Mission Yedakumeri

Don’t know how many of you are actually interested in reading this blog!! But as a promoter of Karnataka Tourism, it’s my responsibility to inform you all ;) Just kidding… Felt like sharing the names of a few great places, which I’m sure most of you would’ve heard of…


Night of Friday, 17th July, though there was an issue going on at the office, I left my desk and rushed back home… All the way, while I was riding, was thinking about the minimal things required for the Toughest trek in Karnataka… But I guess I underestimated the most important factor in such places at this time of the year… The rains!!! There are many a reasons why I felt like that, will run you all through them with time… yeah, reached back home, pulled out my sleeping bag, a pair of cloths, a bed sheet and my cam and a jacket… the destination was Kumara Parvatha, the mountain which falls in the backdrop of Kukke Subramanya temple.



As I had a sleepless night the day before, I tried real hard to catch some sleep in the TT that we’d (a group of 12 which was supposed to be all Tech Mighties) booked. Slept for some 3 hours… from within I wasn’t that comfortable thinking about trekking KP… that too in the peak Monsoon season… I felt it was like us posing a challenge to the nature… Mother Nature had her own sweet reply in mindJ… 1st, as soon as we take a turn towards Kukke near Gundya, a huge tree was lying on the road uprooted… we must’ve understood what Mother Nature was capable of, but NO!!! People from 3 buses and our vehicle got together to make way for vehicles to move on… after feeling we’ve done something great, when we were just 4 kms away from Kukke, the bridge over Kumaradhara river was submerged!!! The river was flowing 8 feet over the bridge… and there we stood all humbled… with no clue as to what is to be done next… our best alternative was to head back to Gundya, and plan something else!!! From within, I was quite comforted that we are NO LONGER TREKKING KP IN MONSOON… but disappointed that the DREAM STILL REMAINED A DREAM…



It was later decided that we trek to Yedakumeri from Gundya… It was a rail trek... I was excited as I had done the necessary homework for that trek and had learnt that due to landslides, that route was closed for the trains for a week… so it was comparatively safe… and as this route forms a major part of the “Green Route” and the trek distance was an estimated 30 km, I was questioning myself if I have it in me for the big treks!!! All the treks we’ve so far been to are 8 to 10 km ones… This was the 1st BIG ONE!!!



Having parked the vehicle at Gundya, we started to trek… we had to cover around 5 to 6 km through the mountain before we actually hit the track… the 1st 2 km was plain road… but then it started getting tougher… and by the time we made it to the top, all were pretty exhausted!!! We had actually made our way through at least 6 waterfalls and couple more streams of water on our way to the track... Took a small break and left to Yedakumeri, which was told to be 12 km from that point… we had “add water and eat MTR food packs” and a few Maggie packets and little other stuff to eat… but as we’d learnt that at Yedakumeri we wouldn’t get anything to eat, we just saved them for our dinner and next days breakfast… filled our tummies with as little as possible!!!



The route was JUST TOO GOOD!!! More Waterfalls and streams followed… if I ever met the Railway minister of Karnataka, I would get them spanked… I agree that it should not be made public as I consider Humans to be parasites and their advent into these places would just spoil it… but 2 passenger trains in this route (Kukke to Sakleshpur or Mangalore to Sakleshpur) would do a lot of good… from the moment we started trekking it was just railway track, bridges which stretched over amazingly beautiful streams, waterfalls, tunnels which were as long as 540 meters at times and beautiful paddock of Hills on either side of the track… Tunnels were really dark, with ZERO Visibility (if the distance was a bit on the higher side)… there were many landslides and we learnt that there wouldn’t be any movement of trains for one week to follow!!! Huge boulders, trees and enormously huge amount of mud slid on to the track blocking it completely!!! And, 2 big factors in this trek are the weight I was carrying (all of my belongings mentioned earlier, and 2 tents or 1 tent and a mini gas cylinder at times) and the rain, which indirectly affected the former… It was raining cats and dogs… I thought a Wildcraft bag, (which was supposedly a waterproof bag) would be better than mine (borrowed the Wildcraft bag from Kishore)… but this is where I had underestimated Mother Nature (I mentioned it earlier)… the bag just couldn’t take the rain... Everything that was kept in the bag was wet (contributing to the weight too, shi*, I hate it, no dry clothes to wear, and top of that carrying dead weight for no purpose!!)…



