Then sun shined on my morning battered soul. Ninad called me to say he would reach the base in 20minutes sharp. So I had 20 minutes now. Sun was shining on me big time. Shivendu got up ready to go in next 15minutes and Ninad also arrived. We left my home at 9:00am sharp.
Base of Parsik in next 15minutes was a cake walk. The way from here was also a cake walk-literally. After making the way through the slums we were below open sky and ad mist tall grass. I had expected nothing like this. There was no soil under our feet. All we could see was that we were stepping on broken grass. Having experience of this route before and knowing in which way to proceed, I was opening the route-obviously. Ninad was in the middle and Shivendu was bringing up the tail. It may seem easy to walk through toe deep green grass, but the real fun is in walking through 6 feet tall dry, grass. We could see nothing in front of us. I had kept the reflector on the summit as point of reference and was moving towards the small ridge between the hills. The route was very difficult and confusing owing to the tall grass.
Finally we reached the ridge through which we were to climb up. I had traveled through this patch for couple of times before and I thought that our troubles would end here. But it was not to be. The trek over here seemed more difficult than ever. We had considered moving over the walls of the ridge before but had never tried it. Right now it seemed to be the most feasible option at this moment so I decided to give it a try. I was still leading and condition of Ninad and Shivendu was getting worse by every moment. Now what we were going through was much more physically taxing compared to what we had done till now. The ground consisted of loose soil and it was very difficult have a grip on such soil. My hunter shoes were proving useless and so floaters of Shivendu and Ninad’s sneakers were in much worse condition. I tried navigating over the edge of ridge but it seemed impossible for my brothers. So we continued with the present way. Over here we encountered a point where there was no space to get any grip nearby. We could not back out from here. The only possible way was to move ahead and that too quickly if we were maintain time that we had lost before. I swiftly negotiated this turn and waited on a small uprooted tree to guide my companions to safety. Shivendu was the one behind me now. He was almost through with this patch when he slipped and lost grip of his legs. He was literally hanging on his hands. I moved towards him and got a grip on him. At the same time Ninad gave away his safe position and moved towards Shivendu who was hanging. During all this I previously had a proper grip on Shivendu but addition of Ninad added only to our woes. It was not possible now for me to pull both of them safety. To add to it my phone started ringing and added to the chaos already present. Somehow I helped Shivendu out, and asked Ninad to hang on while Shivendu took my position. Once Shivendu was on safe ground it was just a matter of time before helping Ninad to safety using the same points that Shivendu had used previously. From here we decided too play safe and wade through the grass. Over here Ninad took the lead and I maintained the balance between both of them. But again during the part just before the summit I took the lead and brought them up with me. Over here we stopped and checked our damage. Shivendu was the worst affected but still he seemed good in morale considered too Ninad. Ninad had a few bruises and was dead tired. Shivendu was more or less the same but the only difference between them was that Shivendu had scrapped both his knees. I was the safest least injured guy. After applying some ointment to our bruises we carried on.
Now our aim was to reach the
We reached the spot over there and took some pictures again. It was a mind blowing view from here. A huge rock has emerged out of the plain rock patch and hovers just above the deep valley below. The darks of the valley are astounding. I had a feeling as if giving the jaws of death a dental checkup. Half an hour over here and we decided to start to descend.
We took a route that I had not tried before. Over here we encountered the same tall grass which had troubled us throughout the morning. After wasting a good 45minutes in this area and ending up peering into the valley below we decided to retrace our footsteps to that point and go back the way we had come up. While descending we again took halt in the same cove and had some biscuits. A plan was made and routes decided upon about our route of descend. By now both Shivendu and Ninad wanted to reach ground zero fast and by the safest route. There is an old cement road that is constructed for ease of the workmen in the control center at the top. We took the same route. The route was very much broken and in a pitiable condition. But still we ended our descend in next half hour. From here we took a rickshaw and reached home in next half an hour.
This trek proved to be the most bizarre and unsuccessful trek of all time. Shivendu and Ninad vowed that they would never come to Parsik again.
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