The Diwali Double

Pahine Navra, from the base

“If you all come,” said Kaivalya, the rock climbing veteran and regular at National Park, “you can climb Navra, while we can climb Navri.”

Usually the mention of the word “bride” and “groom” would not tempt me hundreds of miles away from homely comforts during Diwali, but this was different. Trambakeshwar is perhaps the most beautiful rock climbing places of the state, if not the nation. We had been there once before last year to climb Sunday 1. And man, there were many pinnacles left, right and center most of whose name we dint know. Intrigued, I decided to look up more information about it.

“Kaivalya,” I replied after doing so, “I have some concerns about Navra. There are only 2 bolts, 2 pegs and no natural anchors as such on the whole route. And that too they say the bolts are quite old…”

Never mind that in addition to all there was a drive of 180 kms to reach the base village of Pahine. Mercifully Rajesh, Hemant, Prashant, Ram, Kishor, Sameer, Kaivalaya, Navroze, Sneha, Meenaz and I departed Mumbai, enduring some heavy duty highway traffic all the way to Igatpuri and then miles of unlit roads to the Pahine village in Meenaz’s zen and Rajan’s Tavera.

Ram and Sneha making tea. And me sipping!

The Hike to the base

We hardly slept for an hour, and it was time to get going. Both the pinnacles Navra and Navri along with a huge rock wall named Sasra is visible from the village. We employed our math skills and determined at our walking speed we’d get to the start at 9:00am, reach the top by 1:00pm, be back to the village by 3:00pm Wow, how easy!

Prashant and Rajesh on the way to the base of the pinnacles

All of us hiking up

Unfortunately, these calculations failed to take into account unforeseen things which can basically be summarized as “when everything is going well, something is bound to go wrong!” We were all set to hike when we suddenly see 5 guys with huge sacks walking in the direction of the village. On enquiring they said they were from Mumbai and they too planed to climb both Navra and Navri, but dint decide which one they would climb first!

The Climb

Navra (on the left) and Navri (on the right) up close

By the time we reached the base, the other team from Mumbai suddenly became very generous and asked us to go ahead and climb whichever pinnacle we wanted to. They said they will start climbing Navra in the afternoon.

Gearing up

Good for us! All of us geared up one by one. Sneha was to lead Navra and Kishor got ready to lead Navri. Kaivalya explained the routes in detail to both Kishor and Sneha. This was Sneha’s first lead on a pinnacle and she got going right from the word go.


Here’s a vivid description of her lead in her own words

Sneha taking a good look at Navra

I have been climbing for the last 2 years, but this was going to be my first lead on a big wall. Was I excited? Yes I was excited and anxious at the same time. Can’t really figure out which was more as I clipped on the gear to my harness loops. Soon I realized that I had never really clipped so much gear on my harness ever.

The Climbing route started from the Col in between Navra and Navri. With the air completely silent, I inspected the rock, chalked my fingers and shouted “Climbing”.

Sneha- up up and away!

“Climb on”, Ritz shouted back. The first ledge was visible from below. The climb started of with some easy moves, but soon went on to become tough. The route was a bit zig zag and I came below a small overhang. OK! Best to concentrate on just getting over it. I inched over towards the side of the overhang where there was a nice big hand crack and I’d be home free. Some odd minutes later…I shouted “Off belay!” There was a peg for protection. The first ledge is quite big. Meenaz and Ritz came up one after the other.

Meenaz Climbin gup next

Initially it was planned that Meenaz would lead the next pitch. But then the sun had taken its toll on her and she was completely dehydrated. And Ritz said “….naah aaj mood nahi hai….” Crap! So I carried on. I was very hesitant initially but then I slowly got into rhythm.

Sneha on Pitch 2

The route went up and then there was a traverse of about 10 to 15 feet. Problem was that there was hardly any hand holds. Since there was no bolt or anything I managed to place a shaky piton. Deep in the back of my mind I knew that were I to fall here, I was assured of a big fall, a big swing, and a lot of skin grated off against the rock. It would have been a whipper. More so, however, I also knew that were I to panic, I was going to take the whipper for sure. So I focused on keeping calm and reaching the ledge. But to my surprise I couldn’t find the bolt that Kaivalya had told was supposed to be there.

