A small group of the five of us (3 adults and two children), left our homes at HSR at around 4:30 am on a Saturday morning. We took the Hebbal - Mekhri Circle - Yeshwantpur route and joined the Tumkur highway. Being early, we had hopes of beating the traffic and enjoying a nice drive in the Hyundai Creta. However, our dear friends, the truck drivers, ensured that our speedometer could not cross 60 kmph. So, much to our frustration, we trundled through the beautiful highway, and finally took a left at Dobbaspet, and took the winding road-way which led to our destination. After a narrow escape (a crazy driver dashing down the single lane narrow road took us totally by surprise and a sharp swerve ensured we escaped a major crash!), a shaken lot of us reached the foothills of Shivgange at around 6:30 am.
The breathtaking view of the mountain peak from a slight distance made for the best picture of this trip. With the clouds covering half of the peak, it looked like we were getting ready for our walk in the clouds. The kids could not wait to go touch the cottony clouds. So after parking at a newly constructed car park, and a quick breakfast of idlis later, we started our climb at 7:00 am.
The temple at the foot of the hills was not yet open. We took a left turn to get on the trail to reach the peak. The trail started with steps cut out in the rocks. As Shivgange was known for its notorious monkeys, we took minimum snacks (a packet of biscuits, some cut fruits, and some chikkis, and some tetra pak juices) and we split it across all our backpacks. We took around 4 bottles of water between the five of us.
In high spirits, we worked on the trek, the children their happy and fast selves. We adults were more so in our own world, feeling our legs and knees do the climb and wondering how they would withstand (or come out with bright colours :) ), this test. We did have a companion in a huge monkey which give me a fright as I turned slightly to find it just at my elbow, climbing up hanging on the railing. I almost choked, holding back a squeal, and before I could get my courage back to warn my SIL, she saw it too, and thankfully, the two of us acted nonchalant and let it pass by. We were lucky as it did not suspect anything in our bags and continued its journey.
With not much of an event to speak of, we reached what I like to call the half-way mark of the Shiva Parvati statue, after completing the easier part of the trek. This was around 8: 10 am. On the way, we passed the Olekal Teertha, and Basavanna atop a steep rock. Being still early hours, none of the little shops on the pathway were still open.
After this came the steepest part of the trail. The children went ahead with swift steps under the watchful eye of their uncle. The remaining two of us took it slow, taking in the wonderful sceneries below us, feeling and watching the clouds passing by us, breathing in the fresh morning air, feeling the strong gusts of fresh winds, holding on for dear life to the railings, lest we get carried away with the winds ... phew ... this seemed like heaven.
This dreamy phase of our lives, though, was extremely short lived. As we turned a corner, we saw a gang of 10 monkeys. I warned my SIL this time, and both of us decided to just walk by without giving them as much as a look, thus not attracting their attention. However, as soon as I reached a feet away from them, one of the huger monkeys jumped in front of me and growled. I yelled out and tried to shoo it away, but it persisted glaring and growling at me. Meanwhile, another one swiftly moved behind me and started tugging at my bag. Before I could react, pull out my bag and throw it at them, another one, sat on the railings and pulled at my hair! Yikes! I yelled and shooed them and quickly pulled off my bag and threw it at them. My SIL was a few steps behind watching all of this and giving me some pep instructions.
These, now infamous, creatures, then took the bag and laid it atop a rock in a puddle of water (Oh no!) and tried to loosen the draw string. My SIL quickly joined me and both of stood there, watching the Monkey movie. Very importantly, my wallet, with my cards and license and some 2000 odd bucks, were sitting in a little pocket in that back-pack! Aaaargh ... we watched, with nothing other than that to do, hoping the creatures would quickly go away leaving the bag safe for us to take our wallet back and run!
Oh - but was that to be? Out came the chikki packets, slashed at - and the yummy chikkis were devoured within no time by stronger of the lot. The weaker set jumped all around waiting and growling for their turn. Then - search search - yes there was more - a packet of good day biscuits .... they were thrown at the weaker set for them to munch on. What else??? Cap - Flick away, Hat? flick away ... Water bottles - ummmm ugggghhhh - cannot be opened - flick away - towels? what the hell - flick away .... And here we are holding our breath as each item came out and was flung away - hoping against hope that they do not find the wallet and throw it away - down hill into thin air!!! Exactly at this moment, I chose to remember the story narrated by my friend about how his wallet was snatched away by a monkey and thrown out into thin air, at the exact same Shivgange peak, and he mentioned that he never was able to locate it ever!!!!! Oh my!
