Rappelling @Raigad

  

First time went to Raigad in July 2010 with Vishal and Santosh. At that time only decided that we will be doing rappelling at Takmak tok (Daredevil Cliff) at least once. Later this resolve faded in daily jobs and tasks. However, Dad’s colleague, Ashok Tamhore gave me a chance to join their Pinnacle club’s annual event for rappelling down Takmak Tok at Raigad. Though I decided to enroll, I couldn’t inform (because of short notice time) Vishal and Santosh and I had to go alone with other guys enrolled.

We started on 22^nd night. We all have to meet at Mumbai Central Bus Station at 23:30 pm, from where we were having a reserved semi-luxury bus to Raigad base village (Pachad). We reached Pachad in morning@5:40 am. Though I was anticipating a cold weather at Pachad, the weather was surprisingly warm with cool breeze. After having our morning tea we all guys started our journey to fort at 6:15 am. Me along with my new friends Shubhankar, Harshal and Pawar dada (Pinnacle Member) were leading the team. However after 2/3^rd of distance covered we three friends were the last ones. This was not because of ‘panting’ or ‘fatigue’, but the sole reason was that we got engaged and engrossed in enjoying morning scenery and capturing it with our Cameras. On the way we founded a carcass of green snake (Pine Snake as per Shubhankar) and we did a photo session with it too. The climb was very easy except the last stage where we had to climb steps (1460 in number and uneven in height!!!). We reached the main fort  at 8:25 am and  the breakfast was waiting for us. After having breakfast we were told that we will be doing rappelling in second half as we are late and seats are full. Harshal however managed to get his number in the first half itself.

We fifteen guys and girls rested for some time and gathered again at 9:30 for ‘Fort Sight Seeing’. The guide was arranged by Pinnacle Club and he shared the history lividly and lively and at times made me emotional. Last time (July 2010), we did not took guide, but this time with the guide experiencing the history was fun. I would suggest everyone visiting historical places to get the information from professional guides as they help us in clearing the history. The fort seeing started at ‘Queens Palace’ and ended at ‘Jagdeeshwara Temple.’ It took 2 hours for us to complete the task. Three of us guys went further to see ‘Bhawani Tok’ the extreme part of Raigad in Southern direction which is 3 kms away. I skipped to join them as it would be 6 km walk to and fro (Lazy me!!!). The fort still mesmerizes the onlooker with its magnificence. One can only imagine how this was constructed 350 years back. Its really amazing, especially the acoustics in “Diwan-e-aam” (Nagaar Khana). Fort still makes us think of the visionary of Shivaji and makes everyone bow in awe in front of the statues installed there. Hats off to the dedicated architect and his Great Master.

Came back at 11:30 am, had a bath in cold water and lunch. Meanwhile Harshal came back and said that the experience was Very Amazing. After lunch we were ready for that amazing experience and were waiting to experience it ourselves. Luckily I was given the first number in post lunch session and Shubhankar was after me. This meant that we will be having time in evening for our getting snaps of sunset at Heerkani Bastion.

Went to Takmak Tok for rappelling, Shinde Kaka prepared me for the feat by securing me with Harness and other security equipment. There were some reporters waiting to do rappelling, but I was given preference as I was going to carry the Tiffin boxes for Pinnacle Volunteers at top, intermediate and bottom ledges.

I started off with the cry “” Ganpati Bappa Morya” .Though I was secured with all best in class security equipments, there was still a person in me fearing. It’s terrific when you are on a cliff of 1000+ feet deep, and only on support of a rope. If there’s a slightest of mistake and you fall down, no need fo cremation, as there would be hardly any body left. There’s always a pessimist hidden in our mind thinking that, what will happen if the rope breaks or equipment fails? Especially when the cliff is famous for punishments of execution. I had heard stories that the person who were thrown from there are seen sometimes near cliff asking you to save them. With these all thoughts in my mind, I looked down and at one moment thought, “Bhad me jaaye rappelling. Let’s be safe.”  But the optimist in me consoled and composed me. It said to me to have trust and confidence, not only on myself but more on the Pinnacle Volunteers who were helping and guiding us with their 23 years of experience. After all this was the thing the trekker in me was craving for. If I had missed this, I would have never forgiven myself.