Rajesh belaying Meenaz

I searched the place but I just simply couldn’t find a bolt or a peg. So I hammered down 2 pitons. They were very sturdy. I then spend a good 10 minutes searching for the elusive bolt, before shouting – no bolts here! Meenaz and Ritz asked me to stop there, since there was no way I could be lowered down. We shouted to Kaivalya and others who were climbing Navri about our situation. Meanwhile the other team from Mumbai also started climbing Navra. They made a hell lot of a noise.

Prashant and Ram enjoying the climb

After a lot of shouting and talking on the walkie, Rajesh told us that he would come to up and search the route. In a few minutes he jummared up till the first ledge and joined me. He then found the elusive bolt. He then urged me to go ahead. Thanks to his support I continued. There is a small move to get on near the next bolt where the entire pressure has to be put on the right leg. There is absolutely no hold for the right hand. One had to go on sheer balance.

Rajesh belaying me....freaky traverse!

Now I reached the last part of the climb. And I also reached another overhang. Rajesh again encouraged me to carry on. But there was no way I could go up the overhang. So I stood on Rajesh’s thigh and went ahead only to find that there are no holds for the hand. In fact there was a huge, partly dead cactus right up my face and one small tree (thankfully alive). It was quite an effort to pass a runner around the tree and squeeze through the cactus. I could not see the summit, though a good 30 feet above me. From here on it was a scree patch and to make life more difficult there was cactus on both the sides. I had to climb this patch free.

Quite a few scratches and some intense balance later I reached the summit.
“Woohoo….Summit”, I yelled.

The last bit took every ounce of courage I had. I was very very excited and relived to see a peg on the summit. Kishore who had already summited Navri by then could see me. Navri, is a few meters higher than the Navra. It was around 3:30 pm. And like they say it’s lonely at the top. Sitting on a pinnacle feels even better when your team members are up there with you. But here I was alone. And so was Kishore. Thankfully we could talk to each other.

Kishor and Kaivalya on Pahine Navri summit

Soon there were 3 summiteers on Navra and Navri. Navra had Rajesh, Ritz and me. Navri had Kishore, Kaivalya and Hemant. Unfortunately none of us had a camera. Or it would have made great pictures. Navri summit is visible from the bottom so some pictures could be taken. Other than that what a wonderful day it was. We celebrated our summit with a bottle of frooti that Ritz had carried in his pocket.

Ritz rappelled down first, than I. Rajesh was the last to rappel at around 5:30 pm. We left the fixed line for others to climb next day.


Back to my write up

“Terra firma, at last,” I enthusiastically said. “Oh how I love terra firma.” It felt nice to walk on flat ground. On coming down we saw the other team from Mumbai (Y and Z) couldn’t even reach the first ledge and they decided to rappel off from midway on pitons!

Me at the base of Pahine Navra

Everyone agreed that it was a super lead by Sneha on Navra. It always feels nice after a summit. But the only thing I rued was missing all the action that was happening on Navri. It’s perhaps the most difficult to climb pinnacle I have seen. And we heard about the tales from Kishor, Kaivlaya and Hemant. Great climb guys!

Sneha at the base. On the background Sunday 1 and Sunday 2

After congratulating each other we retraced our steps back to Pahine Village. The half crazy Y & Z team decided to spend the night in the base of the pinnacles. That place was windy like hell. At the village it was party time. A lavish meal of soup, rice, dal, baigan bharta and bhaji was cooked thanks to the cooking skills of everyone. Must say I have never had so much food on a pinnacle climb.


The day after

Meenaz ready to climb Navra the second time

We hiked up again to the base of Navra Navri. And the Y&Z team finally had reached the first ledge. Kishore started the climb and in no time he was up on the summit. Soon one by one every one zoomed up. Hemant, Meenaz, Ram, Navroze, Sameer and Prashant. Apart from Prashant every one summited.

