Tri-State meet - yerkad [xBhp travelog]

After my last weeks exhaustive trek to amedhi kallu, i was not imagined that i'll make this trip. but things went in totally different ways , the tri-state meet of xBhp was planned much earlier on the website and i was already committed to make the trip and i gave my word of availability much earlier itself. so now there is no rethinking on that.. and it was pretty long time for me from long bike rides since my last super fast bike ride to DVG.

From Xbhp - Tri state Meet

Well the whole week prior to the ride was very exciting for most of the ppl and that could been noticed from the constant pouring of posts on that particular thread on xBhp.com, and as the number of ppl participating started to grow, our G2G organizers were taking to busy with lot of background work for this ride.

On Thursday i decided to give my bike for servicing as it has been very long time since my bike got serviced [almost 5000 km], and during this servicing i changed the air filter ,oil filter along with spark plug, and thankfully a new set of tyres which i have changed just a month back, and there is one more celebration ..... my bike completed 2 years :D

Saturday - Day 1
-------------------------

The last night i kept my alarm to 4:00 am as the ride will start at around 5:30 am, and when i woke up i saw the time , it was already 5:30am .. i said myself .. Oh Sh** again i am late ... the thing is when ever there was morning ride , in most of the time i tend to wake up late and do speed runs to catch up with the group. i hurried and got ready in a quick session and my plan was to meet up the group at just before krishnagiri in A2B restaurant, the msged the guys that i am late and going to meet up them in A2B , and left the home and the time already it was 6 am in the morning, and soon after 15 min , i got cal from one of our members that they still not started and i should not hurry up, this gave me relaxing feel and happy that i need not to make high speed runs to catch up with them. our meeting place was scheduled at silk board junction and by the time i reached there .. it was all happening .. guys are busy in clicking photos and i was the last one to reach there , and there are already 45 ppl are present. soon things got fasted up and after checking documents we formed in to 2 groups , one with the fast group with bigger bikes which can do 75-100kmph speed and the other one is slower group with lesser capacity bikes which can do 50-70kmph speed.

the faster group was headed by Santa [comet] and Jhon[P220] as sweeper , where as the slower group is headed by Eric [P220] . and i was in the fast group and my R15 bike can make other bike eat dust when it comes to speed, so we started and untill we reach the Krishnagiri A2B it was unusually filled with heavy traffic and till that times it was very difficult to ride in group.

Finally we reached A2B and had very good Breakfast, and after spending an hour there .. we started up again and this time .. it was perfect group riding with formation. and our planned stop was near dharmapuri .. where we suppose to wait for the Chennai guys [with there group of 24 bikers] .. the whole ride was much fun and it was like a chain of ants moving in tandem with constant speed in formation, soon we reached the spot where we needed to wait for Chennai group, then every body started relaxing and having pics and fun within 45 min the Chennai guys showed up with there 24 bikers .. it was nice to meetup with these guys and as they did almost 260km before reaching us .. once can notice that still they had plenty of energy to ride till our destination.

From Xbhp - Tri state Meet

From Xbhp - Tri state Meet

From here onwards it was a very big ride , with fast and slow groups in proper distance and with proper formation riding we reached A2B restaurant near to Salem to have Lunch, we took a good break of about 2 hours waiting for the Kerala team although they didn;t reached us till latenight that day .. in those 2 hours we can feel the real heat of Salem heat as Sun scorching above with hot weather it was impossible to stand outside .. meanwhile we have a very good lunch and after that rested a bit, before starting off from there.

As soon as we entered the Salem , it was evident that its gonna be difficult ride in those narrow roads of the city with almost 90+ bikes passing in tandom, and as we ride on through the city the ppl of Salem were staring at us wondering how come suddenly these many bikes appeared, at last we reached the starting point of the Ghats which we need to take to reach the yerkad and the entire Ghats section will be around 45km and with almost 40 hair pin bends and numerous bends and curves.

From Xbhp - Tri state Meet

From Xbhp - Tri state Meet

From Xbhp - Tri state Meet

Before starting to climb the Ghats we gathered near the starting point and needed to make some instructions for safe ride , so msg coveyed to all ..that make a single line and no overtaking allowed. and started the journey with small cluster of bikes with proper distance.
the entire 45km distance went like dream ..with all bikes following others and in sync and it seemed from the top like line of ants moving in sync. finally we reached the top and gathered at a point to decide who all needs to go which resort.. as we booked 2 resorts, while we were busy in dividing ppl for resort .. the localities and the ppl of Yerkad were shocked to see these many bikers and moreover there is one more big group of bulletiers around 120 ppl were also there ..