Started off the rappelling, occasionally looking down, often trying to not. I was feeling a little uneasy because of gloves, they were new and tight, restricting my fingers movement. With all these fight, I completed the first stage of 300 feet. Here Manisha of Pinnacle asked me my name. I said Naresh, but my voice was a mixture of excitement, fear, nervousness. I paused for a moment and looked up at cliff and I was filled with awe. It was hard to believe that I had descended from this cliff with help of little rope!!!

The tiffins for first stage were delivered and I was prepared for 2^nd stage of 700 feet. I was supposed to stop in middle and the tiffins of two guys were going to be taken. To ease the exercise, and seeing my novice, one uncle from pinnacle, helped in fixing the lunchbox in such a way that I will not be required to stop and the lunch box can be removed easily, instead of opening the complete sack.

The first stage was a straight cliff with height 300 feet and projectile of 85-90 degrees. The second stage of 700 feet was more difficult with greater height, uneven rocks and overhang (‘C’ shaped curve). But the exposure of first stage gave me a confidence to negotiate this long track. I completed it and completed the rappelling exercise without meeting any ghosts! It was fun. It was amazing. It was awesome. It was Splendid, astonishing, incredible and many more…

I had to wait some time as the guys at bottom ledge had their lunch (4:00 pm). Meanwhile Shubhankar and Prateek also came down. We started our return journey to Raigad. The journey was strenuous as we had to again climb the 1460 stairs. But this gloominess was overcome easily once we saw the Takmak Tok and feat we have achieved some time back.

Came back to fort and after resting for some time went to Heerkani Buruj to have some snaps of setting sun. Though did not get the one which I was expecting as the sky was cloudy and environment foggy. Came back at 6:30 pm and had a chat with Harshal and Shubhankar on history. Shubhankar later termed it as babble. In the night had dinner of Chhole Puri, Kadi, Pulav and Gajar ka halwa. Gajar ka halwa reminded me of old Hindi Movies where mother of Hero prepares it and serves it to her son who is first class first in BA. Dinner was splendid and tasty, rarely can anyone find in such camps. A campfire was organized, but everyone was occupied with sleep and went to sleep in the MTDC dormitory.

Woke up in morning at 5: 30 am and ran to get pics of rising sun. Got some good snaps after waiting for 1 hr. Came back, had breakfast and started for our return journey to home.

In all the experience was a good one and definitely repeatable.

PS:1) I finished Chetan Bhagat’s Revolution 2020.

2) Shubhankar has shared the pics with me and they are very nice. He is a good photographer.

3) Thanks to Pinnacle club members for conducting this trek safely, securely and successfully. Hats Off to Pinnacle too. Especially, Tamhore Kaka for providing a delicious breakfast, lunch and dinner in super timely manner.

THE ITIL BABBLE

My new company, an American MNC in Financial services decided to switch to ITIL. Well ITIL is abbreviation of Information Technology Infrastructure          Library. It contains a library or collection of books for IT practitioners which enables the IT department to provide IT necessities of modern Companies such as workstations, servers, network devices, phones, printers, faxes, etc as a service.

The plus point from user’s view is that they get a quick service from IT guys, which can be measured in terms of response time. For the company, it gives advantages in terms of maximum uptime, optimum use of network links, maintenance of and tracking of company inventories in professional manner, etc.

Done with the advantages of ITIL, let us know how it works. As per the ITIL booklets and other sources, it is a common sense based solutions which enables us to make simple processes so that in an event of any eventuality, the processes are to be followed and impact minimized. SO ITIL uses common sense to make processes to resolve the issue. Incidentally, “Common sense is not so common.”

Does ITIL makes any difference? It surely does. Hordes and hordes of companies are switching to ITIL framework and they are getting immensely benefitted from it. They were able to track their inventories, maintain uptime with Telco and WAN vendors in terms of SLA, determine size of IT team so that the Time to respond is minimum, yet no lost of human resources. It also helps companies to make a list of issues previously happened, so that the next time it re-occurs, they could quickly get on it and resolve it. And more so over, the processes are made proactively, to see that if any issues occur, they should not impact the end users.

