Post Trek Write up - Emperor's Nagala North East - Feb 22 2014

A Die Hard Trek ( Nagala North East with Chennai Trekking Club)

By Vijeyanantham

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A forest with “no Power and no Tower” = Nagala North East of Andhra Pradesh.

U wanna go for a deadly safest trek ,I mean not like school treks?
U wanna try rope climbing ,pool swimming in rocky valleys?
U want to have a camp fire inside a dense forest where pythons roam around?
U are a person who always wants to enjoy life with nature?
U are a person who want to take risk and taste the sweetness of life and nature?
U are a person without selfishness and wants to mingle with strangers and enjoy a day with them?
U are a person who wants to avoid plastic ,go green ,non alcoholic at-least for a day?
U want to do all these things for just Rs.500?

Then continue reading this……forgive my English

I applied for a trek with Chennai trekkers club(CTC)(http://www.chennaitrekkers.org/). And luckily i got selected in my first attempt.Since its their sixth birthday they put many events and i came to know ctc few weeks back, I followed the site and applied.

They shortlisted some 20 people and including organizers the count was 25. They pickedup everyone in 4 cars and we gathered near koyambedu at 6pm on fridayeve (21/2/2014). At that time i dono i gonna do all the above mentioned things.. I thought it gonna end up in a kilometers of walk.

We started and ate near Uthukottai ( without using any plastics )Because CTC theme is “We enter forest,Trek and Leave forest as it is“.

We reached a village at base hills of Nagala at 11pm and put a camp there and camp fire and everyone started to mingle with each other.Some of the organizers shared theirviews and experience with CTC.

No one knows each other till then,i also went alone and not with my friends.Then we slept in base hills and Masu,Praveen,Parthiban (organizers of ctc and also Called as Emperors of CTC) woke-up everyone at 5 AM on.

We put a campfire again and everyone stood near the heat and the cold automatically ran away from us.Then we finished our early morning duties and share common food with everyone(Thokku mix,rice,poli,hand made chocolate,electrolyte,milk halwa,bread and jam and a bottle of water).

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We saw sunrise at base hills (Wherever i go,i wont miss this).We saw the Nature’s red ball slowly rising and spreading it light over us.We started trek,at first it was a catch-up walk .We walked inside a forest and we spoke with each-other with small intro.And we entered the forest ,a beautiful stream of pure Stream of Water welcomed us. We took water from it and everyone took a snap there.Then we enter through bamboos,thorns and we walked nearly 6 kms inside and reached a slope which leads to a small wide pool of water.At that time even though we walked for 6kms without food we were fresh,We had poli(a sweet),idlies and some sweets and collected garbages in a garbage bag(That’s make CTC differ from others) and put it in our bag.We had few snaps there and started walking.

Now the real trek starts.We walked inside the hilly forest area,and we followed the stream flow.Organizer had GPS and they know the trial( Path ),We followed them.Then we walked for another 6km against hilly rocks and streams..many fell down in streams and me too.We reached a pool,it had a beautiful flow of water with water falls..we enjoyed there and had a small bath.

They said another one pool is there..so we continued our walk.After that rocks were slopes and little bit wet,We tried hard,helped each-other and reached the second pool.This one was too deep ,we just see a big black hole in the pool.

Since am a beginner in swimming i used swimming tube(78rs in saravana stores T nagar) and had a swim in it,i gave that to everyone who were beginners like me,everyone had their day there.They said trekk will be over in few min,i was thinking that’s it? it was very easy..but the real trek starts from there……..

We reached a place .A small pool suitable place to take rest and cook,from that place the peak was 3 to 4 km to reach and we have to cross two cliffs by just using ropes and no support and then we have to climb the rolling stones to reach the peak,if we fell down..we fall in a water valley….think that u were in that place…

This was optional..people who dont want to try this can sit there and cook rice and take rest.But no one is ready to cook..so all tried to climb the first cliff…and the thing iseveryone climbed it by using ropes..and all thier energy got drained.
This cliff is deadly and full of sloping surface which is wet.everyone managed to climb it,But ater climbing the first clip ..we can able to see the Second….

The Second Cliff : It was like a narrow zig zag cliff in left side and had a small cave and water fall..and also a deep back pool in the right side..and Masu took rope and climbed the cliff and tied it in the tree.
We have to cross a one man deep pool to jump on a stone that will give access to it.After seeing this 15 people went down and they were ready to cook for all.Thanks for those guys.

Only 10 people including me started to climb it,i had a GPS around my neck and mobile in pocket. Everyone climbed the cliff by one by one ,for each step our heart beat rises.And thank god everyone reached the top of the second cliff without any accident.And then we started moving to the top which is full of bushes and rolling stones.
We followed alternate sides (if am coming in right side,person following should come in left so that if any stone fall down becoz of me ,it wont fall in his head).

