February 1661:
It was 2nd of February and the Mughal Army was marching fast towards the Konkan region from Pune. The army consisted of Horses, Bulls, Elephants, small canons and men. They were equipped for a full fledged war anytime. Their head, Kartalab Khan, was a fierce Uzbek warrior. Trusted by the Mughal Emperor, Aurangzeb, he was sent to the Pune region to assist Shahista Khan to wage war against the Great Shivaji. Kartalab Khan was assisted by Kachhap, Jasawant Kokate, and the lady sardar RaiBaghan.
The army had reached Lohgad and Khan had decided to take the pass between Lohgad and Visapur to enter Konkan.
The spies informed Kartlab Khan that the Great Shivaji was resting at Kuruwande Village, roughly 4 miles west to the Lohgad. Khan instantly jumped at the opportunity to siege the Great Shivaji and gain higher ranks at the courts of the Emperor. Thus, the army changed its course and turned towards to Kuruwande.
As they reached Kuruwande, they found that the informers had given wrong information and no one was at the village. Not wanting to go back, the Khan and his troop decided to descend the Konkan from the pass near Kuruwande – The Umbarkhind.
The Great Shivaji had utilized his knowledge of the Sahyadri to the maximum and trapped the Mughal army in the dense forest of the pass using his famous warfare: The Guerrilla warfare. He and a handful of men attacked the army from higher side of the pass and one of his prominent men Netaji Palkar and few more men attacked from the Konkan side. February, being beginning of summers, the drinking water was scarce too. Kartalab Khan decided to surrender and sent his lawyer, Lady Raybaghan to The Great Shivaji. Soon the Army left with its leaders and the Marathas had won once again proving their rightful ownership on the terrain.
This story must have been repeated by older generations to discourse about the intelligence and valor of one the greatest king of the nation’s history.
July 2013:
Kushal put forth an idea to me of trekking at Umbarkhind as practice trek before the Enduro for Team Rajmudra. The discussions on different platforms of calls, whatsapp, sms’s and facebook didn’t even heat up and handful of people jumped in. Although the trail was chosen, to our delight no one knew the exact route. So it was clear that this was going to be a trek full of exploration.
It was real early morning of Sunday morning when I picked up Ankita and we reached Shivaji Nagar Station. We took the 5:45 AM Local for Lonavala. Our friends joined us on the way. The discussion about the bus station in Lonavala was the hottest topic till we found the only open vadapav joint. Once inside the shop the subject of discussion automatically changed to number of vadapavs and tea cups. This was the heavenly morning! It was drizzling, we had hot & spicy vadapavs and tea and a group of wonderful 10 avid trekkers was on its way to explore… You don’t need to die to be in heaven.
After breakfast, we walked till the INS Shivaji chowk and luckily found a tourist vehicle who agreed to drop us at Kuruwande. Once at Kuruwande, The IT Trio of Ashish, Kushal and Amit inquired at a house for the route and we started the hike.
There is a fencing of INS Shivaji & Reliance Industries that needs to be followed till you reach GAIL Gas Pipeline. Ideally you should follow the pipeline to reach the base village of Chavani.
Since, this was the first time we were using GPS we decided to follow it blindly and the result was an awesome trail which lead us to our future camping site and the truth was that we were lost! It was a quick walk of 20 mins to get back to the pipeline.
Once we were back on track, the view kept us mesmerized till the end. The countless waterfalls did not let us crib about the slippery slopes. The view of few waterfalls on one side of mountain was so picturesque that everyone one of us got ourselves photographed with them. After a long time, I had seen so many waterfalls in one glance. After a due photograph and
long awaited snacks break, we descended further and the Konkan terrain.
This being a rarely explored was a clean and serene terrain.
I had thought of counting the waterfalls, but lost the track of numbers looking at them… Countless of them… The stepped ones… The straight ones… The terrain had just two markings one of waterfalls and other was green trees… Unbelievable heavenly scenery… Best part of trek was climbing down the mountain next to these waterfalls. A feeling of being blessed to have born in this part of world ran down my heart.
The earlier descriptions had mentioned about river crossing. On the earlier day, I and Ashish had spent few minutes searching for river on Google maps, which was of no avail. So, after the descend, when we kept walking towards Village (Chavani), we crossed a spring, I had thought that this is it. Perhaps this one being an intermittent and only seasonal river was not part of Google maps. Crossing of this spring was refreshing but did not give any sense of adventure. Ashish also mentioned that, this was too small.
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With our heavy hearts we walked ahead, and the delightful surprise awaited us! The roaring river needed to be crossed to reach Chavani. Thankfully, Kushal and his friend had slings which we could use to cross a part of the river. The water was flowing with force enough to take a lone person along with the flow. Two villagers noticed us crossing the river and immediately rushed to help us. This river crossing was the first ever experience of my life and thus definitely the most memorable. Everyone was happy with the sense of achievement and adventure.
We marched ahead into the village and a kilometer later we reached the place of battle. There is small memorial, which was submerged in water. The memorial has a bronze mural of The Great Shivaji riding on horse on one side and the brief story of the incidence is carved on white marble on another side. Looking at the memorial of bravery, all of us had adrenaline rush.
