Kaurav Kunda, Night Trek

26th Jan, the Day

The day was quite tiring. Woke up at 5am, spent couple of hours at lal bagh, then 20-25kms of cycling, then a cooking session with hiranya and dyut, after our cook betrayed us. Quite a happening day, not exactly what i expected but anyway quite a happening day. After hiranya and dyut left at about 3.30pm, i went to sleep, which i needed badly to survive the night trek. Woke up at around 4.30-4.45. i was in no mood to go, very tired, i wished that the trip would be cancelled. also no message or call from anyone with confirmation of our trip i was almost thinking it would be cancelled. I called up afzal expecting him to be at home, but he was in bus and would reach majestic in 20 minutes. Oh damn so we are really going. I hurried up packed my bag and set out. I was deciding whether to take an auto or bus. It was already past 6pm, and we were supposed to reach there by 6pm. I thought it was not worth to spend 100/- to reach majestic, so i took my chance and boarded a BMTC bus. Reached majestic by 6.45, everyone was waiting at the Vayu vajra station of majestic. We went to the terminal three from there and boarded the KSRTC bus to Chikkabalapur.

The Bus Journey

The bus to Chikkabalapur was interesting in many ways. As soon as the bus started I tried to get some sleep. Saturday night the roads were pretty empty, and also a highway. The bus driver was going pretty fast. I donot remember exactly where, but suddenly the bus driver braked hard.
We were all very shocked and afraid, what happened. He braked so hard, I was afraid some accident happened. Couple of people came into the bus, some argument was going on in kannada. People were actually screaming and shouting at each other. We had no clue of what was going on. We were scared. We noticed the bus was actually on a flyover. After some heated arguments, the bus started moving but it went ahead and descended the flyover and took  a U turn and turned back. We were startled , started thinking what happened, we are not going to chikkabalapur?
After lots of commotion we got to know the real reason.

This was some new highway that was built recently. As a result the KSRTC buses from bangalore would now use this flyover, which was shorter and took much less time. But no one though about the villages that this flyover skips. As a result people from villages below the flyover find it very difficult to go to chikkabalapur. That's why some youths had taken up this job of forcing KSRTC buses not to use the flyover and to go through their villages and help villagers. I must say we were very impressed. The way they forced and were working for their villagers.
We build these flyovers and donot think about what happens to all the bus stops that the flyover will skip? How will they reach  their destination. It was quite a revealing experience.

Chikkabalapur to Kaurav Kunda

After this very interesting experience rest of the bus journey was normal. We reach chikkabalapur and have our dinner with fried rice/veg biriyani/gobi rice etc...
Now its time to start for our destination, kaurav kunda.

Chaitanya Knows the route, he asks some local people on the way, but since it is already late night, no buses are available. We have to walk about 5kms to reach the base. Since no one is sure about the distance, some people say that it is much more than 5kms about 10-15. Fahad takes out his smart phone and uses the gps to find the way through the village to the base.
We start walking in the direction told by a vendor. After walking some distance we find some local guys, we ask them the way to kaurav kunda. They dont seem to recognize it by that name. We tell them we are going for night trek to this place. They seem surprised and ask is it skandagiri? Skandagiri is famous for night treks, but not this place.  Fahad tries his smart phone gps and maanges to find the route to the base of kaurav kunda. Acording to google maps we have to walk 5kms. We all decide its no use asking around for directions, we should trust gps and start walking. After some time villages are not visible, only huge fields can be seen. And we can also see a small hill with two peaks. some people guess that it is the kaurav kunda, as kaurav kunda means two peaks. Walking on a clear full moon night on deserted road was interesting. After walking for an hour or so, we reach the base village. Some people stop us and ask from where are we, what are we doing on such a night. We tell them that we want to visit the temple at kaurav kunda.

The steep climb

The hill was visible from quite a distance and i am always tempted to climb the hill from the most difficult route. Since we were in a group, everyone decided to climb through the stairs till the temple. I hate stairs, i mean why on earth would i walk on stairs to climb a hill, i mean what's the purpose of a trek if you use stairs, anyway in dark we could not find the stairs and everyone started climbing from whatever route was visible.

This is the part that is most interesting. Climbing a hill, i live to climb the hill from whatever route I wish. My motive is not to follow any trail, I try my best to avoid the trail, and there is a phrase in bengali "jedike du chokh jae", which means take whatever route you can see ahead. So i simply start climbing straight up.
Since it is dry weather, lots of thorny bushes are there. This time I am wearing a jeans. So another thing that i have learnt is, a loose fitting jeans is a very good wear on such treks to protect from the thorny bushes. I mean otherwise we would try to avoid thorns and choose a path with less bushes. But not now, i simply walk over the bushes as if they are not there. And i love to do this. After some time i am quite alone on my way up, some people are much behind and some others were trying to find the stairs leading to the temple. I mean what!! why would any one ever ever want to climb a hill using stairs on a trek. After some time they shout out that they have succeeded in finding the stairs, and direct others towards that. Since it is dark we cannot actually see each other, everyone just flashes their torch light to indicate their position. I flash my light to let them know my position, they ask me to come to the stairs, and I am like yes of course. After that I try to go as far away from the stairs as possible. Slowly the rock starts to become much steeper. Now it is tiring and i have to stop to take rest. It is really fun climbing such a steep terrain in dark on a full moon night.

kinds of Trekking

I consider mainly two kinds of treks, one in which your destination is almost visible, you just have to climb up to reach it, and the second where we have to walk/hike for quite some distance before reaching the destination.

