Thoseghar Pictures

Breakfast time for a bug just outside Satara

Sajjangad - Numerous flowers like these bloom in Sahyadris in Late August

Thoseghar - F1

Thoseghar - F2

F2 - Closeup

Another Wildflower of Sahyadris

One of the many windmills - Chalkewadi

If it gives any idea about the size

Floors of rice fields - Chalkewadi

Left - Sajjangad, Right at distance - Ajinkyatara

Thoseghar

By now, people had started giving up on an outing every weekend. I was tired. It turned out on judgment day that it was just me and B for tomorrow. We agreed to bike, though in the morning the whole laziness in me got us moving in my car towards a Thoseghar for a drive. Thoseghar is around 35 odd km from Satara and is home to two beatiful waterfalls that plunge down the Sahyadris. Around 5 kms from Thoseghar is a place called Chalkewadi plateau thats home to thousands of windmills that generate around I guess 350 MW of windpower which is I guess quite a large wind energy installation as such in entire India.

To get here : Reach Satara via NH4 from Pune. Take a right into Satara, continue to Ajinkyatara, cross it to continue towards Thoseghar. Enroute, one hits Parali dam and Sajjangad [ 12 Kms odd from Satara ].

We continued till Thoseghar. There is a forest department office here, they have put up railings and a balcony as such for tourists to enjoy the sight. Ironically, there is no clear access route to the base so one has to live with the sight, savor it and be happy with it. Crossing these railings is dangerous and is not advisable, dont attempt to get into these waters for there have been quite a lot of deaths here.

Importantly, there are leeches out here, so dont - dont at all venture into any bushes or water as well. I got at least three of these on me. I had not seen a leech for my life, though the first encounter did not prove to be a nice one. We continued to Chalkewadi from here. Though since it was real cloudy, there was a little opportunity to spot all windmills at once. These windmills are massive and quite scary and huge if you reach the base of one. These are spread till Patan from here over the length of Sahyadris. The Koyna backwaters are just 1/1.5 hour of leechful trek from here though visibility is a big issue due to clouds here in rains. Maybe some other time...

P.S. I have moved from Imagestation to Shutterfly as they are closing down soon. I am struggling with image sharing options of Shutterfly so no album this time till I figure that out.

Avchitgad Pictures

Some smaller variety of Hibiscus I guess. Dishas Dhaba, Mulshi

A dryer cloudy humid day at Tamhini

The humble beginnings of Konkan Railway near Roha.

The lush landscape Konkan Railway runs through

Kundalika river - Revdanda creek

The sole canon on the fort

The western end of the fort. Our guide reflects.

Avchitgad

We were tired of biking this time around, so we decided to head somewhere far off with a Sumo. After some discussion we headed to Avchitgad. This entire week had been dry and we knew it was going to be tough. As headed towards Tamhini, the non-muddy blue waters of the dam shining in bright sunlight gave us some idea about the hardships ahead. Typically, a good sign is muddy tea waters and little sunlight :p

To get to Avchitgad :
1] Start from Chandni Chouk, take Paud road to Mulshi, get down via Tamhini. At Vile take the right to Kolad instead of left to Mangaon. After reaching NH17. Take a right followed by an immediate left to Roha.
2] Take Expressway-NH4. Take left from Khopoli to Pali. Proceed to Roha. Stop at Medha or Padam before Roha.

There are multiple ways to get onto this fort. One can climb from Medha or a village called Pingasai or a place called Padam. We were adviced by the locals to attempt it from Padam, which though a much lengthier route, proved to be a good decision. From Medha or Pingalsai, the route passes through really dense vegetation and its very likely to loose way unless you have a local to assist you. We met a bunch of fellas from Mumbai who took the route from Medha and lost their way.

We chose to seek some local experts this time. The sun shined brightly, add to the proximity of the creek and sea made things humid and worse for us. After a while as we got onto the top of the mountain by the side of the Roha Paper mill things got cooler. From here one sees the fort far away at the end of this range. Though the walk consists of a flat walk on a plateau and is not that great a deal.

