Torna A.K.A Prachandgad Pictures

The Hone[y] Collector

Unknown to me - Flower of Sahyadris

My Dhanno - My partner in crime

Karvi flower - Blooms once every 7 years

Swades - HE the people

Torna framed - The way to top through Karvi

Sept - Oct is the time for numerous of these flowers

Another view of Fort Torna

Another unknown to me flower of Sahyadris

The entrance

Torna A.K.A Prachandgad

I have couple of places left on my agenda for the end of this monsoon. I am not one of the winter trekkers, mostly due to my work schedules and more since I have always believed that Sahyadris are at their best in monsoons. If you are keeping abreast with news related to Sahyadris, you might have noticed that there has been a lot of talk about Karvi blooming. This plant is abundant in Sahyadris and blooms once every 7 years, after which the plant dies to be born again from the seeeds. I had been to Lavasa last weekend for a ride and I did spot the flowers, though I wanted to see the flowers in the full glory which saw me and S ride towards Torna early Saturday morning. If you are looking for a piece of history etc. Google can be of great help. I wouldn't reinvent the wheel here, more so since most of us know it and its easy to get it and is out there.

Easy to reach here from Pune :
1] Take NH4 till Nasarapur [ A little past Natraj ] and take a right from here all the way to Velhe which is the base village.
2] A little secret : Reach Donje Phata [ Sinhagad ]. Take a right towards Panshet and just past Khanapur, take a left to Velhe. The road is not in a great shape so if you are looking for a boring ride, take option 1. If you are one who is always on a lookout for something new this is the way to go. Takes little time as well.

We started climbing 10'ish. To utter surprise, we found 3 chicks trying to figure their way to top. They were IT profressionals and had taken a bus from Pune here. Who said there was no incentive in hiking when you have damsels in distress to save :-) Last time I was to Torna was around in 2002, and lot has changed since then. The temple has been renovated, there is railing now at the rocky part. We ran into some weirdos from Mumbai here. Ran into an enthusiastic father from Pune with his kid who was here to witness Karvi. You can spot as well as identify Rajgad and Sinhagad from here clearly. We finished our Good-Days, visited Konkan Darwaja, looked around a bit, frowned over the drained camera battery and headed back. Took option 2 on the way back and I guess we made it back in 1.5 hr. The Karvi is in full bloom here, too bad to miss it if you care at all because the next bloom will be in year 2014.

Rajgad Pictures

A Wild Stunner !!

"Nedh-a" ..In Clouds !!

On our way up !!

Gunjavane [ The village at Base] !!

Stairway to Heaven !!

Taken from Chor Darwaja

Find more details here.

Rajgad

Couldn't cook any plan till friday. AB was stuck in Mumbai due to heavy rains. Got a call late Friday night from PN. He said we were six, and we better decide someplace on Satara side. We thought about a trek to Vairatgad. We started late in the morning so a change of plans had us aiming for Rajgad.

We reached Gunjavane at about 11. If you want to take the Chor darwaja, you have to go to Gunjavane or else you can go to Vajeghar and climb by the Pali darwaja.
The water stream near Gunjavane had swollen and there was water flowing over the bridge. We manage to ride across on bikes. We started our climb with the company of two dogs. We trusted the dogs for the route and let them lead us. That turned out to be a mistake. After a walk of an hour or so we met the local Vijay Mallya who was transporting his brew to the base [ The Hatbhatti if you know this magic potion i.e. ]. He told us we were on the wrong road. So we headed back and Mr Mallya guided us to the correct road.

We made it to the top in another hour or so. It was raining heavily, we hadn't made food arrangements. To add to the problem we met an old chap who had lost
his cow on the fort and was searching for past two days. He needed something to eat. So whatever we had we gave 1/3rd of it to him. We went conservative.
We started getting down at about 4.30 from Chor darwaja. We had some Pohe and tea at the small joint at base and started our journey back. There was more water flowing now on the small bridge. Luckily we got some help from another group we met on the way back to get our bikes across.

But there was another surprise on the way back, another bridge on the way back was submerged. Wasnt worth risking lives in that roaring water barrier of about 150 mtr. To our luck we found an alternate road. Heavy rains meant not much of photography. Overall a nice cool one dayer. Came back to discover Ferrari was on pole.