Have you ever thought of birthday without a party, cake,
gifts, friends and relatives?
One such birthday I celebrated and my better-half planned
a trip, to leave the city (with me of course) for two days and travel
to one of the hill station. So here we – Couple- ready for a trip to the
presumably haunted and quaint hill station an eco-friendly destination–Matheran.
Day 1, August 2nd,
2017, Wednesday
Consecutive holidays are always appreciated by office
gores and from this day my week off, followed by 3 public holidays were
adjusted. And for Mr. Better Half had plenty of leaves. We started out
journey (or our long drive) at 07:00 from Bharuch (BH), RJ27 Wagon R, on NH48.
With pleasant morning and speakers on high volume we were getting close to city
Surat. We were aware of Schmitten –The Luxury Chocolate, factory outlet before
Surat. And on reaching the outlet we were literally got smittened by entering the
outlet shop. I knew as soon as I entered the shop that I was not going to leave
without buying it and that to - Luxury chocolate.
Our next stop was directly to Manor the route we chose to
go from. According to Google Map there are three routes to reach Neral: via Manor, Thane and Kalyan.
Avoiding the Thane city traffic we believed the expert advice of Google and took diversion from NH48 at Manor. Though the road was quite good, but was not less scary than a jungle. To our surprise the so called 4 Lane road ended soon and converted into a single road. Driving for two hours and
covering the distance on the curvy roads we managed to reach Neral. Which was our victory to reach Neral. (Advice 1: Choose Thane Route instead, even if you have
to cross and bare the city traffic).
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| Wrong Route Correct Route |
Now that we had reached Neral by 15:00 we decided to
drive up the steep curved roads and reach up the hill to Dasturi Parking. For
those who don’t know from Dasturi Parking - Vehicles are banned inside
Matheran; which makes the place different from others; so you either walk or ride a horse or a hand
pulled rickshaw. (Advice 2: Bargain as much as you can with the horse
owner). We prettily managed to bargain
with the horse owner “Pappu” and chose his luv kush and Sairat named horses. (Advice 3: Always carry bag packs or else you will end up paying few extra bucks to the coolie). The talkative Pappu who walked between the horses holding the reins and reached
us to our Hotel
Rugby by 16:00 completely exhausted. About the hotel, it was Reliance company's exclusive guest house. The hotel was wonderful in itself, there were individual cottage rooms and the whole construction gave it a kind of royal feel. After getting fresh, we headed straight to dining hall to have some snacks and tea. Being unaware about the unlimited breakfast,
lunch and dinner, we ordered only a sandwich and tea coffee.
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| Our Stay |
It was already 17:00 we set out to explore the jungle quickly as we had gained
a lot of energy after the snacks. The adventure starts with no concrete roads
here, so we walked by the red mud paths through the jungle. In the midst of
jungle one can commonly find golden langurs, giant squirrel and other wildlife
on the way. Interesting thing, that GPS was working absolutely fine. Under its guidance we walked through forested trails to reach Echo point.
(Advise 4: Must
carry cash and torch. If you run out of money and so does ATM’s here. Torch is
a must as the jungles in the night are not lit (still sage)
Echo Point
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| A panoramic view of echo point. |
Echo Point is very famous and is one of the most magnificent peaks. This place is known for its cleanliness and incredibly pleasant weather. This place is situated in the midst of foggy clouds and takes you in a unique state of trance. Being a monsoon season whole of the hills were covered by lush green with lots of waterfalls around. On reaching the echo point, the hilltop gave us a bird's eye view of entire region. Through this point down the valley one can see a beautiful lake. The mountains were engulfed in a fluffy blanket of cotton clouds passing through us. We felt as if were flying with clouds. Few benches were arranged for tourists to sit and relax while having some snacks from the stalls. Though stalls were closed but we had benches to relax and admire the nature's beauty. After spending some time here we started moving towards the next point - Malag Point.
