Monday, September 28, 2009

This weekend Trekking to new route

Hi All,
There are group of people who will be trekking in a new route this weekend. So if anybody is interested to trek in this route, please let me know ASAP.


Trek Route:- Bheemeswara Water falls--->dabbe water falls---->Hosagadde.

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.



Level of Trek:- Moderate

Departure:- 01-Sept-2009 Thursday night.

Itinerary:-

Date:- 01-Oct-2009

* Deaprture from Bangalore by around 10:30 PM.

Date:-
02-Oct-2009

* Reach Kargal in Shimoga District by 7:00 AM.
* Hire a local jeep to trek starting point.
* Freshen Up , Have Break fast on the way
* Reach Trek point and Start the trek
* Start the trek towards Bheeneswara peak.
* Reach bheeswara and play in the water falls and have lunch at bheemeswara.
* Start the Trek towards dabbe and camp in a tribals house by 6:00 PM.
* Have a Camp fire and enjoy the evening. Also interact with Tribals.
* Have dinner and retire for the day

Date:-
03-Oct-2009

* Wake up by 6:00 AM and get freshen up quickly.
* Have Break fast and start the trek by 7:30AM to Dabbe.
* Reach dabbe and go down to dabbe and Enjoy in the Water falls
* Have luch and Trek to Hosagadde.
* Catch waiting jeep to Sagar.
* Reach Sagar and have dinner.
* Start the journey back to Bangalore by around 10:00 PM

Fore Photos and the blog of the route, Please click on the link below
http://sharavathi.blogspot.com/2008/07/mungaaru-maleye-yenu-ninna-hanigala.html


Anybody interested to joining us, please confirm as soon as possible as we need to reserve the bus ticket.

Please MAIL me to prapancha@gmail.com if u need any more information

Monday, September 21, 2009

Its Time to Celebrate and Thank People.

Click Here


Greeting from all staff of "The Sharavathi Nature Trails..."
Hurray ! we have completed 1 Year of Water sports activities !

Though we were organizing Trekking activities much earlier, we are just completing 1 year of water sports activities by this weekend.

Nostalgia :-)
What made us to start these activities?
I have been an ardent nature all through my life. Whenever i see a beautiful landscape, i get the most satisfaction compared to doing anything else. When i first trekked in Sharavathi valley, I just loved every bit of the this rain forest. I liked the peaks, water falls, valley and ever lively streams. Also i will not forget to describe the Linganamakki Reservoir backwater region in the valley. I simply call it as "Heaven on earth". Yes it is indeed. That thick lush green vegetation, those mountains guarding around the backwater makes the place heavenly. When i first Trekked in 90's i just fell in love with this valley. I used to trek every weekend in the valley then. Seeing my enthusiasm, trek organizers offered me a volunteer post where in i will guide the trek team. I was so happy for getting what i was interested in !.
As i was interacting with tribal people of the valley regularly, i came across lot of harsh realities. Major problem was that of livelihood ! for them. Many families are the one displaced when Linganamakki dam was built. All they got is an acre or so land when their loved house, land submerged in the backwater. By now this one acre has been divided in to small pieces of land among sibling , so the livelihood problem. They were forced to find the alternative livelihood as the land they got was not sufficient at all. But the alternative they found was really bad for the forest, themselves and to everyone ! ie., they started cutting off and smuggling rose wood / jungle wood logs !. Forest department had harrowing experience to contain this problem. But people are really nice, they were doing just for the livelihood.

How it started ?


I watched all these problem and decided to do something for it. That's when i came across Narayana of kattinakar. He is simply awesome. His attitude, his abilities to grasp things, his love for the forest, his forest knowledge all became handy to put things in order. What ever i plan and inform him about it, he would simply do it and show me. I really got the major support from him. Thats when we decided to keep doing things which will employ these people, so that they get the decent livelihood. We started off organizing trekking and initially we employed about just 3 people. But our perseverance gave the great result in the first few days itself. And now we have been able to create employment for about 20 youths. Encouraged by this, we started off thinking other type of activities to employ more people. Since i had little knowledge on water sports activities, we thought we would do something on these lines and started searching for a perfect place. For almost 6 months we searched for the place and finally we landed at Gubbagodu.

