-trek to meet us at top later ). Anyways, it was still raining when we met at Kalyan naka and left for N...

So, I finally could ride to Kaas Plateau last Sunday. Almost a year back I came to know about this place, popular as Maharashtra’s Valley of Flower, in a Jet Airlines magazine; was scared to miss visiting the place this monsoon and wait for one more year. Trivia Kaas (Kas) Pathaar or Kaas Plateau is located in the Satara District, some 30 kilometers off NH-4 (now NH 48) towards West. Plateau is about 300 kilometers from Mumbai via NH-4 and 375km via NH 17. We took NH-4, which is obviously a faster and better option to ride, though NH-17 is more scenic and the last leg of some 70 km through ghats would be rather amazing to ride.

It’s been there for geological ages, we have been looking at it for last about 4years and I have been planning to trek it since a long time. Finally, few weeks back, we trekked the Ghansoli Hill. Ghansoli Hill is located at the eastern boundary of Ghansoli town, behind our office complex at RCP. The hill or better hillock is a part of small range that separates Kalyan and Navi Mumbai towns. A search on Google Map returns with a name Parsik Hill for it, though there is one more rather famous Parsik Hill in Navi Mumbai. We also found a NewsArticle , that talks about NMMC plans to develop Nature Awareness Centre at this hills and calls it Gawli Dev Hill. Here, we would be calling it Ghansoli Hill . I asked my colleague about it and he readily agreed. The very next Sunday we did it with another friend. We weren't aware of the route. All we knew is that a Central Road runs along the western edge of the hill and can be reached through the Vashi-Mhape road. We later found that t...