Now, our tummies had a hunger rush too. We sat down in open and had lunch. Before we could finish the lunch, the rains caught us. We wound up our stuff and started walking towards Khopoli – Pali Road. The walk was on the bank of the river, and 4 kms didn’t feel much. It took a while to get a drop at khopoli which was only 13 kms away. The bumpy ride on a dugdug made the journey full of laughter.
At Khopoli, we changed into dry clothes and had most refreshing tea of our lives and headed to the bus stand. After a chatty, & sleepy bus journey, we reached Pune. With our minds refreshed for the week and hearts full of pride for our King.
It was 2nd of February and the Mughal Army was marching fast towards the Konkan region from Pune. The army consisted of Horses, Bulls, Elephants, small canons and men. They were equipped for a full fledged war anytime. Their head, Kartalab Khan, was a fierce Uzbek warrior. Trusted by the Mughal Emperor, Aurangzeb, he was sent to the Pune region to assist Shahista Khan to wage war against the Great Shivaji. Kartalab Khan was assisted by Kachhap, Jasawant Kokate, and the lady sardar RaiBaghan.
The army had reached Lohgad and Khan had decided to take the pass between Lohgad and Visapur to enter Konkan.
The spies informed Kartlab Khan that the Great Shivaji was resting at Kuruwande Village, roughly 4 miles west to the Lohgad. Khan instantly jumped at the opportunity to siege the Great Shivaji and gain higher ranks at the courts of the Emperor. Thus, the army changed its course and turned towards to Kuruwande.
As they reached Kuruwande, they found that the informers had given wrong information and no one was at the village. Not wanting to go back, the Khan and his troop decided to descend the Konkan from the pass near Kuruwande – The Umbarkhind.
The Great Shivaji had utilized his knowledge of the Sahyadri to the maximum and trapped the Mughal army in the dense forest of the pass using his famous warfare: The Guerrilla warfare. He and a handful of men attacked the army from higher side of the pass and one of his prominent men Netaji Palkar and few more men attacked from the Konkan side. February, being beginning of summers, the drinking water was scarce too. Kartalab Khan decided to surrender and sent his lawyer, Lady Raybaghan to The Great Shivaji. Soon the Army left with its leaders and the Marathas had won once again proving their rightful ownership on the terrain.
This story must have been repeated by older generations to discourse about the intelligence and valor of one the greatest king of the nation’s history.
July 2013:
It was real early morning of Sunday morning when I picked up Ankita and we reached Shivaji Nagar Station. We took the 5:45 AM Local for Lonavala. Our friends joined us on the way. The discussion about the bus station in Lonavala was the hottest topic till we found the only open vadapav joint. Once inside the shop the subject of discussion automatically changed to number of vadapavs and tea cups. This was the heavenly morning! It was drizzling, we had hot & spicy vadapavs and tea and a group of wonderful 10 avid trekkers was on its way to explore… You don’t need to die to be in heaven.
After breakfast, we walked till the INS Shivaji chowk and luckily found a tourist vehicle who agreed to drop us at Kuruwande. Once at Kuruwande, The IT Trio of Ashish, Kushal and Amit inquired at a house for the route and we started the hike.
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| Our New Camping Site |
Since, this was the first time we were using GPS we decided to follow it blindly and the result was an awesome trail which lead us to our future camping site and the truth was that we were lost! It was a quick walk of 20 mins to get back to the pipeline.
Once we were back on track, the view kept us mesmerized till the end. The countless waterfalls did not let us crib about the slippery slopes. The view of few waterfalls on one side of mountain was so picturesque that everyone one of us got ourselves photographed with them. After a long time, I had seen so many waterfalls in one glance. After a due photograph and
long awaited snacks break, we descended further and the Konkan terrain.
This being a rarely explored was a clean and serene terrain.
The earlier descriptions had mentioned about river crossing. On the earlier day, I and Ashish had spent few minutes searching for river on Google maps, which was of no avail. So, after the descend, when we kept walking towards Village (Chavani), we crossed a spring, I had thought that this is it. Perhaps this one being an intermittent and only seasonal river was not part of Google maps. Crossing of this spring was refreshing but did not give any sense of adventure. Ashish also mentioned that, this was too small.
.jpg)
We marched ahead into the village and a kilometer later we reached the place of battle. There is small memorial, which was submerged in water. The memorial has a bronze mural of The Great Shivaji riding on horse on one side and the brief story of the incidence is carved on white marble on another side. Looking at the memorial of bravery, all of us had adrenaline rush.
Now, our tummies had a hunger rush too. We sat down in open and had lunch. Before we could finish the lunch, the rains caught us. We wound up our stuff and started walking towards Khopoli – Pali Road. The walk was on the bank of the river, and 4 kms didn’t feel much. It took a while to get a drop at khopoli which was only 13 kms away. The bumpy ride on a dugdug made the journey full of laughter.
At Khopoli, we changed into dry clothes and had most refreshing tea of our lives and headed to the bus stand. After a chatty, & sleepy bus journey, we reached Pune. With our minds refreshed for the week and hearts full of pride for our King.