Ahupe Ghat

For almost a decade, my heart has yearned for this exhilarating and somewhat undiscovered trek that awaits me. It all started when I stumbled upon it during my research on treks near Naneghat, and ever since, it has held the top spot on my bucket list. However, one obstacle stood in my way: getting to the base village. The public transportation options seemed intricate, requiring a group of fellow adventurers who shared my passion. It had been too long since my last trek on Kohoj, and my longing for another one grew stronger, especially with the monsoon season nearing its end. Each passing Saturday without any trekking plans left me feeling disheartened. But then, on that magical Friday evening, when Aishwarya and Videsh proposed another extraordinary adventure for Saturday, I wholeheartedly exclaimed, “Yes!”. The destination, obviously, was a no-brainer… Ahupe Ghat!

However, it was already 6 pm at office on Friday, and I had to hop on to a call. That left no time for me to plan effectively. So, I requested Videsh and the gang to get into top gear and let me know what the plan was later. We had to book a ride, because without wheels, this trek was going to be a major pain in the you-know-what. They scrambled like crazy to find someone who could hook us up with a car, and thank the lucky stars, they managed to find an Ertiga in Kalyan, right in the middle of all the busy Ganpati vacation bookings. Meanwhile, I looked into alternate options for public transport. Turns out, the only way to get to Khopivali (the base village) was a cumbersome adventure involving a train to Kalyan, then hopping on an ST bus to Murbad, followed by a couple of tum-tum rides to Mhasa village and Dehri/Khopivali. It was an adventure in itself just to get to the base village, man! But let me tell you, getting back to Kalyan would have been a whole different ballgame considering how it all turned out in the end… keep reading ! 🙂

We were a tiny tribe of adventurers this time around, with only six brave souls embarking on an epic trek. Some of our comrades couldn’t make it due to their “prior commitments”, but Sonali and Shubham, the workaholics, surprised us by magically teleporting themselves after burning the midnight oil. We had a genius plan to catch the earliest train to Kalyan, so I sprang out of bed at the ungodly hour of 5:30 AM. Little did I know that finding a rickshaw would be mission impossible ! After 30 long minutes of desperate scavenging, I thought I was doomed. But wait, a hallelujah moment! A rickshaw appeared out of thin air, and I jumped in faster than a cheetah.

Now, just when I thought the universe was finally on my side, the gods of chaos decided to play a prank on me. The metro construction work along the route turned my travel into a comedy of errors. I felt like I was in a slow-motion movie. Every second felt like an eternity, and I was convinced I would be the “Missed the train” star of this adventure. But behold, I made it to the station just in the nick of time, only to be greeted by a sea of strangers in a surprisingly overcrowded Saturday train.

We all met up at Kalyan station at 6:30 am and decided to grab some grub at Naivedyam across the street. But, man, that restaurant took forever to bring us our order, even for something as simple as a cup of tea. Can you believe it? This, plus our desperate search for a restroom, totally messed up our plans. We didn’t even get into the car until 7:30 am, a whole hour after we told the driver to be there. No wonder he was annoyed when we finally hopped in, as, we had kept bugging him on the phone to make sure he was on time. And to top it all off, because of the crazy morning hustle at the station, he had to park way far away on Murbad Road. Despite all his griping, we just brushed it off and shouted out, “Ganpati Bappa Moraya!” to start our journey with a bang!

The ride to Murbad was super boring. I mean, we were just going through the city, nothing exciting there. But then, after we reached the bus stand in Murbad, we took a right turn onto the road that leads to Mhasa village from Karjat-Murbad. And OMG, that’s when we saw these totally majestic mountains on our right side! It was like something out of a movie. So, we kept going and passed by Narivali, where the Siddhagad trek starts, and Dehri, where the Gorakhgad trek begins. And then, finally, we arrived at Khopivali. It took us forever ! Over an hour and a half from Kalyan station to Khopivali village. When we got off at Khopivali at 9:10 am, we told the driver to wait for us there. We were all thinking, “We’ll be back by 4 pm, but let’s tell him 5, as a buffer”. Honestly, we had no freakin’ clue how late we would be.