Still, there is something which is lagging in ITIL. What is it?

ITIL lacks the human aspect of technology. We have made the processes so much complicated that the complete IT department is made a mechanical machine, which is bound to follow the process for its efficient working. An imaginary machine which chews end user issues as its food and excrete the output, the resolution. The excretion by=products include reports like outage report, incident report, SLA reports and many more. That’s simple to be heard of, but the problem is the machines internal working at times become so complicated that it is bound to create friction. Every person, who is the part of the machines thought as if he is a mechanical part, and is ordered/ expected to do his art with utmost rhythmic sincerity. eg: “There’s a fiber cut in an area and the ETA is 5 hours. Though the ETA is known the service desk associate needs to follow up every 30 minutes for the status” The reason is, that’s the process defined and we need to follow it. Where’s the commonsense mate?

To the engineer, he cannot expand his horizons of knowledge, because knowing too many things will be risky. We are more prone to give the engineer the ‘know-wants’ (know only that much by which you can fulfill your job).  We are ignoring their needs of ‘know-why’s’ and ‘know-how’s’.  The aspirations of future technology leaders are curbed with complex ITIL jargons like demand management, service management and so on. The modern engineer resembles a zombie. ITIL library was started with a noble view of applying common sense techniques to otherwise complex technology. What we have made it is a complex interwoven noose of technology and management which is difficult to understand just like a girlfriend. Sometimes simple and sometimes it baffles you. Everyone working in ITIL framework is more concerned about maintaining their SLA and OLA and it have lost their essence of human touch. Let me quote an example here. Suppose in a medium office (users<500), an outage happens and the cause of outage is unknown. Say, users are experiencing slowness while accesing some applications on network, local LAN. What happens as a process. Users communicate to the service desk/support desk that they are facing an issue. As more and more users report a same issue, service desk depending on a mathematical formula (which consists of total number of users present, users affected, their role etc) converts the ticket in to an Outage. As the source of the outage is unknown, the issue is escalated to all the tems and a conference brige is opened. All the Technology Units (TU’s) are supposed to join the bridge. Ideally what should happen is that all should work together to work for resolving the issue. But what happens is each TU will check the performance of its device and update the incident manager that they are green and issue might be probably because of other TU. This is simply because they need to maintain their OLA and SLA targets. Most of the times, the issue gets resolved with no one owning responsibility and there is no RCA.

The point I want to raise is that we are transforming ourselves into mechanical robots and tearing the very essence of human qualities like logical reasoning, teamwork, co-operation, collective working and common sense.

Ironically the ITIL was started to apply common sense processes to resolve the issues!!!

Happy Reading….

EVERYTHING IS RELATIVE.

More than a hundred and six years ago a genius called Einstein gave world the theory of relativity (1905, the year in which Einstein proposed the theory of special relativity). The theory revolutionize the experiments & research in physics on one hand, while on the other hand, the theory gave explanation to major unanswered questions in astrophysics like neutron stars, black holes, gravitational waves, etc.

          The relativity theory literally replaced the Newton’s concept of motion, stating that all motion is relative!!! It stripped time of the authority/property to be uniform & absolute. Time was now dependent on velocity and time contraction was a new property attributed to time provided, the speed is appropriate.

                   The postulates of the theory of relativity says that :1)  The laws of physics are the same for all observers in uniform motion relative to each other  (Principle of relativity.)
2) The speed of light in a vacuum is same for all observers regardless of their relative motion or the motion of source of lights.

There were many surprising consequences of the theory. Some which we are going to discuss here are:
a)    Light Contraction: Objects are measured to be shortened in the direction that they are moving w.r.t observer i.e. A same object may appear of different shape (length) to one stationary observer, while other observer in motion thinks it is longer.
b)    Relativity of Simultaneity: Two events simultaneous for one observer may not be simultaneous for another observer, if the observers are in relative. 

