Adventure in Kolad

It definitely wasn’t like any other Saturday morning when I got up at 4ish and started to get ready to embark on an adventure trip to Kolad where I was going to undertake activities like jungle camping, white water rafting, parasailing and waterfall rappelling over the weekend. Organized by my good old friend Jitubhai, this adventure camp was to happen in the rather sleepy but happening village of Kolad. I started off from home at Vikhroli at about 5ish and zoomed off towards New Mumbai where I was supposed to meet up with the rest of the group. We would have some 22 odd people in 2 cars and a coupla bikes. As luck would have it Indian Standard Time prevailed and I was the only one who reached Vashi DOT on time at 5:45. Mumbai city has its own charms in the wee hours of the morning as I enjoyed the cool breeze on the roads. It was during this ride that my odometer touched a rather interesting figure of 8888.8 kms. Numerologically a nice number for the start of a ride.



In no time I reached Panvel and was on the road moving towards Goa. Knowing that the rest of the group was still way behind I decided to continue my journey towards Pen. As the sun broke the clouds over Panvel I let the shutterbug in me completely loose.



I also saw a couple of Busa's rush towards Lonavala zooming past me. I didn’t wanna compare how 125 would stand up against 1300 so kind of didn’t even bother to join in the race. LOL Just kidding!!!!. There is this tradition with Mumbai Super bikers to ride out of Mumbai often on Saturday’s early morning towards Lonavala or Navsari and return back after breakfast.

So off I was riding towards Pen on the Goa highway. Being early morning there was hardly any traffic on the road and riding was a breeze. In no time I was already nearing Karnala Bird sanctuary and saw the legendary THUMBS UP Mountain looming up ahead of me.



I stopped to click a few snaps and tried establishing contact with the trailing team. Without getting off the bike I was off again in a couple of minutes. The next stop was Vatkal naka. Sadly none of the restaurants were open. I glanced at my watch. It was hardly 7:30 A.M. Well I guess this village needs some more time to wake up to cater to the alibaug bound traffic. I gulped some water spiked with electral and moved ahead. Summer being at its peak the heat was slowly building up. Sadly in full riding gear the number of added layers just add to more heat and sweat.

I reached Kolad around 8ish and headed towards Tamhani ghats on SH 60. Stopped for the first time in this ride at the railway crossing after Kolad for the single track Konkan railway train.



Had some time on my hands so waited and clicked some pics of my resting Bike and the Passing train. It’s a wonder how this railway system functions so efficiently despite being on a single track and having certain crossover sections where they have two tracks in a loop for trains to cross each other.



The Tamhani stretch of the roads is laden with some amazing twisties which make the Gladiator behave like the R1 and me like Rossi.



Taking each curve with grace nearly scraping pegs i reached the destination village of VILE and enquired about the adventure camp. After having no clue from the folk there and no mobile network to call up the rest of the team i settled down for breakfast. A really hot missal pav and chai helped me get back the energy and vigor i had lost during the ride.



I clicked a few snaps of me n the bike and the surrounding village sights, while waiting for about 45 minutes before deciding to retrace the route back to Kolad to hunt for the rest of the team.



I had back-tracked about 11 odd kms when i saw some cars and bikes coming from ahead. A familiar face waved a hand out from one of the cars and i turned round and pulled alongside to meet up with Jitubhai. Finally the team was there!!. It took us some more time to reassemble all the people, note down their names and details and move off towards the starting point of the River Rafting adventure. We drove back the road till the Pali turn and then started off towards Pali village. We were about 22 of us in 3 cars (Baleno, Esteem n 118NE) and 5 bikes (Bull T-Bird, Bull 500 Std, Bull 500 Citybike, Pulsar 150 DTSi and Gladiator). The starting point was the beginning of the canal coming out of the lake Ranu.



We kitted out in full rafting gear (helmets n life jackets) and had to keep all our water sensitive gear back in the cars. That was one reason why only a few of us could take pictures at the starting point. We set off in 3 rafts each containing one instructor and about 8 odd people armed with paddles.



We set off in the cam water and drifted right in the path of the gushing rapids coming from the dam ahead. As soon as we hit the fast flowing waters the raft sped up and we rowed hard to keep the raft from rocking to and fro. Maneuvering the raft in such waters is definitely tricky business. Simple commands were given to us in broken English to take the boat FOWAD, REVERS, GET DOWN, HOLD LINE etc... Our instructor Tara was a native of Nepal and a natural born rafter, adventurer and mountain climber. The first set of rapids we encountered was called Morning Headache and although quite bouncy was in no way irritating or treacherous compared to the morning headaches i have had from my boss and my clients. LOL. There speaks a frustrated chair stuck IT wiz. Moving through the rapids we often nearly lost control of the raft when the currents tossed it helplessly all around the river. Couple of places we frantically rowed in all possible directions to keep the raft from hitting the rocks or getting entangled in the bushes and trees around the river. Once we crossed the rapids the river grew calmer, and we started having our part of the fun. Some of us jumped ship and started floating and swimming in the water. The raft also went over unlucky Veenu who managed to get caught in the draft. As the waters became more still each of us slowly slowly slipped out of the raft into the water. The other team flipped the raft by heaving at the lifeline running around the raft. Finally after floating in the water for a good 45 minutes or more we all crawled back into the Raft and then rowed towards the landing point. After disembarking some of us helped Tara heave the raft up a slope and on to a Jeep rooftop carrier. The 3 rafts were stacked one on top of each while we had our very very late breakfast of Poha.

