Treks and travels

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Treks and travels

An exploratory trek to NGD waterfalls

Posted: 26 Sep 2015 05:52 AM PDT

September 2015

Prologue
One way to explore Western Ghats is to look at the source of the river!! A year ago I had visited a village at the foothills of Western Ghats. There flowed a stream and for some reason I tried to look at its source (in the map!!). During this journey I found that the stream formed a huge waterfall. The falls was not known much in the internet world.


Superb!! A little bit of more research revealed that my Udupi friends had already explored this waterfall. Knowing them it was not a surprise.  After receiving some details about this waterfall, I put this in my backlog.

A small pond with clear water
Last week when I visited my native place for Ganesha Chaturthi, I had some time which I utilized to explore this waterfall. I was joined by my brother and my cousins.

Walking along the village road

Travel
A small road deviated from the state highway. We drove for few km on this road to reach where a mud road deviated. It was time to park my vehicle and start walking. We met a person whom we asked for direction. His response was simple. "Just follow this mud track and just take left turn wherever you find deviation". No right-left-right-right-left concept!!

Crossing paddy fields
We followed the directions as mentioned by the villager and walked for about 45 minutes to reach the last house. From here we had to cross the paddy fields to reach a small stream. The sound of the waterfalls was clearly heard which energized us. After crossing the stream we entered into a leech infested forest. The trail was clearly visible and we just ran on it to escape from leeches.



After 5 minutes the falls made dramatic appearance.  What a sight!! It was a huge two step falls. The undergrowth in front of us prevented from getting the complete view of the falls. We were at the edge of the valley. I moved down a bit on that slippery path to get a better view. The image of valley, waterfall, forests and hills was simply amazing.

The first step
It was hard to see the base of the falls. A small path seemed to go down the valley. It was so slippery that we did not dare to go down. All along the way, people had warned us not to get down into the valley. Post monsoon season would offer better condition to get down the valley though the volume of water would be significantly less.

Second stage of the falls
Epilogue
The feel of exploring place that is outside normal tourist circle is something to experience. Hope the place remains serene in the coming days and years.