The Last British Hill Station

There couldn't be any quicker runaway for a Mumbaikar than Matheran. Being just 90 km away from Mumbai, one actually doesn't need to plan  much to tramp there. He could just put on his shoes and head right there. Neral is the base town and can be reached through local trains. When we got there, we found that the toy train running on Neral-Matheran was called off due to rains. I kind of expected it. This toy train is one of its kind in the country. I feel bad I didn't get a chance to experience it a single time, despite going so many times to Matheran. 

Matheran Hill Rail

We took taxi all the way up. If you visit this place in monsoons, you can notice the frequent, tiny waterfalls at the side of the road. One could just pull over and have a nice little shower there. It's that awesome. Well, we reached the top and had to take tickets to enter Matheran. Let me tell you, there are other ways too. One could just wander through the jungle and get into. 

Falls by the road

It was sunny. We decided to go to Panorama Point first. It was a healthy three kilometres walk there and back. Oh! I forgot to tell you that motorised vehicles are banned here. The most comfortable thing you could get is a horse. At the Panorama point, one could see 360 degrees standing there. Punit explained me the meaning of Panorama and the fact that digicams have such a mode, used to capture long, continuous images.

A lovely path

People talk about hundreds of vibrant colours in a scenery. For Matheran, there are just three. Red, green, blue. The red soil, green woods and blue sky. And it didn't make it any less beautiful for sure. It was getting darker as clouds were having a get-together in the skies. We scrolled back to the main area, called Bazaar. It soon started raining. Gradually, it was all white. It surprised me that being just 800 metres high, we were already walking in the clouds. Punit and Ankit were not ready to get wet, but a little persuasion worked. It felt good, and cold. We had some snacks and started skipping again. 

Bazaar

There is this point, One Tree Hill, which is quite amazing. I loved the empty spaces on that tiny hill, for a change. Other points seemed pretty much ordinary to me. We couldn't take out time to visit the temple on the other side of the hill. There's nothing special about it except for there's a dam nearby. Don't get your hopes  high; they don't allow swimming there. Although there is a club which does this thing. Crossing the valley on a rope. I don't know what do they call it exactly. 

One Tree Hill

Dam reservoirs 

While coming down, we chose to go by the railway tracks. The scenery was just amazing. Also, had a natural shower. It was an awful long  and lonely way down. I noticed some numbers besides the tracks, like the ones they write for informational purposes. 109... after some time 108...107...106. To my horror, those meant fucking kilometres. It was actually 109 km from Neral to Matheran via the railway. I kept mum about the fact and let my friends enjoy the scenery. Tired, exhausted, we took a cab from the first intersection point, to Neral. We reached within minutes. Took a local back home. 

The Railway Track

The Ganesha Idol

As Punit Says - Boys love it, nature isn't too far behind.