PAWAN KHIND, Karde & Keshavraj Temple – Travelogue

PAWAN KHIND, Karde & Keshavraj Temple – Travelogue This time we invited Nandana's newly formed family members ( her husband - Naveen and her in - laws - Mrs. & Mr. Narayanan Iyer ) to Pune. It was Nandana's first Diwalsan. We all started from Hyderabad on October 24th and reached Pune in the morning on Oct 25th. Next day, we all went to Kalyan to Meena's ( my Wife's ) Maaher, as her aging mother and maushi wanted to meet the family and bless the newly weds on the occasion of Diwali. We returned back to Pune on the same day. We then celebrated Diwali at Pune. We started our Konkan Yatra on October 28th. We spent our next two days at Amba Ghat, at Pawan Khind Resort owned by Mr. Prakash Shirgaonkar. He is an IIT Grad, and his wife ( Mrs. Madhuri ) is an architect. I must say that they are doing a fabulous job. Their meticulous planning and organizing capabilities is simply awesome. We reached there at about 1 in the afternoon. So their well trained people asked us to freshen up and join others for a sumptuous hot lunch. We obeyed them because it suited us too. In the meanwhile their people shifted our luggage in the rooms. We had an afternoon siesta for an hour or so. They gave us a guide to take us to a nearby stop dam. We all had great fun. We jumped in the water body with our pants, as we had not planned swimming. Baban ( my elder brother ) who is known for his heroics, jumped in with his mobile in the pocket. Poor thing ( the mobile ) drowned, so to say. Luckily it could be brought back to life by heating up in the sun in the next couple of days. They organize evening get together in their amphitheatre from 7.30 PM onwards, till the dinner time. It was really nice to see un known people mingling and making newer friendships. A girl performed a dance to the tune ( radha hi bawari hari chi ). Anupama ( my younger daughter sang a Hindi and a Marathi song. There were skits too, poem recital and what not. In the end they put on the item numbers and almost all joined the dance party. In fact that break way from the inhibitions helped us come closer and also increased our appetite. Next day we had a guided tour of Pawan Khind, in their modified jeeps, which had roof tops built on top. The Gen - Next with few of us from the Gen – Previous grabbed the vintage seats on the top. This was a unique safari type of an experience. The experience at Pawan Khind was overwhelming, just to visualize how Bajiprabhu Deshpande could have fought the enemy ( 1000 or so horse ridden soldiers ) with only 300 Maratha soldiers and ensured that Shivaji reached the Viajaygadh fort safely. We were all gasping for breath to walk down and come up and there these people fought battle with arms and ammunitions and ensured that the king was allowed safe passage to Viajaygadh. Geographically the fort must be about 5 / 6 kms crow flying distance away from this place, and that too in the mountain ghats, with no roads, in the month of June - July when we have heavy rains in the region even now. So imagine those days, around 300 odd years ago. I salute them all and say “ Hats off ” to the valor of Shivaji and his men. Not for nothing Shivaji and all his committed soldiers are worshiped even today. We all had a bath under the water fall at Pawan Khind. We stopped on the way back in thick forest for a jungle lunch with barbeque starters. There too we could see the stamp of their organizing capabilities. There were tarpaulin sheets spread in plain areas for each group. All the arrangements were made. Placards with leader surnames in each family / group were displayed to avoid confusion and chaos. We started with barbequed potatoes, capsicum, corn , onions etc as starters, and ended up with a sumptuous lunch with sweets and taak ( butter milk ). It goes with out saying that a siesta followed. Our resort was about 6 kms from there. Few of the daredevils and calorie conscious people from all the generations and groups , who had probably a little too heavy lunch and wanted to burn a few calories, decided to walk down. In fact they did not want to miss out on dinner too. Others got in and on the jeeps and returned. We again had a great evening at the open air theatre. Luckily we had a group ( Mr. Joshis’ ) who had shubhada ( saa re ga ma little champ fame ) and her brother. They both enthralled every one with their sweet melodies. Neela Tai ( Meena’s Eldest Sister ) and Anupama also gave brilliant performances. A sumptuous dinner was waiting for all of us. We all, who had burnt our calories and who had not, just cut loose and had a feast. Marathit mantat na tase agdi tutun padlo. Next day, after break fast, we started on our next leg of the trip, to Karde. It took us about 4 hours to reach. We checked in the resort on the sea beach, freshened up and had lunch. We walked out of our rooms after a nap at about fivish, in the evening. The beach was calling us all. We had a good time in the sea. Samudraat Mansokt khel lo. Some of the women folk in the group were happy watching, giving instructions, cautioning and shouting and preventing us to go deeper inside the sea. Next day again we started on our last leg of the trip. On the way, We covered Kadya Varcha Ganapati, Ganus’ Kul Dev ( Narsimha Temple ) at Sangamshwar, lord Shiva’s & Kartikey’s temple on the sangam of river Varuna and Alaknanda at Sagameshwar, Kul Devi ( Durga Temple ) at Murud, and the famous Kehsav Raj Temple. We had lovely home made lunch at Mr. Vaidya’s place near Dapoli on the way. We started our return at about 4 in the evening and touched Pune at about 10 in the night. The road through the tamhani ghat was horrible ( to put it mildly ). Thus a nice short trip was over in no time. It was all together a different experience for the Iyers. He was full of praise for the Shirgaonkar hospitality, arrangements, food quality etc. He liked the Konkan area, its food, the kokum sarbat, the mango juice at Keshav Raj and almost every thing. Nandana’s father in law gave a finishing line by saying that he had not enjoyed so much in his 61 years of experience. That sums up all.