Morenchi Factory Blogs: 2013

Trek to Alang & Madan - AMK range💥💥🚌🚩🚦🚪

One of the most adventurous fort I had ever trekked in my life of adventure so far has been the Alang & Madan Trek. This trek was not organized by the org team but we had formed a group within our trekking community in the org. One of my trek friend asked me whether I would be interested to trek with them for Alang & Madan trek in the AMK range near Kalsubai the highest peak in Maharashtra. I did not think twice and said yes to him. This time around the Trek was organized by Offbeat Sahyadris. This was a Mumbai based group and they has given directions to our group as to how to reach the base village of Alang. Our Org group planned to travel and hire via a tempo traveller which was a 15 seater. We were 12 colleagues who had participated in this trek.

My gear

Beginning of the journey

As this was a trek in the Nashik range of Alang Madan Kulang forts and near Kalsubai, we had to travel overnight from Pune. We started after work and few of the colleagues started from the office location. Me too had packed the bag and kept it ready to board from office location to avoid wasting time for pick-ups. We started at 8pm IST from Pune. The route we took was as follows.

We had decided to only stop for minor natural breaks and not stop for dinner or any snacks related stops. We had 2 stops on the way, once near Narayangaon for tea and bio break and the second post Rajur.

Reaching the base village

We reached the base village of Alang wadi at 1am IST and we immediately had our dinner in the Varanda of the villager we were going to use as guide.

Midnight dinner at 1am at Alang Wadi

As soon as we completed our early morning dinner :), we were greeted by the Offbeat Sahyadri Trekkers and the other team members who had travelled from Mumbai.

Late Night Briefing

After the team meeting, we were off to sleep and we were not going to get more than 3-4 hrs of sleep that night. It was 5.30am and we got our wake-up call. It was a chilly morning of Feb 2013 and we had to scamper around for our morning bio breaks.

First rays of light and AMK in sight

View of AMK at 6.43am IST

Team rearranging the gear and reloading for the climb which was about to beging

My gear

With the first water break done the team started marching ahead.

We were to climb this ridge and then climb left wards towards Alang and then Traverse Back to Madan. Our plan was to climb towards the Traverse, unload our backs, complete the Mandan trek and move towards Alang as we had to stay in the caves at Alang.

Madangad standing tall

While climbing towards the ridge of Alang, one has to traverse through a lot of Katal Vegetation.

At the ridge tri-junction, one comes across a carving in the wall which showcases the route for Alang Madan and Kulang. The route between Alang and Madan is doable, but the route to Kulang is not that direct.

Marking and Carving on the wall

Break and onwards towards Alang

We had climbed continuously for 2 hours now and the team leads asked us to take a 10 mins break from climbing.

Our team taking a break

After the break we begin the climb and at every step we had to be very sure of our footing as we would fall down and there was no place to hold on to anything.

Steps onwards towards Alang

The climb is pretty straight and around 60 degrees

The scene is pretty overwhelming for trekkers as well because, once you come out of the Katal region, you are confronted by a climb of around 200 to 300 ft which straight and you are carrying load with you.

Sear rockface of Alang

Reaching the 1st phase of the climbing

After climbing till around 8.45am IST we had reached the 1st patch where we needed rope assistance. Climbing without rope was possible but the safer way was rope. We had traffic around here as based on our booking we were climbing as per groups.

As breakfast, we were given each one of us, the boxes of bhel to eat

Bhel Box

This click is after I climbed Alang first patch without harness.... I just held the rope in the left hand and pulled my self...carried my own bag too...a 15 kg one.

Harness attachment and Trek from Alang to Madan
We were asked to carry our harnesses and then pass one once we had completed the route

Harness was needed as the falls were deadly and direct. A view of one such fall

Me waiting for my turn to traverse to the other side to Madan

Alang and Madan Connecting Ridge

View of Kalsubai Mountain - Cone at the top mountain

Traversing to Madan

Steps at Madan

Tight Stairs

Sweat and Dizziness

Strapped On and ready for my Turn

The view before me

Everyone tucked in and close

Me crossing over - Only the rope and harness as the guide here

Climbing onto Mandan

We had a rope ladder attached and we had to climb the same to reach Madan top. It was fun climbing as it reminded me of by NCC and army prep days as well as the NCC camps that I had attended.

The view of the Kulang Fort before my turn.

My turn to climb and this is how it looked

From Madan Top you could clearly see the Alang Top. Of the three, Alang, Mandan and Kulang, Mandan is the tallest.

Another view of Alang and its enormous extent

On the top of Madan fort, there is very limited space and limited reminiscence of the fort remaining. There were couple of water tanks on the fort, but the water was not portable.

Kulang Fort Visible

To go towards Kulang, one has to traverse and circumvent towards Kulang. There is small mountain structure which needs to be traverse to reach towards Kulang.

Descending from Madan

Climbing Alang
Whatever 2 day food we had carried (dried) we took it out as lunch and had it in between the Mandan descend and Alang climb. The team was setting up the ascend to Alang

Rope Ladder and Guide Rope

Took us till 8pm IST to climb

To ascend the entire team of trekkers it took us from 5pm IST to 8pm IST to climb. We had divided the team in 2 parts so that the climbers who had already climbed start fire and food preps. We first settled down in the Cave and made our bedding for our team. The caves were full of rats as this cave is visited often by trekkers and small food particles attract them.

Post the food prep, we were rationed the food and as it needs to be available for all the trekkers who are atop the fort.

Our Rationed Food

We completed having our dinner by 11pm IST and the entire team of trekkers were fast asleep. As soon as we were asleep at around 1am IST a trekkers shouted very loudly and ran outside the cave extremely fast and within no time all the trekkers had their torches out and flashing them against each other. The one who shouted later mentioned to the team that a rat had climbed his chest and he was afraid of what was on his chest and ran out.

The next morning

We all were up by 5am and after our bio breaks we went to explore the fort.

First rays of the sun over the horizon

Sunrise

Game of Shadows

Morning Chai

Morning 1 by 3 Maggi

Commando Abhijit

Caves in which we stayed

It was time for us to leave so we packed up and were taking pics as we did not know how long it would take us to visit the fort again. While descending from Alang this time we had to reverse and descend downwards.