One Day trek to Kunti Betta
Prologue
When Raghavendra
informed about this trek in whatsapp, I immediately jumped at the chance. When I checked BTC registration site, there were at least 3
treks announced. There was a ‘Kunti Betta’ trek organised by Amol & Ashish. Immediately I registered and conveyed to
Raghavendra. He also had registered for
the same. This would be my 3rd trek in so-many weeks with
BTC. BTC is a wonderful concept. It’s a group of volunteers who arrange
inexpensive treks. Amol, the organiser
is clear, he is disciplined in terms of time.
Strict that he doesn’t allow group to wander around, but goes easy with
trek, changes gear of the entire group as the need arises. Mainly he is totally involved in fun
activities and he sings, dances. He had
organised this with Ashish, another
fun-loving person who is very much interested in photography.
The Journey
We were to assemble in city railway station at 6:30 am.18 of us reported by 6:50 am and moved to
platform after Amol got us tickets. We
were to take Tirupati – Chamarajanagar
fast passenger train (56214) . By the time it rolled on to SBC tracks ,
it was 7:45 am. We all got into GS coaches
and found it was totally crowded. Before
train could move, one soul found a special "AC cabin" which was totally
free, we all moved into this exclusive BTC cabin. That was actually a luggage carrier. There were very few other passengers everyone was squatting on the ground. A few of us went into ‘Upper Berth’, a hanger used for stacking luggage. 2 more joined at Kengeri station and finally
we were 20.
It was started with customary information of rules and policy. Ashish started with each of us introducing our habits, trekking experience. Apart from usual habits like photography, trekking, cooking there were unusual ones like bird-watchers, dancers, belly dancer in the group. Then we started playing dumb-charades.Even when very tough 5 words Hindi movie names were given,there were very good actors who could make others guess it. As usual Amol was leading the way finding all the tough ones. After 1 hour, it became a smaller group and a few continuing with Kannada-only movie names.It took more than two and half hours to reach our destination ‘Pandava pura’. Pandavapura is a typical 3 track railway station. Our trekking base was 4 KMs away. We took 4 auto-rickshaws. It crossed the main town and starting point had a school. We started by around 10:45 am.
The Trek
It was started with customary information of rules and policy. Ashish started with each of us introducing our habits, trekking experience. Apart from usual habits like photography, trekking, cooking there were unusual ones like bird-watchers, dancers, belly dancer in the group. Then we started playing dumb-charades.Even when very tough 5 words Hindi movie names were given,there were very good actors who could make others guess it. As usual Amol was leading the way finding all the tough ones. After 1 hour, it became a smaller group and a few continuing with Kannada-only movie names.It took more than two and half hours to reach our destination ‘Pandava pura’. Pandavapura is a typical 3 track railway station. Our trekking base was 4 KMs away. We took 4 auto-rickshaws. It crossed the main town and starting point had a school. We started by around 10:45 am.
The Trek
This place had actually 3 hills. From the road there was one
hill towards our left and two towards our right. Our trek was to climb the two-hilled Kunti
betta. Initially it started with around
150 steps, we could find a temple and ‘gopurum’ getting constructed. There was a single hill Ganesha etched there. We had to walk for another 200 meters to
start the trail.
Terrain was rocky and full of boulders, a few places were pretty rough… We all climbed the first hill in 20 mins fairly easily. Then got a view of another bigger hill standing majestically. We had to climb down in other direction and walk to the other hill. This was tougher but not very difficult.A few places needed some help. We had a few regular, strong trekkers who climbed fast and helped others.
Finally we reached atop. There was a big pillar like structure at the top. And it was a pretty flat surface. It was very windy and the view was beautiful.We could see the horizon all around. Very beautiful green surroundings, big sugarcane fields and a water body looked lovely. It took roughly 1 hour for everyone to assemble atop.
It was lunch time now. Pot-luck had interesting food. There were parathas,avalakki (Poha), bread and butter, sandwiches. Main supplier Sandeep had 5 packets of cookies and variety biscuits. He also got halwa and son pappadi. We also had apple, banana fruits.
After a brief rest it was game time. There was a dance session. Ankita, Manikant, Amol and others danced to the tunes.We attempted a game of ping pong with little success. Around 2 pm, we started descending.. We could follow same route. Final stage was interesting.. it had a steep slide.. many of us slid down.It was a natural slide. A fitting end to a wonderful trek !!
Epilogue
Terrain was rocky and full of boulders, a few places were pretty rough… We all climbed the first hill in 20 mins fairly easily. Then got a view of another bigger hill standing majestically. We had to climb down in other direction and walk to the other hill. This was tougher but not very difficult.A few places needed some help. We had a few regular, strong trekkers who climbed fast and helped others.
Finally we reached atop. There was a big pillar like structure at the top. And it was a pretty flat surface. It was very windy and the view was beautiful.We could see the horizon all around. Very beautiful green surroundings, big sugarcane fields and a water body looked lovely. It took roughly 1 hour for everyone to assemble atop.
It was lunch time now. Pot-luck had interesting food. There were parathas,avalakki (Poha), bread and butter, sandwiches. Main supplier Sandeep had 5 packets of cookies and variety biscuits. He also got halwa and son pappadi. We also had apple, banana fruits.
After a brief rest it was game time. There was a dance session. Ankita, Manikant, Amol and others danced to the tunes.We attempted a game of ping pong with little success. Around 2 pm, we started descending.. We could follow same route. Final stage was interesting.. it had a steep slide.. many of us slid down.It was a natural slide. A fitting end to a wonderful trek !!
Need not write about the same auto rickshaws we took and
took back the train – Gol gumbaz express (16535) scheduled to reach Pandavapura
16:23, but reached 20 mins late. This
train was less crowded and all of us got seats this time. Most of us dozed off and a few were
listening to music. This journey was more comfortable. In the last hour, we played Antyakshari, so many songs sung by wonderful singers made
it all fun. We reached Bangalore station
by 19:20 with a satisfaction of completing another successful trek. Any write-up is incomplete, without wishing
everyone a good time and thanking our great organizers – Amol and Ashish.
Written By : Srikanth B K
Organized By : Ashish Chouhan & Amol Saindane
Date of event : 01st July 2017
Place : Kunti Betta
Pictures : BTC FB Page
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