From Xbhp - Tri state Meet

Finally 30 ppl took to the resort 1 and rest of us went for another resort, as soon as i reached the resort .. i picked up a good balcony room and along with me 2 more guys joined and we dropped our bags and riding gear .. and took some nice time to get relax, by the time we got back our energy it was already 6 pm , and one of my room partner said we visit some places around .. as the hill view points were near to our resort.. so we took the bikes along with 2 more guys and headed to the view point just some 2 km away from our resort, we spent about an hour before other guys started arriving and as it started getting darker.. we all decided to visit one more view point from where we can take good pics of the city down .. and soon everyone joined for the site seeing activities, and later when we visited that place it was really nice location .. from where entire city can be visible and we can see the vehicles moving in the Ghats, after spending few more hours there .. we all headed back to our resorts and by the time we returned to resort .. the ppl there already started the camp fire and were enjoying the light moments of that time. soon i joined with others and the rest of the night went with camp fire and some nice dinner, as the clock ticket towards 12 midnight finally our kerala guys showed up with there long ride of 700km.. and the ppl who still woke till that time ..welcomed them grandly.

From Xbhp - Tri state Meet

From Xbhp - Tri state Meet

From Xbhp - Tri state Meet

From Xbhp - Tri state Meet

Sunday - Day 2
-----------------------

After having a very good sleep i woke up little late , and by the time i got ready it was 8 am and most of the guys are ready to rock the day, so me and neil [room partner] decided to take a spin around the city and visit the near by lake, so headed towards city , and others were busy in getting ready , as soon we reached the lake we saw a board on which written the way for a falls near by place.. so we decided to check it out and headed towards the water falls , although i have expected that the falls might have dried up in the summer and this time of the season,.. soon reaching near to it .. we realized that we need to take a trek of 1km down to reach the falls .. soon we headed down ..it was very steep and took some time to reach the bottom .. and there was this small falls .. although as i expected the water was very less and place is beautiful .. but still it didn;t impress me much as i saw soo many water falls in the westren ghats over a period of time. after some time we decided to head back to resort to have breakfast and climbing the steep hill took almost 20 min and Neil was totally tiered as he's not used to these kind of physical activities :).

From Xbhp - Tri state Meet

From Xbhp - Tri state Meet

From Xbhp - Tri state Meet

Soon from there we returned to our resort and had a very good breakfast ,.. finishing that everyone got ready for the photoshoot and 2 hours we spent in some really memorable photo shooting, later one group of guys started early to the bangalore .. and later after an hour one group of 7 which included me ..started from there towards our destination.

From Xbhp - Tri state Meet

From Xbhp - Tri state Meet

The whole stretch of 250+ km we rode together till we reach Electronic city from there we departed to our own directions ..with lot of good memories and good feeling.

Thanks to each and everyone .. who participated in the ride :D

Pics: http://picasaweb.google.com/nagoo12345/XbhpTriStateMeet#

Mansoon Trek to Amedhi Kallu

This Trek was planned some 25 days earlier, immediately after our Mullayanagiri trip and as we didn't had a good treks for months gone by , we thought its the right time to go for a trek. as usual we started a mail chain and after deciding the this place, finally we fixed the date 2 weeks back for the trek , but unfortunately that was got canceled due to some reasons and as a result the trek was postponed by 2 weeks [12th june 2010].

Finally 10 ppl [Ramesh,Nagoo,Mohan,Vadi,Malli,Vikram,Praveen,Shivu,Anand and Rajendra] got ready for the trek and most of the guys were from NSN [company] and with our usual frnds now we have some new faces with us.

Now about this place : Amedhi Kallu means tortoise stone if u purely translate to english , well this place is trekked by many ppl and groups over the years , but still its virgin place in terms of civilization and humans intervention. and to conquer this peak one has to trek through most dense and deep forests of western Ghats and through a uphills with full of tall grass, which can cut the skins like razor blade in some angles.

well in all my previous experiences initially i thought KP was the toughest and later when i trekked i found Bandajji arbi i realized that KP is nothing in term of difficulty, but now after Trekking Amedhi kallu , i second all my previous thoughts .. now as for as my knowledge this is the one ... i mean this is the toughest trekking place that anyone can imagine.

Our main idea was to trek in early Mansoon and we knew that we may have to face some heavy rain also, but honestly we never expected this trek to be this much difficult.

Friday Night
-----------------

After the Office hours we decided to meet at the designated places at around 9:30pm for departure in a TT, that day i got little bit late from office and when i reached the home it was already 8:30pm , and by that time Mohan [Trip co-ordinator :)] already brought some sleeping bags for hire and was waiting for me to go for some shopping for the trek, so when finally i reached home without wasting time we both went for shopping to buy some energy drinks and food items like MTR ready to eat and finishing the shopping its time for us to do a final packing of stuffs , by the time i finished my packing it was almost 10pm and ramesh also come to my room by that time , finally we departed from bangalore at 11pm.

