Gavi Betta

Trekking is probably the best I can expect on a weekend - it rejuvenates me. My excitement is always towards exploring new places - the places I have never heard of. It had been three months since my last exploration to Dedupe & Jamalabad, I was on the look out for an opportunity and Sampath from Sharavathi Valley had posted a trek for the weekend - I decided to join in primarily interested in exploring the "Gavi Betta", associated activities though present didnt really interest me to begin with. It was 2 Day outing with a lot of itenary including rappelling, water sports in addition to Trek to Gavi Betta.

I know I am pretty delayed in writing this blog - almost 2 months since I trekked. The trek was on 21st and 22nd of the August.

Day 1: We began our journey from Bangalore early morning. Inspite of a delayed start from Bangalore, we reached Shanivara Sante by noon. Here we met our guide here who suggested an alternate route to the one planned through the coffee estates.

The guide took us to his relatives home were we received awesome hospitality! After a brief break and getting to know the hosts well, we continues our journey from the starting camp. I spent most of my trek time with the guide getting to know the specialties and the mindset of the person. He worked in Bangalore but returned tiered of the noise and the pollution to set up his own studio in Shanivara Sante.

The initial part of the trek was through a common jeep route, but since the road was blocked with a tree falls (thanks to the rains), we moved into the coffee estate. This was were some of our fellow trekkers had some trouble with the leeches.

Continuing the trek further, we reached another estate - there was an artificial lake created by building a dam. It was just beautiful. This water tank acted as the source of supply for the plantations downhill. A small distance further, our guide plucked a cardamom, and showed us how it looks before being processed and it reaches the store. The taste of the cardamom was sweet. He also showed us another fruit which they generally use instead of tamarind, this fruit is dried and then canned for storage.

Further on the route we reached an open area were we found granite pieces laying scattered. We climbed the hillock and were mesmerized by the panoramic view around. After a brief session of photography we continued our trek on another trail.

We crossed few valleys, stream and some beautiful scenery before getting to a fresh green opening besides a pristine lake. The weather this far was awesome with cool breeze, clouds on the horizon, clear view of the route ahead.

We rested beside the lake and I had all the time in the world to explore the small falls that the lake water made as it overflowed its boundary. The accessibility of the falls makes it a really good place for photography and probably cinematography too.

We then had our lunch before resuming the next phase of the trek. Mr Sampath of Sharavathy valley relies on his expert cook for the taste - Mr Dharmanna. He reached the peak via a different route and had prepared an awesome lunch for us to savor.

The "Vana Bhojana" (literally meaning forest meal), besides the lake and the clouds slowly moving closer created a very memorable lunch for me. We as a team had gelled well by this time and were in full flow with our jokes and comments. Post lunch, we got some wild berries as desserts which made the lunch even special.

Just as we resumed our phase two of the trek, the weather turned form pleasant to cloudy and really challenging. We couldn't spot each other at a distance more than 3 mts, the clouds were so dense. One of our trek companions had pulled her muscle and decided to stay back at the spot accompanied by Sampath. The remaining team continue the trek with our guide leading the way.

A 20 minute simple trek given the terrain, we reached an awesome clearing(actually a ridge) atop the hill. This was the peak - made completely of stone. If the clouds cleared up, we could get an awesome view of the Western Ghats and its thick vegetation from this point. We weren't really luck and so we continue with the trek, moving along the boundary of the ridge, we reached a dense vegetation from where we had to get into a steep descent along the ridge to the Cave.

The clouds had now begun to pore and the descent was getting really messy. With some heavy weights (including me) the supporting shrubs were giving way and the sod had turned slippery. The light dimmed and visibility problems were high. The high moisture & rain was instrumental in avoiding us from any shots here.

After a 10 minutes descent we reached a cave formation. "Gavi" in Kannada stands for "Cave" and "Betta" for a "hill" - this the secret of the name this hill has. Getting to the last part of the cave is really hard; it requires us to creep through low and narrow opening between the rocks, move on slippery rock to finally get to the cave. This cave has a religious significance and villagers come here to offer their prayers to the deity here.

After a really hard photo shoot given the low light intensity, we resumed our trek to return to the lake. We reached the lake in around 40 minutes.

We then began our walk back to the Tempo Traveller, which had now been stationed at the main road were the jeep route ends. Continuing along the jeep road which had turned slippery post rains; we moved ahead to get to the TT.

The consistent rains had drenched every one of us, so we were quick to change and get seated in the Tempo. The tempo moved on, taking us back to Shanivara Sante - We had hot coffee and thanked the guide before leaving to a Camp Stay were we would spend the night.

We reached Camp Leapord Rock at night, had dinner and caught some really hard earned sound sleep.

Day 2:

After an hot cup of coffee in the morning, we went on an early morning safari through Nagarahole and then reached our rappelling spot.

We had an awesome Akki Rotti (rice pan cake) and Avalakki (pounded rice recipe) along with the famous Kashaya (herbal tea) which gave us a super bunch. We then completed our Rappeling activities and returned to our base camp.

Delicious Lunch was served and post which most of us spent time in the water sports facility available there.

I enjoy trekking a lot more than the other activities and thats one of the reasons for not having all the energy to write more about day 2, but none the less the second day too was equally exciting as the first one.

We began our journey back to Bangalore, and I got down at Mysore as I needed to get to Surthkal the next day for classes.

Photos: http://picasaweb.google.com/sachidananda.bs/GaviBetta#