After a long movie of 20 minutes (which seemed like eternity!) the monkeys satisfied that there was nothing more in it, slowly moved away to the next terrain. Okay go on quickly guys .... oh no! The last one was just leaving, but the smart fellow, decided to be extra smart, and before jumping off the rock, flicked the bag away! Standing where we were, we had no clue what was on the other side of the rock, was it another rock, or was it a deep drop down, or were there bushes beyond! We quickly made our way down and tried checking and found that thankfully, there were bushes beyond the rock, But there still seemed to be no clue of the bag. Finally, my SIL climbed atop the rock and spotted it in the bushes below. I went hunting for a stick to pull it out of the bushes, when, just at that moment, the near by stall keeper came up the trail and happily obliged us by pulling out the bag. Phew!!! Drenched in water and dirt - I pulled out my wallet quickly and told him to keep the rest of the stuff in his safe-keep till we returned from our trek.
Finally, totally fed-up and tired of this experience, we continued our trek uphill, the pathway becoming tougher as we moved up. Finally we reached the magnificent Nandi atop huge rock jutting out of the mountain. A couple of turns later, we reached the mountain top, and were relieved to have gotten there. This was exactly at 9:00 am.
We were amidst the clouds flowing by, and the entire feeling of having reached the top left us exhilarated. The view all around was fresh, green, and out of the world. Though we just did not feel like starting the descent, the hunger pangs of the younger fellows pushed us to get back up on our feet about half an hour later, and we started our way down the peak.
The tired legs this time wanted more rest, so though the gravity pulled us down faster, we took more stops and got down at a slow pace and finally reached the car park at 11:40 am. And - before I forget - another excitement to end the eventful trip - we spotted a snake climbing up the stairs to reach the temple!!! The snake was a thin and small one with a face as small as half of our thumb. It was completely black, with a white stripe running right across it's side.
All the hard work was making all our tummies rumble - so we rushed to the closest Kamat upachar, had some good meals, pooris et al. We then headed back to Bangalore (at around 1pm) and reached HSR layout at around 3:30pm.
Tired legs but happy minds - fitful sleep at the end of the day! A must do trek - Shivgange - also given some beautiful History attached to it. Look up the stories of Danseuse Queen Shantala and Hoysala King Vishnuvardhana - I was taken aback to find out after my trek that this was the peak from where Shantala was believed to have jumped off and ended her life, as she could bear no heirs to the throne to succeed King Vishnuvardhana! The story of Shantala is my next interest and I am waiting to get hold of a book to quench my interest!
The breathtaking view of the mountain peak from a slight distance made for the best picture of this trip. With the clouds covering half of the peak, it looked like we were getting ready for our walk in the clouds. The kids could not wait to go touch the cottony clouds. So after parking at a newly constructed car park, and a quick breakfast of idlis later, we started our climb at 7:00 am.
The temple at the foot of the hills was not yet open. We took a left turn to get on the trail to reach the peak. The trail started with steps cut out in the rocks. As Shivgange was known for its notorious monkeys, we took minimum snacks (a packet of biscuits, some cut fruits, and some chikkis, and some tetra pak juices) and we split it across all our backpacks. We took around 4 bottles of water between the five of us.
In high spirits, we worked on the trek, the children their happy and fast selves. We adults were more so in our own world, feeling our legs and knees do the climb and wondering how they would withstand (or come out with bright colours :) ), this test. We did have a companion in a huge monkey which give me a fright as I turned slightly to find it just at my elbow, climbing up hanging on the railing. I almost choked, holding back a squeal, and before I could get my courage back to warn my SIL, she saw it too, and thankfully, the two of us acted nonchalant and let it pass by. We were lucky as it did not suspect anything in our bags and continued its journey.
With not much of an event to speak of, we reached what I like to call the half-way mark of the Shiva Parvati statue, after completing the easier part of the trek. This was around 8: 10 am. On the way, we passed the Olekal Teertha, and Basavanna atop a steep rock. Being still early hours, none of the little shops on the pathway were still open.
After this came the steepest part of the trail. The children went ahead with swift steps under the watchful eye of their uncle. The remaining two of us took it slow, taking in the wonderful sceneries below us, feeling and watching the clouds passing by us, breathing in the fresh morning air, feeling the strong gusts of fresh winds, holding on for dear life to the railings, lest we get carried away with the winds ... phew ... this seemed like heaven.
