Matheran - An Encounter with Nature

Thought of living in Pune/Mumbai since the past 12 years and never been to Matheran always annoyed me. Last week, along with a couple of friends I managed to visit Matheran for one day of complete tranquility.

I started off early from Pune towards Neral(Mumbai) to meet my colleagues timely at 9.00 AM. The journey  from Pune was delightful with constant drizzling of rain, mild breeze and sight of mountains covered green throughout the way. On arrival I met my friends and we headed for a quick breakfast.

Matheran, is the tiniest hill station in Asia. One can reach the top by either ascending the mountain on foot or board the Mini-Train or by Taxis available at the Railway station. During the monsoons, train service isn't available due to the risks involved. Hence, we opted to ferry using the cabs available. Scaling the mountain to reach the spot was breath taking. Our cab driver was insane to overtake on the steepest curves I have ever seen. It was a ride of approximately 30 minutes (9KM) which came to an end at the entrance of Matheran.

We bought the entrance tickets and marched towards the main-gate. Being Saturday, there were lot of tourists present. We cleared the security check posts and finally entered Matheran.

On entering, I was shocked by witnessing the green lush trees covering atop, chilled breeze, sounds of people chatting at a distance, fresh air to breath with lots of moisture in it, natural dampness... it was a wonderful experience.

As Matheran is a pedestrian hill station, you can stroll the entire place on foot or you can ride a horse with a guide. We chose the first option as we didn't want to end the journey quickly.

There are in all 38 points to visit (which can be done only if you are interested and have all the time in world),  and 5 of them are famous from which we managed to visit 3 of them, namely,
1. Echo Point
2. Louisia Point
3. Maldunga Point

The first point we visited was after a long walk of 3KM, passing through the thick closet of trees and the Local Matheran Market. The Echo Point, is famous for all the echoes happening there. However, it seems that due to some issue (maybe atmospheric) the voices never echoed. :)

From there we marched towards the Louisia Point which was hardly a matter of 15 minutes by foot. Louisia Point wasnt that impressive as it sounds. We met a kid there who worked for a local restaurant. He guided us further till the Maldunga Point.

Maldunga Point was our final resort. Its a small and silent place at the edge of a mountain. We sat there for a couple of hours, chatted all the while. The clouds were hovering above us as they were indicating heavy showers.

At 5.00PM, we descended the mountains of Matheran and headed back home. It was a pleasant journey with loads of memories and a promise to visit again in order to visit the remaining 35 Points ....

Cheers!