TREK : PEB / VIKATGAD

                                         
Location: Near Neral/Matheran

Elevation : 2100ft
category (Difficulty): Simple+
Total Member: 5
Best Time: Rainy/Winter season
Date: 23 July2011, Saturday



PEB is also known as Vikatgad.
I had come across an advertisement in Maharashtra times which organizes trek to PEB,and suddenly an idea flashed in my brain(I guess, I also have some kind of brain), hey why don’t  plan for PEB as I have never visited the PEB fort.

Then I searched on google @ PEB and collected info. And then related to PEB fort,it occurred to me that there is left route from DILKAP college of engg.

So I started searching for enthusiastic trek members, the LEAR group is quite busy with their scheduled tasks, HTEFRIEND was also busy so I approached PCT group(my college group).  The PCT group includes Adesh,Sachin,Siddhesh, Amit and myself. All people were ready except Adesh, who wanted to go for PandavKada (waterfall situated near Kharghar). After lot of request and pleading, he finally agreed  and a gave a green signal to the  PEB plan. Special thanks to Adesh.

So the plan was finally decided on 23 July 2011.
Guess what, it was 1st trek for all PCT group members.

JOURNEY

We all decided to meet at THANE station (except Sachin) to catch 6.13 Karjat train. We reached NERAL @7.30AM.

Sachin was suppose to meet us at Neral as he was going to come from PUNE and  suspense was that he was coming late as there was no choice for him to come NERAL from PUNE so early. Sachin was reaching KARJAT till 8.00AM. So till that time we had some snacks like POHA, UPMA in nearby hotel at Neral station.

We moved ahead till DILKAP college, meanwhile we suggested Sachin to join at DILKAP college by RIKSHAW. We took 1 hr from Neral station to DILKAP college(8.00 to 9.00am). Sachin reached at DILKAP college @9.00AM by RIKSHAW paying Rs 60/-.

WRONG TURN

We were supposed to take left turn  from DILKAP college without crossing DILKAP college, but by mistake we  took the right turn by crossing DILKAP college. We reached some very small village, where 2 children (aged 10-12 years) showed us the correct path. The benefit of taking the wrong route was that we encountered a wonderful waterfall and  disadvantage  was that it was long route as compared to normal path.

HINT N FOLLOW

We remembered the hint to reach the  PEB we should followed the MSEB Towers, so we somehow managed to reached the MSEB tower. Till MSEB Tower no other trekking groups were present so that we could follow them, and our trek members started ridiculing me (its very normal n usual). Once we reached MSEB tower, we saw 2 other trekking groups. Seeing them we  cheered up n our spirits got energized.

Fog all

Route from MSEB tower to base of PEB is lavish green but from base of PEB to the peak there was dense forest and tricky rock patch . Rock patch is hardly 15ft but it is better to be cautious while climbing rock patch. We had reached PEB fort by turning around to the front side form there you are able to see Prabalgad-Kalavantin from there.


Rock Patch

NEAR to TOP

After crossing the rock patch, we visited GANESH-GUHA, it’s a very  scenic place where all our trek members clicked  their pics in idol KRISHNA style (picked up the hill  with  little finger). On moving ahead, there was 20 ft wall  to stop us to cross the wall, but one ladder was present to aid the trekkers,by observing its  current condition we could conclude that ladder is from Adam's ancient period. The ladder had been hardly supported by screw kind of thing. When we climbed the ladder, initially  the ladder was steady but as soon as we about to reach  to the upper end of the ladder, the ladder started trembling.

But there is a distinguishable adventure during ladder climbing.

On the Top

After adventure of the ladder, On the way, we could see some tunnel like caves but it was actually for meditation purpose. It took 20 mins to reach the top from there, where could see small house like temple but it was actually a trance [samadhi]. We were chatting with the disciple/priest, who told us that actaully the Budha-followers came here to carve the caves but due to stiffness of the Rock, they had to change their plan.

After we had visited the samadhi, and  then the next place  is the Highest peak on the PEB n i.e. Prati-Girnar which  is similar to Girnar fort in Gujarat. On the Prati-Girnar summit, renovation was going on around "Paduka of the Datta". But Adesh suggested before visiting Prati-Girnar, we should have lunch.

Lunch time:

Responsibility of  organizing the lunch was assigned to Adesh. He came with full preparations. Our lunch was sandwiches. Since we were newbies, Adesh brought only the ingredients of the sandwich like Onion, tomato,cucumber,potato, chutney n bread.

Adesh opened his Sandwich center there. We had lend a hand to cut tomoto, onion,cucumber to prepare sandwich and eat also. After having our lunch, rain started pouring and we had to pack up our sandwich center immediately.

Now nature turns active as we were under the sky. Fog and strong breeze was playing hide n seek with us. From top we saw the shadow of the clouds moving across the  base village. The base village is quite sunny n our location is foggy with little showers of rain, we have came across two sides of the nature.

As sachin supposed to go back to Pune, we had increased pace of our speed. We moved to the bastion, which is on the other side of the prati-girnar ,from there we could see the glimpse of Panaroma point (part of matheran hills).

Return Journey

We decided to climbed down the other side of PEB which was upfront of the Panaroma point. Planned route was along the Neral-Matheran mini-train track to the Dastoor naka (entry point of the Matheran). Route till railway-track is kind of green pathway subsidized by one side valley. So be careful while going thru this route. Route contained two ladders but ladder is in good condition as compared to previous ladder.

Fun on the tracks

Kadevarcha Ganapati

lonely crab

Walking along mini-train track was quite good experience. Enroute we saw Kadevarcha Ganapati (big stones are arranged in such manner that it look like idol Ganapti)After reaching Dastoor naka we had sip of tea with Parle-G. Bunch of Taxi's available for Neral station from Dastoor-naka. We caught Omni(Taxi) from dastoor-naka to Neral station.Fare per head was 60/-. Taxi landed us directly to neral station.

savangadi

Summary of the trek:
It was just begining of the rainy season. all surroundings of the PEB was covered by simply lavish green.
Apart from that, initially i had to bear all the comments from PCT group that where u brought us here n all that,  afterwards they didn't have words for explaining the experince.