In the TT we spent some time to know each others and later its all hungama , most of the night has fun with teasing the guys and cracking the jokes, and some spirited dancing with music for few times


Saturday - Day 1
------------------------

We reached the Darmastala in the morning around 6am and we decided to get freshup there and leave for shishila for the guide , who can take us for trek this peak.
after the freshup we had breakfast there in a hotel , and left for our destination, we needed to go via kokkada [small town] to reach shishila [village] and interestingly kokkada is the last point where our mobile signals can reach after that village there is no mobile network coverage.
Finally we reached Gopu Gokule house [the person who can arrage a guide for us] and he was nice talking person , he helped us to get a guide and also we needed a utensil for boiling water [for MTR ready to eat] which we forgot to carry from B'lore.

From Mansoon trek to Amedhi Kallu

From Mansoon trek to Amedhi Kallu

From Mansoon trek to Amedhi Kallu

by the time the Guide arrived we started the final preparation for the trek by packing and dropping the items needed or not needed to make the luggage light, soon after we reached the starting point a 4-5km away from shishila village , and asked our TT [Tempo Traveller] to come to same spot on next day at around 11am to pick us back again.

Actual Trek
-----------

The Trek started spiritedly but within few couple of minutes some of our guys pissed off by hearing that the peak of this Trek will be around 18km [This was wrong information], and cursing themselves we started off.

From Mansoon trek to Amedhi Kallu

From Mansoon trek to Amedhi Kallu

From Mansoon trek to Amedhi Kallu

From Mansoon trek to Amedhi Kallu

After a couple of meters the real horror started with hundred thousands of leeches spread across entire stretch which ever space they can get and waiting for the prey to leech. as many of us expected few of us come prepared for this and the most of them were too negligence about these and they quickly become the prey for leeches, even more to add difficulties there started drizzling rain and what more the entire trek is totally uphill and there is no flat land or slope.

soon within first 2 km some 100 leeches feasted on us with fresh blood, although i was totally prepared before trek itself for these monsters, for the entire trek i was bitten by only 2 leeches :D, but others are not so fortunate sadly.

as we keep on trekking in this deep forests, we faced difficulties as rain started increasing its speed and as well leeches too become more aggressive and more over here the leeches are lot bigger compared to my other treks be it be KP or Green Route, and adding to this was our luggage, for me i was carrying 32kg of luggage comprising sleeping bag, tent, food, water...etc..etc. and what more .. after some 3km Ramesh started to loose his patience with these blood suckers and he was already fed up with them and he clearly said he can't carry his luggage , he was too overloaded with tent and some hidden water and snacks in the bag :P, soon i had to carry his backpack also ...

After a long difficult trek of 3 hours we reached some Grass land away from trees and .. now we faced even more difficult task to climb it as its even more vertical and very steep which are needed even more energy.

we stopped by that place for some relaxation and photoshoot and this place is the most beautiful place i have ever seen till now ... there is huge mountains surrounded us with lush green grass land and trees , and playing with them was this clouds soo close to ground and mist all over those mountains .. its like heaven .. and there is no camera can capture this much beauty , where ever eye's can reach u can find natures ultimate beauty and its soo refreshing .. even though there was drizzling rain .. no body seems to care .. everyone is busy in tacking snaps in different angles and enjoying the natures beauty.

From Mansoon trek to Amedhi Kallu

From Mansoon trek to Amedhi Kallu

From Mansoon trek to Amedhi Kallu

From Mansoon trek to Amedhi Kallu

From Mansoon trek to Amedhi Kallu

From Mansoon trek to Amedhi Kallu

From Mansoon trek to Amedhi Kallu

From Mansoon trek to Amedhi Kallu

From Mansoon trek to Amedhi Kallu

after the session started the real hard trek, climbing these majestic mountains, we kept on climbing these and around 3pm we reached a spot where we decided to camp, this place is almost top of the mountain and there was a very big rock under which we took shelter, we had our Lunch there and decided to set up a camp, and most of guys were too tiered and they wanted to stay there for the rest of the day, unfortunately by the time we finished our lunch its was almost 4pm and still we needed to go for another 3km to reach the peak.