From the top you can spot, Roha, Kundalika river, the backwaters of Revdanda creek the villages of Medha, Pingalsai, the begining of Konkan Railway and miles of lush rice farms. There are good traces of the fortification. Sole Canon. Our guide fellas complained that the villagers in Medha pushed two in valley, probably with the intention to sell it. There is a Mahadev/Shiv Mandir on the top. The villagers have constructed a shelter out here for the same. There are some water tanks. Ones near the temple with potable water. No arrangement to stay on top though. The flower carpet had just begin to set this time around. Typically late August/first week of September is when the numerous wild flowers start to cover the otherwise bare naked mountain slopes of Sahyadris.

The Paper mill at Roha/Padam was closed 25 odd years ago. As you start climbing from Padam, you climb by the guest house of paper mill. Its quite spooky and locals claim has a ghost who calls out to you if you go around that place at night. If you are looking for some ghostly adventure, maybe worth a try. Not my cup of tea, I dont quite get along with ghosts that well :-)
Check out the complete imagestation album here.

Visapur Pictures

Waterfall enroute Visapur just outside Bhaje

Fortification - Fort Visapur

Plenty of good stuff for stomach on the way.

Disintegrating fortification.

Lohagad from Visapur.

The faint traingular pinnacle is Fort Tikona. Pawana dam to right.

The faint pinnacle is Fort Tung with Lohagad to the right.

Bhaje village and Karla-Malavali valley.

Mumbai-Pune Expressway

Visapur

We had some time constraints this week. Keeping that in mind, we thought we went somewhere around and not spend much time traveling. This got M,B,GD and me travel towards Visapur 7.30ish.
For people who are looking for directions - To get here :
1] Start from Pune, travel on NH-4. Take the left towards Malavali - Bhaje past Kamshet as you are travelling towards Lonavala. Cross the guarded Railway crossing - bridge over expressway and park your vehicles at Bhaje.
2] Travel from Chandni Chauk to Paud to Jawan, proceed towards Pawananagar and keep asking for way to Lohagad. I havent done this one yet but this is one piece of information I got this time. Try it if you are an adventurer and find the monotony of traveling on the highway boring.

We reached Bhaje 9.30ish. To our surprise, there wasn't a single soul or lovebirds seeking shelter enroute. We continued our journey after modeling for the Liril ads etc. to the bifurcation at the base of Lohagad where we took the left to Visapur. We made it to the top in about 30 odd mins. Again this time we had heavy rains pounding us just after some time as we reached atop. Visapur as such has a huge huge area and take quite some time to cover.

One can spot Tikona to the left, Pawana Dam in between and Tung, and Lohagad to the right in that order from the top. On the other side one can spot the base villages and Mumbai Pune Expressway. For history of this place etc, read the Gazetteer or Google it up.

PS> The locals informed that, the previous week the deputy CM paid a surprise visit to Lohagad with 150odd cops and the cops gave quite a generous beating to the Somras fans out there. Alcohol is banned around here per them. So all you boozers out there, watch out. Cheers :p

Those who wonder what happened to the good old Hotel Lohagad-the only place for the foodies en route : I asked the guys here this time around and I was told that some boozers beat up the old man and his wife and didn't pay for the food etc. The poor couple left the place for their native place Ratnagiri.

Check the complete set of pictures here.

Koregad - Korigad - Koraigad Pictures

Waterfalls enroute Ghusalkhamb from Mulshi.

View of the Mulshi Lake. The semi-circular wall is visible.

The tall cloud covered mountains enroute.

Numerous water sources like these empty in Mulshi Lake here

View of the Northern arm of Mulshi Lake.

The steps to Korigad.

One of the numerous wild flowers of Sahyadris.

Saffron

Fortification - Korigad

A mushroom - I caught it inside a hole in the fortification

Koregad A.K.A Korigad A.K.A Koraigad

This weekend since kuch log were too tired of "Sumo Chalana" we decided we headed somewhere nearby on bikes. We thought about Rajmachi, but then considering that we are bunch of old men we thought of something nice, which got us moving to Korigad.

This fort is past INS Shivaji near a village called Peth Shahapur enroute Ambavane where Sahara Amby Valley is located and belongs to Sahara India. Yes they own the fort believe it or not.

To get to this place from Pune essentially one needs to :
1] Travel on NH-4 to Lonavala / Expressway take Lonavala exit. Take the left to Bhushi Dam/INS Shivaji and continue to Amby Valley. Keep looking for Peth Shahapur.
2] Travel to Mulshi. Just before the dam wall, take a right to Ghusalkhamb [ 40Kms from here ]. The road is not so good, though if you need a taste of adventure scenery and greenery. This is the route. When you hit a T with a Chai shop at corner, take a left for Ambavane and look for Peth Shahapur.
3] Travel past Mulshi via Tamhini, past Dongarwadi, there is a bifurcation for Lonavala. This road is super scenic and Sumo worthy. This road would take you to Bhambarde, from here continue to Ambavane and then to Peth Shahapur.

