After a long long research on web & failed plans , finally i decided on to this plan by seeing in the link sharavathi trials. Just when i was supposed to plan for their first mansoon trek there was some work at my home because of which i had to cancel the trek for that weekend, luckily i was cotinuously in touch with sampath who is the co-ordinator for that site he told the next trek would be on 16th July which incidently is on my birthday. I was so happy that atleast this year i spend most of my days in trekking and exploring new places..
with 3-4 days before the trek i shortlisted people who might come without any issues i started inviting one by one. First it was prakasha, he instantly said yes, and then uday Sachin chandru adarsha praveen everyone agreed. Later took the detailed plan from sampath & approx expenditure which he said around 2300, but went to 2700/-
The starting point of trek was from kargal 25km from sagar, but as the busses were full, I booked till sagar, and i heard that some other group is also going to join there itsef.
Friday night 9:03 at scheduled time the bus left majestic, and we took the bus at navrang. The climate at Bengluru was cold, cloudy. so we got packed ourselves properly to protect ourselves. as none of us were aware of mansoon trekking.
The Bus reached sagar at around 5.30 AM there as expected it was raining , So asked few local person about the bus, he said the first bus starts only at 7.30. After sometime the trek leader Ram reddy(a free lancer trekker) who was sleeping in the bus stop itself as he came previous day completing augumbe trek. Then he called all other 2 groups who were in sagar itself then around 6am he went to ksrtc bus stand to verify the bus timings, luckily there was a bus standing which would leave at 6.30. so we all boarded the bus, all window seats were wet by rain, and thats where we started to get the mansoon in touch with us from there till end of trek, we were conrinuously we were in touch with rain water .
We reached kargal at 7.30 by that time there were few local arranged vehicles ready for pickup, as we were 7 of us, we got fitted in brand new tata sumo vehicle. the plan was to first take us to freshen up at muppane IB. so this place was some 20 km away from kargal from main road we took left and went inside for about 2km. Inside there we had 1 big lake kind of place which was very good place to just come and stay for 1 day, even the facilities are good enough.
We got freshenup soon and thought to start photo session, suddenly there was heavy rains started waited for long time to wait but still it didnt stop. so photos session got cancelled but luckily i had took few photos as soon as i get down from cab.
Then we had breakfast there meanwhile ram collected the amount 1500 from each of us as discussed in mail by sampath. we left to the base point.
Base point was the place from where we collected all our respective luggages to carry, like i carried some 2-3 kgs of jaggery, and some body took oil, rice etc.
So the trek started, it was called as golf course green, as the place was full green like lawn & few trees, the best part was of the drizzling rain which had strted.
we went on till the top of the place & then it took about some 3-4 hours then we reached "basavana bayi" where we halted for having out lunch & meanwhile we saw the falls. It was horrible experience to see that falls, where the water force was so heavy that we almost took 5 min to just cross the flowing water to other side and go for dist of just 10 mts. every one was holding the branch of a tree and crossed. It was raining heavily that time.
So after we saw the falls we came back & had lunch, then we left the spot to rech our today destination. it was a place called Kulundur.
this is the place at the bottom mountains. and it is accesible by bus easily.
Here we stayed night in some small house, where there was no light falility, and there was heavy rain outside continusly.
as soon as we reached the house, we booked some plcae for us then myself adarsha & prakasha came to see the small temple which was on the main road. Incidently there was a boy whom we met and he started telling all about the place N the temple. it was real fun, I felt that we miss so many things in city, whereasthese ppl who are here enjoy their life with nature, But that feeling holds good only for us, as he thinks the city life is far far better that forest life. He knows the difficulty of the forest life, how tough it is to survive when in rainy days.
As it was raining we stayed in that temple for about till 7 PM it was so dark that time, and rain didnt stop, so we had to run to the house and then we had dinner chat for some time then we slept.
we had nice sleep as we were tired with trekking.
Next day morning, i thought of taking bath in the flowing stream n the current of that stream was so high even though it was a small stream flowing in between the "toota" i couldnt go to middle, just i stayed at one corner and took bath, then we all had breakfast and left.
It was cloudy day, thank god it didnt seem like raining.
We crossed one village then we reached the forest area again. from there i met a person venugopal who is a good athlete, he use to tell me to take care of my camera well because day before he had made his camera wet and it was not working, Thoug i took few oics from sachins camera n taken care, last he tok back and spoiled it. I had took many good pics in that all were gone.
then the trek went on venugopal was with me only supporting me whenever i wanted to transfer weight, because he needed photos and i was alone. he took my pics n i took his.
trek started to become little more tough when we entered the thick jungle and passing through it. though there was a route we didnt had any clue where it will take us.