         As a reader you must be thinking that why I am telling you all these things, these things one can easily get on Wikipedia or net. My purpose of writing this was to make you little prepared for the topic we are going to discuss now.

Long before Einstein proposed his theory we as human beings were practicing one of the applied components of the theory. We have developed a relativity of comparativeness. We as human beings , always try to relate the things which are not with us and compare ourselves with the ones who are having that things. If my neighbors buy a 32 inches LED TV, I will instantly compare my 21 inches color TV with the LED and start relating myself with the virtual LED TV. I will visualize stating how fun it would be watching my favorite movies in that TV. I will start working hard so that I can afford that TV. We are so much obsessed with the comparison that we are never contented with things we have. We always crave for more and more, first in quality and then in quantity. This tendency of human beings is the main reason for progress of our race and at the same time, the miseries we are facing.

 Consider another example, there was a layman who migrated from village in search of job and started working as an unskilled worker. He was having a son, who was smart enough to complete his studies and joins the same company as of his father, but as a skilled worker. Comparatively the son is more successful than his father and you will agree to this.

There’s an another family of two business tycoons who inherit the wealth from their father and decide to split citing the differences with each taking companies of his choice. They run their family business independently with each controlling some core industries. After some years, the younger brother earns Rs. 300 crore per year, whereas the elder brother earns Rs. 1000 crore. Who’s the successful of the two brothers? Now let’s compare the second brother with layman’s son. It will be foolish to say that the business tycoon is winner because in that case we will be only comparing them on basis of their assets.

The habit of relating and comparison starts from the childhood, in the form of our school marks. The competition to score higher marks has subdued our joy of learning. The endless race for materialistic things are stolen the satisfaction of working. This race is often ridiculed as rat race. We run for imaginary happiness. I think that a phone will make me happy; I work for buying a phone. But after buying a phone, I start thinking that a phone with features like mp3 player, good camera, java platform should be bought and it will suffice me. I again start working to get that. I keep changing phones to satisfy myself and still I am unsatisfied somewhere.

This chase of the mirage continues and I end up my life in chasing the materialistic needs. We have made our world a battle ground and are fighting against each other.

Stopping here as I guess I am drifting from my topic.

Thanks and Happy Reading.

Physics and Philosophy

“A system will tend to move from a state of high orderliness to state of disorderliness in absence of force”

This was a statement in one of reference book of our graduation course. The immediate thought which came to my mind was that there is so much co-relation to molecules of matter and humans.  A group of people also tend to move from orderliness to chaos if it is not acted by a force. The force might be from inside as a leader who guides them or chieftain or a government which imposes certain set of rules on them through constitution or perhaps a religious authority which decides the behavior of person through the customs and traditions. Ironically, in every society Civil or Military, democratic or authoratian, capitalist or socialist; there exists a group of people who always crimp of happenings around themthen there are some people who stand in support of the system. The stability of the system depends on the the number of people on each side. If number of people at anyside switches drastically, there happens to be change through revolt, unrest or coup. The reason for the unrest might be support and aid from outer nations/societies. The example to quote here will be discontent in countries like Libya, Egypt, Syria in recent past.

Lets compare this to a open system (Thermodynamic term) of beaker filled with water. Initially, the beaker is at rest and water molecules are bounded by internal forces of attraction and they cannot change their state. Now we heat this beaker and water starts boiling and water gets converted to steam. The water molecules get energy to break the molecular forces by the heat provided. Incidentally, here too the help to molecules is provided by external forces. J

This is the most wonderful and interesting part of physics. It is not only the most important of basic sciences with wide branches as Mechanics, thermodynamics, electronics, electrodynamics, electrostatics, relativity and many more. The example quoted above is just from one part of physics i.e. thermodynamics. If we co-relate every aspect of physics with philosophy we will surely find something interesting to deal with human behavior. Laws and theories proved in Physics can be applied to molecules and living beings alike.

Let me prove this with one more example.

