Kalawanti Durg on 29 June '08

It all began on a lazy Saturday afternoon in May when I was sitting at my desk pondering about new ways to kill time; just because I am paid for it (people who work on Saturdays know what I’m talking about). Anyways, one of my friends forwarded a mail with the heading “Kalawanti Durg – Chk it out”. This particular friend deserved a special folder in my mailbox because he is amongst the many who think that it is their moral responsibility to remind us of English etiquette with his “Good Morning”, “Good Afternoon”, “Good Evening” & even “Good Noon” mails every day without fail (whoever wishes you a “Good noon” !!!). Nevertheless, he deserves this extra space here for enlightening me about Kalawanti (not to mention the “Good Morning/Evening……” mails). Having had nothing better to do, I literally jumped at the mail & idly googled for more info. I have to admit I had no particular idea what was I up to since post-lunch sessions in office tend to drag at a pace that even snails can beat you at.

Helpful as always, Google spewed a lot of info; both relevant & irrelevant (little did I realize then that Kalawanti could be a girl’s name and that too so many). Subduing my urge to check out the females, I got down to the relevant results; which got all the more interesting, especially the pics that got me hooked on right away. With little in mind I pointlessly forwarded the pics & the links to some of my friends with whom I had been to IrshalGad a few days back. As the clock struck 5.30, I knew I had accomplished my mission for yet another Saturday & dashed out of office to the world waiting outside with all its worthwhile offerings on weekends.

Back to office on Monday morning, I had a lot of replies to my mail (which surprised me) trying to fix up the next trek to Kalawanti Durg. The next few days saw a lot of ditching from everybody (I mean, everybody). All things said & done, we finally decided the day to be 29th June, almost a month after it all originally started(the creative excuses everybody offered is a different story). We boarded the Sinhagad Express and alighted at Karjat junction because we didn’t have many options to go to Panvel directly. We took a six-seater rickshaw (tum-tum, dum-dum, dhug-dhug, chug-chug…whatever they are called) to the old Mumbai-Pune highway for Rs. 9/- per head for the seven of us. We did a little bit of haggling with the other richshaw-wallas to take us to Thakurwadi, which we presumed to be the base for the trek. After a few minutes of 'kaka-please, mama-please', we ultimately settled at 300 bucks to Thakurwadi village. The ride was uneventful, except for the fact that some of us pointed out some peaks, presuming it to be Kalawanti which in turn led to a pain in my neck having snapped it a couple of times trying to figure out the correct one, the fog making it all the more difficult. 20 minutes & a few bumps later we were at Thakurwadi village at 10am. Having paid the six-seater guy, he took off leaving us fending for ourselves. We walked a little further, to find some houses which only dogs homed in; their barking definitely didn’t have a welcome tone to it. Luckily, we met a few guys a little further who turned out to be from Pune as well. After the initial pleasantries, we more-or-less agreed to the path we had to take. It was a breeze for them with their four-wheeler than it was for us, the foot soldiers. But there’s something about mornings that injects people with a new vigour (I still cant figure it out after so many years, I prefer sleeping through the mornings, given a chance), we decided to take the path less travelled (both literally & otherwise) to the base of the pinnacle traversing through the foliage with no particular idea where I was heading.

