TREMALS - The Trekking Mammals

Thanale caves, Waghjai ghat, Telbaila & Savashni ghat.

Date : 3-4 Nov 2012

Participants : Subodh Bhave, Varun Bhosale, Ramkrishna Chauhan, Prashant Salian & Imran Vasta

I want to start by special mention of Manoj Bhave and Kiran Shelar who helped us a lot in planning the itinerary and logistics of this trek. Thanks a lot guys....

We planned to travel to Thanale village by early morning direct ST from Thane. Myself, RK & Prashant met at Thane stn at 5.45 am. Caught a rick and travelled to Khopat ST stand. The 6.15 am bus was already there. Varun also arrived in time and we boarded the bus which was quite empty. On the way at Rabale we picked up Subodh as well. So now hum paanch ready to go. The bus reached Pali at around 9.10 am and conductor announced "Bus will leave at 9.45 am for Thanale." 35 minutes break, hmmmm. But that gave us an opportunity to have break fast also. A very welcome misal paav, vada and tea.....

As scheduled the bus left exactly at 9.45 am from Pali and reached Thanale village at 10.20 am. We went to sarpanch of the village Mr Maruti Phate. He was referred to by Kiran Shelar. He arranged for a local guide Anil who would guide us to Thanale caves and connect us to Waghjai ghat route.....

The trek began at 10.30 am. After first ascend we were walking on a plateau thru jungle. It was pleasant. Halfway thru this plateau we had our first glimpse of Thanale caves on the opposite side of the mountain. We crossed couple of streams and then arrived at a big stream. Here our guide said that this is the point where we will have to come back and go towards Waghjai ghat. I was puzzled since we were suppose to connect to the route from the left side of the cave itself. But Anil said there is no such route exists and we were disheartened. That meant we now had to ascend to Thanale caves, descend back to this point and then walk the other side of the plateau and connect to Waghjai. It meant that we would have to trek 2 hrs more in the heat.....

We decided to leave our sacks here and began the steep ascend and then traversed to the caves. Thanale caves are in pretty good condition. We had our usual photo sessions. Myself and RK decided to explore the route ahead. At the end of the caves there was a traverse going ahead. It was small and due to grass was slippery as well. But it was managable by our trekking standards. RK went ahead and about 7-8 mins later he returned and said that he almost covered 70% of the connecting route to Waghjai. We returned to the caves and informed this to the rest of the guys. But we cannot do anything about it now since we had left our sacks down. Our guide still insisted there is no route there and just after there were 5-6 local adivasis (ghanghars) who came from that route. It just increased our disappointment. I remembered Kiran Shelar's word. He said that the villagers also dont know this route and only local adivasis know it.....

Nevertheless the trek must go on. It was about 12.20 now. We started descending and reached the stream. Picked up our sacks and started to walk the plateau beneath the caves. We reached the Waghjai route and there we bid good bye to our guide. Time now is 1.30 pm. We had some snacks since we decided to have lunch only after completely ascending Waghjai. We began the gruel ascend in the heat. Waghjai is an ancient route and is even older than the Savashni route. The route goes through a ridge and is exposed for most part. We reached a plateau and we landed in trouble. Grass was all around and the trail was lot. After about 40 mins of trail hunting we were back on track. Another deterring factor was the lack of breeze. Seems the Almighty had switched off the fan and not even a single leaf on the tree was moving. We struggled through this part of the trek.....

As we were nearing the top RK and myself ahead, Subodh & Varun called us behind since we missed the Waghjai devi mandir. The mandir is just couple of minutes to the right side of the main trail. We went to the mandir and rested for a while. RK and myself tried to search for a water tank around the mandir which our guide had said. But in vain. We then moved ahead and reached the top of plateau at around 4.30 pm. Phew... On the top there are couple of landmarks which can easily help us to identify the start of the Waghjai route. One is an elecric pole which is also visible from below Thanale village and another is the mango tree.....

We sat beside the tree and decided to have our lunch. Subodh had brought chapati bhaji thanks courtesy Megha Bhave. I also had brought some MUTTON KEBABS. Yummy. Had our lunch and we moved towards Telbaila village which is about half an hour walk on the plateau.... By this time there were clouds in the sky with slight drizzle. The climate had become cool and pleasant. How cruel¿¿ When we were trekking the difficult part the climate was treacherous. We reached the village at about 6 pm. After some enquiry with locals we decided to stay in the school.....

RK and Prashant went to enquire about tea and food. RK had a small argument with one of the locals regarding the cost of the tea. We advised him not to argue with locals since for a trekker they are the first line of help during an emergency. But his effort ensured we had tea and dinner in a nominal rate. We ordered only some dal chaval for dinner since we had carried lot of food stuff ourselves. There was a funny incident late in the evening. Our 3 Maharathis went to answer nature's call. Prashant, Varun and RK. Seems they found an isolated place and sat. But as it turned they were almost on the main trail of the village. Almost half the village passed by them and they were trying to hide themselves....

We had our dinner and retired for the nite. Got up at 7 am in the morning. After refreshments and breakfast we started towards Telbaila summit at about 8 am. It was a really small hike and within half an hour we reached the col. There's a mandir there and also a huge water tank inside. Few young members of Nisarg mitra Panvel had come there for climbing. We watched them for half and admired their climbing skills. Subodh went into nostalgia and remembered his good old climbing days. The young guns were also quite charged up - RK and Prashant. RK was sure that he will take up climbing in near future. From there we also tried to work out the Savashni route and its starting point. We bid goodbye to the climbers and descended towards the village. Reached the village, picked up our sacks and off we set for Savashni....

The time is about 9.50 am now. We start walking on the plateau. And the grassy plateau was making it difficult to find the exact trail. But we managed it some how and reached the starting point of Savashni which is a little rocky. There are the famous seven rock-cut steps here due to which this route is also known as Saat paayrichi vaat. And within 5 minutes the route enters jungle and most of the Savashni route passes thru dense forest. Quite opposite to Waghjai. But again no breeze which again made trekking uneasy.....

After first descend we reached a plateau and were lost in grass. We took a left, walked for a while and realised we were traversing towards Sudhagad. We turned back and did more R&D. We were a little iffy to take a right since we had been advised by Kiran and Manoj that the one of the route on the right goes towards Thanale. Taking left routes we were descending almost on a path made by us. After trekking thru this maze we reached the bottom and quite surprisingly towards the river. Yes we had unintentionally missed Bahirampada village amongst the chaos. The time was around 12.30 pm. We took the welcome dip in the river. All the heat was gone now and we were fresh as ever. Reached Dhondshe, caught bus to Pali and from Pali to Thane. End of trek....

The trek was exciting, exhausting, offbeat and a successful one. As usual it was a wonderful n memorable trek and an enriching experience.

Yours trekkingly

Imran Vasta