Lets consider the principle of inertia which is one of a basic building block of Newton’s law of motion. “Inertia is tendency of a body by which a body tends to oppose any change in its state of uniform rest or motion”

Inertia is a property possessed not only by non-living things but also by all the living beings. Lets take the example of human mind. There is a good saying which states that,”Human beings do not change when they are provided options, but they do change only when they donot have any option left” People everywhere always have a tendency to resists change. Whether this be a change in ageold customs or traditions, adopting a new technology or else in the simplest form changing their daily habits. With all the daily routine they get themselves in their groove and enjoy the warmth. They will never try to do anything out of the box apart from their daily schedule. It applies to all of us; you, me and everyone.

Hope this will clear my argument that physics is not only a science subject, but also a subject of humanities. Need to discuss more things like Newton’s three laws, Relativity, Electrodynamics and many more things, but some other day or else this discussion will never end.

Ending this discussion on a humorous note. Analogy to Newton’s law of gravity which states that; “Every body attracts other body with a force which is directly proportional to their masses and inversely proportional to the square of distance between them”

Similarly there is a law of attraction towards girls,

“Every boy gets attracted to a girl by a force which is directly proportional to her beauty and inversely proportional to the square of strength of her father and brother”

Hope you enjoyed reading this as much I enjoyed writing.

Humour : Difference between North Indian and South Indian wives

Found an interesting post on Net. Sharing with you....

Wives from North:
1. At the time of marriage, a north Indian girl has more boyfriends than her age.
2. Before marriage, she looks almost like a bollywood heroine and after marriage you have to go around her twice to completely hug her.
3. By the time she professes her undevoted love to you, you are bankrupt because of the number of times you had to take her out to movie theatres and restaurants. And you wait longingly for her dowry.
4. The only dishes she can think of to cook is paneer butter masala, aloo sabji, aloo gobi sabji, aloo matar, aloo paneer, that after eating all those paneer and aloos you are either in the bed with chronic cholestrol or chronic gas disorder.
5. The only growth that you see later in your career is the rise in your monthly phone bill.
6. You are blinded by her love that you think that she is a blonde. Only later do you come to know that it is because of the mehandhi that she applies to cover her gray hair.
7. When you come home from office she is very busy watching "Kyonki saas bhi kabi bahu thi" that you either end up eating outside or cooking yourself.
8. You are a very "ESpecial" person to her.
9. She always thought that Madras is a state and covers the whole of south India until she met you.
10. When she says she is going to "work out" she means she is going to "Walk out"
11. She has greater number of relatives than the number of people you have in your home town.
12. The only two sentences in English that she knows are "Thank you" and "How are you"
13. She thinks Govinda can dance better than Michael Jackson.

Wives from South:

1. Her mother looks down at you because you didn't study in IIT or Madras or Anna University .
2. Her father starts or ends every conversation with " ... I say..."
3. She shudders if you use four letter words.
4. She has long hair, neatly oiled and braided (The Dubai based Oil Well Company will negotiate with her on a 25 year contract to extract coconut oil from her hair.)
5. She uses the word 'Super' as her only superlative.
6. Her name is another name for a Goddess or a flower.
7. Her first name is longer than your first name, middle name and surname combined (unless you are from Andhra)
8. When she mixes milk - curd and rice you are never sure whether it is for the Dog or for herself.
9. For weddings, she sports a mini jasmine garden on her head and wears silk saris in the Madras heat without looking too uncomfortable while you are melting in your singlet.
10. She thinks Mohan Lal is the sexiest man alive.
11. Her favourite cricketer is Krishnamachari Srikkanth.
12. Her favourite food is dosa though she has tried North Indian snacks like Chats (pronounced like the slang for 'conversation')
13. She bursts into songs with her cousins in every movie.
14. She bores you by telling you which raaga each song you hear is based on.
15. You have to give her jewellery, though she has already got plenty of it.
16. Her thali (Mangal Sutra) weighs more than the championship belts worn by WWF wrestlers.
17. She is more educated than you.
18. Her father thinks she is much smarter than you.

Harishchandragad...

