The Hindu Business Line : Raining memories

It is the only time of the year when a day may dawn to absolute clarity; all that suspended dust having been washed off by the first downpour. On such a day, crossing the Vashi creek by rail is a treat.

Shyam G. Menon

Perhaps, I shouldn’t go to Irshalgad.

This hill, around 1,200 ft high with a saddle-shaped rock pinnacle for crown, stands off the old Mumbai-Pune road about an hour’s drive from Panvel. During summer you can climb rock to the pinnacle’s top. Its base is a fine destination to hike to during the rains, monsoon hike being a speciality this side of the country. Hikers – regular, occasional, fit, unfit — turn out to walk, get drenched and be happy.

The rains here are actually beautiful. It is the only time of the year when a day may dawn to absolute clarity; all that suspended dust having been washed off by the first downpour. On such a day, crossing the Vashi creek by rail is a treat. Under a blue sky with well-etched clouds, you see all the way to South Mumbai at the tip of the island’s arc. Straight across, you can count the number of quayside gantry cranes at Nhava Sheva port and see the colourful containers stacked on big ships. To the left in Navi Mumbai, the real estate wealth of Palm Beach stands innocent with freshly scrubbed building facades. For a minute you forget one’s relative poverty and accept it as another place in town.

Far in the distance, you see the thumb-like Karnala pinnacle, Irshal, its neighbours, Prabal and Matheran. You forget your worries in the cool breeze atop the long rail bridge; take in the overnight eruption of greenery on the hills of Bhabha Atomic Research Centre and slowly dissolve into the squalor of the giant city ahead.

With no urban mess near by, it is even more beautiful in the real outdoors, few hours’ ride from the city.

The first day of July, spent on Mahuli near Asangaon, was marvellous. With the hill’s upper ridges lost to dense rain clouds and recently sprouted vegetation masking the path, it wasn’t long before a wrong turn taken required original navigation on muddy slopes, to rejoin the trail. It was fun. What hit you though, was the sheer brilliance of greenery all around. The Maharashtra Sahyadri is unique. It starts the year with a tired look, weathered grass and growing patches of brown scree. By peak summer, scree dominates — an irritating, granular form of dry soil that shifts under one’s shoes, depriving grip. What is left of green is a mix of hardy tufts of grass, clusters of shrubs, tough thorny plants and trees with that burnt-up look. Villages are emaciated outposts. The scene changes mid-year.

Two days of rain and the baked earth bursts to life with green grass springing up all over. Two days of drizzle was all it took to give an eerie netherworld appearance to Belapur’s favourite climbing crag; the awakening of leaves, creepers and the grey glint of a monsoon sky hinting it was time to leave nature to its rejuvenation. From there to Mahuli’s beauty reborn should have been, at best, a fortnight’s work for rain and earth. Amazing!

Irshal, of late, has been different. Sure it’s green, but aside from rain and earth there is something else at work.

In the days before the Morbe dam next door started filling up, the region bordered by this hill, Prabal and Matheran was a nice place to hike through. You could stretch your limits and link up two hills in a day or over a full weekend, link all three. The formerly empty reservoir of Morbe had helped hikers cut across the intervening valley floor. One terribly wet evening in mid-July 2005, Morbe was however fast filling up and the wind working up a fury with the measuring apparatus at the local rain gauge, when its sole attendant spoke of high rainfall levels. Drenched as we were on the return from Irshal and dry as he was, he looked funny in that rural setting — clad in shorts and T-shirt, reporting water level amidst obvious rain while the wind spun a bunch of spoon-shaped instruments above his head. We moved on.

Few days later, Mumbai and Navi Mumbai drowned in the infamous showers of July 26.

So it was with some trepidation that I returned to Irshal this June 27. The rock saddle was completely covered by clouds and on the hill’s approach ridges the fairly large group of 22 hikers was pelted with stone-like raindrops. The umbrella helped, not to stay dry but to shield from the painful barrage. I remember passing the rain gauge. The small facility, seemingly new two years ago, looked aged and rusty. Unlike before, the attendant wasn’t around for a chat. Those spoon-shaped things were whirring as usual, bizarre bit of activity in a place shut to the world. I also remember casting an anxious eye at the Morbe dam; the reservoir wasn’t bloated. Even a thought of July 26 crossed my mind, the brain’s logical half battling to impress rational reasoning on its superstitious partner. The hike proved enjoyable, everyone got soaked in the best tradition of a monsoon trek. Yet somehow, I waited.

On June 30, Mumbai and Navi Mumbai were lashed by heavy rains. Trains stopped; low lying areas were flooded. As the next day’s papers echoed memories of July 26, I wondered — what was it between Irshal and me?

Perhaps, I shouldn’t go to Irshalgad.

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