At-last we reached the peak by holding the bunch of bushes and climbed the top ,out of 25 only 10 made it and we conquered NAGALA NORTH EAST.We had a victory pic there and felt the nature’s beauty there.

Then we ate Indian gooseberry(Nellikkaai) and we started from there,but climbing is little bit easy comparing to coming down..all stones started rolling ..successfully we reached the second cliff top and we climb down the cliff…it was risky and still we came down and climbing down the rope was very difficult,i felt like “Man vs Wild”,some can say its too much but its not too much for a common man like me.
Because i never know i can do all these things.Then we reached the Nature Kitchen (Our cooking spot),Our friends cooked rice,we bough tomato thokku,onion thokku ,puli thokku had a great lunch and again collected garbages and took rest for 15min ,thats the longest period of rest we took in the trek,We never sat for more than a min in 30 KM long walk.

Organizer praveen guarded us at the back and other organizers made us to pass the trial in front, no one was left back. Hatsoff to their organizing,they boosted us.And while returning we spotted a great forest legend eating a rat….

A Python!!!! eating a rat…after seeing us it tried to move slowly but it cant,now i got a meaning for “Man VS Wild”.Then we took photos and started without disturbing it,spotting a python in nagala is the first time they said.Am lucky.

Then after tireless walk of 15km we reached the base hills and sat down ..we finished all accounts and closed the balance (thats the honestness of CTC).And at last we had introduction and feedback session.The day ended up with a sunset…….
Everyone shared their views and some where saying i was trying for past 6 months but now only i got shortlisted..i said “thank god i got the opportunity at the first time itself”.And we had a dinner and tea in Uthukottai and we “safely” reached home.

I never thought these kind of things existing in Tamil Nadu..but it exists and it happened to me!!!.Am still feeling like climbing in hills.Surely i will go to some other hill treks with CTC and take part in a trek in future.Now i can say “I had a greatest day in my life to make everyone hear my experience“.

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Thanks to CTC !!! Thanks to all of Trekking friends !!!.

Note:
People who wants to know about CTC,follow this website and apply for an event and wait for ur chance……
They wont shortlist friends group and i strongly recommend to go alone and make friends there..becoz if u go with ur friends u wont make friends there.Come to CTC and know wat is adventure!!!

http://www.chennaitrekkers.org/
From my experience to make trek beautiful..

1)Buy good shoes ,should be weightless strictly no woodlands shoes,and also grip should be good.(try quencha in playground.com)
2)Weightless backpacks
3)Small water bottle..drink less water
4)swimming tubes (its 78 rs in saravana stores)
5)electrolyte
6)dont sit while trekking if u walk for 5km then your legs will take care of walking for the rest of the trek , it will automatically walk.

Have a great trek !!!!

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NAGALA TREK with CTC – “A life time experience”

By Mahesh Kumar

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A life time experience which I had on 22nd feb 2014. Yes , this is the day where my dream of trekking in nagala  become true. As usual registered for nagala trek and eagerly waited for reply. After six months of long wait this time CTC dint disappoint me. Felt very happy about it and eagerly awaited for the awesome , thrilling , exited experience which i am about to feel.

We , 23 young like-minded people  who were passionate about  trekking joined and get ready for the trek to nagala north-east. Myself and parthi reached first at CMBT sharply at 5pm itself , later joined Rajavel , Sai then comes our Prof Diwakar with Rebecca . He was very keen in getting snack items which he promised , we searched and found all but finally missed pakoda :P

             We travelled all the way to Nagala and reached the base hill around 11pm. On the way had a good dinner where our organiser insisted not to use plastic sheet over the plate for our CTC members, truly inspired by the 'NO PLASTIC , GO GREEN ' theme of CTC. Then had camp fire and we went to sleep at 12am at the base hill. It was so thrill since in middle of base hill with no protection we just slept. It was the trademark of CTC where we are nature lovers and live and enjoy with the nature. ​

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Morning we all got up at 5am itself and had taken torch light and roamed around the place to get refreshed and ready for trek. We all set and ready for this adventurous trek. The initial path itself was so confusing, where I got missed the trial and went the other way and returned to correct way , from there onwards I was keen on following the people correctly. It was such a wonderful paths all the way , feel like walking in dense forest. Nagala north-east is so greenary where water stream is found all the way right from the base hill. Approximately after 4km walk there comes rocks along the water stream , where we carefully took each and every step since some were slippery . We reached a place and decided to have breakfast. Prof. Diwakar is the photographer of our team and took photos . Emperors are famous for food. No wonder this time too it was too great food we had , poli, idly , sweet all were awesome. Then started our trekking again

We were energetic team where we reached the first water pool at 10am itself. Thought the way all were sharing their beautiful trek , bike ride , travelling , work place , personal experiences with us. It was really nice to feel that we become so close within few hours. That’s another great thing which I love about CTC. The water pool was fabulous and had a very good time over there. I enjoy very much since this pool is for non-swimmers too J  The small rocks inside the pool was a bit slippery but friends always  helped when I was in need and I am able to manage and spent some lovely time for more than half an hour.

