2 days Trekking on 29/30th Nov Weekend

Dear All

We have 2 days trek on 29/30th Nov Weekend. This is one of the beautiful route, which is a must do route for a passionate trekker/nature lover. This route has 3 water falls and 2 view points and many streams....

Below is the route details.

The Sharavathi Valley:- The Sharavathi river valley nestled in the central Western Ghats, Shimoga district has been an ecological paradise. The Sharavathi River, rising at Ambuthirtha in Thirthahalli taluk flows north-west and drops down in the Ghats at the world famous Jog falls. The sharavathi Valley is home for many water falls and to some of the beautiful streams. The valley is evergreen to semi-evergreen forest along with moist deciduous type of forests dominate the entire basin along with scrub savannah, grasslands, marshy areas and plantation of acacia, cash crops like areca and rubber providing diverse niches for a variety of taxa. Rare evergreen species such as Dipterocarpus, Syzygium, Cinnamon, Diospyros, Aglaia, endemic Palms along with the globally endangered Myrist-icasps makes this an ecologically sensitive region to be conserved and not marketed.

Trek Date:- From 29-11-2008 to 30-11-2008 (2 days)

Trek Route:- Hogevaddi---->Basavana baayi--->Belligundi falls--->Goodanagundi falls--->Kattinakaru.

Departure from Bangalore to SAGAR:- 28-11-2008. Friday night...

Return from SAGAR to Bangalore:- 1-12-2008 by around 6:00 AM.

Date:- 28-11-2008
* Deaprture from Bangalore by around 9:30 PM.

Tentative Itinerary,
Date:- 29-11-2008

* Reach Sagar by early morning.
* Freshen Up, Have Break fast and Catch a local bus or hired jeep to the trek point by 8:00 AM
* Reach Hogevaddi , the Trek start point by 10:30 AM and Start the trek
* Reach Basavana baayi peak by afternoon. Play in the water falls and Have lunch.
* Start the Trek towards Padubeedu and camp in a tribals house by 6:00 PM.
* Have a Camp fire and enjoy the evening(Depends on rain situation). Also interact with Tribals.
* Have dinner and retire for the day

Date:-30-11-2008


* Wake up by 6:00 AM and get freshen up quickly.
* Have Breakfast and start the trek by 7:30AM to Belligundi water falls.
* Spend time in valley view and belligundi view
* Trek to Goodanagundi water falls and if possible Enjoy in the Water fall (depends on the water level.
* Have luch and Trek to Kattinakaru.
* Catch a local bus or hired jeep to Sagar.
* Reach Sagar and have dinner.
* Start the journey back to Bangalore by around 10:00 PM

For photos of the route and blog write up pls visit this link

http://sharavathi.blogspot.com/2008/08/2-days-trek-on-16-17th-aug-2008.html

If you wish to join us, please confirm me ASAP, as i need to reserve the BUS tickets

--
Sampath Kumar
The Sharavathi Nature Trails.....
E-Mail: prapancha@gmail.com
Blogs:- http://sharavathi.blogspot.com
http://kuchodya.blogspot.com

"Save Water, Save Energy and Save Earth for our next Generation"

15-16th November Camping/Kayaking/Trekking Report

After long time, Subbu called me and said " sir, we guys want to come for the Kayaking/camping/trekking program". I was thrilled to hear this, coz subbu and co is always fun to be with. I had trekked with this team from Bheemeshwara to Dabbe falls in mansoon and it was really memorable one. So i asked subbu only to book the tickets to sagar and they did it themselves. On 15th Nov 2008 Saturday morning, i met subbu team at Sagar KSRTC Buss stand and we had a morning tea. Then we moved to private bus stand to catch local bus to go to camp site.
at 8:00AM Gubbagodu Bus turned up and we all got in to that. It was comfortable journey as it was totally empty. by 9:00 we reached the camp site. By then our breakfast was ready and we all had a nice breakfast. after a while, i briefed them about some safety precautions and also we got introduced ourselves. Then all of fastened the life jacket and dived in to the water. We played in the water for about an hour. Then i called everyone for the coracle boat briefing. I briefed about the boat, how to paddle and how to land etc. Also i took one by one and trained them on the paddling. After brief handling everyone went on a long drive.
Then we decide to move to our camp island. This time i am taking u all on visual tour :)

The Camp site.

Moving to Camp island in coracle

The Gang on "Islands exploration mission"













Sun Set View from an island

Time for Camp fire

Lazy Morning...!

Enjoyed the Kayaking most...













It was time for Rafting













Tried diving too :)













Dive from Raft..!













It was time to say good bye...