The people who have helped us

Though we had idea and knowledge, we had problem for the capital required to purchase the equipment. Even conservative estimate started crossing a Rs lakh mark !. When i approached few regular trekkers, they were all appreciative of this effort and helped us generously. Among them are Rahul pathak, his cousin Prshanth pathak and Vinod gaitonde. These people's monetary help and the moral support helped us to start off things smoothly.
Though surrounding villagers were skeptical about our motive initially, they all supported our effort eventually. We will remember the services of Mr.Subbarao of Gubbagodu village at this moment. Without his consistent effort , it would have been difficult to convince sarrounding villagers. The other 2 persons who helped us to settle down and convince villagers are Mr.Sridhar Hegde and Mr.Ranganath Hegde. Both of them worked hard to convince villagers and Govt authorities to grant permission.
Another person whom we remember forever is Mr.Vijaya Kumar, Range Forest Officer of Sagar sub division. He is one of the most upright officer. smugglers have a very bad time in his tenure. He was appreciative of our effort and he encouraged us to carry on as it helped the department in containing the illegal logging and smuggling of other forest resources.
When we went and met Mr.Praveen Kumar, The Assistant Commissioner of Sagar Sub division to grant permission to conduct the activities, He too appreciated the idea and helped us to settle down. Our sincere thanks to him.
Other two persons we would like to thank is Mr. John Fransis (Joe) and Mr.Shashidhar Gadad. Initially they helped us by shooting some of the most beautiful photos of the camp place.
Last but not least, Almost all our trekkers have helped us directly and indirectly, we would like to thank all of them.

The Invitation


Our Water sports / Nature camp program completes 1 year by this weekend with much success. To mark this occasion, We plan to have a "Pooja" in our camp at Gubbagodu on 27th September 2009 Sunday.
On behalf of Trustees and staff of The Sharavathi Trails..., I cordially Invite you all for the Pooja. Please free up yourself This weekend and grace the occasion.

Sampath Kumar
Secretary
The Sharavathi Nature Trails...