This dreamy phase of our lives, though, was extremely short lived. As we turned a corner, we saw a gang of 10 monkeys. I warned my SIL this time, and both of us decided to just walk by without giving them as much as a look, thus not attracting their attention. However, as soon as I reached a feet away from them, one of the huger monkeys jumped in front of me and growled. I yelled out and tried to shoo it away, but it persisted glaring and growling at me. Meanwhile, another one swiftly moved behind me and started tugging at my bag. Before I could react, pull out my bag and throw it at them, another one, sat on the railings and pulled at my hair! Yikes! I yelled and shooed them and quickly pulled off my bag and threw it at them. My SIL was a few steps behind watching all of this and giving me some pep instructions.
These, now infamous, creatures, then took the bag and laid it atop a rock in a puddle of water (Oh no!) and tried to loosen the draw string. My SIL quickly joined me and both of stood there, watching the Monkey movie. Very importantly, my wallet, with my cards and license and some 2000 odd bucks, were sitting in a little pocket in that back-pack! Aaaargh ... we watched, with nothing other than that to do, hoping the creatures would quickly go away leaving the bag safe for us to take our wallet back and run!
Oh - but was that to be? Out came the chikki packets, slashed at - and the yummy chikkis were devoured within no time by stronger of the lot. The weaker set jumped all around waiting and growling for their turn. Then - search search - yes there was more - a packet of good day biscuits .... they were thrown at the weaker set for them to munch on. What else??? Cap - Flick away, Hat? flick away ... Water bottles - ummmm ugggghhhh - cannot be opened - flick away - towels? what the hell - flick away .... And here we are holding our breath as each item came out and was flung away - hoping against hope that they do not find the wallet and throw it away - down hill into thin air!!! Exactly at this moment, I chose to remember the story narrated by my friend about how his wallet was snatched away by a monkey and thrown out into thin air, at the exact same Shivgange peak, and he mentioned that he never was able to locate it ever!!!!! Oh my!
After a long movie of 20 minutes (which seemed like eternity!) the monkeys satisfied that there was nothing more in it, slowly moved away to the next terrain. Okay go on quickly guys .... oh no! The last one was just leaving, but the smart fellow, decided to be extra smart, and before jumping off the rock, flicked the bag away! Standing where we were, we had no clue what was on the other side of the rock, was it another rock, or was it a deep drop down, or were there bushes beyond! We quickly made our way down and tried checking and found that thankfully, there were bushes beyond the rock, But there still seemed to be no clue of the bag. Finally, my SIL climbed atop the rock and spotted it in the bushes below. I went hunting for a stick to pull it out of the bushes, when, just at that moment, the near by stall keeper came up the trail and happily obliged us by pulling out the bag. Phew!!! Drenched in water and dirt - I pulled out my wallet quickly and told him to keep the rest of the stuff in his safe-keep till we returned from our trek.
Finally, totally fed-up and tired of this experience, we continued our trek uphill, the pathway becoming tougher as we moved up. Finally we reached the magnificent Nandi atop huge rock jutting out of the mountain. A couple of turns later, we reached the mountain top, and were relieved to have gotten there. This was exactly at 9:00 am.
We were amidst the clouds flowing by, and the entire feeling of having reached the top left us exhilarated. The view all around was fresh, green, and out of the world. Though we just did not feel like starting the descent, the hunger pangs of the younger fellows pushed us to get back up on our feet about half an hour later, and we started our way down the peak.
The tired legs this time wanted more rest, so though the gravity pulled us down faster, we took more stops and got down at a slow pace and finally reached the car park at 11:40 am. And - before I forget - another excitement to end the eventful trip - we spotted a snake climbing up the stairs to reach the temple!!! The snake was a thin and small one with a face as small as half of our thumb. It was completely black, with a white stripe running right across it's side.
All the hard work was making all our tummies rumble - so we rushed to the closest Kamat upachar, had some good meals, pooris et al. We then headed back to Bangalore (at around 1pm) and reached HSR layout at around 3:30pm.
Tired legs but happy minds - fitful sleep at the end of the day! A must do trek - Shivgange - also given some beautiful History attached to it. Look up the stories of Danseuse Queen Shantala and Hoysala King Vishnuvardhana - I was taken aback to find out after my trek that this was the peak from where Shantala was believed to have jumped off and ended her life, as she could bear no heirs to the throne to succeed King Vishnuvardhana! The story of Shantala is my next interest and I am waiting to get hold of a book to quench my interest!
