Scaling Skandagiri-II

...Continued from part-I

We started our climb at 2 in the morning and soon lost our way:). As with any group, this led to lot of accusations from most of us on everyone but themselves. But the view from the 'dead end' itself made the unintended detour worthwhile.

While we turned back and were searching for the correct path, Sandy fell and injured his leg badly in the process. That he didn't give up and finished the whole climb speaks a lot about his mental and physical fitness.
The above accident split our group into 2.People who were ahead had no idea about the severity of the fall and merrily reached the top of the mountain by4 A.M.As we had to support Sandy in his climb and also get Kamte to do the same( quite a task..), we got left behind. The view at the night itself was quite deceptive, it made us believe that the top was within reach, only to show us that it was still a long way ahead. This made our group irritable and people who were ahead got a lot of stick.
After all the above, we reached the top by 4:45A.M, and the view was breathtaking. It made our tiredness vanish in no time. There are a couple of buildings in ruins along with a Shiva temple, which is where we had a campfire going on. It was cold, windy and blustery which made us to fall on top of one another to get some sleep.
We saw the setting of the moon(first for me) while the sunrise was blocked by clouds.While it was a bit of dampener for us, the view of surroundings in daylight made up for it easily. We stayed at the top till 7:30A.M, took photos, and started to come down.
As with the climb, some among us got down quickly, while we took our sweet time to get down and did so by 11A.M. By that time, most of us were sleeping inside couple of empty water pipes. As some of us were still coming down, this led me to sleep on top of them(pipes).
We came back to the city centre by 2, and reached Banglore by 4 in the afternoon. We slept like hibernating bears till the next morning ( Suzie was an exception).
It was a pleasant experience and I look forward to many such.

P.P.S: I wish to thank everyone who came that night. In no particular order, we were me;), Maava, Boggi, Suzie, Kavi, Vaibhav, Gubaal, Kamte, Pramod, Pradeep, Sudi, cc, Wodeyar, Raviraj, Shastri, Vinay, Shivprasad and Sandy

Scaling Skandagiri-I

At last, after an year and half of meticulous research and planning on all the expeditions that can be taken out from our base(BMSCE), and with a perfect record in execution of the plans( in virtual reality, anyway), we decided that it was time to get 'physical'.
The place we chose for our maiden venture was 'Skandagiri'. Why?? No one knows..The number of people who joined in was also a pleasant surprise.After much deliberation on what supplies were to be taken and in what quantity, 18 of us left for Skandagiri on the evening of9th March,
Skandagiri is 5kms from Chikkaballapur which in turn is 90 minutes from Majestic.We reached C.B.Pur by 10p.m.By that time, we had finished off snacks which were meant to be refreshments during the climb and were showing signs of cannibalistic behaviour. This drove us to a dhaba to satisfy our hunger and in some cases, ulcers. After the dinner, everyone said that the food served was 'very good'. It was true and the aftereffects were felt by most of us for the next few days(weeks).
After satisying our hunger and emptying our wallets, we started the long walk towards the base of the hill on the stroke of midnight.The sight of 18 grown men(in some cases,almost), many with wooden clubs in their hands, made many people suspicious.One person stopped his cycle 100ft from us and was actively searching for escape routes, while another started speaking incoherently when asked for directions. Accompanied by welcoming packs of dogs, we reached the base of the mountain after a 'long march' of 90 minutes and it was quite a sight..
The hill stood head and shoulders above its companions and glistened in the moonlight. The fact that it was a full moon night, made our mistake of not bringing enough flashligths, redundant.
To be Continued...
P.S: Any exaggerations are only an attempt at humour.

happy anniversary...!!!!

It has been almost a year, since some in our class remembered that 'man(and woman) is a social animal', and sharing your time with other similar minded people can be as pleasurable as getting 90+% in our annual battles with authority.
We took our first tentative steps in this direction by going to a bowling alley. Then to quell the fire in our belly, we went to a restaurant where we paid too much for too little and came back acting truly contented.The above outing was to celebrate the birthdays of two in our group. The inflation during those days made everyone in our group to look for "that special someone" who would share their burden.
That group consisted of about 20 people, of them only 12-14 still remain now, The group size is still the same due to new inclusions. Honestly though,I miss 2-3 people who left.. The reasons for their departure are best known to themselves.
From then till now, the aforesaid bunch of people have restaurant-hopped(new word, Yipeee!!), so as to cover almost the whole gamut of restaurants in the surrounding areas. Some were pretty good and some were utter tosh.. Every visit comes with its own memories, that I cherish profoundly.
All this has taken place while i have found new relationships, fought with my conscience and found out a bit more about myself and others(in that order).
In a couple more weeks, we celebrate our first anniversary as a group and I fervently hope we will celebrate more...
P.S: We had a bash on our anniversary I believe....