“Trekking: where the soul finds its rhythm and the earth its melody, every step is a story, every trail a new chapter.”
Few months ago, Manohar shared this information about a three-day
trek in Keralam known as Agasthyarkoodam. A trek company by name Journey craft organises
it. The pictures and videos were amazing with the trails full of waterfalls.
Some of us were keen to do it, but were not sure when the announcement would
come. Manohar kept following up with Journey craft. Their peak season is
January-February and off season is till March. As I had other commitments in early
march, we chose March 14-16 and got the approval from journey craft. Initially
six of us registered, but as Guru dropped out, five of us remained. We discussed
about different ways of getting there, and finally decided to take Sujith’s
Lodgy with a driver. Hari had found a driver who seemed expensive, I found one,
who cancelled couple of days before the trip. Finally, Sujith found one from
his office.
The trek is managed by Keralam forest department and there
are formalities. All of needed medical forms filled in prescribed format.
Leader of the group had to give an affidavit. When we booked, ours was the last
batch. Later due to high demand, the date is extended till April! I feel summer
may not be a good time to trek Agasthyarkoodam. Booking amount with food was Rs
5700/-.
Journey craft made a WhatsApp group based on the date of the
trek. While the group had 20 people, we couldn’t find anyone while trekking. Whereas,
there were 100 people (permitted number per day is 100) who came through
different channels, many directly registered at Keralam Forest Department
website.
The Agasthyarkoodam (1,868m) trekking is one of the most
challenging and rewarding trekking experiences in the Western Ghats. The peak
is in Agasthyamalai range of western ghats and the Neyyar Wildlife Sanctuary. The
peak is a ~50 km, physically demanding trek, recommended only for those with
excellent fitness. According to reports, a 3-day trek allows better exploration
compared to a rushed 2-day schedule. The trek starts from a place called
Bonacaud 61 Kms from Thiruvananthapuram. We had seen some videos that looked fascinating.
It is also a pilgrimage with a shrine for sage Agasthya on the peak. Sage
Agastya is a prominent figure in Hindu ancient history, both in Ramayana and
Mahabharata. He is considered as the father of south Indian mysticism. Please
refer to the links here to find out interesting tales about Sage Agasthya’s
life: (https://www.wisdomlib.org/hinduism/compilation/puranic-encyclopaedia/d/doc241351.html,
https://isha.sadhguru.org/en/wisdom/article/agastya-muni-story,
https://www.fablesrus.com/post/the-mystical-magical-sage-agastya).
This peak is frequented by many pilgrims, mostly from Tamil
Nadu. Everyone has to go through Keralam Forest department, in the predefined
time slots.
Day 0, 13 March 2026: Manohar came to my home at 15:15
and parked his two-wheeler. Sujith came in his car with Shashank and the driver
(Bayalappa) around 15:40. We took the Nice Road and picked up Hari near
electronic city. We then visited Chandapura where my brother had house warming
for his new home. The road to here was bad. We spent few minutes with them, and left.
There was a huge traffic jam due to a village fare. It took some time to get to the
highway. The route was through Hosur, Selam, Madhurai, and Rajapalyam. At 4:00
in the morning I took to driving in order to give some rest to Bayalappa. After
driving for about an hour, there was big traffic jam where I handed over driving
to Bayalappa. We reached Vithura, a major town near Bonacaud. We found a
place to freshen up and also a room for Bayalappa to stay for two nights.
Day 1, 14 March 2026: We were supposed to pick up our
breakfast and packed lunch at a restaurant called Pothikai, we saw the board,
but missed the place and reached the Bonacaud check post. At the check post,
people had lined up and were going. The authorities promised us that they will
get our food in some time. We lost a couple of hours in this. Once the food
came, we had the breakfast (Appam) and added the lunch pack to our rucksack. The
forest officers checked our documents and later at another counter they checked
for plastics. Some snack that was in plastic carry bags was transferred to
paper bags that they sold. Whatever is let in, is noted and a Rs. 100/- per
item was collected as a deposit. It was 11:10 by the time we started the trek.
