TREMALS - The Trekking Mammals

Trek : Mrigagad, Paaymodi Ghat and Andharban

Participants : Manoj Bhave, Abhijeet Kesarkar, Girish Ganoo, Nikhil Karyekar, Hrushikesh Khare, Imran Vasta

Date : 23rd & 24th Nov 2013

Plan was to trek Mrigagad and Paaymodi ghat on day one and either Dere ghat (Ghutkyachi vaat) or Andharban on day two. The trek turned out to be exhausting due to heat and humidity. Six of us started on 23rd Nov morning by Pali/Thanale S.T. from Khopat Stand, Thane at 6.15 am. Got down at Parli and caught a six-seater for Bheliv which is base village for Mrigagad and also for Paaymodi ghat. At 10 am we started for Mrigagad fort and like my last experience got lost in the bloody jungle. Ascended some trail and then had to tackle a tricky traverse to get to the chimney followed by rock-cut steps. Mrigagad also has an underground cave similar to one in Peb. We explored the fort, saw few water cisterns and then returned back to Bheliv.

At 12.30 pm we started for Paaymodi ghat with 2 guides from Bheliv – Akshay and Subhash (2 Young Guns of the village). Initial 35-40 mins is through the plains before we reached the starting point of the ascent. Although much part of the ascent is through the jungle the afternoon sun burning down on us took a toll on us in this steep ascent. About halfway there is a water tank with potable water in it. But it is located at about couple of mins of deviation from the main route and can be easily missed. At this point we left our guides since the route ahead was single trail without complications. Somewhere around 4.45 pm we completed the ascent but it was not the end of the trek. It takes an hour of traversing and walking on plateau to reach the human civilization. Meanwhile Hrushikesh and Nikhil were left behind, lost the trail and did some rock climbing stunts. We reached a small private road in the interiors and had to walk about 10 mins to reach Fantacy Resort on Lonavala – Amby valley road. This point is somewhere around 3 kms ahead of the Loins point. The ghat lived upto its name and someone has cleverly named it as Paaymodi (Foot-breaking). On the route we met about 3 local villagers who were descending the ghat after finishing a day’s work on the Lonavala hills station. Daily up and down the ghat plus the day’s work for livelihood. Salute to strength and stamina of these guys.

It was about 6.30 pm and dark. First day of the trek was done but we were way behind the schedule since we had grossly miscalculated to reach here at about 4 pm. Girish was to return back to Mumbai from this point since he promised to join us for only one day. Abhijeet also returned with him as he was not feeling feel. They took a lift from a truck and were headed towards Lonavala. The remaining 4 of us sat there re-evaluating our further plans after the delayed finish of day 1’s trek. As per our info the last bus for Bhambarde was at 4.30 pm at this spot and that was way gone. Our initial plan of day 2 was almost down the drains.

So as a change of plan we were pondering to go to Korigad and do our night stay or go to Ambavane and do the Nisanichi vaat on day 2. All this weird plans were going thru our mind as my mobile rang. Girish called up saying he saw an ST passing by and we could catch that one. We all took our sacks and were on alert. After a while the ST arrived and generous driver stopped it as well after our frantic waving of hands. I was ahead and asked the conductor where the ST was heading. The conductor asked us instead where we wanted to go. I thought of saying Ambavane first, but then I took a chance and told him Bhambarde. To our surprise the conductor said hop in. We were pleasantly surprised and jumped into the ST. The conductor said this was the last bus in that region for the day. Its timing is 6 pm from Lonavla and it is resident (Mukami) bus to Barpe with routing as Lonavala-Ambavane-Salter-Tailbala Faata-Bhambarde-Barpe.

This meant we were back on tracks for our day 2 plan. We reached Bhambarde at about 7.30 pm and started for our 3 kms walk on tar road towards Ghutka village. After 1 km Ghutka Faata came and we turned right. As we just moved ahead the resident (mukami) bus of Ghutka (from Swargate) came and we boarded the bus to cover the remaining one and half km. We did night stay in the mandir in Ghutka village. We enquired with the conductor whether this bus (as per our guess) goes to Pimpri and he said no.

So next morning we got up early at 5.15 am and caught this bus which left at 6 am and reached Bhambarde. From Bhambarde we caught the Telbaila- Swargate bus and reached Pimpri at around 7.30 am. We immediately marched towards Andharban. The route starts next to a small water storage dam at about 10 mins distance from Pimpri village. There is a Samadhi of Shri Navji Balkawade on the trail not too far from the start. From Samadhi another trail goes to Siner Khind and till Gothe village behind Siner Khind. Just after the Samadhi we got a breath taking view of the valley and Bhira dam at the end. We crossed few dry streams and soon found one which had a clean water source where we had our breakfast. Andharban route is an easy and pleasant jungle trail from Pimpri to Hirdi village which can be covered in 3 to 4 hours. It is a combination of traverse and plateau with most part of the route covered with jungle and is flat without many ups and downs. There are many streams on the route and should be an exciting trail in monsoon.

We reached Hirdi at about 11 am. We rested there for about an hour, had a cup of tea in the village and started our descend towards Bhira at about noon. It took us about 2 hours to descend and the heat was back to torture us. Reached Bhira dam to mark the end of trek, rested and had our lunch. Found out from locals that the bus service from Bhira to Pali is not operative since last 3-4 days due to some maintenance activity on the road. So in our bid to reach Pali we took six seater to Vile and from Vile another six seater to Nandgaon. Here we luckily got the Koshimbale-Thane S.T. which was late.

This trek went off schedule and almost went off plan by the fag end of day 1 but was again back on schedule because of Girish’s presence of mind to call us and inform about the passing ST. Thanks a lot Girish. God bless u.

Yours trekkingly

Imran Vasta