After the quick breakfast the Bikers traveled in the Jeep to the starting point of the rafting adventure to pick up the bikes. We freshened up for a minute and then rode the bikes to Village Nehrunagar also called Postachi Vadi where we had the riverside camp. Lunch was nicely laid out under the trees on a buffet table and we had riverside dining tables and benches to sit and eat. The food however was strictly vegetarian. To make things better even desert was served for us.

After a quick lunch about half of the group set off towards Hans adventure campsite where there was a rather small waterfall where we had planned the Waterfall Rappelling run. We set off in two cars and i was the only one on a bike, carrying the guide Kishan. On arriving at the waterfall we realized that the delay we had been into has been carried forward all the way and we hardly had any time to completely enjoy the activity. I was the first one who was supposed to go down the waterfall and after kitting up as i stepped near the ledge i suddenly felt some amount of uneasiness.



Not taking any further risks i decided to back out at the last minute and asked the next in line Martina to proceed. She luckily was in much better shape and carried out the complete exercise very efficiently.



The descent was quite scary and slippery as there was hardly any grip on the rock face but then i guess it’s all about mentally being prepared for the adventure. The whole rappelling surface was divided into three major sections, the first one was about 40 feet of wet and slippery vertical rock face, followed by about 15 feet of flat or gentle sloping surface and the last 35 odd feet of extremely steep but semi dry rock surface.



Amyt however was courageous enough to actually do the same rappelling exercise twice, despite having slipped dangerously and spinning on the rope during one attempt.



I sat on some rocks a little distance from the activity site and did some serious introspection. It could have been the fatigue of the earlier day. Could have been other stresses eating into the rare gray matter bordering on fuzzy logic inside that skull of mine.



As darkness fell we slowly started to wind up the activity. The afternoon skies were turning amber slowly as the sun had started moving off towards the west. Since i was the only one on the bike i started off early from the rappelling site and took off towards the riverside campsite. After reaching the riverside camp, i took a quick shower and settled down for an early dinner.

The other half of our group which had stayed back at the campsite went around trekking in the jungles nearby in the evening and enjoyed their time. Around 11 in the night it suddenly hit all of us that the 1 of the 2 cars had still not come in to the campsite yet. People missing on such adventure trips is often one of the major concerns for any camp organizer and Jitubhai asked me to help him locate the missing people? I have been with Jitubhai on about 5 - 6 adventure trips before and have ended up being the rescue team on almost all of them, so i guess he kind of has started associating me with this task. I and Roy started off on my bike and rode the jungle road in the dead of the night trying to hunt for the missing car. During this search and rescue run we ran into a herd of wild boars and saw wild rabbits darting across the road. To make matters worse we were chased by a madly barking dog and by no means was the road surface good enough for me to speed away from the menacing jaws of the animal. Somehow luck favored us and by the time we returned past midnight the lost car had been able to find its way back home. I used this occasion to reach the closest fuel pump and fill up. Despite being quite tired most of us still sat alongside the river bank chatting away to glory while I crashed into my tent almost immediately past midnight.

Next day morning some of us got up early to catch glimpses of the sunrise while i relaxed some more time and then ventured out of my tent.



The freshness in the environment was oh so refreshing that i ventured out with my camera and started capturing one impressive sight after another, flowers, river banks, trees, other effects, people from our group etc.













In some time I woke up a still-sleepy Roy and we started getting ready for the second round of the rappelling session. The only menace in this serene environment was the presence of large fire ants. These insects were quite dangerous and were seen in abundance here.



Since I had not done the activity the earlier day I was slotted to re-attempt the same again on Sunday. I guess this time mentally I was more or less prepared for the same. I had a quick breakfast and gulped down 3 - 4 cups of tea to completely wake me up. Getting ready we Bikers decided to move off early and search for an alternative route towards the Hans Adventure Rappelling site. After traveling for about half a km on the undiscovered treacherous road, we noticed the road condition deteriorating so badly that we had to run back and take the same old route we had been taking earlier, long as it may be. I by this time had practically memorized the entire stretch of road as i had already done it some 2 - 3 times the earlier day and even in the night. We rode back into Kolad and decided to go to a nearby petrol pump for the other bikes to fill up and top up the oil levels.



