Mahabaleshwar again

Made it again yesterday (16th Nov 2013, Sat) with a colleague's family. My wife wasnt along this time. It was more of a better understanding. Did fulfill certain regrets of last trip, like buying radish , visiting Arthur's point, Mahadev and panchganga temples...etc. But this time we missed the shri ram vada pav and also the panchgani point.
Driver this time was good as well but wasnt aware of the points to visit, so took a guide. I realised this trip that there are primarily only 4 locations to visit inside mahabaleshwar and one in panchgani. was actually confused until now by the many different names as points which are actually all grouped to 2 or 3 locations.
So below is the list of places actually to visit in Mahabaleshwar according to my understanding.

1. Needle hole point - Which includes 3 other points like Kate's point, balakwadi dam, elephant head...etc
2. Arthur's seat point  - includes 5 other points in the same location like Malcolm Point, Tiger spring, 3 monkey...etc
3. Mahadev temple - As told by the guide, the Lingam is Swayambu, made of rudraksha and is 5000 years old and the temple structure is 1500 years old. Also the panchganga temple for the 5 rivers (Krishna, sawitri, gayathri, koyna, venna) is near by
4. Venna Lake - boating and horse riding. Paid Rs. 300 for the row boat ride that includes the helper who did the rowing.

The guide took Rs.500 from us after negotiations but thats more than worth it for he actually showed only 3 points as we did visit the lake ourselves. May be 300 would have been right

There is a point at panchgani that we missed this trip becoz of time.

But we made it to other things like the chocolate factory visit (guess this is wat is mapro garden) along with fresh juice shop and restaurant, free strawberry farm visit, tried strawberry with cream, dashing car , go-kart ...etc
The cost of dashing car and go-karting was lesser this trip though was little smaller.
Dashing car : Rs. 90 for double, Rs. 60 for single, Go-kart: Rs 230 for 5 rounds.

We had our lunch at Alishah near venna lake, it was delicious and awesome lunch at 4 pm with lots of chicken.

weather was great with consistent breeze and sun. Though ppl claim the season is between March and May, i found this the right season with right weather.

It seems there is also the Mahabaleshwar market that we dint make it.

Am sure my next trip to Mahabaleshwar will be very better ;-)

My blog of First Mahabaleshwar trip is here

Mahabaleshwar in a day

The plan was in progress for some weeks already. Made it yesterday (13thApr2013) with my wife and other tamil colleague friends. Since maharashtra govt doesnt permit more than 6 passengers on even a SUV, we did find it difficult to get one but got it at the end.
Though the driver(Mr Pappu) delayed an hour to pick us all, but he made it very comfortable by working  like a semi-guide. No one in our team knew any marathi literally, me and another person can try Hindi some extent and thats it. He took us to the very famous vada pav centre, Shri ram vada-pav at shirwal on the way for break fast. Couple of us in the gang had the vada-pav for the first time, butter milk after that actually made it a real good break fast. Pappu also made me try another gravy like dish to be taken with the pav that i cudnt remember the name.
when we were nearing the foot of the hills there were fig farms on the way and we stopped to buy fig on the road side. Pappu bargained with that old vendor to get a kg for Rs.50. i paid him Rs.10 more and the old man had such a genuine smile as a thank you that did give a great start for the day.
The first stop was for the view of Mastani lake from one of the top points on the way. This lake was built for a then Rani named Mastani for her bath it seems. The next point (dont remem the name) gave us the start of the real fun. The point actually had a view of a big  valley(oh yeah thats what its all there) and since its not the right season, it was full of sun and no breeze or green around. But we took lots of instant photos jumping, standing on the border rock..etc. Price for the photos : Rs. 100 for 3 photos, Rs.50 a single. extra copies 30 each. The specialty was the click timing of the photographer who did capture amazing jumping shots without any retake. And fun continued with Camel ride. it was the first camel ride for all of us except one, so naturally was interesting. We did take videos too.
Then to a go karting center, where it had a few more fun options along with the go-karting like bungee-jumping, dashing-car, jumping-bull, ...etc. we all took dashing-car that was more enjoyable dashing on each other heavily. I dont remember if i had taken it earlier but this time with wife did give more entertainment. one bold friend did take the catapult-bungee-jumping. it was his long time wish to do that and was so satisfied on me doing a full video of it. Though i initially hesitated to spending time at go-kart especially at a hill station, i must agree i did enjoy. Thankfully none interested in spending  Rs. 500 for the actual go-kart ride.
Next we continued to many points, while finishing our lunch at a small restaurant on the way. Food wasnt that great but i had the best of them all with chicken, popplet fry (a fish fry), garlic roti, fried rice...Infact me and pappu had to finish off all those that others couldnt. Then to other points, more than the site view, we enjoyed the fresh strawberries, kola (ice with sweetened color), corn, cut mango, butter milk....etc...etc. yes it was all different tastes that gave us fun.
We did not fail to take photos. Some spots that  we visited i did only later identified their name by searching the images that we viewed. Needle point, Balakwadi Dam at Kate's point and one more that i dont know the name that was the bigger point and we ended the visit of points. All were tired of so much of walking in the sun.
We decided to end the trip with boating. It was nicely crowded at Venna lake for the boating. We took two paddle boats for an hr. since we reached after 4.00, half an hr rent wasnt given. Rowing boat was there as well, but we did enjoy paddling. Pappu accompanied the one that i took. we even tried racing, photoing...etc and got tired and ended the trip in 30 mins. Pappu was worried about us wasting the other 30 mins but we couldnt help :) :(
Heavily exhausted, all took the ginger tea at the tea stalls opp the lake. It was good and 3 of us took a second tea as well. There were this fresh strawberry, mulberry , carrot , corn and also a violet radish like fruit getting sold so colorfully all over. We did miss it to buy there near lake but later on the road side, all took atleast a box of strawberry each. Near the lake as well there were horse rides available though we dint try.
We started back home. No one wanted a dinner at all!
 Its not that we covered everything of mahabaleshwar, like waterfall or the temple...and probably not the right season too.....etc But still it was indeed an amazing day with fun for myself. I had my moments of struggle to avoid my bachelor inside ;). I did feel my transition.
I hope my wife did enjoy and others as well.

Update on Nov-17: Visited again in Nov 2013, the blog is here