While Walking towards the Malang point again crossing the foggy jungle, several small waterfalls were seen around with chilling water. No sooner had we reached Malang point more or less all the points are similar offering with the great glimpses of valley.
Malang Point
One of the must visit place in Matheran hill station to have a nature's view. Malang point is a plateau with loose red mud and importantly with no fence around it. So, if you have shaky legs, please stay away. I would describe Malang point as one of the breath-taking point of Matheran. Here the breeze was chilling, running through our hair, making us extremely shiver in the wind so we stayed less due to fear or not having fence and headed back to our hotel.
Walking down the muddy path in forest, getting dark and foggy cloud covering the jungle making us almost scared of the place, we met a localite who told us “It’s nothing to be scared of in Matheran”. Now the jungle was not that scary for us. By 19:00 we managed to reach hotel. Completely exhausted by the journey and a 6 kms of walk, we were craving for some delicious hot food. We were lucky enough that our hotel staff provided with what we wanted. The dinner was not less than a 5 star hotel menu.
With full stomach, wandering around the hotel, the clouds again passed through us. The only thing we missed was television. It was for the first time I realized how much time we waste watching an idiot box. And this one of the reason we don't give time to ourselves. With no television in the room we both (Mr. and Mrs.) had a long romantic talk sitting on the chairs provided outside the room.
Day 2, August 3rd, 2017, Thursday (Birthday)
Next day morning we both were all geared up to explore other points and the market. No sooner had we opened the door the clouds came cutting the rain drops to us, entering our room. Yes it was raining. There was heavy downpour the whole night. We had a too good breakfast and after waiting for an hour the rain stopped and we left hotel. We decided to walk by the red mud to explore the beautiful points waiting for us. On the way through the market we came across a map hoarding. So we decided to visit Charlotte lake as of for now.
Charlotte Lake
Charlotte Lake is a prominent lake which supplies water to hill station. It is just 1 Km away from the main market. The lake appears exceedingly ostentatious. An antique and archaic temple of Lord Pisarnath is positioned to the right of the lake. The lake stretched with greenery on either side and gently inclined bank. We found low hanging tree branches and went down to settle down by the lake itself, dipping our feet into the water. I also threw some pebbles to see how far can they land in the water and how can they bob up and down before finally sinking into the bottom.
Crossing the lake and moving towards the reservoir built on the lake, to its left is Lords Point which was our next point to visit to. Ahead of the reservoir there was a grand waterfall. Due to high wind the flow of water was flowing back to us in form of drops.
Lords Point
Lords point is also one of the must visit points if you visit Matheran. Lords point is famous for its scenic valley view and waterfall. Through Lords Point you can see Echo point adjacently. After taking few snaps we decided to return back to hotel. On reaching the main market, we had our lunch ans shopping. Thought there is nothing much to shop around. But we managed to buy a leather purse which was good in looks.
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| Birthday Cake |
Buy 15:00 we return our hotel room. As there was nothing much to do but rest, Mr. Perfect managed to arrange a lovely birthday cake. There was a small celebration in room. We again went for market in the evening to roam around. We had boiled corn from one of the stall present in the market. (Advise 5: Don't carry any eatables in hand or else you will end up chased by monkeys on the streets).
And this is one reason why Matheran is so clean. People don't litter around.
Day 3, August 4th, 2017, Friday
It was time to bid adieu to Matheran with a heavy heart. We called the horse owner to our hotel to take back to the Dasturi Car parking.
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| Signing off. |
One of the important member who accompanied us to our trip. We had escaped from the city to come to this beautiful hill station and each path making us go through woods again to reach to new breath taking view of hills and the greenery.
The trip was not over though! Descending the hills was another great experience .
Waterfalls were ubiquitous.
Finally we reached to car parking and headed back to Neral and all the way back to home.
Quote of the post: Matheran is just the perfect place to find peace away from the hustle-bustle life style and take a break to relax, enjoy by the nature.
Trip Very beautifully captured in words...
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