Gang trekked to Devaragudda peak to get the backwater "Bird view"

Campers:-
1)Subbu
2)Shalini
3)Flavia
4)Sirish
5)Jeethu
6)Mahesh
7)Veeru
8)Bhat
9)Sampath


It was the most memorable and fun filled program. Everyone was lively in the whole program.

Few words from Campers.
"Alive and kicking!!!
The trip was great Sampath..
The place, the food, the people, the shit island.. Everything was excellent..
--By Jeethu
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It was jsut awesome sampath..... Food was just excellent....

hope to catch you in another trek....
--By Veeru
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Simply Superb !!! hope to see some wildlife next time :D
--By Shalini

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Trip was indeed great...apart from the food n fun,liked the completely scluded place the most...

happy i gave myself a lavish treat and perfect weekend..
--By Flavia

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hmmm weekend well-spent (shoud i say well-ate :D )

i really liked that island, wht a place,

hope next time will get an apportunity for kayak race of all 8 people :)
--By Subbu

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Photos of the program
http://picasaweb.google.com/subbukl/61_kayaking_sharavathi_valley_nov08#
and
http://picasaweb.google.com/machonirvana/SharavathiBackwater#

Nov 8/9th Weekend Kayaking/Camping/Trekking report

After gap of a month, some campers approached me for the Kayaking/Island Camping Program. As usual, after addition and subtraction, we were of 6 member small gang. Vinod, Offered me to reserve the BUS tickets, so that was smooth affair. We decided catch the last bus from Bangalore to Sagar, so that the connecting local bus to the camp spot will be a comfortable. On 7th Nov friday night,we left Bangalore and we landed at Sagara on 8th Morning at around 7:00 AM. All of us got freshen at BUS stand toilet facility and had tea at a Hotel. By then it was 8:00 and Our local Bus arrived at the BUS stand. We all got in to Bus and sat next to the driver. As we all were looking some city bred lads..Driver pulled us in to conversation. He started explaining about how it was pre 1960, before the dam was built and now etc etc., He did not forget to give some tips too :).
By 8:45 We reached our Bus stop. We all got down and trekked for about 15 mins to our camp site. By then our crew had just landed there. Quickly our cook started preparing breakfast for us. Mean while I decided introduce everyone to Swimming. Before that we had a small briefing session. After the session all if got in to water and had a splash for about half an hour. By then Breakfast got ready. As all of were hungry to the core, we rushed there and had stomachacheful of 'UPPITTU'. That tomato uppittu was superb. Instead of Tea, there was this Khashaya, whiich is a local herbal drink. This drink is prepared like tea but powder is different roots, which are available locally. After having nice Breakfast, i introduced coracle paddling to campers. Everyone picked up very fast. We decided to move to island and all of hoped in to coracles and rafts and moved to island.
After reaching the island, all of us got in to water for the long swimming session. Meanwhile, our cook dharmanna had started preparing lunch. After a nice swimming session we all got back and had lunch. We rested for a while after the lunch and started off island exploration. All of got in to coracle and moved to a big island which was about 3 KM from our camp island. On the trail, we did see many small island. Each had different type of vegitation and shapes. At one island , we stopped for a sunset view. It was amazing view with water surface started turning to red color. Our photographers (Shashi and vaibhav) took some beautiful snaps and we started paddling back to our camp island. Quickly our guides started the camp fire and we set up the tents. All of sat around camp fire and some cracked great jokes and we had some time pass discussion on various subject. The moon light was bright and it was amazing seen around us. The water surface was flat as there was no wind and over the top there was a moon light. So it was awesome seen around, it was looking like silver plate around us :). By then dinner was ready, all of had nice dinner. We could not sit for long as everyone were tired...so decided to retire for the day and slept off.

All of us woke up by little late morning by around 6:30 and immediately i asked them to take the boat and go off to an another island to finish our "NiThya Karmas" :). Everyone were shocked, as they did not expect this !!!. Finally all of went in to another island and finished the routines... and came back to camp island. By then tea was ready, we had tea and got in to water for the morning splash. We played for a while, by then breakfast was ready. The menu was "AKKI ROTTI and PALYA". It was awesome combination. It was too good to have the hot and crispy rottis just out of stove :). After nice Breakfast, we had another round of tea and rested for a while. Then i called everyone to brief about "Kayak". Kayak is a single man paddling boat. It is great pleasure to paddling this boat. So after the brief everybody tried out the boat. Only Nhihal, got toppled many times while getting to the boat. But finally he could manage to get in and enjoyed the rides. After the kayak, next was raft rowing. after the briefing of this rowing, everyone tried bit raft rowing. Next was diving from a dead tree in the water...that was really fun. Everyone enjoyed this session. Later we had lunch and it was time to pack up. After little rest, we all packed up and put in to boats and left for the main land.

