Vasota : At the heart of the jungle

Koyananagar : Maharashtra’s best kept secret

Last year after our trip to tamhini ghat , we were really worried as we have seen thousands of people flocking every single waterfall in 90km long tamhini ghat . Idiots equipped with plastic, alcohol bottles  had literally hijacked the tamhini ghat and its beauty. This got ardent nature , peace and trek lovers thinking if there are any peaceful jungles left in Maharashtra where we can stay away from the citizens of “Bhavda” republic , people who wear brightest color clothes / embroidered jeans   , shirt but without buttons , glittering goggles , stand in front of the waterfall  with “click me I am sharukh khan(king of bhavdas)” expressions. ...for more specifications on bhavda republic , feel free to contact ….so we were worried …. Fortunately we got to know about koyana reserve forest , the most beautiful evergreen forest in Maharashtra.

Backwaters of koyana hydro power project have kept this evergreen forest alive and secluded from cities. Blue waters of koyana span across 50km length and is the only means of travel in and out of the jungle. Our last trek to koyana forest was one of the most memorable one , we stayed in a small jungle village near the reservoir , had a delicious khichadi and extra dose of gyan from the forest officer kamble , who tried his best to verify if we really are research students from Mumbai university :D …he would point us to any dam tree and ask “what is this” and we would pass our helpless looks to priti (offbeats trek lead )….priti would tell him some biological name and wink at us ….”don’t worry he doesn’t understand English name J” …we travelled deep inside the forest ..along the blue waters of shivsagar reservoir to jungle jaigad , even during months of march it was dam cold inside the forest.

Taking clue from the previous trek , we knew trek to vasota and nageshwar is going to be a special , I dreamed of diving into those blue waters again … photographing green vine snakes and if lucky spotting big cats. Offbeat sahyadri’s (offbeatsahyadri.blogspot.com) trek page mentioned in bold letters “carry enough warm clothes …its really cold up there”…no wonder people bought thermals , jackets , gloves and what not J

I had a company of 5 this time from pune , Vishal and pravin , friends from previous treks joined in with Jitendra , Pavan and Bartakke(12% J) …all of them die hard trekkers …wavelengths matched instantly .

We reached satara at about 2 AM and tried our best to take a power nap :P but failed badly …so finally decided to enjoy hot poha and tea instead at 4AM. Mumbai batch arrived at 5Am and we started towards village Bamnoli in a private bus. Dos and Don’t’s , registrations , permissions , boat bookings and we were finally on boat at 8 …. Boat ride to met indivali , the base village for vasota fort , takes about an hour , water was clean , cold and tempting me for a dive but somehow averted it,a group from mumbai had started singing (shouting would be more appropriate word ) old Marathi songs by then and I felt like throwing them in the water instead  :P …vasota was the priority. Vasota is a very old fort ruled by raja bhoj II (1178) to Marathas (till date J) , also called as Vyagrhagad (vyagrha = Tiger) …and unlike tiger valley in khandala ….this region still has tiger’s presence ...koyana along with chandoli and radhanagari forms the Sahyadri Tiger reserve.

Climb to vasota is easy but tiring jungle walk ..it took about 3-4 hrs for the group to reach the top ..last hour is a steep ascend  . Vasota stands at center with old vasota fort at its left , nageshwar at its right , konkan at its back and blue waters of shivsagar in front. On a clear day one can see dabhol cost line …pavan , who visits this fort very often enhanced my knowledge …hazy climate denied me that view though J   

After some rest and lunch started towards Nageshwar. Most of the route was easy except a connecting ridge between vasota and nageshwar which is totally exposed and dangerous …it took us some time to take the entire group through.

It was 4 PM by the time everyone reached nageshwar …. Priti from her past experience knew that we need to start descend asap and cross the difficult rock patches before it gets dark , so started pushing everyone to get going.

Priti quickly formed the pairs …one experienced trekker and a fresher , she knew descend would be like hell walk for first timers ... mountain face on one side , slippery narrow path and a clear fall on other side was the descend. Akhil , it was his first time and had slipped earlier and dropped his confidence was paired with me , we started at snails speed ..more we descended more confidence he stared gaining …same was the story will all others.

Suddenly I heard someone scream …it was 50+ uncle who was doing it well till now without any support … had slipped …straight into the valley but managed to hold onto a bush …vishal and rajas rushed for help and were able to reach just in time and pull him back ... a small bush managed to stop uncles fall …few cms more and there was a clear drop of about 200ft …. Uncle survived after some minor injuries . Vishal then made sure that he held on to uncles hand till the end of the trek.

This incident scared the freshers even more and speed reduced even more but the experienced supporters kept boosting the morale. Finally after 3-4 hrs of difficult and slow descend we managed to reach a plateau and freshers were more than overjoyed when they heard pavan saying “difficult patch is over now , there are stairs now 600-700 of them  and then a small walk to the village choravne”  .

The moon had taken over spreading its beautiful white light but we still had to take the batteries out …few years back a trekker was bitten by a snake on this route so we had to be careful.

Stairs had brought lost confidence back and freshers we now far more comfortable ,  after 2-3 hrs more group reached choravne safely.

Enjoyed hospitality by locals …great food and a late night moon walk in the village before retiring for the day … most of the tired legs had retired long time back … we heard manav shouting “oye priti thandi kaha hai ??? :P” …blast of laughter and yet another trek ended with smile.