Tuesday, November 27, 2012

Maarloorgundi and Goodlugundi

First of all my sincere thanks to Rakesh Holla for believing in us and sharing the details of the location. As promised to him i will not be disclosing the location details of this place unlike my previous treks.  The basic idea is not to make information easily available for people who would go and spoil the beauty.  Only those who are really committed to keeping it clean and are mature enough to maintain the sanity of the place would have the access to the same. One clue for all the adventure enthusiastic people around is, this falls is in Sharavati Valley.


As Rakesh had mentioned in his blog it was a day not to forget. I have trekked a lot of mountain peaks but probably for the first time i got so much time to spend at the destination. Since we had started early from Bangalore on Friday night we reached the starting point for the hike very early. We got to spend the entire day in front of the falls.


Once we reached the Goodlu gundi falls every one got into their swimming costumes and got into water. The best part, it was not deep giving an opportunity for all the non swimmers to get into water as well go and sit below the water falls. However just like every other water falls one has to be very careful of those slippery rocks which can hurt you ankle badly. I did injure myself slipping and hurting my right ankle once but luckily it didn't result in anything major.


After swimming and sitting below the waterfalls for almost 2-3 hours, every one were very hungry and we opened our lunch and had a heavy lunch. Once done with lunch we decide to explore Maarloorgundi water falls just below. The small hike to Maarloorgundi is pretty steep and one more dangerous point was a couple of us crossed the water body on top of the water falls which was very risky. If you slip you will land at the bottom of Maarloorgundi water falls :-).


After around 10min hike one can reach the bottom of Maarloorgundi which is a very beautiful water falls. One thing that came to my mind was to visit the place in monsoon to get few pics of the water falls in the best of times. I know i might not be able to get into water but then the water falls would be in the best of its form.


Every one were very tired after playing in the water for almost the entire day and we decided to rest on the Rocks in front of Maarloorgundi water falls. After a small nap we decided to pack and then find a suitable camping site for the night stay. The location of the water falls is around 30min walk from a small grass land peak. So we decided to camp on the grass lands. Our earlier plan was to camp in front of the water falls which we had to give up eventually. If you decide to camp its always safe to camp in a place which is close to water yet outside the thick forest vegetation. Try to find a place with grasslands, you can always find grasslands trying to move towards the peak. Never camp in the peak of the mountain as the winds might be very strong.


We pitched our tents and then we decided to walk and spend our time at the sunset point viewing Belligundi water falls. We got a good view of the Belligundi water falls and our guide Halappa told us that we can also go to the bottom of Belligundi which is a beautiful water falls and one of the tallest in the region. Probably this would be our next trip as well. Belligundi will be a 9km hike one side.


After watching the sun go down in the Arabian sea we headed back to our tents. Few of them prepared the dinner but a couple of us had some fruits/snacks and slept off. The weather was very good for camping it neither rained nor was very cold and it was perfect. However we could see lightning in the adjacent mountain where we had seen Belligundi water falls, later we realized that it was the dynamite blast which was happening. I am surprised, mining in western ghats is illegal and i am pretty sure this must one of those famous illegal mines still operating without any fear.



We got up at around 6 in the morning and a new lesson on cat hole was learnt from Diwakar for attending nature call and keeping the place clean. The concept of digging a small pit and covering it up once done would keep the place clean and also human excreta is not left to open air.
Since we had GPS, going back was never difficult even in the absence of our guide Halappa, whom eventually we met half way down. Halappa had decided to go back and stay in a house at the bottom of the hill the previous evening.


Over all it was a small trip with not much of difficultly but we enjoyed a lot at the destination. The waterfalls was very clean and felt good that very few waterfalls are maintained in this state as of date. Most of the water falls have been badly littered with plastics, beer bottles. As a rule of our team we make sure we carry back every thing we had taken and nothing is left back at the destination. Any one who comes across this blog please make it a point you don't drop your traces in the place you visit, keeping it virgin for the next visitor as well :-).

After coming back from the trek and reading Rakesh's blog again i realized we missed few things at this place one was going on the opposite side of the water body to get a full view of  both Maarloor gundi and Goodlu gundi water falls together and also we could still have gone further down from Maarloor gundi to get a view of one more bigger water falls. No problem probably some other time :-).


Any one who finds out this place please make sure you keep it the way it was and don't disturb the same. I would feel guilty if the place is destroyed because of my blog.

For more pics visit
https://picasaweb.google.com/104354993819772501480/Maarloorgundi_Goodlugundi