After a number of breaks and a couple of rendezvous about heading back (wasn’t my idea though ;)), we decided to make it to Yedakumeri no matter what… Finally, at around 6:30, we reached the Railway station… it was 12.5 km from the place where we started… after begging the station master to let us spend a night in the station, we unpacked the tents… after cooking some MTR Stuff, I just crashed…



Got up in the morning and some “Punyaathma” had cooked some Maggie… ate that happilyJ… I’d spoken to a person there (Sreenivas) who obliged to cook us some breakfast which we could carry (in case ppl got hungry)… after packing up everything, (including the Pooris that we got from Sreenivas) we started back… this time we just went on and on and on… I was actually missing the juntha of this group, and the trains (I was on a track for a total of 12 hours!!!)… after walking for some 8 km, 3 of us decided to just continue without breakfast as we had to climb down the mountain and order the food for others… but this meant I didn’t get my share of Poori!!! Sparing a thought for all the girls (who were all foodies), I decided to move on… the next 4 km was on the track and after that some 5 km through the Mountains… but I was determined to make it, no matter what!!! Among the other two, one was all exhausted… and the other was all pumped up!!! So the weight was just increasing all along the route… but that didn’t matter…



Having seen more than 100 waterfalls and not taking a dip in even one of them were killing me from within… I told them that… but they were like, we don’t have time for that… well, I decided to make some time for myself!!! Started walking swiftly and took a decent lead (the bigger the lead, the more the time in the falls)… all of a sudden, out of nowhere, heard a train coming!!! It was doing a general check of the track… but that was a surprise (dunno if that was a pleasant one or not!!!) made way for it having run for a hundred meters to ensure that I’m in a safe place!!! Found a decent falls and just stood there for some time and was all pumped up again… the other 2 came and we decided to leave… the track was done… now it was through the mountains!!! I had never expected it to get that tough. Especially trekking down… but that is Western Ghats, in the rains… I was thanking myself that KP was still an eluded dream!!! 10 minutes into it, one of my companions gave up… and he asked us to continue, and that he would take his time and come… with absolutely no food reserves, we were all exhausted… the next few km, we just walked… no admiring nature, nothing… and as soon as we were almost there, (the guest house was 100 meters approx, less than that I guess) I saw a Khaka shop… barged in, had a few idlies, chickies… and when I had enough energy to get up, made my way through to the guest house… it was around 2… Hot meals were ready… after my well deserved lunch, took a nap… at around 5:30 all others came back… we all packed immediately and left to Kukke for the temple… after the darshana, we had dosas and we left to Bangalore… reached home at around 4:30 and slept like a log for 6 hours!!!



Though it is not advisable to trek this place in monsoon, I would say that, THIS IS A TREK WHICH IS NOT TO BE MISSED… it was simply an amazing experience… reminding me that we are all a miniscule part when compared to Mother Nature… and that we must never underestimate anything…


The Route along with Distance parameter:

Bangalore to Gundya (270 KM) via Kunigal, Hassan, Sakleshpura, Shiradi Ghat.
From Gundya to Railway Track: Approx 5 to 6 KM
Track to Yedakumeri : 12 KM

At Yedakumeri, for food, you can check with the person named Srinivas. He works for the Railways.

Nearest Medical Centre: Kukke

Nearest Bus Stop : Donigal

Best Season to Trek: November to February

Best Season to admire the beauty of nature: Monsoon - June to November, but ensure you have the necessary stuff.