Place: Varanda Ghat
Base village: None
Height : ??
Grade : Easy
Me,Sau,Chaitanya,Deepak,Purvesh,Shailesh,Sharayu,Bhavin,Deepak ,Pankaj did this trek on 9th Nov 2008. Kavlya is a virtually unknown fort on top of the Varanda Ghat some 33 km from Mahad and 80km from Bhor. Last time when I did a ride on the ghats I spotted the Bhagwa flag on top of this hill and asked the locals there as to whether this was Kavlya and they said YES, I had known of the existence of the fort but didn't know its location , now that I knew we decided on a trek to the fort and add it to our existing fort list !
The initial planning by me of the timings was like , we would be able to complete the climb (initial) in 20 mins and time to view around would take around 1 hour and back to the base in about 2 hours and back to Pune by 2pm but that was not to be , read on.
We started from Pune at around 7am post meeting everyone at different points and then a fiasco on the road to the new Katraj tunnel with truckies who with double the load trying to overtake another truck at speeds of 20kmph and blocking the fast lane , they never learn.
Post that it was fun riding on NH4 over the smooth tarmac and broad roads. Stopped at Natraj as everyone was showing signs of hunger, had a nice breakfast of upma and tea and post some entertaining photosessions from Chaitu, Saurabh, Deepak and some timepass left ahead.
Reached Kapurhol (from where we turn to Bhor) in no time. Found out that the others stopped just ahead of the turn as they were unsure as to whether this was the turn or not , and I confirmed that this indeed was the turn to Bhor , as there isn't any sign board on the NH to tell this people do get confused. Got onto the 2 laned road to Bhor and went ahead , roads were good. Entered Bhor at around 8.30am and there was road work going on , asked everyone to follow me as we were to pass via the city and one missed turn could cause confusions, and the last thing we wanted was lost bikers trying to find out the way...:)
The city road was empty in the early hours so we managed to get smoothly out of the city and touched the road to Mahad which was to take us to the Varanda ghat. The roads out of the city were also good for about 5-6 km before the bad roads started , bad as in typical country roads with potholes greater than tarmac, this reduced our speeds but it was not so bad. Amidst cool views of the backwaters of the Nira we went ahead and touched the ghat, the ghat ride was uneventful with good roads and nice twisties beckoning.
We made good time and reached the point on top of the ghat at around 10.15am and stopped for the others to come in. In the meantime ordered chai and bhaji from the stalls there. Others came in 10 mins and we waited for Purvesh who was to come in from Mumbai via the NH-17 and Mahad. Everyone had their share of tea and bhajis and vada paav and post enquiries we set for the fort. It was 11am , the schedule already screwed :)
We got onto the path , thankfully the sun was shining from the opposite direction so we had nice shade all the way but the path was very slippery and sloping downward, but not so dangerous. It was a nice payvaat all the way , we reached the top of the fort in about 20mins and then I realized that the fort expanse on top was way too huge to be completed in 1 hours time. Post some photo sessions on a rock at the extreme end. The fort top is covered with knee lenght grass and 6-7 feet tall karvi bushes.
We went to the right side of the fort , climbed via the payvaat via thick bushes and went ahead towards the extreme end of the fort, passing remnants of some old structures and finally reached the extreme end of the fort which had a bastion and a flag. Post some photosessions , I went towards the other end from there to just explore as in what is there but didnt find anything of interest so came back. Had nice lunch of theplas and thaali peeth thanks to Purvesh and Sharayu and we started back. The sun was at its peak and we felt the heat , in the middle me , Chaitanya and Bhavin slided down over a particularly steep stretch of descent , me for the sheer fun of it did it.
Reached back to the place of descent from the fort , Purvesh,Sharayu,Sau and Deepak decided to try the difficult left hill part and we decided to stay put and climb down as we didnt want to try stuff in the sun that is. We started climbing down and got onto the narrow path , slipping and struggling over scree we made it down to the road and to the stall and gorged on glasses and glasses of nimbu sarbat and taak and waited for the others to return. The time read 2.30pm and we needed to start fast for home. The others came in by 2.45pm including the adventurous bunch and then they had their share of nimbu sarbat and taak and bhajis.
We finally started back at 3.15pm parting with Purvesh who had to go via Mahad to Mumbai and we started back for Pune via Bhor. The ride back was uneventful with stops at the back water views of the Nira and photos with Sharayu deciding to let her legs in water at a bridge and enjoy the coolness. We hit the NH-4 via Bhor at 6pm and came home by 7.45pm thoroughly exhausted with the riding. Nice trek!!
