घेई छंद.......

"हा छंद जीवाला लावी पिसे" अशी परिस्थिती नसली, तरीही सध्या एक जुना छंद नव्याने जडला आहे किंवा सुरु झाला आहे.. तुम्ही माझ्या नवीन एलिझाबेथ चे फोटो FB वर पाहिले असतीलच, त्याबद्दलचा हा लेख!!!

एलिझाबेथ अर्थात माझी नवीन सायकल:   New Cycle
Make: SUNCROSS Explorer
7x3 gears with front suspension
Front disc brake, rear V brake

सायकल डिसेंबर मध्येच घेतली होती, पण म्हणावा तेवढा उपयोग करत नव्हतो.. त्यासाठी एप्रिल उजडावा लागला!! म्हणतात ना, देर से आये लेकीन दुरुस्त आये... बहुदा असेच झाले असेल 
थोडक्यात सांगायचे तर गेले महिना भर सायकलिंग सुरु आहे. छान असे  समानव्यसनेषु पार्टनर पण मिळाले आहेत (विराज शेटे आणि  श्रीराम देशपांडे )  त्यामुळे अजून तरी सातत्य टिकून आहे.. 

सेल्फ रिवॉर्ड म्हणून स्वतः ला 2-3 स्पोर्ट्स वेअर, जेल वाली सीट आणि हेल्मेट ला लावायचा btwin चा दिवा घेऊन झाला. तेवढेच motivation, नाही का?

   

BTWIN light

सध्या दररोज नांदेड सिटी, सारस बाग तर रविवारी खडकवासला असे सुरु आहे. लांब पल्ल्याचे कुठलेही goal नसले तरी सायकलिंग करत सिंहगड पायथा जाणे, सिंहगड चढून येणे आणि परत सायकलिंग करत घरी येणे, एवढे साधेच ध्येय ठेवले आहे...पाहू कधी पूर्ण होते ते !!

At Khadakwasla Dam

Khadakwasla Dam

At Vetal tekadi aka ARAI Hill

Dream becoming reality

In one of my earlier blogs, I expressed my dream treks in my life. (http://lifehotoaisee.blogspot.in/2009/03/dream-treks.html 10 March 2009)
Preikestolen is one of those dream treks.

When we were planning for our visit to Norway in 2014 summer, I told Deepa that I will do Preikestolen trek.
It is a very famous trek in Norway and one of the World  Heritage site too!
Deepa and Ankur also decided to join us for this trek and planned perfectly including the NSB train and hotel bookings. Preikestolen is situated near to Stavanger, a city West of Oslo, Norway and south of Bergen (which we visited last week before this trek!!)

(More details to follow soon)...

Few of the photos are added below. You can see more photographs at https://picasaweb.google.com/117568562398842642093/Preikestolen
Let me know if you do not have access to this link, and I'll provide you the access!!

पुन्हा एकदा 'राजगड'

Rajmachi trek participants liked the night trek very much and hence I immediately planned our next night trek to Rajgad on 22 April. Later the date was changed to Saturday 23rd. 

‌As the trek date came close, the group started to shrink from 11 to 8 to 7 and finally only 6 were available. That to Krishnat joining on the day! We planned to reach base village Gunjavane by car. Sachin, Krishnat, Atul joined in Ashwin's Duster and Vir picked me up from my home. Except Atul and me, all others were first timers to Rajgad fort.

‌Our group has a great reputation of planning the trek perfectly, however missing the timelines by 1-1.5 hrs!! So no wonder as same thing happened this time as well!! As per the plan, we were supposed to reach base village Gunjavane by 8:00 PM and we reached by 9:45 PM. We had a stop 25 kms before Gunjavane for tea and Parle G; hence we did not take a break and started to hike immediately. 

‌Last few Rajgad  trek observations: 
1. We missed the initial route and took little more time to correct ourselves. 
2. We took 2 hrs to reach Chor Darawaja on the fort. That was our best time so far!

‌This was Sachin's first trek. His last attempt (?) to Sinhgad was not great, however he said he has improved his endurance. Keeping all these in mind, I anticipated to take 2.5 hrs this time to reach and was cautious enough to cover the initial portion quickly. Weather was pleasant with little coldness in air. A day before, it was full moon night, hence we expected better moon light. We did not get enough of moon light though as moon rise was post 10 PM.