There are some people on this planet who haven’t lost their stone-age instinct even with Darwin arguing about evolution & people agreeing with him generation after generation just because our textbooks told us to. One such instinct that comes to the fore in some of us is the natural sense of direction. Mr. P happened to be one of the few creatures blessed with this instinct & I decided not to dispute and merely followed him, imagining an invisible antenna perched on his head that picked some kind of invisible waves from the base of the pinnacle. Walking wasn’t all that taxing, if you ask me even if it was drizzling since it was level terrain with just shrubs to dodge, duck & step on. As if I had spoken too early, Mother Nature knocked at someone’s (back)door, this time Mr. B had some urgent business to take care of. I think the sight of streams on the way triggered the reaction, so armed with a water bottle & the stream for company, Mr B made the most of nature & the solitude, meanwhile we had cameras out already, not for him, though. It struck me then that I remembered reading that Thakurwadi & Thakarwadi were two different villages & the rickshaw-wallah kaka had driven us to Thakarwadi (& not Thakurwadi, one damn alphabet made a lot of difference). I didn’t mention it to anybody, cursing myself & the kaka as well (for making a mama out of us). Anyways, the short break made us a little lighter (especially Mr. B who indeed was lighter). After another short session of walking, we spotted the guys we had met earlier conveniently drive their four-wheeler up the road which was a few meters ahead. We finally did a bit of scrambling but managed to get on the road in the next few minutes which for the first time since morning I knew was the correct one (Thank you once again, kaka!!)

After a drinks break (only water, actually) & a quick pose-n-shoot session, we started trudging on, convinced that we finally were on the right track. Apart from the four-wheeler guys, another group of about 10 guys were also in line for Kalawanti Durg that day, so that is how it was, 3 groups footslogging for the pinnacle. The climb from here is relatively tame, with a gradient varying anything between 30° & 40°. 45 mins of walking brought us to a small hamlet where we verified the way to the pinnacle & rested for some time waiting for the rain to stop. It was sometime between the road & this hamlet that Mr. B lost his sandals but decided to continue barefoot. (Guess, he liked Mother Nature more than any one of us; first the open-air dump & now this I-will-walk-barefoot thing really is too much)
Following the directions (I listened carefully this time for another alphabet slip) we took off for the next portion, technically leading amongst the 3 groups, this time a little more vertical climb greeting us. God bless the angels who made yellow paint marks on the rocks to guide forlorn souls like us. We took another break, more to break the monotony than out of tiredness & had the best thing in the world - ‘Tiger Biscuits’; our bags were getting lighter with each stop that we took, suited us all the more for obvious reasons. With the gradient getting steeper, we had to clamber through rocks & shrubs and the drizzle turning into rain didn’t make our task any easier, but we enjoyed it all the more. We lost our ‘leader’ tag when we saw a few guys descending but continued nevertheless reaching the base of the pinnacle in about an hour’s time since we had started from the hamlet. Here we met another group from BBay who were also descending & had stopped for a short chomping break.

There are times when you think that you have made it & that is precisely the moment when you get a slap across your face. We were literally delivered a slap across our faces by the rain that was trying to blow us off the hill. With the Bbay group having left, we were the only guys stuck at the base with the dilemma whether to scale these slimy rock-cut steps & possibly get blown off (the newspapers would suddenly be interesting, the next day) or just stay put & evaluate our options after a while. Thankfully, all of us chose the second option, we clutched on to our jackets (& our dear lives) even as the rain delivering its acupuncture therapy with brute force for the next 15 mins wasn’t making any one feel better. It stopped as suddenly as it had started, 20 mins of the rain left us with cold limbs but deep down consolidated our resolve to scale these damn steps, it was now or never. The first part of the rocks are very tricky where you have to hold on to the rocks & and be super careful when it comes to your foot grips, ‘slippery’ is another word that keeps repeating itself in your head over and over again. However when I finally was at the first step with the rest of the guys following, I knew there was no stopping now. The rest of the steps were quickly covered with the anticipation of what lay in store for us at the top, something that seemed unwieldy in the morning. It was just a matter of minutes when we reached the penultimate part of the pinnacle, about 9 ft of vertical rock standing tall between us & the summit; we threw our bags off our back in a mad frenzy to get to the top. Mr. R got the credit to be the first one followed by the rest of us.

