The Adventure at Malshej Ghat

Pre Trip Blues:

Hemant mailed one day saying that he wants to spend his birthday in Bombay. More specifically in a place called Malshej Ghat, which according to him was just an hour and half from Mumbai, blah blah, 3600 mts above sea level, blah blah, etc, etc. He also said that he will be stopping over at Goa to gear up for this small trip of ours. That was the sweetest thing that he could tell me. So the orders were placed by one and all for whatever they might require. But then circumstances, god knows who makes them up, but yes, circumstances made all my good friends drop out one by one. Dal said that he had to study and Herman said that he had no money. This cheesed me off a bit because whenever I make the plans it never materializes, no matter how hard I try. So in the end it so happened that Hemant and me were the only people who went.
So on D-day Hemant reached Lokmanya Tilak Terminus and gave me a call, “Dude where the f@#* are you. I have only 50 bucks on me. Get some money and your arse to Bandra. That’s the only place I know in Bombay!!”
Wow! I thought to myself. So there I was with a lot of explaining to do when my mom asked me where exactly I was going with the huge bag and my cheque book. The huge bag contained my 2.1 speakers that would provide the only entertainment out there and the of course the cheque book was our only means of getting to our desired destination.
Finally we left from Bandra, catching a train to Dadar and then changing over to the central line to catch a train to Kalyan. From Kalyan we had to take a rickety, old State Transport (S.T.) bus only to dump it an hour later because our legs were paining from the standing. Somewhere in the middle of nowhere we stuck out our hands and a considerate and drunk truck driver gave us a lift till the top of the mountain. Thank god he did that coz the view on either side was so breath taking that we thought we died and went to heaven. If ever there was a heaven in Maharashtra, I guess it would be here.
Finally after paying the driver 40 bucks and a peg of whiskey, we got off at the M.T.D.C. resort only to be driven away by the dearth of rooms. So we took a small trek after finding a few locals, who acted as our guides, and ended up at a homely lodge called the 'Nisarga Lodge'. It was situated in a picturesque part of the ghats, surrounded by lush green valleys. After eating some local food the inevitable took place. At 2100 hours our trip began.

The Trip:

Can’t say much here, can I? It’s different for everyone. I was told that the first time, and it holds true every time I’ve done it. This time I started off in Goa at a rave, with my surroundings turning around and the walls moving back and forth and all this while changing color. There was a purple and a violet and green and pink. There I was moving among strings floating around. The walls were moving into me by now and I knew I was doomed. Doomed to have another trip for sure. All I could hear was screaming, reptiles abounding. Only to realize, it was the rain that was lashing into the window and the figures were nothing but the peeling plaster of the walls. Then as I was about to lie down, Hemant comes in to roll a joint and starts complaining about how he needs alcohol to kick off his trip. We pufed up and then he left me to lay back and fade away into my own wilderness. Trance was still playing the background, a few drunken guys in the neighboring rooms were getting louder than the music. I went to check it out and found Hemant really happy as they had what he was craving for --- ALCOHOL. It doesn’t matter where it comes from as long as it’s there. Thats when it began: I started puking everything that i had inside. Was it the people we had just met or the food or something else, still remains a mystery. That triggered a chain reaction among the drunken people too. After half an hour, I was feling much better, where as the other's weren't. Kicking myself for having come out I enter back into my liar to lie absolutely still before repeating the entire sequence of events agin. At this point I thaught I was in some dream. In the middle I went out to check out the weather and chill out along with it. That's when I found Hemant standing bare chested braving or should I say fighting the rain and the wind and the cold and whatever he was feeling at that time. Hope he writes down his account of that night soon so that I can post that up too out here (I also want to do a sort of research on other people's trips). Yeah, one more point worth mentioning: It was Hemant’s b’day that night. Our last J was smoked around the time when image image 5 was clicked, where the two of us struggling to hold that sweatshirt in place for the snap. I don't know why Hemant was so persistant in doing just that. The pic's come out pretty neat for that situation. That was also the time when we decided to stay awake for sunrise and click a few pics. The trip doesn't end there but goes onto 0930 when I decided to venture out back into reality .The rest has to be imagined folks because I ain't that good a writer (if that wasn't obvious by now) to put everything I saw and felt down. All I can say is that my trip ended with a strong urge and desire for my innerself to be in Barcelona. I don't know why that happened or if I'll ever get there but that feeling was very strong.
There are a few pics put up and some more will be put up soon, I promise. And these pics ARE definately worth more than a thousand words for us.







Image 2: To have or not have was never the question.







Image 3: Wasted! totally wasted! (I also feel the need to wax!)








Image 4: Two men totally lost. One excited at the prospect. The other wondering what the fuck was he doing out there.








Image 5: 'Manipal - Inspired by Dope' The place where it all started. Fuck knows when's it gonna end.





Post Trip Hues:

Hemant wanted me to stay awake till sunrise but suddenly our roles reversed. He fell asleep and I couldn’t even though my entire trip was spent hallucinating on the bed. “You must live your life to the fullest!” cried out the drunk from the other room, whom we had actually help get to his room the previous night. Giving him the thumbs up and a fake grin I proceeded to see the sunrise while Hemant snored away in the room. Then I realized that there was the World Cup Finals that night and we were a good distance away from TV and beer. So I woke Hemant up, asked the room service to get us breakfast and then bid adieu to the lodge and it’s inhabitants. It was around 10 when we left the lodge and when we caught the S.T. bus back it was around 12. Two hours of walking among the waterfalls, drunken men of all shapes and sizes had got us very tired. I was woken up with a jolt, and found out that we had reached Murbad, a place that was just an hour away from Kalyan. But just when our bus entered the depot, there was news that the Shiv Sainiks had created ‘dangal’ (riots in Marathi) in most parts of Mumbai. So here we stranded with 1000 (or maybe more – who bothers counting) other passengers, all held at ransom by hoodlums who play themselves into the hands of politicians. Finally after 4 hours of waiting and cursing, we set out again, our co-passengers in obvious fear and panic. The only 2 people chilling out were Hemant and me. Reached home at 2130 hours took a bath, ate some of mommy’s cooking and immediately set out to watch Italy trounce France’s ass on penalties. That’s another adventure, maybe not worth writing about. For now, just hoping you guys liked this one.





Image 6: Still Buzzing. Still wondering.









Image 7: "I am the lizard King. Yet I can't do everything."