Sathvik's BLOG Kodachadri Trek and pictures (ಕೊಡಚಾದ್ರಿ ಆರೋಹಣ) RNSIT

This is my first blog and I am going to write about one of the best trek I have ever been to .

"Want to experience heaven , u have to trek this place "

We were group of 8 from RNSIT engineering college, Bangalore. We were coming to Kollur after visiting an amazing place called "Agumbe", After seeing Agumbe I was thinking can I get to see a better place than this !!!!

We reached Kollur around 9 pm , It was raining heavily and our bag were on the top of the Toyata qualis (our amazing transportation vehicle) , got bit worried about the status of our bag , though we had covered it . We were all tired that day. Fortunately got 2 rooms to stay in a hotel . It was quite a nice place , but was very hot , in-spite of raining outside !! We had to look for food that night , which was not an easy task , food around this place is very average.

So all of us slept thinking about our trek , the next day .No one had any idea how the trek would be .

We woke up early in the morning , n took "darshana " (prayers) in Kollur temple which was very important as there are myths surrounding it .

On our way to temple we just had a glance at the place where we were going to trek , my eyes remained wide open !! got pumped up seeing the amazing place , n also got one doubt Are we really going to trek till the top !!!!

The pic below show u the glance of the Kodachadri hills surrounded by bed of clouds ,which we planned to climb . At first we were not sure, we inquired with the resident people in Kollur they confirmed that the one below is only Kodachadri ! :)

Finally having very light breakfast , n buying few liters of water which was very necessary seeing the peak n work required to reach there . We loaded few of our things in vehicle , n drove to supposed to be starting point of the trek , we prepared our self .

This is the place where there is a small shop where u can have coffee tea n biscuits , after this no shops for miles to come .

There are 2 ways , one way u can go thru climbing the hill, that most trekkers do , if u have people who doesn't want to climb up or got tired seeing the peak itself , can take another longer route , which is around 20 km through Jeep . which will cost u a bit .

We started climbing uphill, It was a plain ground at the staring then suddenly the steep appeared to be more n more , We haven't climbed even one fourth of the hill, n few of our friends backed off from trek , seeing the steepness of the hill.

So we were 5 of us now (Akshay , Rahul, Prem ,Sandeep n Me) who determined to trek to the top , not giving any chance to lower our spirits we 5 continued , It was rough place , full of sharp Stones making it difficult to grip , with our shoes , giving a lil support to each other we climbed few meters , We got bitten by leaches in the start only.

Then we came to know that standing at one place for more than a min is calling for leach attack :)
We started climbing , taking very little rest in between. There is no mark as to where to go , and having heard that people get lost in this place gave a Lil spine chilling experiences, but seeing few thrown bottles (which I hate) there we assumed we are probably going in right direction .

An hour of trek in the unknown jungle kind of place , with a pin drop silence , not even sound of leaves that day, was bit scary . But all of a sudden we could hear the voice of people shouting , we suddenly got energy flowing through our veins ,we shouted crazily. Then we came out of that jungle n just got spell bound at the amazing view that we came across .

Here the soil was very loose , there was great chance of slipping , still Rahul Prem n Sandeep had this "don't try this at home" action to do :)

We were inch closer to our destination , we could not afford to take long rest , we were already tired , but beauty of nature was our driving force .

In that narrow place , enjoying nature we walked through , here fortunately it was not very steep and was enjoying walking on straight road :) Our happiness was short lived and again rough roads started , here even tress n plants were obstructing our way .

I was getting damn tired and my legs were paining like hell . Fortunately at that place from nowhere there was a guy selling curd milk , we drank one glass each , phew it was so refreshing , We inquired few things from him and it was very helpful , and came to know that we are on right track . We already did a continuous 1 hour of trekking.

We were almost at the top, we could feel that . Then we came out of the shades of tree n saw one house far away , We knew that some house is at the peak , where we can have our food and can take rest for a while. We were happy seeing that place but i was worried a bit , It was way up straight , I thought I would have to do rock climbing to reach there :)

We managed to reach the top of the Kodachadri peak at last after an hour and a half of continuous trekking .

View from there was just amazing ,superb experience .

There came an old lady asking about how we reached till there and we came to know that she was Girijamma whose name we had heard before , she is a bit famous in that place , anybody would recognize her name there :) , she helped us in knowing more about that place and the places which we still planned to visit .

We refreshed a bit there , As one would thought its the end of the trek . there was still lots store in for us , there were 3 more places to visit , Agasthya Thirtha ,Guha Ganapati and finally Sarvagna Pitha .

We booked our lunch in the house , and we were charged to finish our trek with a high note ,visiting all places . The trek after that , till we reached the peak was the toughest .There was no signs of any living being there and at one point we thought we were lost and should move back, but still we had no mood to let go off our efforts and we continued exploring the unknown areas and after half an hour of exploring we reached Agastya Thirtha and Guha Ganapati , Priest in the Guha ganapati helped us knowing a bit about that place , people were very friendly and helpful .

Next was our final Destination , Sarvagna Pitha it was a km away and we could feel the cloud while reaching there , it was just amazing experience and once we reached the top , happiness was like conquering the hill :)

We thought there would be nothing at the top apart from few trekkers but to our amazement there was a guy selling few biscuits n cold drinks and of course famous lime water , and his name was Maadesh,very nice guy. We were so tired that we all took about 3 glasses of Lime water each and we spent around an hour there experiencing the beauty of nature , clouds forming and going in front of us .
Just cant explain it , have to enjoy it real :)

Finally after spending an hour or so , we came down , coming back was quite easy compared to climbing as we knew the route by now . We spent lot of time at our favourite destination coming back as this picture would suggest :)

At the end I would conclude saying , " Life is half spent before we know what it is. " so make best use of it .
"Just living is not enough... One must have sunshine, freedom, and enthusiasm ."