Blog of Parag

Protected: Diwali 2010

November 10th, 2010

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It was a gorgeous Fall day… perfect for doing anything outdoors. Kids just love this yearly activity of visiting pumpkin patches and apple orchards for picking apples. Thankfully, our neighborhood orchard has both pumpkins and apples. There was a lot of chatter while we walked between the rows of apple trees looking for apples that were low enough for the kids to pick by themselves.

Adit: Did you know how I got this apple?
Me: How?
Adit: My friend gravity helped me pull it down from the tree.
Ashwini: Gravity is good. She always pulls everything down. Apples, your arms and legs. Keeps you from floating away in space.
Adit: Gravity is not a girl. He is a boy.
Ashwini: No. She is a girl.
Adit: Uh.. uh. A boy!
Ashwini: Maybe gravity is both a boy and a girl… a goy or a birl.
Adit: or a borl.

It stopped right there as we approached a tree with lots of low-hanging apples. Click below for more photos.
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Kulanggad

January 26th, 2010

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There are about 350 forts in Mahararastra. For whatever reason, I kept going back to the same forts I had visited before. This time when we decided to go somewhere new. Our choice was Kulanggad (कुलंगगड) and it turned out to be just great! This fort is in the same range as “Kalsubai” (कळसुबाई), the tallest peak (~5300 ft) in Maharashtra. This fort has two neighbours, Alanggad (अलंगगड) and Madangad (मदनगड) aka Mandangad (मंडणगड). Climbing on one of those is very technical and requires rigging up ropes. Thanks to bombardment by the British when they took this set of forts from Peshwas in 1818.

Elevation at the top of Kulanggad is about 4850 ft requiring a climb of about 3500 ft from the base. It is quite evident from the photos that this mountain has pretty straight rock walls and the trail goes along notches in the rock. There are steps carved into the rock and at many places they are very narrow and you have to watch your footing carefully. It was probably one of the most difficult climbs in Sahyadris for me.

This views of rugged mountains all around while climbing and from the top of the fort are absolutely amazing. Other than a few caves, there are ruins of old buildings on the top of the fort. Some of the buildings are right on points that are at the ends of the fort. There is a sheer drop of more than 2000 ft on three sides of these building. These must have been watch posts. Due to the fort’s natural defense, there wasn’t much fortification required.

There are a lot of water tanks (carved in stone) on the fort and that makes spending a night on the top easy. Some people might not even touch this water after looking at it but, believe me it is potable. No one in our group had any problems from drinking it right out of the tanks. All our problems arose from not being in good physical shape for such a rigorous hike.

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