Sajjangadh- Thoseghar Oct 2011

Day 2 of the satara trip.

left the hotel early morning and headed straight towards sajjangadh. knew the way towards the bogada, same one enroute kaas, so didnt had any issues reaching it. had breakfast in another obscure place. the drive to sajjangadh was another awesome one, with green hills all around, no waterfalls though, but green all around nevertheless. stopped at few places to take some snaps, which came out real good.

reached sajjangadh after few sharp twists n turns. real narrow road to reach the top, but in the morning with not much traffic, the drive was pleasant (but what did i knew :). parked the vehicle at level parking, with another two cars, the stairs start right from the parking place and are in decent shape n size. so climbing was no trouble at all. just the commercialization of the place really bothered me. there was no natural feel at all to the place. too much trash strewn all over, tanks all green in color with ladies washing clothes in it. was real eyesore. lots of local people, lots of shops, lots of houses, makes this place a village rather than a fort.

this place has samadhi of ramdas swami, the spiritual guru of shivaji maharaj. a math on his name. ram temple. went through this place at our own pace as not much rush was there. went to the backside of sajjangadh to get some real awesome views around, a dam, a serpentine road towards thoseghar, and a awesome view of sajjangadh itself. spent some more time here, just clicking photos. by this time it was 12 and time for lunch.

this place arranges lunch for people, issues free coupons, with few conditions. all "men" have to bare their upper torsos and sit. chant the shlokas behind the ones from temple, and should not discuss anything among themselves. the lunch was good enough, rice, daal, sabjee and some sweet. we ate our heart out. after that we have pickup our thalis and drop it at specified location.

we started climbing back to the parking after the lunch. and to our surprise , now there were about 30 cars and few buses parked in that small parking, with my car at the back of it all, cant move the buses :) had to wait for sometime till some hundred kids from some school gathered around this bus , littering all over the place with coke cans, the bus started moving soon after, it took nearly 30 minutes just to move out of the parking, going back n forth in that narrow place.

the route from here till thosegarh was real treat, no traffic, no people around and just green nature around. had snaps stopping at every place that we felt we should. reached thoseghar. the windmills were to be seen all around , but on the next hill. at thoseghar , asked for directions to reach the steps that takes you to the viewing gallery, therez nothing to ask really, its a small place. still. after you descend down to the gallery, the view is breathtaking. couple of falls around, must be a treat to watch in mid-monsoon, now only water was there, no mist around to add to the drama. anywayz. it was worth the effort and distance that we covered.

as we started to leave, it started to rain heavily, got drenched (again) to the core, but this time we were ready with multiple spare clothes in the car. so no issues. had chai at the tapari, and moved back, as it was raining heavily, and didnt know how far the chalkewadi farms are there, the windmills were visible from here, but you cant really gauge the distance. the route back was more awesome with more hills in the front and sajjangadh in full view. we again stopped at multiple places to click photos.

reached satara by 4.30 sumthng, bought kandi-pedha from the shops around bus-stand, and started the return journey to pune. the route feels a bit a shorter than while coming, maybe cause of the ghat , which you dont have to cross while going back, a tunnel cuts the route short. remember while climbing it was one way. as while returning you come via different route. which merges to the main road somewhere further. had masala-dosa n tea at kamat. and was in city by 8 sumthng. it was a aaram se covered trip with no regrets.

parting shot , for you guys to get inspired :)

Kaas - Bamnoli Oct 2011

after a long long prodding (by u know who...) finally planned to visit kaas. didnt had many expectations, cause of the crowd ofcourse. did the smart thing by planning to visit the place on weekday. friday it was. planned to stay one nite and visit the nearby places at my own pace rather than hurrying up unnecessarily and end up home at unearthly hours.

so woke up to a bright sunny friday morning at about 7 am, and was on road by 8ish. was kinda sore with day's outing at lonavla with office group. but was feeling okay with dont know what to expect. had breakfast on bangalore highway post crossing the tunnel. some dumb place, dont remember the name or exact location. the crowd on highway was as usual idiotic pune crowd, with people on foot running across the highway careless about the blazing horns and cussing drivers.

ghat on the way was the worst that i had came across(not that ive seen a lot), with one way traffic and speed of vehicles in reversely proportional to its size, with huge trucks not moving at all, cars in first gear only and two-wheelers raring to get the top spot. it was fun nevertheless. u have to feel the heat once to become a seasoned driver :)

satara comes in a whizz, maybe 2 hours from pune, dont need to ask anybody any directions. entered the city and searched for a hotel to stay for the nite, got one , and came out freshened up. turn from the eiffel tower wala chock is kinda tricky, made famous last week by our very own mr.amir khan. took a wrong turn there, went ahead, asked directions, turned and was on way correctly this time to kaas pathar.

post satara the route is as beautiful as it can get, all the way to kaas and beyond. had heard that we had to park the vehicles much before the actual place and from there some bus will get us there, but thanks to my own good thinking (on a friday remember :), we were able to take our car till wherever we wanted, park it wherever we wanted, and take snaps the way we wanted :) very few people around, could just imagine what the situation will be on a sat/sun. as i had thought, the place was a let down. yeah the place had flowers all around, wild ones, white, purples, blues, and dont know what. not sure if we were a bit late in visiting the place or was it just really boring and hyped.

anyways, clicked few more snaps like these and went straight to bamnoli, the so called mini-kasmir of this side. the ride to this place is the one to go for. screw kaas, and just head to bamnoli in rainy season. its really worth the pain and the distance. the lake is surrounded by green colored hills all around. had a boat ride till the sangam of 3 rivers(forgot the names), now, a word of caution for all boat ride lovers, get into it only if u can survive the ears shattering and mind numbing dhad dhad of the boat engine. i cudnt bear it any longer and wanted to jump out of the boat in middle of the sangam :)

headed back towards kaas, and had another round of snaps at the plateau. a bit longer session than what we had in the afternoon. by the time we started back to satara, the darkness was falling in the valley. midway, it started drizzling and in few minutes, torrential downpour started. and i started driving ram-bharose. pitch dark, ghat road, the downpour, and just pure instinct about being on the correct route back :) thats what i call ram-bharose driving.

by the time we entered satara city, the rain was left behind in the valley sumwhere and the city was dry as hell. came back to the hotel, freshened up, went out for dinner. came back and slept. so much fun for a day.

parting thought, i mean shot.