‌Rajgad route is quite easy nowadays. It is mix of plateau and hill climb as mentioned below:
- Initial walk on almost flat land followed by small hillock. Once we reach here, we have to take left else chances of missing the route.
- 10 mins of plateau walk followed by first steep walk. 
- Little plateau, then small gradient walk followed by second hill walk
- Last flat walk of 5-10 mins towards right followed by well secured climb through rock cut steps to reach Chor Darawaja (चोर दरवाजा) .
We took 3 breaks of sufficient time on the way and reached on top in 1 hr 40 mins. I guess weather played an important role in minimizing the fatigue.

‌There were many groups already reached at Rajgad and we crossed 2 more groups on the way. Hence we decided to move to the Padmavati temple quickly to secure place for sleep. Fortunately we got good place (near the wall).  After settling and resting for 10 mins, we came out and had our wonderful dinner in the beautiful moonlight!! 

‌We got a descent sleep, except couple of interventions from rats around, which managed to eat our remaining parathas and a gentle touch (??) to Ashwin's chiks :) Next day our plan was to visit Balekilla quickly and start to descend as early as possible. Previously I visited Balekilla twice, but only till the main gate. This time, we decided to roam on the plateau and discover more things. We can clearly see forts like Lingana and Raigad along with Sinhgad, Purandar and Torana off course!!  

View of the surrounding area was very clear and we took lots of photos here, courtsey Ashwin! We visited Sadar (सदर), ruins of palace (राजवाड्याचे अवशेष), moon shaped lake (चंद्राकृती टाके) and a temple (ब्रह्मेश्वर मंदिर).

‌Due to tedious rock climbing (though with proper support structure), Ashwin and Sachin said that they will not visit Balekilla again... After the Balekilla visit, we rushed back to the temple and had our breakfast and tea. We started back at 10 AM and reached Gunjavane at 11:50 AM. We collected plastic bottles (almost 3 full bags) during our return journey. We had couple of stops  for lemon juice (typically I have the moto to spend at such places to boost local economy!), hence we immediately left for home from Gunjavane. 
Vir and I concluded the trek with delicious pithale bhakari (पिठलं भाकरी) at Kailas :)

सचिन बालेकिल्ला  चढताना 

अतुल समवेत 

बालेकिल्ल्यावर टिम सोबत  

सचिन  समवेत  

Click from Balekilla (Sanjivani Machi at the back)

सदर

राजवाड्याचे अवशेष

ब्रह्मेश्वर मंदिर

चोर दरवाज्याजवळ वीर आणि सचिन  

चोर दरवाज्याजवळ अश्विन 

2nd Get Together at Baramati

       Post successful hosting of first GT, there were discussions on group about second one. GT proved to be a good place to meet so many friends at one place. Those who missed earlier one were very much eager to come second one. After so many discussions, the second one was planned at Baramati and date decided was 5th June 

Initially I was doubtful due to this date, you know why, right??

      Around 2 weeks before the day, Trupti texted me on whatsapp. I was a bit surprised as I had totally forgot about her and secondly never had a one to one discussion with anybody in our group. Chatting to girls in the group appeared to be a distant affair!!. Anyway breaking the ice before meeting at GT was really nice idea by Trupti, and I guess it helped in some way, making connections stronger afterwards. 

     Couple of days close to GT day, and my plan got fixed to travel with Atul. Meeting start time was 11 am, however Atul and I started at 10 am from Pune. We were going to be late for sure, so I informed the same on group. We reached at around 12:15 pm, and were very happy to see the scattered group clicking themselves at pool side.!! 

Within 10 minutes, everybody gathered back in the hall to start the GT. In short, Atul and I were on time 

     Attendance this time was definitely less as expected, with addition of couple of new faces! (I remembered 4, Trupti, Deepak, Shekhar and Smita) Session started as per agenda shared by Abhi on the group, first being the introduction. Girls got the luxury to introduce themselves from their seat, whereas boys were asked to introduce from the podium. Shekhar, Sagar and Deepak spoke something different while recollecting school memories. Otherwise rest of the piece was monotonous. After that Sagar and Lata sang 2 beautiful songs and changed the mood of the group. 

Next we played dumb charades. Most of the members were new to this game, I guess, which brought good fun while playing. Except one, when Lata got a movie, she directly came towards boys and pointed towards Anand. It was then a good guess for everybody to cheer out loudly saying 'सैराट' 

      Lunch menu was awesome, and as everybody were hungry by 3pm, it proved to be delicious. Some of the folks still did not like it, menu being vegetarian . 

Post lunch, the endless discussion started, what to do with the collected corpus? Good part is, everybody participated in the discussion and gave valuable inputs. It showed one thing, everybody was very sure about the purpose and objective. Making it concrete, directed and sustainable still proved to be a challenge. I guess, with all those inputs, few guys should take lead to form the final direction!!

