Purely from trekking perspective, KP is arguably the best in Karnataka. Since the forest department has blocked some of the good treks in Karnataka, KP is overcrowded on weekends by trekkers mostly novices with little respect to the nature. There are many trekking groups who take people to KP & on any Saturday night, expect rainy season, you can find so many tents at the camping site near Bhattara mane. Its common to hear loud music on portable speakers and people screaming till late night. This is the reason why many famous and experienced trekking groups have stopped trekking KP.
Note : I will be talking about the trekking time in this blog because the plan was an aggressive one and that it was critical to cover distances in stipulated time..
I had been to KP twice, first time was in rainy season so there wasn't much crowd(read here). But the second time was a totally different story. It was in January 2017, when I planned to take a group of 10 people, mostly newbies. Both these times the trek was for 2 days, camping near Bhattara mane on Saturdays. Though I had heard about KP being overcrowded on weekends, this time I had to experience the pathetic situation first hand. The end less queue for dinner at Bhattara mane, the fight for plates and then the loud speakers and flash lights in the middle of beautiful nature were really frustrating. Having said that, the fact is, what KP offers from a trekking perspective is second to none among the places accessible on weekend from Bangalore.
Since I was preparing for Khardungla challenge, I was not able to do any serious trek after my Friendship peak expedition. Also I couldn't go for any Himalayan expedition in 2018 because of this very reason. Once Khardungla was completed rather successfully, came the Bengaluru Marathon(SPBM-2018). Since there was a secret vow to Babu sir that I will do sub 3:30 marathon for RunMachines, I couldn't afford to miss any weekend long runs. Post Bengaluru Marathon, the focus was shifted to the last run of the season, the Mumbai Marathon. Since we get only 10 weekends after SPBM, missing a weekend long run was never an option.
But I was longing for some serious trekking. So a thought crossed my mind, why not do KP in single day? When I gave serious consideration to this thought, I felt it was actually a good one for 3 reasons. Firstly I need not miss a long run. Secondly I need not tolerate the frustrating not so serious trekkers on Saturday night. But most importantly I would get a chance to test my body.
I was convinced that I need to try this, but the problem was who will accompany me on this insane trip. Also I did not want any bottle necks in this extreme try, so I had to be careful before checking with anyone. After quite a bit of thinking I thought I will check with Karthik (a good footballer and a Half Marathoner who was with me on previous 2 treks to KP & also on Green Route Trek) if he agrees its good else I was prepared to do this alone.
Though Karthik found this idea little risky, I was able to convince him that we can pull this with some effort.
The worst case planning was, to start trek latest by 7AM, reach Bhattara mane by 10AM. Start from Bhattara mane at 10:30 and reach peak latest by 1:30PM.(If we cannot reach peak by 1:30PM return from where we are at 1:30). Start from peak by 2PM reach Bhattara mane by 4PM and reach Kukke by 6PM. The stretch from Bhattara Mane to Kukke is fully forest area so I had carried my headlamp for emergency.
We booked Sugama bus on Saturday, 24th of Nov. We actually reached Kukke quite early at 4:45 AM. We freshened up, had breakfast and started our Trek at 6AM.
1st leg : Kukke to Bhattara Mane
As we reached the entrance of the forest, we met 2 other trekkers who were unable to find the way since it was very early and there wasn't enough light.
We showed them the way and they started trekking with us. But they were lagging behind a bit. I felt this could be a potential bottle neck so started trekking fast and Karthik followed me. We had just covered 1 KM when sole of my left shoe's gave up. It was a very old shoe which I had used for 3 Himalayan expeditions and for a number of local treks, but I never expected it to come out so easily.
I had a decision to make, either to walk back to Kukke wait till shop opens and start again, there by loosing valuable time and putting the whole plan at risk or continue with the same shoe. I took out a polythene cover and tied it to the shoe like a thread and started trekking further. We trekked at a good pace and as we were almost reaching Bhattara mane, I had another setback. This time the other sole also gave up!! But by now I was prepared to trek even with the slippers I had. Despite all these we reached Bhattara Mane in 1hr 45mins!!
Shoe tied with polythene cover😓
2nd leg : Bhattara Mane to Peak
We rested for 10 mins, kept our luggage at Bhattara mane and carried only a bottle of water & few snacks(pack of chikki and mixture) in a string bag. We started our trek to the peak at 8AM, well ahead of my worst case planning. We trekked at a good pace and reached Kallu mantapa.
We had snacks at Kallu mantapa and started trekking to the top without wasting much time. On the way we crossed a number of trekkers who had started trekking from Bhattara mane in the morning. I was at the peak at 10:15AM while Karthik reached 15 mins later swearing to me for being too fast.
We took a few pics and had the remaining snacks. While having snacks we were discussing about some budding poets and we talked about one of our multi-talented friend Vijay Chikkanaragund.
At the peak
Rare case of Karthik whining on the way to peak 😂😂
3rd leg : Peak to Bhattara Mane
After spending close to half an hour at the peak, we started back to Bhattara mane. To our surprise we saw our friend Vijay(about whom we were talking a few minutes back) completing the final part and reaching the peak. Apparently he came with a trekking group and they started from Bhattara Mane in the morning.
Trekking down was becoming a particular challenge for me since there was literally no sole in my shoe. So we trekked a little slower. We also stopped for some nice pics at Shesha parvatha.
We reached Bhattara mane by 1:30PM, taking 10 mins more than the time we took to trek up mainly because of the condition of my shoe.
We had a nice lunch and 4-5 glasses of butter milk at Bhattara Mane. Since we were way ahead of schedule, we even slept for 30mins under a tree!
Sleeping, since we were well ahead of planned time!!
4th leg : Bhattara Mane to Kukke
After the sleep, we started to Kukke at 2:45 PM. This is actually a boring leg for me so on both my earlier visits, I had literally ran down.
But this time because of the shoe, descending was little more frustrating.
We reached Kukke 2 hours later, again taking 15mins more than the time taken for the climb.
But as we reached Kukke I was relieved because I was able to complete this trek without needing to walk on slippers.
We booked a room for couple of hours, freshened up and went to temple to have dinner.
After having dinner we boarded the bus to Bangalore which we had already booked.
Shoe after the trek. I was fortunate as the sole stuck together till the end!!