The first category are mainly small hills, which take at-most 2-3 hours to reach the top. The second are, trails in western ghats where climbing is less and walking is more.

If your destination is visible, in case of small hills that would be the peak, you will never get lost. Since all you have to do is reach the peak somehow. My favorite part is "somehow". In case of small hills you get the option of exploring, since the chance of getting lost is virtually zero. You climb from wherever you wish. The only thing that varies is difficulty depending on from where you climb it.
The best thing about these small hills is that people consider them easy to climb. because they always try to find the "trail" which is the easiest way to the peak. But after climbing about 5-6 small hills in the past, I believe a trek is as difficult as you want to make it. Even the easiest treks can be made toughest if you  try to climb up through the steepest side. Normally these small hills have climbing options of all gradients. It is up to you, how much challenging are you willing to make the climb.

Join the group & continue climbing

So after some time I reach the temple from left and I meet others who climb up through the stairs. I was surprised to find some people from bangalore had come at this time of the night to visit the temple. I think it must be some famous temple. The people strongly objected to our plan of going to the peak of this hill. They say it is very dangerous, we should not go up and tried to stop us. Anyway we were not going to return back from here.

We sit down at some distance from the temple where the pilgrims cannot disturb us and finish our introduction session. Everyone tells us briefly about their trekking experience. We have 2 first time trekkers. We decide on our leader and sweeper, chaitanya is our leader and viru is the sweeper.
Well now that sweeper and leader are decided you have to be in the group, no more exploring!! Once and twice myself and afzal try to sneak out of the group to some other way, but are caught and viru is now keeping a close watch on us, so that we stay in the group. After some time we reach a flat clearing.
 From here two peaks were visible. So we are not yet at the peak. We go to the top and explore for some time here and there.
The clear night sky is really amazing. I have written a separate blog for my sky watching session.

The Difficult Night

This is the first time I am going to spend an entire night, on the peak of a hill, under the open sky, on a very-very cold and windy night.
Its quite an experience and my confidence was boosted several folds regarding
We reach the peak, find a clearing near the cliff and settle down there. Now the most important thing, camp fire. Thats a must to survive this night. So we start collecting dry twigs and branches to start the camp fire. We get a chance to explore the peak, on the pretext of searching for dry wood. Its really quite an experience, I must tell you. Midnight, full moon, peak of a hill, rocky terrain, lots of thorny bushes and add to it steep cliffs. Simply amazing.

Some of us brought our sleeping bags. You can sleep here under this condition if only only if you have a sleeping bag. So soon we see couple of mummy sleeping bags lying here and there.
Rest who did not bring it, were trying to keep warm near the camp fire. But since we have to spend the entire night the fire has to sustain till early morning. Now sustaining the fire till morning is not an easy task. We need lots and lots of wood to burn to keep it alive. We collect as much branches and twigs we can. Someone takes care of rationing the available dry wood while keeping the fire alive.

Well I try to stay awake, listening to the small talk going on around the camp fire. The strong cold wind makes it very difficult to keep sitting and stay awake. At last I give up and get my sleeping bag and well try to sleep for some time.
I could realize it must have been quite a struggle for others to stay awake. They must be counting each second and waiting badly for the sunrise.

At last we have sunrise, everyone wakes up, some photo session
Every one starts to go for sleep. I was carrying  a sleeping bag, but i wanted to exlpore the place, whole night. I was in no mood to sleep. Myself and ruwise tried to explore some nearby places, it was fun in that pitch dark night. After some time he also joined the others around the fire and we started to spend the time by talking about some silly things.
It was getting difficult to stay away from the fire, it was so cold. On top of that cold wind was blowing, it was impossible to sleep without sleeping bags in this weather. Since many people did not bring sleeping bags, they had to struggle to stay awake. The camp fire was the only hope to survive the cold night. Also it was getting difficult to sustain the camp fire. Enough dry woods were not available at the peak. So 

Lal Bagh Flower Show, 26th Jan

The Saturday was special, 26th Jan. We hate it when we lose a holiday just because its on a weekend. Well anyway I had enough plans to make sure not even a minute of 26th Jan would be wasted

Plan A was early morning lal bagh

Homework, Local Birds

This time i actually prepared myself.
In last 2 months, I had been to 2 bird sanctuaries and even at Kanwa Dam I saw lots of interesting birds. After my experience with birds at Kanwa dam, I decided to learn recognizing at least a few common birds. I started reading the wiki page on "birds in Bangalore", quite a good starting point for a newbie like me. So, my decision of going to Lal Bagh at early morning was pretty much taken to test my new hobby of bird watching.