From Mansoon trek to Amedhi Kallu

From Mansoon trek to Amedhi Kallu

From Mansoon trek to Amedhi Kallu

finally no body willing to go further other than me and Malli, and by that time there was heavy rain started and combined with heavy fog there was almost narrow visibility, maximum we can see is about 15 feets and we both along with the guide started climbing again and that time it seemed very difficult due to heavy wind which can blow away a person strait in to cliffs below .. as further we ascended about 2 km it become impossible to see anything and even 5 feet visibility became very difficult and combined with heavy rain and fog, our guide advices us to return back as he was also unable to see the trail to the top, and it was already 5pm and still 2 more hours of trek we need to do, it became clear that if we push further it can be dangerous to descend back in dark night.

From Mansoon trek to Amedhi Kallu

so we finally disappointed and decided to head back, and with those difficult environmental condition we realized that even descending steep hill can pose serious difficulties.

First time in my life i saw a wild animal here .. its a wild cat .. its very big and very strong , it just jumped infront of me and crossed my path in a lighting speed .. before i realize wt happening it disappeared in to tall grass, all this happened in 3 seconds

when we reach back to the base camp, the guys were already pitched 2 tents and were enjoying there warm moment , only we 2 were totally drenched in rain and cold were standing like monkeys, and moreover to our shock there was place for only 2 tents to pitch and each can accommodate only 4 ppl, we 2 left out. and although we had one more tent, we didn;t have enough space to put it, what can get worse than this ,.. all my cloths were totally wet and finally around 6pm we were decided that 2 of us will sleep outside tent in a sleeping bag and it proved to be good idea later in that night.

From Mansoon trek to Amedhi Kallu

quickly we prepared our Dinner and had some good moments together chatting joking and laughing, by the 7pm we already in bed and i think this is the first time in our life we are sleeping so early :D

we'll be 10pm in the night once again most of us woke up and started making hungama , which led other sleepy guys to wake up and spend some joking/teasing time till 12am .. after that everyone went to sleep again till 6am in the morning except malli who sleeping besides me outside tent occasionally looking outside all around with his torch for any possible animals :D and every time i used to ask him sleep without worry.

Sunday - Day 2
---------------------

We woke up around 6 am in the morning and it was chilling cold, the fog covered us completely and thankfully the rain has been stopped, so we decided this is the good time to head back, without wasting our time we packed up everything, and started our descent .. and trust me .. coming down a hill is as difficult as climbing it.. and finally when we come down the grass land it was started raining heavily and without caring the rains we had good time to enjoy the beauty and lot of pics .. now every one took a pause and got ready to battle the our ultimate nemesis the leeches ...

From Mansoon trek to Amedhi Kallu

From Mansoon trek to Amedhi Kallu

From Mansoon trek to Amedhi Kallu

From Mansoon trek to Amedhi Kallu

From Mansoon trek to Amedhi Kallu

From Mansoon trek to Amedhi Kallu

From Mansoon trek to Amedhi Kallu

as we entered there territory, they started there attack .. it seems they were waiting for us. and as we started our way back carefully , they were also got ferocious and adding to this was heavy rains .. and almost we took only one break .. most of us already tiered and it was leeches who got advantage of this .. after almost 3 hours we finally reached the road , from where we have started our trek, and Oh,,boy its soo nice to see the civilization again and especially the road , a clean road :D

soon we started we remove our bangs shoes .. in the middle of roads to get rid of leeches which are swarming on our shoes and socks and even on bags .. and there we found the actual causalities.. most of us got bitten by them very hard .. and thankfully i got only one bite.

From Mansoon trek to Amedhi Kallu

From Mansoon trek to Amedhi Kallu

From Mansoon trek to Amedhi Kallu

From Mansoon trek to Amedhi Kallu

From Mansoon trek to Amedhi Kallu

From Mansoon trek to Amedhi Kallu

From Mansoon trek to Amedhi Kallu

soon after taking bath in nearby stream we relaxed a bit and enjoyed the photo sessions and started waiting for our transport and the wait went on till 12 pm and every one getting frustrated on driver .. and unfortunately there is no mobile network coverage. finally we hired a jeep and went to Darmastala .. where we are able to search our Transport and finally we started our way back to B'lore and till Hassan there was heavy rain lashing and most surprisingly..the total weather is changed after Hassan and it was sunny.

finally we reached B'lore around 9:30 pm, and brought us with lot of memories and fun.

Photos :

http://picasaweb.google.com/nagoo12345/MansoonTrekToAmedhiKallu#


Final words
----------------

1. This is most difficult trek - i rate this 9 out of 10 in terms of difficulty
2. Best time to visit : 2 months after mansoon good at Dec or Jan
3. Water Point: only one, Take enough water
4. Mobile Network: Interestingly on peek its available but not in bottom
5. Guide contact: Gopu Gokule 08251269246 - shishila village