We eagerly set off on our trek, filled with excitement and curiosity. As we wandered through the idyllic village, we followed a trail we discovered on wikiloc, skirting past breathtaking rice fields. Despite not encountering anyone to guide us, we remained undeterred. After an hour of exploration, we found ourselves at a beautiful river crossing, just as we had seen in some videos. Although the water was shallow, requiring careful navigation of slippery rocks, we embraced the challenge. As we crossed this hurdle, we noticed the landscape gradually shifting to an uphill ascent. The view on our right afforded us a magnificent sight of Gorakhgad and Machchhindragad, accompanied by the soothing sound of the nearby flowing river. With a sense of optimism, we continued our journey, eager for the adventures that lay ahead.

After our previous encounter with mosquitoes at Kohoj, we made sure to apply Odomos again to protect ourselves. To our relief, there were no mosquitoes this time. We continued along the trail until we reached a fork. The right turn led to Gorakhgad, while the straight path led to Ahupe ghat. Interestingly, we didn’t come across the usual trail markers like ribbons or arrows. Fortunately, we relied on the Wikiloc trail, which provided us with guidance throughout our journey. As we made progress, the trail became steeper, turning into a challenging climb over rocky terrain that would have been a flowing stream during the peak monsoon season.

Fortunately, the weather gods decided to show us some mercy that day, sparing us from a downpour that could have turned our trek into an epic challenge. Let me tell you, that climb to the top was no joke. We had to take breaks every few steps just to catch our breath, wheezing like asthmatic penguins. I thought I was about to collapse from exhaustion, but then along came Shubham, our fearless comrade, with his never-ending enthusiasm and relentless motivation. I swear the man runs on pure adrenaline, and Sonali too. She had that “I haven’t slept in a week and might doze off anytime” kind of look, but she powered through like a sleep-deprived warrior. Along the way, we stumbled upon these magnificent balsams weaving their anti-fatigue magic. It was like bursts of botanical inspiration.

And oh, the animal encounters! We couldn’t help but joke about running into some wild beasts after that fiasco with the bull and those mischievous monkeys on the earlier treks. Well, we did encounter some langurs, but let me tell you, those guys were even more terrified of us than we were of them. All in all, it was a climb to remember, filled with laughter, sweat, and a few potentially embarrassing moments. But hey, that’s what makes life an adventure, right?

At around 12:30 pm, we finally made it to the top of Ahupe ghat after a tough climb of about 3.5 hours from Khopivali. We had already devoured all our snacks, and, now, our mission was to find a good spot to chow down some lunch, while enjoying the amazing views. Luckily, there’s a little village up there that you can get to. So, we took a breather by a gorgeous lake and took some stunning photos to remember the trip. Aishwarya was quite entertained with some baby lambs and picked one up in excitement. Fun times, for sure!

However, it soon became evident that securing our lunch arrangements should take priority due to the absence of any restaurants in these rural regions. We quickly realized that home-cooked meals were primarily available and required prior notification to the villagers. Therefore, we hurriedly embarked on a mission to find someone who could provide us with any kind of food.

After wandering through three wadis and walking for about a kilometer, we finally stumbled upon Santosh Supe who runs a small ‘gharguti khanaval’. We asked him and his wife to whip up six veg thalis for us. Sadly, we were hoping for some real village-style chicken goodness, but no luck there. Videsh made a valiant attempt 🙂 at sourcing chicken from someone else, and Shubham even had his eyes on a healthy looking rooster, but then, they gave up when they found out how long it would take. Also, poor Videsh couldn’t convince his mom for the permission to have chicken between Shravan and the Ganpati festival.

We had around 45 minutes to check things out before lunch was ready. It was already 2 pm and we started doing the math on how long it would take to get down. I was confident it would take us at least 1.5-2 hours, considering it took us 3.5 hours to come up. So leaving by 3:30 would be alright. Well, turns out I was dead wrong :(. We made our way to the edge of the cliff and, man oh man, what a sight! The view of the rock edges and the plains below was absolutely jaw-dropping. From up there, we could see Gorakhgad and Machchhindragad, as well as Khopivali and the Padale dam nearby.

