Harihar Fort
Vertical
Mountain face of more than 200 ft. In the middle of it, Somewhere, an orifice
and To reach till that point, vertical climb (of more than 80 degree gradient)
through flight of stairs carved on open face of the rock face. Interesting?
That’s just a part of the story. Once you pass through an Orifice (Darwaja),
then another set of short alleys, stairs spiraling left, right, straight or
taking U turn before taking you to the “Top”. Sounds exciting? All this you can
experience in Harihar fort Trek. Harihar trek is like Hollywood movie. Full of
Action, thrill, adventure and all this in 120 min. flat.
Harihar fort is
situated at 3500 ft. in Tryambakeshwar range of Sahyadri mountain in
Maharashtra. It is located in Nashik district. It’s base village is Nirgudpada.
From Mumbai, you can each via Kasara – Khodala – Nirgudpada route Or Igatpuri/Ghoti
– Pahine- Nirgudpada route. If you are going via public transport take Kasara
route as public transport (read jeeps and sumos) are more frequently available
than other route. ST buses are infrequent on both routes and may available at
the gap of 3-4 hrs.
This trek can
be easily done as 1 day trek from Mumbai. However, We decided to do it as overnight
trek. We started early morning on Christmas day of 2015 and reached at Nirgudpada at 2 pm. thanks
to low frequency of public transport as mentioned above. However nice winter breeze
was making afternoon sun pleasant. Even
though I mentioned Nirgudpada as base village, it is just a cluster of few huts
and small houses.
Trail to fort goes through fields and then climbs hill
till it reaches on the col between Fani dongar (Mountain) and Harihar fort. From
there, trail turns right to Harihar fort. After that you can climb rock cut
steps to reach first darwaja.
While following trail from Nirgudpada, focus on col
between Fani dongar on left and Harihar fort towards right. However there are
two (or more than that) prominent trails, one moves slightly left towards Fani
dongar. Take that route. Another route, which initially looks like going
towards harihar fort, climbs till considerable height and vanishes when height
to reach at col remain just less that 100 ft. or so. Many (around 50 %) groups
reach till this point and then to avoid going down again, many of them climb through
thrones, risky patches to reach to col. Wise option is to get down bit and move
towards correct path and reach to correct trail to avoid unnecessary risk.
From fields till col, it is nice climb where your heart can
demonstrate how fast it can beat and make its presence felt. It takes approx. an
hour to reach till here. Then we turned right towards Harihar. In golden light
of evening Sun and cool breeze, Harihar was standing tall showing it’s true
might. Our mind was already racing on the rock cut steps. But it was still some
distance away.
From base, Harihar fort appears, rectangular in shape. However
from this point, we realize that it is actually triangular in shape.
Before steps starts, there is nice slope with scree,
loose soil and nothing to hold :-). If
you start skidding from here, you can enjoy non-stop slide till base of valley.
(At least, that thought cross your mind). So needs to negotiate this patch
carefully. One of our group member was so careful at this patch, that he
transformed from two leg animal to four leg, then tortoise and then crawling
creature. He would have given run for money to gecko or crocodile with his
style.
Then we reached to most interesting part of the trek. It
was those vertical rock cut steps. These are nicely cut steps with proper
holds. It feels awesome when you climb till darwaja to look back straight
down in the valley.
But that’s not all. Once you cross the darwaja, internal rock
cut route moves through narrow and short alleys and internal spiraling steps
moving like snakes with lots of twists and turns.
After crossing two more darwaja like this we reached at
the top (but not the top most point of the fort). From here, we walked towards
lake and further ahead to shelter (this was probably old temple). It had enough
space for 10 – 12 people to stay.
When we reached there, it was getting dark and strong
wind was blowing. That was increasing chilling effect of winter. Good
part of the room was that it’s a rock structure, close from all side and
has only small window like space to enter inside. So even though it was chilling
outside, it was nice and warm inside.
There was already another group there. But we all
adjusted fine. Even though we had our food with us, they offered evening and
morning tea and even breakfast.
It was full moon night, so it was wonderful experience,
sitting on mountain top in the dark, looking at moon rise and chatting. After
chatting for long time, before cold and wind could freeze us, we returned to
our warm room.
Next morning, we got up early. But there was no point in
going outside in cold and dark. So we extended our sleep till 6.30 am. Then we
got up to witness Sunrise, clicked few photographs. Our co- trekkers offered us
tea (It is actually heaven to get ready made hot tea in such cold morning where
you have expected nothing).
Our next target was to reach on top most point of the
fort. To reach till that point, route is steeper and full of loose soil and scree.
If you are confident enough then only attempt to reach till top. (There is
another route to reach here which comes from lake, which is safer). After that,
small rock climb and you are on the top.
Experience from here is awesome. With wind flowing at
such high speed unobstructed that It was difficult to hold flag even for some
time and you get the feeling that it can actual lift you off your feet. (So it
is better to keep flag down, at least you will be on the ground ;-) )
Then we came back and started descend. Negotiating with
all those steps (internal and external) was taking time. We had to be careful
as our sacks where hitting rock face and in turn pushing us towards valley. Also
while descending, eyes follow straight into the valley. That adds excitement
;-).
We negotiated all steps, scree patches safely and soon
came back to Nirgudpada. Then reached Kasara via Khodala. From there back to
Mumbai.
It was another wonderful experience which will remain in
the memory for long long time.
