Into the Wild!!!

I joined Chennai Trekking Club already one month ago. This club was founded by a Belgian guy Peter who has been living in India for 11 years!!! He was travelling a lot in Tamil Nadu and other states in south of India and know this part of India much better than most of local people. Since Peter hates staying in Chennai during weekends and he loves trekking in pure nature a lot, he has founded this club. Today the club has more than 2000 members and organizes one or even more treks almost every weekend. And last weekend April 4-5 I finally joined one! Normally there are 60-80 participants at every trek but since this was a special trek organized only for expats, we were just a little group of 20 people. We met on Saturday early morning and set out for our destination: Nagala hills situated 2 hours to the north from Chennai.

After these two hours of driving through small Indian villages, we reached the startpoint of our adventure. We prepared our backpacks (fastened sleeping mats and sleeping bags), divided the food provisions bought by Peter, put on sunscreen (it was only 9 am but the sun was already merciless) and full of enthusiasm we started to walk. Since the beginning I was feeling like Alice in wonderland...No cars, no honking, no people, just pristine nature.

the first view

















the first group picture - everybody still smiling at that time ;o)

We spent first 30 minutes of walking under open sun and it was REALLY hot so we were happy like kids when we reached the first pool with little waterfall. Everybody jumped in and enjoyed the cool water. Since I was ill before going for the trek and I still didn't feel 100% fit, I didn't want to swim and I just washed my face and hands. I was watching others swimming and jumping from the rock when Peter said: "Alright, everybody into water, we climb up the rock and then we'll make a human chain to get our backpacks up as well." Ah, how naive I was again when I thought I would avoid getting into cold water during this trek!!! So we started climbing up the rock. Hm, I would lie if I said if was easy. The rock was very slippery (we were climbing barefoot and wet feet don't make the best combination together with rock) and there were not many nice grips. However, everybody made it and it filled us with a new energy and desire for adventure.

the first pool we swam in and rock we climbed up

We continued our walking either through the forest or by the streem jumping on huge boulders. However, if you imagine a nice forest path you're even more naive than I am! There was almost never any path! We were just struggling through bushes and climbing up and down rocky hills. But we were still surrounded by pure nature which I really enjoyed.

climbing up and down, jumping on boulders

After some more climbing and a even one accident (a French lady fell down and cut here leg...she was OK but bleeding a lot!!!) we were rewarded by nice pool again. And this time there was a tobogan as well!!! I couldn't help myself, I forgot about my cold and cought and merrily slided down.

Anthony on natural tobogan...it was just great!!!

But since time was going fast and we had a long way ahead of us, Peter stopped our childish frolic by "Move, people, move, move!!!" which we heard so many times after ;o) Until lunch (Indian sweet pancake) we were still just walking in more or less flat forest. However, then the real trekking strarted. Since our destination was a 800m high peak where we were supposed to spend a night, it was quite obvious that at one moment we will have to start climbing up. And the moment was here. We were scrambling up the hill, falling down (dry soil with rocks is quite slippery) but getting up again and still moving along. At least the forest protected us from the sun. Yet, these favourable conditions were about to finish soon as well. We left a friendly shade of forest and put ourselves to the sun's mercy. Walking in dry alley with the peak (our destination) above us was really motivating ;o)

Finally we got to the first peak and the view was so nice (although we still weren't that high) that it just filled us with new energy and enthusiasm.

on the first peak

After 1-2 (it might have been only one, but we definitely felt tired like after two ;o)) more hours of quite a hard climbing, we finally reached our destination - 800m peak. The view was just breathtaking!!! All the hills were lying deep under us and sun was slowly getting ready for going to bed.

Whow, this was crazy!!! Maybe it doesn't look so but it was really high and I wasn't 100% sure about the rock we were sitting on ;o)




time to go to sleep ;o)

And that was the end of the first day. Tired like kittens we went to our campsite - a little bit less rocky and flatter place where we were able to spend night. After a delicious dinner (instant soup and noodles ;o)) cooked on campfire we muffled into sleeping bags, found the least painful position (it was bit less rocky and flatter but still not that comfortable ;o)) and felt asleep already at 8 pm.

Early in the morning, we set out for our way again. Peter convinced us that it was better to walk a bit before having breakfast (it will taste better) and we foolishly trusted him when he assured us that we'll be under the peak in 1 hour. However, when we saw the lovely view we forgot about being hungry.

morning view from the peak



















the peak on which we spent night

We were walking down to the valley. There were no paths at all and sometimes the terrain was quite scary. Once we were climbing up a big rock and then walking along it with a depth of many meters under us (I was so grateful for all hours of climbing on artificial walls and trekking in Dolomites in Italy!!!). And climbing down usually wasn't big reliefe..it was hard and dangerous as well. Moreover, it was getting really hot again. But fortunately, there were always some nice pools on the way in which we could cool down our aching bodies.

A little waterfall when we were relaxing, swimming, jumping from the rock...

It was getting late and we already knew that we wouldn't be able to get back to our cars before the sunset. So the rest of the trek was in a bit faster pace, just with a quick lunch break and cooling down in pools that we had to cross. At the end of the trek it become quite complicated because one German guy felt sick. He was dehydrated and too weak to walk on his own so two Indian guys had to support and sometimes even bear him.

Night in India comes very fast so we weren't that surprised when we were suddenly walking in the dark. It was already a complete night when we finally got out of the forest. We had few more kilometers to the closest village from which we wanted to get a taxi to get to our cars and go back to Chennai. Everybody was tired so we even didn't talk, just walked as fast as possible to get to the village at a reasonable time. When we got to the village we found out that the only means of transport in the whole village is one old bicycle (how naive we were when we thought we would find there a car!!!). So Peter sat on the bike and pedaled more than 5 km to his car, then he got back for other drivers, they went together for the rest of cars and motorbikes and finally picked all of us up.

I got to my bed at 3 am, I was exhausted, whole my body was hurting but I was so happy!!! It was for the first time I was outside the civilization, in a pristine nature, doing some physical activities. And it was such an amazing adventure! Climbing rocks without any backing up, drinking from streams without use of any purifying chemicals (fortunately my mum doesn't speak English and thus can't read this blog ;o)), sleeping on rocky ground under open sky, swimming in pools and jumping from the waterfalls...