It was here that I bumped into another Gladiator rider. It’s quite an interesting sight to notice someone riding the same bike as one does and also maintaining it equally good. The pictures almost speak for themselves about the siblings meeting.





Once the bikes were in ship shape we zoomed off towards Hans adventure rappelling site and reached there quite late in the morning. Enroute Punita rode the Bull 500 and handled it pretty well on curves. I too was carrying Veenu as my pillion and despite that disadvantage I was feeling way too tempted on the curves to dip the bike and enjoy the twisties; which I did.



The second round of the rappelling session started off well. The first person to go down this time was Jitubhai being the most experienced adventurer amongst us he almost negotiated the entire cliff in perfect copybook style technique. It was only on his insistence that I decided to give this another shot, but decided I would be the last guy to go down.







I kitted up again for the second time and attempt the descent. This time I managed to do it albeit not with flying colors but didn’t get wary of the height or of the slippery surface. I guess deep inside we all have our demons and we only have to fight them and win. So there I was the last of the Mohicans having descended down the cliff and feeling wonderful about myself.





After resting for some time we moved towards the riverside camp for lunch. It was already pretty late in the afternoon and hunger was kind of getting to us. The Lunch was again a rather hurried affair with many of us sticking just to deserts. We were all ready to hit the roads on our way back to Mumbai. After a few customary group photographs we all started winding up.



The staff quickly folded the tents and we headed up the slopes towards the parking lot where I had parked my bike. I was the first one to leave as I wanted to capture the route in its grandeur through my camera. Barely had I moved from the campsite that my path was crossed by a magnificent wild peacock. Before I could take out my camera he was already deep inside the woods. Damn the bird was too quick for me else I would have got a wonderful shot. The road was divided into basically three kinds of surfaces. The smallest stretch but most tricky one was the one with loose gravel on it. Since I had some time on my hand and knew that the others would be quite far behind I took the liberty of posing in comfort and clicked some cool snaps of the gladiator n rider on this terrain.





After the gravelly road we had a HUDCO sponsored and maintained Smooth tarred road. Speeds could be increased on this road and since there was not a soul in sight the ride was even more enjoyable. Somehow when you are the only soul on the road you feel like you are becoming one with road and with some nice mp3 tracks’ playing through earphones ecstasy reaches newer height.



The next stretch was the muddy patch created because of previous year’s landslides. This was like riding through similar terrain I had encountered at Rajmachi earlier this year. Felt like riding through a valley. Couple of places there were tempting humps which made me go airborne a-la Paris - Dakar bikes.





After the Muddy patch I again hit civilized roads and had the liberty of taking some more snaps. Curious villagers looked at me in the flamboyant attire trying out the exercise of stopping the bike, running a few yards ahead clicking a picture then running back to the bike, getting on and riding off again.



The end of this road was a narrow makeshift bridge over the canal which I had to cross to reach Kolad village. Once in Kolad village roads were lined with trees and it was quite a shaded ride. Kolad also has its share of good old Alfonso mango trees.





Once I was back in Kolad village I waited for the rest of the vehicles and caught up with them. I stayed on for some time but since I was getting late decided to break off and zoom ahead. Got stuck in the mother of all traffic jams near Vatkal naka but being a bike I could get off the road and take the extreme left lane to reach ahead of almost all vehicles barring some stupid morons who think a Scorpio can squeeze into a gap where an auto rickshaw also would get stuck. God forgive them for they know not where they tread. After than maintaining a cruising speed of 70-80 kmph I managed to reach Panvel by about 7:15ish thus covering some 120 odd kms in about 106 minutes averaging a speed of 67.8 kmph. Not bad considering the activities I had been doing throughout the day.

I halted on the palm beach road to gulp a drink of water and take rest. Finished off the remaining few photographs there playing with the light effects till the camera batteries conked off.



Then it was time to go home. I rolled into my parking lot around 8:30ish and calculated the distance I had covered. Although not much I had run about 438 kms in total through some of the best terrains available. I would be attempting the same adventure again sometime in monsoons when it is said that the river is even stronger and the ride more exciting. Looking forward to more adventures in the coming months!!!

Anyone cares to join me on the next one?? Just lemme know.

More details from the web can be got from following websites:

http://www.naturetrailsindia.net/kundalika.htm


http://www.ecomantra.org/River_rafting.asp


Details of the waterfall at Hans are here:

http://www.businesstravellerindia.com/200507/monsoongetaways01.shtml


http://www.nivalink.com/hans/index.html


For all those who have the patience of going through all the pictures here is the link to the picasaweb album.

http://picasaweb.google.co.uk/praveen.sathaye/AdventureInKolad


Cheers n Happy Riding!!