Prologue: I was in my 10^th standard and a child, both in terms of age, maturity and trekking. Had completed 3 treks only; to Mahuli, Rajgad and Shivneri. Heard a news at one such trek that a doctor, in his 20’scommited suicide at Konkan Kada, Harishchandragad. The reason after 6 unsuccessful attempts to descend from Konkan Kada, he decided to end his life in Kada’s vicinity. I was unable to understand, why this Konkan Kada is ‘Aparajit’ or insurmountable to get down, but it definitely made an impression on my mind. After my 10^th standard, I moved out of Kalyan and missed further opportunities of trekking.

The Trek: After completing my formal education & settling down in career, the trekking bug started buzzing in my mind. Started off with Raigad, which was very easy. One day my friend from Dombivali called up and said that his group is planning to go to Harishchandragad the Christmas weekend (25 and 26 December 2010) and asked me if I am interested. My instant reply was yes, I will. I was very excited about the idea and at the same time was nervous, with doubts about my physical fitness, especially after reading some blogs on net. With my friend Vaibhav’s help a lot of preparation work started. It mainly consisted of shopping of things like backpack, trekking suit and many more things. I was still not believing that I am going for treks after a period of 10 years and that too Harishchandragad. On the night of 25^th December, I was busy partying on occasion of Christmas; Vaibhav called me and updated me that the plan has changed and now its 26-27 December (Sunday Monday). The reason behind this, he expected a huge crowd of trekkers up and it will be problem for sleeping. I don’t had any problem as I was expecting to have my night shift on Monday, but that definitely meant that I would have to wait for one more day to be on top of Konkan Kada. I said OK, but somewhere in my mind, I was thinking, that whether we will go or not. The next day I called Vaibhav and our plan was fixed. The outline was to meet at Dombivali at 9:00 am, go to Khubi/Khiravare village by a prebooked Xylo by 12:30 pm, reach the top of Harishchandragad by evening, go to Konkan Kada for Sunset view, stay in the caves overnight, get up in the morning, revisit Konkan Kada for sunrise, move to Taramati, have lunch and get down, reach Khubi village by 5:30-6:00pm in the evening and get back to home by ST bus. All the eatables were already bought and we were set to go.

