Matheran
The name Matheran means either "forest on top" or "mother forest". This is again another hillstation of the Western Ghats and situated at an height of around 2600 feet. This is one of the hillstations developed by the British as a summer hangout place. The unique thing about Matheran is that polluting vehicles arent allowed inside. You can also avail the facility of a narrow gauge train if you are lucky and are in time. The thing that puts one off is that this place has too many tourists making it crowded at times. People are the last creatures that i feel like seeing when on treks atleast till i am all fine.

The thing that makes this trek a unique one for me was that this was my initiative towards team building during my tenure as the Fine Arts secretary. In the institute I feel it is most difficult for the Institute Secretaries to have a committed group of people to work because they have no incentive to offer than their company in exchange. So it all started with a group of people(RANG sophies + Suri and me) who had just started knowing each other and there was a full year lying ahead to be spent together.
We started at about 5:00 am from Insti to Neral after whereas a deadline of 4:15 am was set to depart from insti, thanks to people who had long hairs to comb and could even think of taking bath before a trek. We were well in time to catch the first local.
The onward journey became beautiful after we were out of the suburbs. The patch from kalyan to karjat is the most beautiful in early mornings of the monsoons. You can watch the numerous waterfalls and lush green hills as the local train tears through the dense cold morning air. Tiny raindrops hitting your face when you try facing the direction of the train leaning outwards sends a tickle down the spine. A person doing this for the first time is bound to be overwhelmed by the excitement it creates and I could see the same in the faces which were trying to grab as much as they could. The train halted and we rushed out.
We were around 11 and most of us were here for the first time. The most unfortunate thing was that the narrow gauge train route was blocked due to recent landslides and so was the trekking patch so we had to walk all the way along the road as none of us wanted to hire a cab to the peak. We took breaks at spots where we found waterfalls and streams. The clear, cold mountain water was too refreshing and a regular encouragement for those who gave up at times. We reached the hill station in 3 hours after starting at the base at 8:45 am.
We were expecting some rest after reaching the top but i guess that was simply too much to expect. The points were spread all over the hillstation with each point being separated from other by atleat 4 kms. Without pacing we could have never covered the "to be seen" spots. Charlotte lake, Monkey point, Panorama point, porcupine point were some of the good ones. Though we managed to cover most of them we were badly exhausted. We took a cab downhill and reached insti back at about 8:30 pm. The trip was a hit as we all had enough fun and obviously the purpose of the trek was also served.


The group: Suri, Shiksha, Pooja, Bhavna, Sumit Parmar, Jango, Dilkash, Brahm, Niraj, Niranjan and myself.

Sad part of the trip: We didnt carry a good cam. The fotos were taken by a cellphone cam