Tuesday, September 1, 2009

A memorable trek with a unique group

A memorable trek with a unique group



In our country there are so many problems, issues, crisis etc., Though Most of them are solvable easily, we make them complex and live with them !. In the olden days nature of problems were different, like mostly it used to be related to eking out livelihood. But now we must say we have almost come out of this problem atleast in urban areas today with economy booming. Especially after IT/BT and other export related economy boom, we have almost solved the livelihood problems. But in this process there are many issues which have come up. Among these new type of problems are disappearing of joint family living concept is a serious one as it creates emotional problems. With this problem seriously affected are our elderly people. Though many of our elderly people have no problem financially, problem is activity less, loneliness life disturbs them a lot emotionally.
Many of us sheds crocodile tears for them but ultimately only few come forward to help them. "Ananda Balaga" is one such informal group, is doing great service by involving elderly people in activities like Trekking, Camping and trips to many interesting places in all over country.The group has covered many himalayan trek routes like Manasa sarovar, aadhi kailas, pindari glacier etc., and also they have explored many routes in our own wetsern ghats. This group was started by Anand sir, who has retired from Government services. He is a nature lover himself and he is the motivational force behind this group. As i have trek organizing experience, i must say its toughest job to put people together...!. Still anand sir does mind going through this process.
In the month of April "Ananda Balaga" approached me for the camping/water sports in sharavathi backwater. I happily agreed and we had a great camping time for 3 days. It was most memorable association for 3 days with great minds assembling in one place. For our luck we had a cultural fest also. Gubbagodu , near by village to our camipng place, had a annual utsava and cultural evening. The group had a chance to enjoy the cultural programs.
After the camping program, Anand sir was planning for a trek from ling time in sharavathi valley. Finally they decided to trek and fixed the dates for 29/30th August and as suggested by me we planned to trek in our ace route Basavana baayi-->belligundi -->goodanagundi falls route. After all yes-no-yes group size became 20 people. I requested him to organize private vehicle to reach the trek starting point as going by bus will waste precious morning time. Accordingly TT was arranged. I requested group to leave bangalore as easrly as possible, so that we can reach trek starting point early and start off trek. It was anounced that departure time is 9:00pm but as usual we left by 10:00 pm by 1 hour lag. We reached Kattinakar by 7:30. On the way from sagar itself, it was raining heavily...indicating whats there in store for us for next 2 days. We were lucky, by the time we reach kattikanakar, rain had taken a break and allowed us to finish daily routines and freshen up. After we freshened up , hot masala idlis were ready for the breakfast. Dharma as usual had prepared nice masala idli and sambar with chutney. All of us had breakfast n as usual kashaya and tea. Took a drop till hogevaddi and started off the trek to the basavana baayi which was our first destination without wasting time. Trekkers were so scared of leeches..!! couple of yards trek, red zone for many started !!.. leeches started having a great feeding fest !. Some did not bother much for the leech but many started removing them... But i must say leeches are the most intelligent parasites on earth ! :). By the time they remove in one part they used climb in other part...in the end they never escaped the sting !. With blood stained legs, finally we made it to the Bsavana baayi. First thing everybody did is to remove the shoes and deleech the legs..!. After a while we decided to move to the falls. As it had rained heavily, stream which we had to cross to reach the falls was full and brimming. With our guides help everyone crossed and reached the falls. As usual it was amazing scene, everyone just plunged in to the falls and pulled everyone who were scared in to it. Everybody enjoyed for quite some time and had to return as everyone was hungry. By then Dharmanna had prepared a nice lunch, wasted no time and had lunch nicely.
After the lunch, we split the group in to two based on individuals interested and capability to trek. One will take tougher route to reach our night halt tribal house and other will take easy route. I went with a tougher route. We usually dont trek on trails..we just barge in and make our own trails. So we started off the trek in the dense forest towards kendollare peak. Trekkers were all fine on trek front but many were scared of leeches. After seeing their plight, i directed manju, our guide to change the course and make to the plain land instead of the thick jungle. So we avoided kendollare peak and came to plain of nakkalu village. As there was still time we decided to climb a small peak and then descent to the kanchigadde majnanna's house where we were supposed to halt. in the plain there were no leech so every one were thrilled but rain started pouring. Trekkers did not bother for the rain and we climbed the "hoovina bare"peak. After spending couple of minutes on the peak, we started the descent as it was getting dark. It was about half an hour trek and we were there in the house where we had to camp. it was so chill. Narayana had sensed the situation and had put up a small camp fire. All of us had a small warm up session and by then hot tea / kashaya along with Hot Mirchi bajji were served. It was a great relief to warm like in this fashion. After little relaxation there came call for dinner. Menu was nice pulav, chapti and payasa...everyone enjoyed the food. As we were tired, went to the sleep early and opened eyes only in the morning!. By then bed tea was ready and we hall had tea.Rain god was kind enough and had taken a break..so we all ran in different direction in the forest behind the house to get freshen up...! we wasted no time and started off the trek.
Looks like rain god finished the break and started pouring heavily..but we did not bother for him much and we trekked towards padubeedu, where we supposed to have breakfast.The trek trail from kanchi gadde and padubeedu has a beautiful grass lands. These grass lands are treat to the nature lovers. They look like well maintained golf course !!!. By the time we reach padubeedu Dharma had prepared akki rotti and badane kaayi chatney...all of us had stomach full rotti. Again we wasted no time and started off trek to our next trek point, goodananagundi falls. It was again trail in the thick jungle. People found it tough to wade through. Leeches had a feast day in this trail..!.But everyone made it to the falls. As it had rained heavily, falls can be seen from far only. It was mejestic falls, i call it as Nayagara of our state. Specially the background and stream way and the rock formation around the falls is amazing. Everyone enjoyed the falls view and started the trek back. On the way we took deviation and went to the stream just above falls and some swam for some time there.
After this falls view we started trek to the belligundi falls. coming back was bit easy, everybody trekked well. We reached belligundi view point and we were lucky, the valley was clear. otherwise many times in rainy season, valley gets covered and will not get cleared for hours. Belligundi view is just amazing, its very artistic background attracts a lot. we spent lot of time over there. after photo shoot we decided to trek back to padubeedu. By the time we were back, yummy lunch was ready. We hogged like anything. Rain god did not show any mercy, he was at his fierce as possible. After the lunch we trekked back to kattinakar. As it was chill weather, we decided to have a hot tea and kashaya. After the tea party, we said bye to narayana and co...started off journey back to bangalore.
It was memorable trek in many ways..It was nice group of various background and different age group. All thanks to anand sir for putting together such a nice people.

More Photos :-
  1. http://picasaweb.google.co.in/rekha62ak/RecentlyUpdated?authkey=Gv1sRgCN6T9bvhp5bgxAE&feat=email#
  2. http://picasaweb. google.com/ Tejnashrivastava /MY1STTREKKING? feat=directlink
  3. http://picasaweb.google.com/rusha58/DeepuCamera?authkey=Gv1sRgCKevk4C4xuzA0wE&feat=email#