      As usual, time became the culprit to bring such a wonderful session to an end. We had group photograph, again at poolside!. Being the environment day, Smita handed over small plants. Good and innovative way to remember the session!!

      Atul had to go to Indapur for his work, so I came back to Pune with Sagar. We had good conversation on multiple topics. It was a nice journey cause I got a chance to know Sagar more. 

After the second GT, I personally felt that the bond of this friendship is getting stronger day by day!

"जुळले होते सूर, आता घट्ट झाले बंध

शाळेतील मैत्रीचे वाढले ऋणानुबंध ।

मम म्हणे, राहता सहकार्य तुम्हां सर्वांचे

येईल पूर्णत्वास "मैत्र" जीवांचे ।

इति श्री मम उवाच GT पुराणे द्वितितोध्याय संपूर्णम ।

#MM

K2S Trek - 1 April 2016

Trek Activity: Katraj 2 Sinhgad Trek

Start Date: 1 April 2016

End Date: 2 April 2016

Participants: Mahesh M, Amit T, Vinit J, Vikram K, Santosh B, Nitin A, Pradip P, Pradeep, Sachin K, Brahma R, Santosh M, Yogesh S, Yogesh P, Rahul C, Bharat J

Katraj to Sinhgad, commonly known as K2S, is a famous trek for the Puneites. This is very treacherous and enduring trek and typically done at night time. Full moon light is preferred for this trek, and one can observe lot of people on the trek route during summer nights. I planned this trek was planned right after our Rajmachi trek on 11 March and date was finalized as Friday 1 April night, which had a 40% moon that too from 5 AM onwards. So most of the trek would have been in dark, and hence everybody was supposed to bring the torch.

We had ample time, and hence I was expecting large number of participants this time. I was the trek lead for this trek. After few drop outs, finally, we were 15 in total who were ready to go for this night trek. Everybody assembled at my home, from where I booked a bus which dropped us at Katraj tunnel. Initially, the plan was to start at 8 PM from my home, however it was 9 PM when everybody gathered. So we started bit late. Earlier we used to start this trek from Katraj old tunnel, but now we do this trek from Katraj new tunnel.

Out of 15, only 4 including me had done this trek before. So it was necessary to brief others about the trek details like path, breaks etc. At the assembly point of Katraj Khind Dhaba, I briefed everybody along with the do’s and don’ts for this trek. Fortunately, ours was the only group that night for the trekking. I asked Vikram and Pradeep to be in the front for this trek and Amit, Yogesh and I decided to be at the backside. Others were suggested to stay in the middle. We started the trek at 9:20 PM. We hiked the initial patch till hillock by 10:10 PM, which was quite a good speed considering the newcomers!! I brought parathas for everyone for dinner along with red spicy chutney and pickle. But the gang was in full speed and decided to break after some time. After crossing almost 20% of the distance and 3 hillocks, team finally stopped for food. We all enjoyed the parathas along with few fruits. We did a lot of fun during dinner. We all were together till this point of the trek. After 30 minutes of break, we continued our trek.

Distance between the front guys and back guys started increasing. At mid of the trek, the distance was almost 30 minutes. There is no water available on the trek route, hence everyone was advised to bring 3-4 liters of water with them. Yogesh brought 3 liters of water and had consumed it all till mid-way. It was then challenging to support him till the end. He started pulling his muscles on the way and we had to stop frequently to give him stretches!! Finally we reached the junction point, where trek route meets the tar road, and time was 5:10 AM. We (6) were almost 1 hour late than the plan and others had already on their way to Sinhgad, which is 3 kms away, on tar road. Luckily, we got 1 jeep at this junction, and Yogesh decided to go with it. We, then started walking towards Sinhgad fort and successfully reached there before 6 AM. After few stretches and cup of tea, everyone witnessed the wonderful sunrise from the fort.

Bharat, Vinit, Amit and I decided to walk down the fort, whereas others planned to go down by jeep. We had a group photograph here before separating. It was an awesome trek with no injuries! Last time, I had a shoulder muscle pull. It took more than 4 months for recovery. After enjoying the superb delicacy available at the fort - curd in the matka and limbu-pani, we started for return. On the way back, I threw seeds of different fruits and other trees in the valley. Hopefully, few seeds may survive and in future, we can have trees there!

We took 45 minutes for descent. Total time was 9 hours and distance travelled was 23 kms. After enjoying the misal-pav at the base, we caught the bus to return to the home.

How to get There: This trek starts from Katraj tunnel (Old as we as new). Catch a bus or auto from the city to reach there. From here, the trek starts and one has to cross 13-14 hillocks to reach the Sinhgad fort. Carry enough water as water is not available on the route.