After reaching main land, we said good bye to our guides and started the trek to "Devara Gudda". After about an hour trek we reached the peak and it was an awesome view there. It was bird view of the whole of Sharavathi backwater. We rested for a while and started off the trek towards Alahalli where we were supposed to catch the local Bus back to Sagar. It was nice trek initially through the thick vegetation and later through habitation. Afetr about 3 hours of trek from the peak, we rached Alahalli. We had tea and waited for Bus for while. Got in to a packed local bus and reached Sagar by 7:30. After some time pass, we had dinner and got in to the bus back to Bangalore. As all of were tired, we all got nice sleep and we reached mejestic by 5:45 AM. It was another Memorable,wonderful and activity filled weekend...

Campers:-
1) Shashidhar H B
2) Vaibhav
3) Nihal
4) Vinod
5) Somanath
6) Sampath

Photos:-

Photos by Vabhav
http://picasaweb.google.com/naga.2005/KayakingCampingTreking#

Photos by Shashi
http://picasaweb.google.com/hb.shashidhar/BackwatersOfSharavathiValley

Kayaking-Camping in Sharavathi Backwater on Nov 8/9th

Hi All,
Sharavathi backwater is about 60 KM in length and about 15 KM wide !!!!. It became backwater when dam was constructed at Linganamakki of sagara taluk in Shivamogga(Shimoga) district to the river Sharavathi. This backwater has created lots of islands, it is so great to explore all these, where thick vegetation still exist and lots of wild life in it including some rare birds.

Here info on camping and water sports...

Date:- 8/9-11-2008 weekend (2 Days)
Camp Site:- Sharavathi Backwater Near Sagara in Shimoga Dsitrict
Accomdation:- Dome tents on an ISLAND in the backwater.
Food:- Food is going to be Simple Vegetarian food and it will be freshly cooked food at the camp site.
Transport:- It is an option. u can travel on ur own (we will guide u how to reach there) or we can arrange transport

Itinerary of Camp activities in Sharavathi Backwater.

Day 1:-

* Arrive at Camp site. Freshen up and Have Breakfast
* Group Introductory session and initial briefing by the Camp leader
* Introducing everyone to water, and a small swimming/floating session.
* Transfer to Island in coracle.
* Long Swimming and floating session. Initiation to Coracle paddling.
* Have Lunch and rest for half an hour.
* Start the Islands exploration trail by Coracle.
* Return back to the camp site and have tea
* Have a camp fire and fun time at camp fire
* Have dinner and retire for the day

Day 2:-

* Wake up early in the morning. Freshen up and have tea
* A small swimming/floating session
* Introduction to Raft Paddling
* Introduction Kayaking and Individual Kayaking session.
* Have lunch
* Trek to "Devara gudda". Spend time on view point and climb down to Bus stand
* Travel back to Sagar and take Bus back to Bangalore
* End of session



Photos of our Adventure Water sports and camping Faliclity in Sharavathi backwater
http://picasaweb.google.com/stanfrancis/VIRGINLANDONSHARAVATHYRIVER#
or
http://picasaweb.google.com/shashi.gadad/SharavathiValleyWaterSports#
or
http://picasaweb.google.com/punithaharsha/SharavathyTrek25Oct08#
or
http://picasaweb.google.co.in/ganeshkudva1977/Sharavathi06Sep08#



A Blog on our new Adventure Water sports and camping Faliclity in Sharavathi backwater
http://sharavathi.blogspot.com/2008/09/kayaking-camping-and-trekking-in.html
http://vivek-nag.livejournal.com/4623.html

Map of the camp site



Pls mail to prapancha@gmail.com for any more info...


--
Sampath Kumar
The Sharavathi Nature Trails.....
E-Mail: prapancha@gmail.com
Blogs:- http://sharavathi.blogspot.com
http://kuchodya.blogspot.com

"Save Water, Save Energy and Save Earth for our next Generation"