Homework, Cycle Lighting

One more thing that i did to prepare myself for the early morning trip to Lal Bagh was to assemble the lighting gears for my cycle. I already had the front light, I designed the rear lights also. It took couple of hours to get it ready. Last time I remember I was riding my cycle at 6am I badly needed a front light and a rear light, as it was very dark on main road . I had bought all components needed to make the rear light long long back, but because of my laziness never managed to complete the circuit. But this time I completed it and finally installed the setup on my cycle and went to sleep at 1am.

Early Morning Cycle Ride

Next day morning I woke up by 5am, got ready and called up afzal to make sure he is awake. I was surprised that he was not only awake but washing his clothes at 6am in the morning. I just messaged hiranya, because i was sure he would not be awake and I did not want to disturb him. I started at around 6am, was excited to test out my new lights.
I was not really sure of how much help the rear light would be, but the front light was also not of much help.

Anyway it was much less darker than i thought. At 6am pretty much there was enough lights and my front light was not needed. I knew the route to Lal Bagh pretty well, since that has been the standard meeting point for most of my long cycle rides. The last time i went on a long cycle tour was when mayuresh was in town. I really miss those 100+ cycle rides, but because of lack of company it has stopped for almost 8-9 months now. Anyway I reached lalbagh by 7am. I saw that the entrance was pretty much crowded already. I thought i would park my cycle inside, but a person stopped me, he said I cannot take the cycle inside. i started reasoning with him, what harm can a cycle do. He was persistent that I cannot park my cycle inside. I could not possibly leave my cycle on the main road. I started losing my temper. I thought what the hell, now a days it is a crime to cycle. no respect. they donot even allow you to park your cycle in a botanical garden in our country. He kept saying go to the other gate. Lal bagh has 3-4 gates. I thought he was just saying that to get rid of me. I was very upset and angry, I thought i had done so much preparation and planning, and everything will be spoiled if I cannot park my cycle safely. I realized this man would not budge, no use of arguing with him, I thought lets take a chance and go to the other gate to see, if they allow cycles there. I remembered an article in paper about no parking of cars near lal bagh on flower show days. I started looking out for other alternatives if i cannot park my cycle inside lal bagh. I went around and reached the west gate of lal bagh. This seemed more crowded. Lots of two wheelers parked here and there. I thought i will lock my cycle along with the railing somewhere here. I started looking for a safe spot, and then I saw the cycle parking stand by BMP. It was awesome, I was cursing these people, but they have actually made a separate parking stand for cycles, which had a pretty impressive design. My mood was back to happy mode. I realized I donot have a single penny in my pocket, if there is ticket i have to go to an atm. But soon I saw, from 6am to 9am there are no tickets. this facility is to promote morning walkers. I was really surprised to see the 7am crowd. Lots of people, everyone in their athletic attire, doing stretching exercises/walking/jogging/running etc etc.

The atmosphere was really charged up with freshness, energy and at the same time calm.  It felt great to see the lake and the 7am atmosphere. Well technically 7am is not early morning, but for me it is the earliest that the morning can get. I took couple of pics which could inspire me to come back here on such early morning weekends more often.

 I started to search for some interesting birds. At the corner there was a small water body, separate from the main lake. there i noticed a couple of birds, the indian cormorant, the little egret, and some other birds which i could not recognize. I realized you need a lot of patience to watch birds. I was lucky to spot a kingfisher. It was almost repeating its pattern of flying back and forth between two branches, waiting on that branch for some time, then plunging into the water to pick up something, could not see what, but hopefully a fish. I took some pictures but my cam was not good enough to get a decent pic.

 After some time, afzal,hiranya,dyut and fahad arrived. It was about 8am, so entry was still free and flower show was supposed to start at 9am. were all amused at the "free" entry thing. We started looking around. Lots of stalls were put up, looked like some kind of fair was going on. Everything from home made honey, juicer, bonsai plants books were on sale. We went on top of a huge rock like thing. Monkeyed around on some trees, lots of pics and time pass. After that the photo session started. All kinds of vegetable plants were on display. hiranya got pretty excited and we took a pic of almost everything. People got restless, saying we can go to a sabji mandi and take as much pics of vegetables as we like.

  After taking a photo of almost whatever was on display, everyone else got frustrated. Then we moved on to some stalls by nursery owners. basically they were selling different kinds of beautiful flowers. ah heaven for shutterbugs. we took macro shots of each and every flower, well almost. And then the most amusing thing happened, afzal's battery got expired. We were all like laughing out loud, afzal was clicking so many shots of vegetables and other things, but when the main purpose of visit to lal bagh was clicking the flower show, his battery ran out. So he tried to disturb us from taking so many shots and also people got tired of waiting for us to finish shooting everything. At  last we took a walk around the lake, and dyut pointed out an interesting thing about cormorants, that they actually can go underwater for quite some time, unlike other ducks. After that we left for home.