Disclaimer: Right from the day of planning, I knew what we were doing is illegal. Considering the risks involved, I personally do not recommend this trek to anyone.
Since I am basically from the coastal city of Ankola, I have seen the construction of Konkan railway in the mid 1990's. I was always fascinated by the scenic beauty of this stretch. As I grew up I came to know that train journey from Mangalore to Bangalore is a equally fascinating. They are similar stretches with greenery and a lot of tunnels.
I heard of Green route trek when my Engineering batch-mates trekked this stretch. Since then it was always on my checklist. Unfortunately, trekking was banned around Sakaleshpur region ever since Naxals were tracked there.
I always used to mention this trek(of-course with disappointment) to my roommates whenever we were planning for some treks.
My roommates did fair amount of research from their side and they understood what I was missing.
Finally in 2014, myself and 3 of my roommates(Nataraj, Harsha & Karthik) decided to take a chance and go ahead with the trek.
The risks of this trek were:
1) Since its illegal, if caught by RPF/forest officers, section 24 of the Karnataka Forest Act (acts prohibited in reserved forests) attracts imprisonment of up to a year or a fine of Rs 2,000 or both.
2) Route from Yedakumeri to Highway cuts through thick forest which is famous for Elephants.
3) Fitness is key, as it is difficult to rescue if injured.
When we spoke about our plan, as always quite a few of our friends expressed their desire to join us. But I was ruthlessly honest with them in detailing the risks of this particular plan, and as expected at-least 5 of them backed off..
Despite knowing all the risks, Bharath (my engineering classmate) & Vinayak (Nata's friend) agreed to join us in the crime. So finally we were a group of 6.
Our plan was simple:
Start trek from Donigal(half an hour from Sakaleshpur)
Trek till Yedakumeri(19 KM)
Decide whether to continue till Kukke(further 16 KM) or return back.
Back-up plan : If somebody caught and denied permission, travel till Kukke and trek Kumara Parvatha.
We packed a few clothes, rain gears and A LOT OF FOOD as were not sure about the challenges ahead of us.
We were all set to leave office early when we got the news that my roommate Karthik had high fever. I spoke to him and we collectively decided to go ahead with the trek.
We boarded a Karnataka Sarige bus to Donigal on Friday, the 27th June.
Reached Donigal at around 4.30 AM. I checked at a tea stall and people there scared us saying its illegal and suggested us to cover Manjarabad Fort(which also is a beautiful place in monsoons).
I said we will try and asked for the route to Donigal railway station and started to find that. We were supposed to walk on Bangalore-Mangalore highway for half a KM and in the darkness it was very risky with Vehicles moving very fast.
We found another group of 4 people who were also trying to find the railway station. After desperately searching for half an hour in darkness, we finally found the way to railway station.
We were aware that, if station master found us he will be stopping us, so we spent some more time finding a opening. We were careful and used our torch lights only when it was absolutely essential, this made the search much more tedious. Finally we found a railway underpass and we planned to climb the same. But there were thick bushes which we somehow negotiated and entered the trak.
Once we were on track we were all alone with the nature. There were very few goods trains on the track. We saw the colors of nature as the sun rose.
We soon realized that walking on railway track was not as easy as we thought. We were covering just 3 KM every hour. Considering our speed and illness of Karthik we decided that we will trek till Yedakumeri and will find an exit.
Since we had ample time we even went for a swim in a small stream.
Finally after walking 19 KM, crossing 17 tunnels and over a 50 bridges, we reached Yedakumeri by 12.30 PM.
Once we stopped trekking at Yedakumeri, we started feeling the pain of trek; which mainly is because of unequal pressure on feet from walking on railway sleepers and stones).
We were sitting on the stone benches and everyone was so tired that we dosed off for a few minutes. We were woken up by the screaming station master. He said if we donot leave in next 10 minutes, he will be calling the RPF. I checkedwith the workers there and got to know that if we walk for 5 KM we will reach a village from where there is a bus to Sakaleshpur at 3.45 PM.
We started walking towards the village when I met a railway engineer and while speaking to him I told that I was unaware that this trek is illegal. He said that, they are stopping the Karwar-Yeshwantpur train at Yedakumeri for him and asked us to join him. As we were walking back again the station master started screaming, so the engineer asked us to wait somewhere away from station master's view and get into the train once it stops.
We followed his words and were in Sakleshpur by 4 PM. We could have bought tickets at Sakaleshpur and continued our journey till Bangalore in the same train but we decided that we will have some fresh food and travel by bus.
The risky trek was over within a day and we were relieved once we were out of Sakleshpur railway station without any further issues(we were travelling without tickets ).
They say "fortune favors the brave" & we indeed were very fortunate to complete this trek, as just a week later a group of trekkers from Chennai were caught and booked in Sakaleshpur area.