Meenaz and Ram on Pahine Navra summit

Kishore on top of Navra with Navri on the background

The Y&Z team too summited too after using our fixed line. Their plan to climb Navri came crashing down as the lead climber had a fall and it triggered a mini rock fall. In a minute they came crashing down. All of them miraculously escaped the fall from about say 20 feet.
After helping these guys to wind up, we packed up by 4 pm and left back for the village.

The Diwali weekend just couldn’t have been better far away from the maddening noise and pollution of Mumbai. A fact all of us rejoiced in. And on top of that 2 summits. After 2 days of mind blowing fireworks on the rocks, all of us really just wanted to go home, take a shower, sleep, and revel in the memories of the trip later, preferably after our aching muscles had recovered.

Onwards Mumbai ho!

Pictures Courtsey - Navroze, Sameer, Sneha, Meenaz, me and everyone who clicked them.

For some real cool pics click on Sameer’s album

http://picasaweb.google.com/wildsmp/PahineNavraNavriRockClimbing

Tel Baila Greens

The Tel Baila Greens

Tel Baila massif from the village

After a bit of a Himalayan hangover, they feeling of sweating while climbing dint go down too well initially. However getting back to climbing after a big monsoon break was exciting. And even better was to get back to a big wall. A bit early in the season, so the right hand of the temple route on Tel Baila seemed like a good place to start with. Whether we could pull off the climb in moss laden rock face was something that had to be seen.

It was a quick fire early morning ride yesterday. Having left Mumbai around 4 am, the base village of Tel Baila was by 7.30 am. The road after the Amby Valley crossing is as bad as it was two years back. Back then we were four in Fazin’s Maruti. This time we were eight in sumo. Apart from Meenaz, Jigna, Sneha, Zaffar and me from Mumbai, there was Deepak from Pune, Debu da, a friend of mine from Calcutta and Miki all the way from Tokyo!

The view from the col - greenery all around

The walk to the temple in between the Col was a breeze. The weather was bit cloudy, the wind was mild. Perfect climbing conditions. Only thing the route seemed to have a liberal tinge of green.

Deepak (red), Debu Da (yellow), me (blue), Meenaz (blue) and sneha (sitting) taking a look at the map

I gear up for the lead and carry almost about everything. I moan and groan and bitch and discover some long grass, slippery holds and finally get my ass up the first pitch. A big place where almost 10 people can sit. Meenaz, came up next, followed by Sneha, Debu da and Jigna. The other three stayed down the whole day, perhaps enjoying, perhaps getting bored in between clicking pics.

Me leading the first pitch

The first ledge is above the grass patch. Sneha climbing

Debu da, fresh from his summit of Kilimanjaro a week back led the next pitch. He’s a big muscular guy, and watching him lead this interesting section was cool. Being a sports climber he dint trust the ring bolts one bit. “Very bad bolts, rusted, eroded! All of us egged him to continue. Communication with the wind thrown in was funny at times. It was a mix of English, Hindi and Bengali.

Debu da leading the 2nd pitch

Debu da taking a breather before the summit. The route follows the crack.

The route was a diagonal traverse and then a small crack. After he reached on top of the crack, finding the route amidst a tremendous growth became difficult. Someone from right bellow shouted another 150 feet more to go Debu da (don’t remember if it was Zaffer or Deepak). Am sure he must have been rattled, but another 5 mins or so, he screamed “Ok am on top. And there are very good bolts”.

Jigna on her way to the top

Jigna, Meenaz and Sneha went up one after the other. I cleaned to the route, not before leaving back one choke nut and one quick draw. The summit was small place with bolts, both new and old. The views were superb. Greenery everywhere.

Jigna before the crack

The descent was fast affair. But only after the usual rope management drama. I forgot how many times all of us coiled and hauled the ropes up and down. Jigna was the last man to rappel off the summit and Meenaz was the last to rap off from the first ledge. When we get back to the temple all sweaty and we choke down a chocolate cake, sandwiches and ladoos.
It was a nice climb. A perfect antidote for the Himalayan hangover that all of us were reeling under.