1-2nd Nov 2008 Trek report

In the Previous Trek we had explored 2 new water falls in the valley, code named veegi falls. After i shared these snaps in my mailing list, some more trekkers wanted to trek in this route to see these falls. So i decided to arrange the trek on 1-2nd Nov 08. Initially there were few people , but later numbers swelled to decent 10. We booked TT for the travel as all buses were running full because of the Deepavali festival rush. We left Bangalore by 10:00 PM and reached Sagar by 5:30 itself !!!. We reached Sharavathi chain gate by 5:45 AM and stopped to get freshen up in the river. After an hour on banks of river, we started off our journey towards trek starting point. On the way we had tea in KARGAL.
We reached trek starting point by morning 8:00 AM, by then our cook had prepared AKKI ROTTI (A local dish made up of rice flour) and Khara baath. The best thing was that we got the Neer Bella (liquid joggery) this time too..It tastes like honey !!. Evey one enjoyed the breakfast. Then came the Khashaya (A local herbal drink)all of us had stomach full and decided to start the trek.
Before we started off, We had a introductory session and I gave few safety instructions to everyone and requested them to introduce themselves.
We started off the trek and after about a KM of trek, we were getting down to the first water falls. It was almost 80 degree slope with wet surface!!!. Everyone started going down carefully! even then some had a free fall...!. After about half an hour struggle... it was spledid view of the falls. All of us just stood where were ...! It was a great view. Then we went near the falls and took some snaps. We had D40 and 40D photographers (Shashi and Krishna) who were busy trying out their skill!.
Later we decided to say "SAYONARA" to the falls and trekked along with the stream to the second falls. It was a nice trek experience with Cris-crossing stream now and then. After about an hour trek, we reached the second falls. It was amazing falls and it was apt place to enjoy in the falls. So all of us got in to water within no time as we wanted to refresh ourselves very badly...!. All of us played in the falls for about half an hour. By this time Our cook Dharmanna had prepared the lunch and we also were hungry after a nice play in the water falls.
It was superb sambar and rice along with the papad and pickle. All of us had stomach full and rested for about 10 mins. It was about 2:00PM so we decided to start the trek towards Melnur, where we planned to camp for the day. Intially the trek was tiresome as we had to climb up the valley. But later it was a flat trek on nice ridge. It was 'Haadugere valley to our right and it was kanoor valley to our left. Even though we were trekking in high point ridge, we were not able to view the valley clearly as thick vegetation was blocking the view. After about 2 hours of trek, we reached a another beautiful valley view point. Here we waited for sunset and it was great experience to watch the sunset in the silence with bird chirping. Our D40(Shashi) and 40D(Krishna)'s were busy clicking the sunset pics and tried many techniques...Some were annoyed with their photography technique discussion and started pulling their leg :-p.

After the sun set, we trekked down to the tribals house, by then our cook had reached early and prepared the tea to all of us. We had refreshing tea and we were having some time pass talking. Our regular trekker Krishna knew that our guide Narayana knows lot of interesting puzzules. so he pulled narayana and requested him to give some puzzles to solve. First one was to make 9 equal pieces in the 3 small sticks with only 3 break :). All of them got in to serious thinking mode, But Dinesh came out with some unreasonable solution which everybody rejected it but finally it was solved Muruli ...! Later some more puzzles were given by narayana, all of them were solved with little effort by our trekkers.By 9:00PM dibber was ready. Dinner was superb with the Hesaru kaalu payasa (made of Moong grain). All of us had nice dinner and retired for the day.
All of woke up by 5:30 AM and finished out routines. And were ready by 7:00. Break was ready by then. All of had breakfast and tea and started off the trek towards Kanoor fort. Before we entered the fort i brief the history of the fort. It was built by Rani "Chenna baira devi" of salva dynasty in the 14-16th century. Now just a ruins are left. There some beautiful stone temple still which are partially destroyed by 'Treasure Hunters'. After an hour of trekking inside the fort, we explored most of the ruins and decided to trek down to a Jain temple which was built by the same queen in the 16th century. While trekking down, on the way we stopped for lunch. We played int he stream. It was a welcome splash with lot of humidity around. By then lunch was ready. We had lunch and trekked towards Temple, which was nearby. We visited the temple. Temple history was explained by the care taker cum guide. This temple has been maintained by Archeological society of India(ASI).
After the whirl wind tour of the temple, we trekked towards Gersoppa. We had to cross the Sharavathi river in the boat. The boat is a snake boat. As we had instructed our driver to come and pick us from this point, he had come their and was waiting for us. All of just took a final group photo and started off our journey back to Bangalore. It was an another memorable trek.

Trekkers:-
1) Sampath
2) Shashidhar
3) Krishnamurthi
4) Prahlad
5) Dinesh
6) Murali
7) Palghun
8) Santosh
9) Shashidhar R
10) Kiran

Photos links:-

Snaps by shashidhar
http://picasaweb.google.co.in/shashi.gadad/SharavathiExploratoryTrek1st2ndNov08?authkey=qd17f9MK1p8#
Snaps by Krishnamurthy
http://picasaweb.google.co.in/mpkrish/SharavathiValleyTrek3#
Snaps by Prahlad
http://picasaweb.google.co.in/askpsk/SharavathyValleyNovember1st2nd2008?authkey=PAHz7l08KaI#