The Paravathamalai Night Trek and the crazy events that happened there…..

This trip was going to be a special one for many reasons. I had wanted to go to parvathamalai many times and had even went to the bus stop to go there – twice, only to have various circumstances stop me. This was also my good friend Siva’s 25th outing. So, all bags packed, I set out to CMBT to board a bus to Polur on the 27th of April, 2014, Sunday. At CMBT, I met up with Siva’s cousin, Kailash, who was coming with us. This 11th grader can sure talk a lot, as I was about to find out! Siva was going to join us at the Polur bus stop from the Kavalur observatory. We got into the 12.45 bus to Polur. The bus journey was sleepy and I soon lived up to my er.. reputation by falling into deep sleep! We reached Polur by 5pm. We called Siva, who said he’ll be there by 2 hours and asked us to roam about. Well, killing time is something I am good at.. We walked for a kilometre to a small hill called Venkata Perumal Malai, which took as some 30 minutes. But at the base, the watch and some huge dogs barking changed our minds. The locals also said that climbing up and down would take close to two hours.

Venkata Perumal Malai at Polur, We almost went there.

So, giving that up we slowly trudged back to the Polur bus stop. We downed some juices and went and filled ourselves up at the Muniyandi Vilas Outlet there. Siva and Deepak arrived later at nearly 8.15pm. After they came, more juices followed and we then got into a bus to Kadalaadi – the base of Parvathamalai at 9 pm. The four of us reached the base at nearly 9.55pm where some friendly dogs joined our group. We started climbing fast. The climb was tough as the slope rose steeply and the weather was humid. In 10 minutes, the altitude rose by 100mts and we were sweating like mad. If we were to squeeze our shirts then, a cup of sweat would’ve been filled! I was sweeping behind this time too, as Siva didn’t want the dogs that were walking close by me, too close to him :D :D . After some breaks and continuous climbing we reached the area where some poles were driven into steep rock. The slope rose at 80° at that region. By the light of our torches, We could see how the path fell to steep slopes on both sides. Siva asked me to the front at this point and I had fun going ahead! We reached the temple at the top at 1am on Monday. After seeing around the temple, we decided to sleep near a tower in the temple where the winds were nice and heavenly.

Our sleeping spot!

We only had two blankets and we slept off sharing one blanket for two persons. As the night progressed, the temperature dropped off badly and winds rose up too. My teeth were chattering and I was shivering badly. This was completely in contrast to the sweaty humid weather that was prevalent during the climb. At around 3am, we shifted ourselves behind the tower where the winds couldn’t come. Siva and I drifted asleep soon and got up at around 5 am to see the sun rise.

Glorious Sunrise

After some photos and seeing the heavenly clouds underneath, we saw two monkeys roaming in that region. One of the monkeys was particularly aggressive. We had seen enough of the sun and started down at around 5.55 am.

the pesky rascal poses!

After a little climb downhill, we were aggressively engaged by the monkeys. At one point the aggressive monkey I mentioned before got up ahead and started jumping at us. Siva who was leading, went back in defence. I threw a bottle and stick to scare the monkey, which did scare it a bit and made it even more aggressive and went down quick. The three others retreated up instead and were quickly surrounded by more than 10-15 monkeys. I told them to use their bags as defensive tools and hit the monkeys if they had to. I didn’t know how Kailash understood that because in the next instant he threw his bag at the monkey. I had just got past the aggressive monkey and was seeing the bag on the ground behind me in utter shock at what the hell was happening. I tried to grab the bag but the monkey was quicker and held it and started to make growls and jumps at me. At this point, I tried to divert monkeys’ attention by throwing a glucose box down but they took the glucose and looked at my bag intently now. I was surrounded by some 13 monkeys now, all looking at my bag expectantly. I closed up my bag and ran downhill to a shopkeeper there. I kept my bag in the shopkeeper’s tent and got a thick stick from her and run uphill, barefoot all this time. All pent-up frustration and rage got out at that instant. I roared aggressively and charged at the monkeys which got shocked and scattered. The aggressive monkey still stood by the bag and I shouted at its face and got close with the stick and it also ran up. The good news- I got the bag. The bad news- the monkeys went up to my three friends. I gathered up the bags contents quickly which were thrown on the ground by the monkeys who were clever enough to open the bag, mind you. In that instant, a towel and a bottle at the edge of the path disappeared into monkey hands. I egged my friends to charge and escape down, which they did somehow. We went to the shopkeeper’s shop and drank some tea. All this action had taken place along the thin path where the slope fell steeply downwards. I was still in a rage and vented it on some monkeys that came down again. I returned the stick and pulled out a root from the ground for myself. We proceeded downhill fast and had monkey encounters between shops. I had some really nice “khool” at a shop. We soon descended fast and met our doggy friend soon.

Trekkie Dogs and me bond well atleast! :) :)

We now took photos and came down leisurely, recollecting the crazy monkey encounter and my outburst! Kailash got an earful and I ensured I reminded him of it through the remainder of the trip :P :P We were laughing a lot at everyone's antics..:D We reached the base at 8.55am. We went to a field nearby where we and the dog ate biscuits and we took photos. We got into a bus to Polur at around 10.45am and reached the bus stand nearly an hour later.

back to level ground :)

We had a huge breakfast at Hotel Everest, near the Polur bus stand at 11.45am. We got into a bus to Chennai at 12 noon which started off 15 mins later. We reached Perungalathur.3 hours and 30 minutes later where I bid adieu to my friends. I reached Tambaram and as I was looking for a bus home, I couldn’t help laughing at the thoughts of me going wild on the wild monkeys….