Hi All, After very very long time went out somewhere. Added financial constraints restraining me to ride out far- hence decided to explore the nearby places, specially during the monsoons. Want to finish off trekking maximum forts till the rains disappear. Started the season with 800 year old Fort of Kohoj situated off Mumbai Ahmedabad highway on the Manor Wada road.
Its around 3200 feet high and the difficulty is classified as "MEDIUM" by trekkers. The tallest peak in Maharashtra "Kalsubai' is classified as "SIMPLE"- so this one was going to be a bit difficult as far as my trekking standards are concerned. The ascends are quite vertical and very taxing on your legs. That is only the initial part- after trekking 60%, panting for breath and almost dying of dehydration- the hilltop seems nearer and you feel its over. Unfortunately it is not- the remaining 40% is even more vertically challenged and there is no path hence very easy to get lost- loose slippery rocks, fallen trees and logs under which you have to crawl through and just keep walking on instinct looking up at the sky visible with small gaps through the thick tree cover. But then success is more sweeter when things are tough and it's an amazing feeling when you get there on top of it and specially when a darpok guy like me who is scared of heights stands at the edge of a cliff looking down at the road where we were just some hours back. We were 4 of us i.e. Salil, Vinod, Arjun and me- unfortunately Salil has to retired half way owing to tiredness and Vinod developed a real bad pain in his left knee on the last difficult section, hence even he returned. We returned via some different route with a localite as we were sure of losing our track in dark. Through with initially tough sections where one guy slipped off the rocks and almost lost his life, luckily escaped with minor injuries getting stuck in the rocks- rest of the descend though tiring but was comparatively easy to the path we took to climb up. Got down the village on the other side and were dropped till the Manor Wada road in their Scorpio. Later took a lift in the trailer till Waghote village to catch up with Vinod and Salil. Anyways enough said- that was just to brief you with the excitement faced on the trek, the pictures have the descriptions in case you missed out on anything here ;) Hope you like them. http://picasaweb.google.com/pulsurge/TrekToKohojFort# Regards, Deepak