The cliffs looked freaking awesome from this vantage point ! It was like a mini Konkankada or something. We found this cool little spot near the edge where the tired gang just plopped down one by one. Sonali, who was totally wiped out, decided to crash out for a bit, and so did Shubham. Meanwhile, Videsh, Vatsal, and Aishwarya were all busy snapping killer pics of the cliffs and those Sonki flowers on the plateau. As for me, I decided to be a daredevil and went to another edge of the cliff for an epic view of Gorakhgad that you couldn’t see from where we were. I have to say, it was a bit risky but it was totally worth it!

But then it was time for us to hurry back for lunch, and we did. Videsh spotted a damn snake in the fields, but he didn’t want to freak the girls out. Time was flying by, and before we knew it, it was already 2:45 pm. We rolled up to Santosh’s place for a simple yet delicious meal of dal, rice, masoor sabzi, and these soft rice bhakris. It was a whole new experience for Aishwarya and Vatsal, chowing down on village grub like that. Poor Vatsal had a little struggle eating with his hands, since he’d never done it before. But once we polished off that satisfying meal, we hit the road again. The sky was starting to get a little dark and there was a light drizzle. We made a pit stop at the next wadi to grab some water bottles and restock our stash. It was already 3:30 pm, but we were feeling good about our progress towards our goal.

We embarked on our daring descent from the edge of the plateau at the slightly late hour of 4:00 pm, naively hoping to reach the village of Khopivali by 6:00 pm. Little did we know that our misadventure was just about to begin. The rain had turned the once solid rocks and soil into a treacherous slip-and-slide obstacle course. It seemed like we were starring in a particularly slapstick comedy, with Vatsal and Aishwarya leading the way, slipping and stumbling in their running shoes. We kept our driver updated, informing them that our estimated time of arrival had evolved into a mythical 6:30 pm. As we trudged through the dense jungle, the rain clouds made everything gloomier. But there were brief moments of hope as tiny cracks in the cloud and tree cover allowed flickers of light to tease us. Two and a half hours of non-stop slogging brought us to the river crossing, by which time darkness had set in. Thankfully, the treacherous slope was conquered, and we found ourselves on level ground, breathing a collective sigh of relief !!

At the moment when the sun had already retired for the day, we found ourselves in a scary situation of navigating through a mini jungle, in the dark, and then into some muddy paddy fields to reach the village. With our trusty phone lights acting as our magical guiding wands, we embarked on this epic adventure. Thankfully, we managed to stay on track by following the recorded trail, avoiding the embarrassment of getting lost in the wilderness.

But wait, amidst all this madness, Shubham’s keen eyes spotted a flickering group of fireflies, which brought a much-needed dose of excitement to poor exhausted Sonali, who was seeing them for the first time. Shubham, even managed to catch one of these mystical creatures, much to Sonali’s elation !

As we tiptoed along the slippery edges of the fields, occasionally finding ourselves in less-than-graceful positions, we felt a wave of relief knowing that we were getting closer to civilization. Finally, by the stroke of 7:20 pm, we triumphantly arrived at the village. It’s quite remarkable how the descent took just as long as the ascent, which can only make us blush a bit with embarrassment. But hey, at least we were safe and sound!

After summoning our driver, who thankfully regained his composure from the morning chaos, we jumped into the car, bidding farewell to Ahupe. By 9 pm, he dropped us off at Kalyan station, where we embarked on a somewhat leisurely journey aboard a slow train to CSMT. As for me, I made a timely departure at Mulund and finally reached home at 10:30 pm – stomach growling but immensely relieved.

Looking back, this trek was way more challenging than I had anticipated. I mean, even the rain gods couldn’t resist playing their part in making it extra exhausting! Let’s just say, it’s like signing up for a marathon with a hangover – it’s gonna drain your time and energy faster than you can say “why am I doing this?!”

So folks, take my advice: plan ahead, start early in the morning (aim for an 8 am kick-off from Khopivali), and make sure you begin the descent by 2:30 pm. Trust me, you don’t want to be walking in the dark in a forest.

If you’re thinking of satiating your taste buds at the village on top, give Santosh Supe a call (details below) and make sure you’re not left stranded, waiting for your lunch. Alternatively, pack your own scrumptious goodies for the journey !

But hey, for all the breathtaking views, the sweat-inducing climbs, the vast plateau that feels like another planet, and the adrenaline rush, this trek was totally worth it! Just remember to bring your sense of humor, because laughter is the best way to survive those thigh-burning moments. Cheers to the adventure seekers!