Now, this is how you end an exciting, eventful day on a high note.. To know how exactly this happened.. just read on..
The series of events started on Saturday, when yours truly and Anup decided to trek to Vairatgad on Sunday.. It was decided that I will be picking up Anup from his abode at 7 am. In the meanwhile, confirmation from Abhijeet Thatte was due. We would be going by ST bus , if he joined us.. else it will be the bike..
We are thankful to Abhi for gracing us with his absence, without which history would have taken a different course.
So, here it beings..
7.15 am. I reach Anups’ place and we head towards Narmadeshwar Amruttulya for breakfast.
8.00 am. We begin our journey towards Vairatgad. We had two options to follow.
1. Take the Pune-Satara highway till Wai. Then reach Vyajwadi, 7 km from Wai.
2. Take Pune-Satara road till Bhor phata. Reach Bhor from there. Then take the road going towards Wai, via Mandhardev ghat.
Being of an adventurous nature, we decided on the second option.
Mandhardev is 25 km from bhor while Wai is another 10 km away.
On our way, we passed by Rohida. The way to Mandhardev is one of the most amazing motorable ghats I have ever seen. The winding road and greenery all around mesmerized us to no end.
We have always held ST buses in high esteem, for their ability to reach even the remotest of all locations.. But our respect grew by quite a few notches, seeing an ST bus climbing this ghat..
Anyways, we reached the top of the ghat, where a road leads to the Mandhardev temple while another one descends towards Wai, which is the one we took.
10.00 am We reached Wai. From there, we took the road going towards Vyajwadi ( the base village ). We parked our bike in the village and asked for directions to the top of the fort.
A villager gave us very simple directions. He said “Draw the English numeral four along the fort top-the ridge-down towards here. Now follow this path in the reverse order and you shall reach the top in no time.”
We did exactly as told.. But as is our wont, we lost track after about 15 mins of climbing. We could see the top of the fort all along, and would have somehow found our way. As we were contemplating on our next move, we saw two village boys coming up towards us.
They said that they saw us going in the wrong direction and had come up from the village to guide us. We are really thankful to Manoj and Dheeraj for helping us out.
They not only led us to the top, but also gave us a guided tour of the entire fort.
There is a small Shiva temple and a room on the fort.
The best part is ChorKhind. It is a narrow cutting in a rock around 2 feet wide and with a slope of over 70 degrees. It led to a neighboring hill.
Had it not been for the two kids, we would most probably have missed this place.
2 pm. After having our lunch, we started descending. When we reached the base village, we distributed chocolates to a whole gang of children (friends of Manoj and Dhheraj).
3 pm. We started on our return journey. We now planned to visit the Mandhardevi temple at Wai. We were again witness to some awesome views of nature at its very best in the ghat. Enroute, we passed the base of Pandavgad.
4 pm. After paying obeisance at the temple, we started back on our return journey.
This time we decided to take the internal road from Bhor towards Nasrapur. On the way, we could see sheets of water pouring down from the gates of the Bhatghar dam.
On Anup’s insistence, we decided to take in this view from as close to the dam wall as possible. After talking to the authorities at the project and trying out several routes to reach the place ( all wrong!! ) , we finally made it to the base of the dam wall.
There’s an interesting incident to narrate out here.. On our way to the dam, we met two people coming back. One was an employee at the dam while the other was a local villager. The official enthusiastically showed us the path to reach the dam wall and did not try to obstruct us in any way. But, the villager started making all sorts of enquiries, our names, places of origins (yes!! I had to explain that I am a Bengali from WB but have been living in Pune all my life…), our intentions and what not… And his reasoning for all this.. “These are not good days.. terrorists can be found everywhere nowadays”..
Anyways, after seeing the dam from close quarters, we were finally on our way back to Pune.. But, fate had something else in store for us.. Just as we were nearing the Katraj ghat, we encountered a massive trench ( yes.. ‘a trench’.. that thing cannot be called a pothole.. ) on the highway. As soon as our bike passed over it, we realized there was something wrong. The rear wheel had a puncture. Luckily, there was a repairing guy just some meters away.. But, when he tried to remove the wheel, we realized that there was a bigger problem. The mono-suspension seemed to have been damaged. It had got locked up and the wheel was stuck against the bike frame. It was getting late now and we were getting panicky.. We just wanted to get the bike back in Pune so that we could get it repaired from a knowledgeable person.. We somehow managed to catch hold of a tempo-wala and persuaded him to transport the bike to Aundh ( albeit at a heavy price L ).
We were both preparing to loosen our pockets for getting the suspension replaced.. but, it turned out to be an anticlimactic situation.. The suspension was alright. Only that the axle had got caught on the rear foot rest.. We heaved a huge sigh of relief ( the biggest of my life, maybe.. ) , on seeing the wheel free.. and the suspension in perfect working condition..
For more photos...
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