26^th December, Sunday, I woke up 6: 00 am in the morning and started off for Dombivali. I called up Vaibhav, who picked me up from Dombivali station. I was expecting 6-7 people as a Xylo was booked, but I was shocked to hear that only 3 guys. Myself Vaibhav and Vaibhav’s friend, Prabodh. Vaibhav’s packing was still pending and I helped him to do that. The items which we got from Vaibhav’s place  were boiled potatoes, 2 big utensils, ¼ kg sugar, tea powder, milk powder, 3 loafs of bread and many more things to eat. I put some of the things in to my bag, including the utensils. We moved from Vaibhav's house and I was hearing a tak-tak sound from my bag, initially I thought it was of the utensils, but later I realized that I am losing grip of my bag. As soon as we reached Prabodh’s house (10 am), I checked my bag and noticed that the stitches are getting loose. It was my new bag and I was felt like being cheated. Being superstitious, I considered it as a warning of not continuing the trek. Still with optimism filled, I decided to move ahead and consider this as weakness of bag. We helped Prabodh to pack his bag and it was 11am by now. We were still waiting for the Xylo. After 4 phone calls, the cab came and we were moving out of Dombivali by 12:30 pm, after repairing my bag. The driver was irritating and his driving style was more irritating. All over the journey of 100 kms, he never crossed 60 kms/hr on speedometer. Even vehicles like M80 and Maruti 800 were overtaking us. The only vehicles which were unable to move ahead of us were bullock-carts and cycles. The result, we reached Malshej Ghat by 2:00 pm. Evn after this pathetic driving the guy was reluctant to drop us at Khiravare and was insisting us to get down at Khubi Phata. The excuse for this was, he is not carting his Stephaney with him and the road is kachhi sadak. Prabodh literally reprimanded the guy to drop us at Khiravare. The plus point of this was that we were able to get some really good snaps on the road. Finally we were at the base of Harishchandragad. After tying the carpet and utensil to the bag, we started our trek. Time was 3:30 pm and the sun was harsh. We were walking for a distance of 8-10 minutes and then taking a break for 5 minutes. The reason of break was different every time. No one was ready to accept that he is tired. The breaks were for taking photos, tying shoelaces, changing bags, drinking water, looking at the scenery, giving way to the trekkers who were going home, etc. Enroute, we saw many fellow trekkers going down. They were in groups of 10-15. We were happy that our decision to postpone the trek was good. The path was difficult and changing everytime, sometimes a pagdandi, sometimes through bushes, and mostly rocky. It was the road the rain water has made for itself, and hence was very rough. Only Prabodh was the one experienced one amongst us and hence he was bugged by my question every time, ‘kitni door hai?’ and he used to reply in percentages, 5% covered, 10% covered, and so on. The trekkers coming don were more generous and their reply was ‘you have almost reached…’ with a smile on their face. Somehow by 6 pm we have reached Tolar khind and there we were surprised to see a small makeshift hotel. We had lemonade there and believe me, it was the tastiest drink I ever had. There we met fellow trekkers from Pune, who updated us that since last two days, there was a huge crowd gathered there up and even thefts of things like shoes, cameras have occurred, and advised us to be careful. They also updated us that there was a group up, who is in complete Party mood and has created havoc up. Their daily activities included drinking, singing, dancing, etc. After Tolarkhind, there is a rock phase, which is a steep climb of 60 ft and we decided to clear before sunset. We moved quickly after having a break of 30 minutes and a photo session at Tolar khind. The rock phase was interesting, especially because it gave a beautiful view of the surrounding mountain ranges and the Pimpalgaon dam. After the rock phase, Prabodh told us that now there are two ways of going to the top, one regular, by crossing 7 hills and the other lesser known, in which we will be having a tough climb initially, but will be reaching the temple 45-50 minutes earlier. To save time we decide to go by the lesser known path. This was the second mistake which we did, the first being, carrying too much things to eat. Prabodh was unaware of the way whereas me and Vaibhav were first timers.  So, it was a trial and error road for us and we were searching for the road every time. After every 20 minutes walk, we were lost and were searching for road, unable to find road or way ahead, we used to turn back at the nearest junction and then looking for a new way out. The cycle continued for at least 5 times and after having a small discussion, we decided to go back and take the regular route. By the time we reached the rock phase, it was 10 pm and we decided to have our dinner and stay for night there itself, get up early morning and start on the regular route and reached the Harishchandragad temple early morning and go at Konkan kada for sunrise. We stayed in a makeshift hotel, which was like a hut with no walls. After having our sumptuous meal of boiled potatoes, pickle, bhakris, apples, we slept. The winds were blowing very fast and the air was also cool. Thanks to the lantern we were carrying, there was a source of light. The temperature was around 7-8 centigrade and we lit a fire in the chulha of the hotel. Earlier it was decided that one of us will be awake and be a sentry, but later, all of us decided to sleep. The next day’s plan was as to wake up at 4:30 am, get ready to move by 5: 00 am and start the remaining part of journey, so that we will be at Konkan kada for sunrise. We woke up and started our journey on time. There were 7hills to be crossed. The air was cool and climate was pleasing. We were