The depressing thoughts of passing Lonavala traffic early morning and search for some adventure found us travelling towards Mulshi at 8.00 in the morning. We chose option 2 as I had not travelled on this route before. After a good amount of timepass, photography we reached the destination.

Since this is a Sahara property and due to the proximity to Lonavala, you always have some company for climb. Sahara chaps have now put a tarmac road right to the base. There are steps to get to the top as well. The fort is huge as such and has fortification in place to great extent. There is a lake, a temple, few canons and marshy land. One can spot the Amby valley right at the base of the fort.

We got down at about 4.00 discussed our options and decided to head back via NH-4. I had been here with B and PN long time ago, that time some stupid a**s sons of GW Bush had stolen the fuel from our bikes. This time I had some weird lady asking 60 bucks aggressively for no reasons to let us park our bikes. Not that 60 bucks was an issue, though the manner in which the bi**ch demanded it was quite shocking. We had run into a drunk man on the way in the morning, I did the honors of asking him for the directions. He was slurring about how the fort belongs to locals etc. etc. Overall the locals around don't quite have a very nice attitude towards visitors. As for these Amby valley morons, they are clearing up quite a piece of forest here for making roads to the very base of the fort. Soon they'll have red carpet laid up all the way up on the steps. Sahara has about 10K acres or more land in this beautiful valley, their golf courses by the huts of the locals and they are killing it for sure. Must visit before they kill this place completely.

Find the complete set of pictures here.

Kawlya A.K.A. Kavlya Pictures

Neera Devghar Dam

One of the many bridges in backwaters of Neera Devghar

Life on Roads - Monsoons

The endless number of waterfalls you see on this road

View of the valley enroute Kawlya

Main range of Sahyadris

Approaching Kawlya - The mist covered mountains

Primate shot by a primate

View of the valley and waterfalls from Kavlya/Kawlya

Kawlya A.K.A. Kavlya

Ill cut the long story short this time around. We had multiple options. It was likely that we would have had to bike this weekend. Though, thanks to the elaborate efforts of Lord C...shwar. We found ourselves traveling in two Sumos to Kavlya/Kawlya fort with Lord C's apostles.

Historically, this fort has been described as the stronghold of Chandrarao More of Jawali, who was Shivaji's archrival. We were always taught stories of the thick jungles of Jawali and how difficult it was to get round those. Its to not to a good, though to a fair extent still holds the same charm.

We got going at 7.30 AM in the morning, had breakfast at Natraj on Satara road. After stopping down for good amount of time for photography at Neera Devghar dam we headed towards the destination. This route is the second route after Tamhini that connects ghat to Konkan and probably very few know it and I guess its very nice to be kept that way. What this ensures is that there are little tourists. No plastic, no trash, no drunkards and all and nothing but you and greenest valley with beautiful waterfalls emptying relentlessly in it.

Ill intentionally skip the directions part here. Its worth making that effort and figuring out this treasure on your own. We got going amongst heavy mist, reached the destination. Though due to mist, clouds went round it and went far too ahead and wandered. After some searching and adventurous stunts we gave up and decided to retire to base where the vehicles were parked.

There are quite a few interesting things around this place. There are traces of old steps off the route which is normally taken for hiking. If you talk to the locals you would find hell lot of information about some of the things which are still not much known to the regular traveler. We indulged in some of the greatest waterfalls I have ever ran into on the way back got some of the neatest shots I could ever get. Check out the complete imagestation album here.

Mangad Pictures

No weekend breaks - A farmer slogging out early morning in Mulshi.

Where the road goes round Plus valley - The Bhira Hydroelectric pipes in Tamhini.

Main range of Sahyadris to the East of Mangad.

A lush Paddy field near Borwadi.

Waterfalls in Tamhini. These thundered the way back.

Water tanks and the farms below - Mangad.

The ruins of fortification

Parsha - [ Parshuram ] the guide at Entrance. Parsha is a good man.

The climb

The Dargah atop Mangad.