Siddarabetta – a dream destination!
Well..more than a 'trekker', I had always connected
more to the tag of a ‘Wanderer’ ;) for simple reasons – very few dream
destinations, a handful of target peaks – rest, just go wherever Life takes you
to and – get Surprised!
Siddarabetta though, was one of my dream destinations mainly for two reasons: 1. Heard a lot about the history and ambience of the place. 2. Cave exploration.
Siddarabetta though, was one of my dream destinations mainly for two reasons: 1. Heard a lot about the history and ambience of the place. 2. Cave exploration.
Got a chance to co-organize this trek with Master Oogway aka
Abhishek :P Despite the facts we had with us (heard from many sources
that cave exploration was stopped sometime back here), we still decided to go
ahead with the plan; and see if we came up with something new ;) :P. And so
opened the event, shortlisted candidates, packed our bags on the D-day and
started our journey in the TT…in heavy rains on Sunday morning….
The Introduction round with no names:
Yes. We really did this ;) The regular tu-tu-main-main between Abhiyum naanum started from the beginning
of the journey itself :P He wanted to play Dumb Charades, but I wanted to
have an Intro round first! Well, we then decided not to disappoint each other
and came up with an ‘Introduction via Dumb Charades’ game ;). So the deal was –
each participant had to enact the name of another participant in the group [surprisingly, none had noticed anybody else’s name out of the
shortlist e-mail ;)]. With all the right spirits, the game – with this twist –
turned so exciting, that nobody introduced themselves during the idli-vada break (in the middle of the
game), and eagerly waited for the game to be resumed post tiffin :P Try it –
and you will find out how much power your Nomenclature
has ;) (right from mythological characters, to planets, to chemicals, movies,
and some totally weird names you wouldn’t have imagined you can link with!).
Nilavalagaan – took away the icing,
thanks to the game, everyone remembered his name too well throughout the day :P
 |
| Dumb Charades |
 |
| Dumb Charades :P |
 |
| Audience trying to guess who :P |
So after this totally out-of-the-box Introduction round, we
moved to the regular Dumb Charades. A proper mix of people from all parts of
India ensured that movie names were brutally murdered and then enacted! [I
never saw the name ‘Zubeida’ from the ‘Shuu…su..zooo.?? Ta …da??’ angle before, thanks to Tamil’s
form of script, the movie-name turned out to be a hilarious word] The
ice-breaking session was successfully accomplished in the TT, and we reached
the base of Siddarabetta.
Cave exploration:
At the parking lot, Abhi & I came across this elderly
person who, must say,was a blessing-in-disguise. He not only
gave us directions to the start of the trek, but also confirmed that cave-exploration
was allowed; and advised us on the rates to be negotiated with the guide. With
this bunch of useful information, we reached the peak, hired a Guide and started
out for exploring the 1km long cave J
Everyone was super excited with this bit [me too – this being
my second cave exploration in the last 15 days :P], and with all sorts of
jokes, we headed inside the cave in a queue. Someone from our queue gave a
hilarious start by commenting ‘pls don’t faarrr***,
we are bending behind u’; well, and then keeping with the ambience of the
place, we immediately hushed to silence; and entered the beautiful gallery of
rocks!
 |
| Cave-entrance |
1/4th of the cave is just a walk inside the
gallery. Right at the entrance you will find an Eeshwara temple, and a priest
pouring cold water on people [you need a token to take this holy bath]. Few
guys took a complete bath with those 3 mugs of cold water, well, I chose to get
it poured only on my head:P. We reached a point where another Shivalinga stood
[apparently it is naturally formed ‘shivalinga’] and a small water outlet nearby
[drink this water – and you will really feel its amrith!’]
 |
| End of 1/4th of the cave |
 |
| Start of the Actual work-out :P Cross this challenging slab! |
The actual work-out started after crossing this part of the
cave. We faced an inclined slab of rock, that had to be covered tactfully. Thanks
to Abhi, Guru, Miten and the guide – who ensured that all of us crossed this
slab successfully. The way after crossing this slab was a total criss-cross of
narrow lanes [some vertically narrow, some horizontally :P], and we had to do
all sorts of twisting, bending, jumping rocks and the monkey-jazz – which was
thrilling and fun :D The ambience inside the cave was truly mesmerizing - you could feel real great vibes around! In the mid-way we found a grapevine [the guide told some
technical word for this tree in kannada] that’s ages old. Took few pics mid-way
and then successfully completed our 1km of Cave exploration – a thrill of
the event!
 |
| Somewhere in the middle of the cave |
 |
| somehwere inside - 2 :P |
The Bonus trek - Channarayana Durga:
All thrilled, happy, and hungry after completing the
cave-exploration – we starting chalking out plans on ‘what next’. It was just
1.00pm, and we had time till the evening in our hands. So we decided to have
our lunch inside the TT, and do another trek – to Channarayana Durga (a half an
hour journey from Siddarabetta) [thanks to Abhi’s time calculations!].
Hurrr…hurrr…aage badho:
Channarayana Durga Ascend – though a smaller peak, this is a
little challenging due to its steepness. The initial stretch got little tiring
for many due to the sun; but eventually the afternoon turned a bit gloomy – and
with Abhi’s hurrr..hurrr..and the kicks of motivations that the team gave each
other – everyone managed to reach the
top of the Fort :D The last stretch of the peak is truly a beauty. Abhi then
took us to a viewpoint on the top of the Fort. To reach this you have to climb
the steps built on the wall, with creepers as the hand support – this was
thrilling as well!
 |
| Channarayana Durga - view from Base |
 |
| Last stretch of Chanarayana Durga fort |
 |
| The View point |
Channarayana Durga Descend [swap of organizers-participants :P]
Post a small photo-session and the ‘Awesome’ feeling; we
started descending down the peak. We reached half-way through and rested at an ‘open
space’ [ Master Oogway’s all-time favourite spot of any hill - an 'open space' :P].
Some of us (including both Abhi & I) were so engrossed in watching the sky here,
that we did not realize that most of the participants had already moved ahead
of us :D Looking at the progress, both of us sweeped the group for a while; and
watched the rest of them leading us and doing it so well :D Well, it really
felt proud to see the whole group making such progress through the day –
considering there were a good number of first-timers as well! ;) :P
Reached the base – all wearied down, thrilled and happy with
the twin adventure – we called it a day and headed towards our TT.
Return journey:
Took a session of feedback, visited some memories from the
morning Dumb-charades-Introduction, gave tips to the first-timers and then a
round of cheer to the whole team! Post this, we rested on our seats – not feeling
strangers any more - and waited for our respective stops to bid a good-bye to
one another with a promise of meeting sometime, at some other trek J
Well, this trek was an amazing booster – being the 2nd
cave exploration within span of 15 days, plus, a twin adventure on a single day
:P
Thanks to Abhi (Master Oogway, truly :P) and the whole group for being an awesome
sport. Kudos to all the first-timers who took all of our motivation very
sportively and completed the whole adventure! Hats off..
A special thanks to Captain Ajju for the training, which helped a lot :)
And finally, signing off, confessing that the term – ‘Bonus
trek’ is not my original…plagiarized from Chaitanya [a fellow BTC
Organizer..:P]
Cheers!
Swatz
No comments:
Post a Comment