enjoying the weather and were not feeling tired. After crossing the third hill within 30 minutes, we again lost our way. We were unable to find our right path and as per our guide Prabodh, he instructed us to keep left and walk, and we were doing so. This time we were o the right path within 1:30 hrs and did a lot of obstacle crossing, to do so. We crossed water bodies, made our own way through the bushes and wild plants. Finally we were on right path, but the sun has already risen. The other thing which happened was my bags belt once again came off and I have to tie it and treat my bag very delicately. Finally, at around 8: 30 am we reached the Harishchandragad temple and were greeted by some foreign and Indian trekkers who had just woke up. We secured our luggage, got fresh and immediately moved to Konkan Kada. The way to Konkan kada was comparatively easy, with no ups and downs, just plain rocks to walk on. It took 35-40 minutes to reach on the top of Konkan Kada. After looking down, and sides of the Kada, I was spell bound by its beauty and the word which came of my mouth were, “Aaicha gho, kay aahe hey?” A cliff going 3000 ft down (2000 straight and 1000 slant), 1700 meters in length, that too in C-shape. This was one f the best things I had ever seen and I was staring at it for approximately 25-30 minutes. All the adjectives like marvelous, awesome, amazing, mind-blowing, will be short t describe the enormous beauty of the Konkan kada. For nearly half an hour, I was lying down and enjoying nature’s beauty, enjoying breeze, sun and birds. My mind was just willing to stay there and keep only looking at the place. A small thought crept in to my mind, suppose, an earthquake comes or a land slide happens at the place where I am laying down, what will happen? It made my hairs stand up. But the beauty of Mother Nature removed this though and I was again looking for birds, wind and cliff. It’s not an experience, which cannot be written down, typed on a keyboard, nor can it be explained to anybody as the words fell short. Somethings in life are to be experienced by ourselves like clearing a critical exam, passing in the interview of the job of your choice, the thrill to ride the bike at 90+ speed on a chilly winter night and experiencing your fingers getting freeze, your first kiss to your girlfriend and enjoying the scenic view at Konkan kada. Everything is magnificent there. Vaibhav and Prabodh were also enchanted and experiencing the same feeling. We can see Taramati, Rohidas and adjacent mountain peaks from there. To save time we decided to skip Taramati. I was really feeling sad of missing the sunset and sunrise at Konkan Kada. We had a quick photo session here and moved back to the Mandir at 12:30 pm.  There we had our lunch which consisted of different types of sandwiches like achaar sandwich, kakdi sandwich, normal sandwich and many more variations. We decided not to make magi or khichdi, so as to save time. We had a chat there with other group and came to know that these are the guys who came from Sangamner every year on 24^th December with a view of Picnic. This was the same group, which we had heard of creating nuisance here. They were packing up and in process of leaving. We were shocked to see their baggage which included small inverter, stove, big utensils, etc.                After having our lunch, we moved on and started our home journey. The time was 2:00 pm. I was on the lead. On our way back, we decided to follow the arrows which are made on rocks to show ways. However after walking 20 minutes, we again lost, we were unable to find out our way in the rocks. After meandering for 25 minutes, we came to know that the path, we had initially chosen was the correct one and laughed at our stupidity. Vaibhav was going to lead us from now onwards as we have already lost twice under Prabodh and my guidance. The home journey was simple, except the rock phase, which took more time. It’s easy to climb, but difficult to descend and we were experiencing the same. When we were negotiating the final rocks, an old man of 65+ years came from back, he was a local villager. He went down comfortably, without any support and that shocked us. Apart from that, what he told us was to “Be Careful, else we will fall down the cliff!!” The whole concept of trekking was shaken in my mind and I completed the remaining part with that shock. By 6 pm we were at Khiravare and were planning to get fresh by having some tea and snacks.  There was a tractor transporting sand, towards highway and we decided to ask for lift. We had to choose between a cup of tea and 1hr walking. Tea lost. The tractor guy gave us a lift free of cost till the school, which was halfway. We completed remaining two kilometer by walk. We reached Khubi village. After reaching the highway, we observed that not even a single ST is willing to stop and take us, even though they are going empty. We got lift in a truck who dropped us at murbad. We reached Murbad at 9 pm. The next bus for Kalyan was at 10 pm. In the bus I sat in the seat just behind the driver. I closed my eyes and decided to have a nap. The road was of Ghat turns and when the bus turned, in my mind I was at Konkan kada, having a ride in rollercoaster along its curve. My dream was incomplete as bus reached Kalyan. Time was 11 pm. caught the 11:37 pm Dadar slow local from Kalyan. Prabodh and Vaibhav left at Dombivali. I reached my room at Malad at 1:30 pm. Had a nice bath and slept. Next day the same old routine life was to be started with morning shift.    

            Epilogue: I completed my dream trek. Harishchandragad is worth going again and again. The beauty at Konkan Kada and Harishchandragad is mesmerizing. Now planning to go to Harishchandragad in rainy season. Meanwhile, I have started googling for institutes who organize rappelling camps at Harishchandragad. If you know any, please let me know.


           PS: Adding some photos