No adjectives can ever do justice to the view from the top of the pinnacle; one by one all of us eased our way to the top, even Mr. B whose wide grin said it all since he had walked half the way without any footwear. Initially greeted by just fog all around, it got clearer by the time the last of us got to the top. We couldn’t see as far as IrshalGad but I mentally figured out the rough location where it would have been. The view of Prabhal machi is awesome, with the fog clearing off with each passing minute the greenery on the surrounding hills & the plains beneath is worth dying for.(Not literally though, one jump from the top & gravity does the rest for you). A photo-vid session later, we finally sat down to let the orgasmic feeling of satisfaction sink in. Lying on my back, I was speculating the real reason for man’s psyche to get to the better of Nature, trying to prove his supremacy over Nature since time immemorial. There was nothing atop this hill, neither the elixir of life nor any treasure (Heck, you can’t even see any females from the top, I tell you) but the urge that drives man to the highest of mountains & the deepest of oceans, to venture into the unexplored is something that is best left unsaid.

Damn, this philosophical crap creeps into my mind only when I am high; well this time I actually was ‘high’. But the reference to ‘high’ is strictly for literary purposes, my fagged limbs bearing efficacious testimony to the fact that I didn’t take the more favoured booze-or-dope route for being ‘high’. Snapping out of my thoughts, it was time to take the second half of the journey; we made our way down following the same sequence that we took to the top, for some unspoken logic. Almost all of us were comfortably down the pinnacle until Mr. K pulled his thigh muscle & unluckily he was the last one for the descent; he finally managed to come down but not before yelling a few expletives at no one in particular which prompted us to name that particular part as ‘AZ’ point (Marathi speaking fellas, no prizes for guessing what AZ stands for). The climb down was relatively easier than climbing up but we watched every step because we were well aware that most of accidents happen during the descent (I wonder whether the people are plain excited or just want to end their lives having been on top of the world). We soon reached the first step & carefully managed to clamber the tricky portion one by one till all were on safe land. The rest of the descent was uneventful leave for a slip here & a fall there but managed well enough till the hamlet. We took a stop midway which meant my bag was to be made lighter with the biscuits & water vanishing in a flash. Almost forgot to tell you about the other two groups, we met them on our way down & briefed them about the climb ahead, leaving it up to them whether they wanted to go all the way or simply be chicken.

Continuing on our way further down, we reached the road where these guys had parked their four wheeler & waited for Mr. B who understandably took longer than the rest of us. Meanwhile the four wheeler guys also hurried down which meant that Mr. B & the four-wheeler gang almost made it to the road together after about 40 mins. Lucky that Mr. B was, he got a lift till the hospital a little further down in Thakurwadi (Thakurwadi!!! Kaka, are you listening???). We left Mr. B to accompany the guys & walked down the path that would take us to Thakurwadi. Walking for a good 45 mins, we finally reached the hospital & waited for a few more minutes as the familiar four-wheeler drove by, not without dropping Mr. B. After a few more minutes of walking & a few enquiries with locals, we zeroed down on the bus that was expected in a few minutes time to take us the Panvel ST Stand. The bus did arrive & graciously stopped for 7 totally drenched guys waving their hands like madmen. The drive to Panvel lasted for about 30 mins which gave us the opportunity to catch some sleep. Having arrived at Panvel ST Stand, Mr. B got a new pair of sandals & all of us had some Pav-Bhaji & started back for Pune in yet another ST bus.

Back home at 10.30, I bet anybody would have headed straight to their bed. Not me, though, for the EURO 2008 finals were on & I wouldn’t have missed it even if it had been for a terrorist attack. Sleep tried to overpower my senses during the fag end of the first half but I managed to hang on till half time when I called ‘half-time’ myself & caught a nap till the second half started. The uneventful second half hoping Germany came back for the one goal deficit was taking its toll on me. Silently praying for Germany to mange just one flick of the ball into the Spanish net didn’t yield any results till the end. Disappointed & weary, I didn’t even bother to watch the post-match ceremony & finally made my way to bed. But not before promising myself to thank my ‘English-etiquette’ friend the next morning (which I didn’t do till I decided to write this down.)

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The pix are yours for the asking: http://picasaweb.google.com/floydq/Kalawanti