Around some 1 PM we came out of forest and saw there was a small village i was really shocked to hear that those villagers have to pass through the same route if they need to go to city.
The village was so beautifull, it was right in middle of the mountains thick jungles. awesome feeling.
but scary because they have to walk so long to go out & there is no other means of transportation also.
then we had lunch in betlween and the trek continued. trek became more and more tougher from here on as the route looked like "route not taken" the guide some times used to get confused himseelf he use to tell everyone to wait for ppl to come.
I was walking either fast at front or at last, because i dont wait for any one to come, and i had my camera with me, so thats enough, stop whereeven needed take pics and then just walk.
finally we reached the top of some mountain where we al halted, there was so much of coulds that the visibility was very less, took some pics, enjoyed a lot there. then we all left.
meanwhile there was a small story happening, there was a guy n girl came with us, the girl didnt had any luggage with her whereas i didnt knew who is carrying her luggage, as the guy was coveredwith raincoat and his front big bump & bag on his shoulder, i thought he was fat, later found that he was carrying 2 bags one front n other back. She was his girlfriend, she was from AP and he from bihar or somewhere,... then we all thought Kuch paane ko bahut kuch khona padta hai " :-)
moving on. trek passed on then all our group members came together, and told everyone to come fast and dont stop in between so that leaches will bite. dont stop frequently..... then we had to stop at some plaes where there was a turn or no way to go ahead. finally it was around 3 or 4 PM when we finally saw a govt IB where i ran and thrown all my bgs and went to side to remove my shoes to see leach. it was just some 5 min when rain slowly started and sudden;y it became heavy that i thought may be rain was just waiting for us to reach destination.
Rain became so hevily that we couldnt even walk in that. meanwhile whn i took a round of that IB i saw there were blood stains, like krishna paada actually it was the girls legs, who didnt bother to remove the shoes, and they were severly bitten by leavhes.. my god. blood was simply flowing..
Then i told ram to find out the bus to leave he said at 4 pm there is bus, u can have lunch and go, but we thought we need to go badly, now itself so that we can catch jog falls also, But the bus which was suposed to come didnt came.
so we all waited in rain eating the things we broiugnt. Meanwhile i paid 1.5K to the tata sumo fees which we took on day 1 to reach base camp..
somehow we went to have lunch and ram told he will stop bus or us, i was just finished having lunch the bus came, so ran away whereas prakasha n adarsha carried their lunch with them to bus.
finally the trek was over, it was around 4 PM and 1 hr drive to kurinjal from where we get bus to sagar. many busses will come bus conductior said.
Venu gopal & krishna murthy & then the boy n girl whom i told also came with us. even they had bus around 9 PM night. I asked the driver how far is jog from kurinjal & sagar, it was exactly a triangle journey. like from kurinjar it is 5 km to jog, and 11 to sagar,
and many busses will be available from jog to sagar also, if we miss there is a bus from kurinjal itself at 7PM.
so I decided if we have luck we may get to see Jog, and convinced everyone, but Praveen did not believe that we will see jog and we might miss our plan finally convinced him and we continued the journey to jog in same bus/
the driver was so terrifying that we boys itself were scared the way driver was driving, but the local ppl knew that driver is driving normally they didnt feel a bit .. at one point he appliued brake when there was a car in front i cant forget that in my life. he car driver would have had heart in his mouth.
after we got down i saw how driver looks like, shocked, he was around 50 +, still driving like this.great man..
when we reached jog it was still bright and it was cloudy . we ran to there and we could see jog falls just in time, though we couldnt see it for long time & clearly we could see in between the passing clouds.
lot of ppl were staiding and it was raining too. took some snaps and left the jog.
when we came out there was no bus, we waited for long time we enquired a local vehicles they were asking lot of money which it didnt deserve. then finally a rajahamsa bus to sagar came we took it and left. charged some 30 or 60 rs per head.
When we reached there we had bath and then we planned to have non veg dinnner as i was starving to have heavy dinner, finally me prakasha and praven had non vg dinner @ some hotel. nice fish fry & chicken, rest had some veg food. but they had beer.
It was 10.30 when our VRL bus was suppose to come, he came some 5-10 min late i was nervous if we didnt get bus then what as it was raining everywhere. finally it came at 10.40 around, the bus ride was so good and the seats were awesome that we did not feel that we were in bus and reached blr in time @ 6AM..
that marked the end of our great journey of mansoon trek...