Trek to Sandhan Valley🚩🚩⛰⛰🌑🌑
Post the successful trek of Fantastic Four couple of trek leads wanted to explore Nashik Range further and then one of the lead mentioned about exploring Sandhan Valley. Even I had not heard of this and I too researched about the same. At the time this looked like an unexplored region and we had to plan the travel properly. It was going to be just 3 of us, the 3 Musketeers who were going to visit the place. One of our friends had a Wagon R car which were going to use for this travel. This was going to be a overnight journey. So we decided that we leave directly after office and meet at one point. I was to be picked at Nashik Phata.
We understood that we were going to reach the base village in the extreme early hours, hence it was going to be cold outside, we were going to put up ourselves at Amruteshwar Temple at Ratanwadi and then move towards the base village at the sunrises and breakfast. Hence we had carried our sleeping bags in case we dont get a safe location to put up. I had packed with me some parathas for 3 of us, some groundnut chutney, some dry chikkis, and sabzi which would last till the lunch of the next day. Similarly the other 2 folks had carried similar food.
Reaching Ratanwadi🚩🚩
We reached Ratanwadi at 3am IST, we slept beside the Amruteshwar temple by putting up our sleeping bags and slept till 6am IST for the reason that we had to do our morning duties. Post that we had very few stalls in the area which had some breakfast to offer as well as since being in the Bhandhara Sanctuary, the mobile network was negligible. The villagers told us that if we were to make any phone calls we had to walk till the entrance of the Ratanwadi village were there was very feeble range and either drop SMS or make calls.
I took some pics of all 3 of us having morning team and breakfast. Once breakfast was done, we started our journey from Ratanwadi to Samrad which was about 10 kms ahead.
We reached the base village of "Sandhan Valley" which is Samrad and after parking our car, we started moving towards the opening of the Sandhan Valley. The walk towards the opening of the valley is about 10-15mins walk, but the opening showcases why the valley is so mesmerizing.
The pathway captured may look narrow and small, but the size of the boulders is huge.
The valley had a few surprises for us and the 1st surprise was a water pass
Post the water pass the valley starts increasing its depth and height and the boulders also start getting even more enormous. The size is evident in the pics from here on.
Then comes the 2nd surprise which is the second water pass, this water pass is deeper, at least till the chest and one has to be very careful while passing. We had to carry out belongings on out head and be careful that we dont fall as we will get drenched and there was no place to hide or even change.
Further surprise was there were forest insects in the water and we had to be careful and at this stage we recalled Bear Grylls.
Crossing the water was fun, captured once I had cleared the stage.
After crossing the water patches, there is a 1kms walk into the valley and one has to walk till the valley opens up again. The sunlight, hardly reaches the base of where you are walking.
While we were walking till the valley opened again in an enormous way, I was able to click one of the best clicks I consider I have captured in my photography ability.
Finally after walking through enormous, boulders, water zones and endless walks, we finally reached the spot where the valley fully opens up. I am sure in rainy season, this has enormous rapids with a waterfall at the end of this.
This view showcases the enormity of the size of boulder as well as nature.
We all were looking like small ants which was crossing the Valley.
Post exploration of the Valley, we took our lunch break, we opened all our dabbas and started to have what we had, it was a very long and tiring journey for us.
Post lunch, we started our return journey, we had decided, that while we go back and open this trek to other members we will limit our journey till a certain point and not go beyond as we had to do the same passes again which we had taken while descending first.
With this we completed the Recce Trek, it was fun for 3 of us and we mentioned to each other that this would be one of the blockbuster trek within the org. With this we took some time out and rest and then started our return journey towards Pune. Until next read, enjoy reading.
Abhijit More
Pune