Initial path was a nice canopy with mostly flat trail. In about 40 minutes, we
were at camp 2, Lathimotta. We continued our journey through the green trail
with the background music of crickets chirping. After crossing Camp 3,
Karamanayar, we came to a waterfall around 13:00. Many people were taking bath
here. We had our packed lunch, spent about 45 minutes here and continued for 15
minutes to reach camp 4, Vazhapainthir. After about an hour we arrived at
another major waterfalls. After crossing the stream across, we arrived at Camp
5, Attayar at 15:20. The trail from here got steeper, sometime through forest
and sometime through grasslands. It was 17:30 by the time we reached the
Athirumala basecamp. The total distance covered from Bonacaud to Athirumala was
12.4 kms.
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| Document check at Bonacaud |
The camp is located in a very scenic place. There are three large, simple dormitories, two for men and one for women. There is a dining hall with chairs and tables. There is a series of toilets and bathrooms all clean and with good flowing water. Behind the camp is a trench to avoid animals coming in, and it has wooden logs working as a bridge. Beyond this a path leads to a stream. We also get great view of Agasthyarkoodam from here.
After seeing around for some time, we gathered for dinner. The dinner of boiled rice ganji (kanji, porridge) with mung bean sukka was delicious and sumptuous. Night sleep was OK with one break in between.
Day 2, 15 March 2026: We got up in the morning and
did some photography. I had a shower and had breakfast of Poori with mutter gravy.
At 7:45, we left for Agasthyarkoodam. First one hour was through a green
canopy, the trail steeper than yesterdays. At 9:00, we arrived at a waterbody
that was slowly fed by a stream coming from top. We spent half an hour here and
proceeded further. The view was amazing with many distant peaks, variety of
trees and shrubs with colourful flowers. Around 10:30 was the first rock
climbing with the help of a rope. The elevation was quite high. After another
20 minutes, there was one more rock climbing with rope. It was 11:20 when we
reached the top. We went around seeing the beautiful scenery on all four sides,
visited the Agasthya muni shrine, where people were worshipping the sage. We
were at 1,868 meters above sea level and the view from the top was breathtaking.
There were many people rejoicing and clicking pictures. We also did lot of
photography. We met Akhil, who was also from Bangalore who clicked some
interesting photos of us. Around 12:45, we started to come down, once again using
the ropes, that were more useful now. At 14:00, we were near the pond, where we
once again spent some time. It was 15:45 by the time we reached the Athirumala
campsite. The total trek distance for the day was 9.33 kms based on my Garmin
watch. We had lunch of steamed boiled rice and sambar.
Later we went to the stream behind the camp and took bath.
Evening dinner was once again boiled rice ganji with mung bean sukka. That
night was cooler than the previous one, and I hadn’t carried a good blanket.
Day 3, 16 March 2026: Breakfast was Puttu with Kabuli
channa curry. Around 8:00 we left the camp and started coming down. Manohar
paced ahead and couldn’t be seen till we reached the camp. We reached Attayar
camp at 9:15. At 10:15 we crossed Camp 4. The trail was the same we had taken
while ascending and the views were amazing. On the way, we saw some fresh
elephant dung indicating recent movements. We took a refreshing shower in the waterfalls
and moved down to the basecamp. It was 12:30 by the time we reached the check
post where we showed the plastic boxes returned and got our deposit amount
back. The trek distance for the day was 12.35 kms.
Our driver, Bayalappa, was waiting for us. On the way back we had lunch at Pothigai restaurant. It was a feast with several dishes and payasam. Around 14:00, we left for Bangalore picking up some Kerala chips and halwa on the way. Around 21:00, we stopped at an Anjappar restaurant near Madurai. Sujith drove the car for about 1.5 hours giving some rest to Bayalappa. It was 5:30 in the morning by the time I reached home.
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| Banana chips |
Agasthyarkoodam was our first major trek in Keralam. It was
one of the most scenic trails we had seen. While it was the “off season”, still
there were so many streams and water falls indicating that the peak season
would be even more beautiful.
Thanks to Manohar for initiating the trek, to Journey Craft
for organizing, to Sujith for lending his car, to Hari for keeping track of the
expenses yet again, and to Shashank for the company. While it is tough for us
to plan short trek in Keralam, we would love to do more similar treks in the
future.