Then comes the difficult level, travelled towards the second water pool. The path was steep and we were careful about the travel. We ensure our safety but still sometimes since the rocks were too slippery we slipped and felt into water. It is too a good experience though :P Then there was no trail all the way , we explored and travelled from now onwards, it was so thrill and fun to discover a new trail to reach our target. We finally reached the second water pool. First time I felt bad about being a non-swimmer since guys who know swimming had a great fun over there. But still I got opportunity to swim using the swimming tube once JI was so much feared to swim using the swimming tube , so first waited for some of my dudes who are non-swimmers to swim :P Later I too tried and it was such a great feeling to swim for first time using swimming tube . Thanks to vinodh for helping me all the way to swim in this water pool and I feel so easy and comfortable to swim with the help got from him. Next , I thought , by this our trekking part got over , but there comes the CTC’ians next adventure. We again used to climb high on the steep path where we find some big rocks to climb. And this time Charan helped us to climb some big rocks on the way.

Then comes the more dangerous and adventures rock climbing path. I never thought or even imagined about it during this trek, hope many too thought the same. One big wood +slippery rock surface+rope using these we need to reach our target. Many tried and made it. I tried 4-5 times but the rock surface was too slippery so I got slipped and finally gave up the plan to try. But there comes our charan , who is really enthusiastic and supportive and helped me, bharath and many others  to climb the rock using rope and reach the top. Special thanks to him J Then comes even more dangerous rock climbing , and 11 bold people alone could make it to top and see the top view of it. I am confident that next time I too will make it J

The time they travelled to peak, we started cooking for lunch. Saravanan  , Nagalapuram nizam  took the task of cooking food. Myself , maduresh , muthu , rajavel  helped him . Bharath had a great sleep meantime :P  During the cooking time we had bread and jam to gain some energy. Then we had very good lunch with hot rice and 6 variety pickle thooku. It was delicious and spicy. Then took rest for few minutes and had good talk with madhuresh rajavel and muthu. The few people who went to peak returned back and had lunch and after few minutes we started to return back to base hill.

The return path was organized so well. Ganesh, masu lead the team where Praveen was the sweeper  and Charan and vinoth ramped up the team to continue with the pace to reach the base hill before it become dark. It was planned too well where we got enough few minute rest then and there and finally reached the base hill successfully. 

It was a sweet surprise that we got opportunity to see the PYTHON along the trial path. We were excited and took photos with python and we no more want to disturb it for a long time and  hence left the place soon.  We travelled around 26kms totally today . Then it was planned to reuse the plastics which we bought during the trek which was too good initiative, the remaining was collected in the trash bag. We all got settled in base hill where we had a short intro about ourselves , which were really heart-touching and really  too good . The main things they like much is  “NO PLASTICS” , “NO LIQUOR” , “ROCK CLIMBING” , “TARGET WAS ACHIEVED WHICH WAS SET” “INSISTED ON GREENARY ACTIVITES “ and awareness to participate more in “SOCIAL TREKS”. Then the account settlement happened and trek cost comes to Rs.600 per head. Then we went to the same hotel and had great dinner this time with chicken and biryani J

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Then the respective cars were planned to take people  which was planned according to their place where they stay which is another great thing which I like about CTC where they ensure safety and care towards people till their reach their respective destination. Finally said good bye to each other and returned back happily.

It was such a great trek which I had in my life where I got another set of new friends in quick span of time . Sincere thanks to the organisers Masu (  Really mass you are )  and Praveen ( gethu boss neenga )  for making this a special day in my life. Also  my special thanks to charan( who helped me throught the trek )  and rajavel( for accomdation in car ). Wish to have more fun and adventours journey in the upcoming trek events too especially with Emperors. Also I ensure that will become a initiative to ‘NO PLASTICS ‘ policy and will indulge myself  in attending    more social treks and voluntary activies with CTC. Thanks a lot to all my friends. A big bye to all and wish to see all soon in the upcoming events with CTC.

Do’s and Don’ts :

1. Always wear a very good trekking shoe with good grip which will help us a lot during trekking
2. Try to learn swimming soon so that we can enjoy nature a lot.
3. Always adhere what organisers say to ensure more safety.
4. Ensure that you always travel along with your friends during the trek.
5. Involve more in social treks and say “ no to plastics , go green”