Yedakumari, the 'forbidden' trail

Yedakumari has been in our must-do list for a long time. In 2006, many of my friends from Gudigar Youth Club (GYCB) trekked the green route, but I missed out as I was visiting Boston that time. I compensated myself by doing the Boston freedom trail the same day. But it was always in my mind that I should do the trek between Donigal and Yedakumari. Giri had the same idea and when Vijender came up with the plan, we couldn't just resist.

But it was going to be tough looking at the fact that this was going to be 'illegal'. We read blogs where people had been turned down by railway authorities. Some had written that they had taken 'permission', but we knew it was impossible. Vijender wrote to one of the bloggers and he gave some very useful tips. This person had done the trek alone! Though Vijender sent the first intimation to the regular larger group, we were thinking that it would be better if the number is small. It later turned out that only six of us were left. We decided to leave office on a Friday afternoon and go to Sakaleshpur by bus. We had several options for coming back and decided to take it as it comes.

For those who don't know, Yedakumari (yedakumeri, edakumeri) is a small railway station between Sakaleshpur in Hassan district and Subrahmanya in Dakshina Kannada. It was an abandoned meter gauge line years back and was very popular among Trekkers because of the scenic nature around the route. It is very picturesque with the hills of Western Ghats, several streams, thick forest, tunnels and bridges. Recently the line was converted to broad gauge and trains started running thorough this route, the major passenger train being the Karwar-Yeshwantpur express. Though most others are goods trains, trekkers are discouraged due to safety fears.

We had decided that we will carry the regular backpacks instead of our trek bags so as to pass as normal visitors in case of getting caught by Railway authorities, though we knew that it was difficult. We met a couple of times at office to discuss the preparations and to make a checklist of things to carry. The major "must-carry" was going to be the torch! We decided to skip the sleeping bags as they were going to be bulky.

On Friday, 28th January 2012 six of us (Sheshagiri-AKA Giri, Rane, Vishwas, Vijender, Samit and I) trekked the 17 1/2 km railway track to Yedakumari. We came to office with our luggage. We had decided to meet post lunch at the Esteem Mall bus-stop at Hebbal. We got into a BMTC bus that was going to Majestic ~1.40. Vijender had known that there was a Mangalore bound Volvo bus at 2.30, but apparently, it was scheduled at 2 pm and we missed it by a whisker. We got into a Mercedes that was going to Chickmagalur. This bus left ~ 2.45 pm. The journey was comfortable and we got down at Hassan ~6 pm. Just before reaching Hassan, the bus had stopped at a "Kamat Upachar" where we had snacks (Giri felt that the palak pakodas created gas!). Hassan bus stand was very impressive, and in the background was beautiful Sunset happening.  Rane, Vishwas and Samit took pictures, but I was lazy to take my camera out. The bus from Hassan to Sakaleshpur was ordinary and got crowded as it proceeded halting at several places. We reached Sakaleshpur at 7.45pm and enquired about hotels for stay that night. We had a nice vegetarian "plate meal" at a restaurant near the bus stop, did some last minute buying for things like electral, spare batteries for the torch, etc. and proceeded towards hotel Ashrita, what was said to be good. Unfortunately Ashrita didn't have space and we had to move down to find other possibilities. The next one was Gandharva, and our boys certified that the toilets were decent enough.

While the younger lot ventured out and savoured 'gad bad', the older ones decided to rest. The next morning we woke up at 5.30 am and took refreshing cold water bath. We were told that we had to wait till 7 am for hot water, and we didn't want to get delayed. We came out around 6.45 and caught an auto. It was fairly easy to fit six of us and our luggage. Srinivas, the auto driver said he would charge Rs. 150 for the trip, which we thought was very fair at the end of the journey. On the way, he stopped to get us breakfast. We relished hot idlis and sambar in a small roadside shop. We also packed some "ghee rice" for our lunch. We requested Srinivas to drop us little ahead of Donigal railway station and he readily obliged. We had to find our way through some ups and downs before we reached the railway track at a spot that was marked 50/600 (indicating the distance to Subramanya road station which is 56.8 kms from Sakaleshpur).

Starting point, just ahead of Donigal station

As we were starting our trek from there, we heard loud noises from our behind. We saw that there was a huge group of trekkers that had started from Donigal station making all kinds of sounds. We instantly detested the sight of it and decided to be as far ahead as possible from this noisy group. Here is an advice to fellow trekkers: while it is quite natural to be excited when you are among the scenic beauty of nature, it is important not to make noise and disturb the tranquillity of the nature. Also it is important not to litter and spoil the beauty.

One of the boxes attached to a long bridge

Wild flowers

Stream

Thus as we decided to be away from the noisy group, we paced ourselves very well and were moving at a constant average speed of 3 km per hour while enjoying the unparalleled beauty of both sides of the track. There were 17 tunnels in the route, the longest being 572 meters. It is pitch dark in these long tunnels and it is a must to carry torch. It was quite foggy and cold when we started the trek and the weather became clear as we proceeded. Still it was not bad as sun was still behind the green. There were many bridges on the way, some small, some very long. Long bridges had sidewalks, or boxes to rest in case of a train’s arrival. Every time we came out of a tunnel, the view was breathtaking with many unusual, beautiful birds and butterflies flying across, resting on the trees around. We saw that another group of trekkers who were ahead of us were resting near a stream. 

Bridge!

We kept continuing. In between there were railway workers who were checking tracks, greasing the joints. After about 5 kms, we saw a warning board saying that trekking on the tracks was prohibited.  Few minutes after that was the first tunnel, which was 239 meters. When we had finished around 8 kms of the trek, a very long goods train crossed us and we watched it from sides. After that we reached a station called Kadagarahalli. We sat there for few minutes, but the people there asked us to leave as they were expecting some engineers to come. Just after the 11^th tunnel which is the longest, we saw one more goods train crossing. There was also a small work vehicle (trolley) which really sped past us when we took a snack break after about 5 hours of trekking. The boiled eggs came in handy to get us ready for the final lap (at least for those of us who could eat). From the place where we had stopped for snacks, we could see different birds at a distance. After about an hour, after passing through wonderful scenery, we reached Yedakumari station at 1.55 pm. 

We had covered the distance of 17.5 km in about six hours’ time.  We sat down there and finished our packed lunch. There was another group there which was going to Subramanya for a wedding by walking through the jungle (~5 km) to the highway. Though, we had that as one of our options, while drinking tea at Yedakumari station, we were told that there is train that is coming from Karwar and going to Yeshwantpur, Bangalore. We were also told that we can buy tickets and pay fine to the TC once we got into the train. This appeared to be the best option as it would take us back to Bangalore the same day! Hitch was- we had done an ‘illegal’ trek and now were going to get into a train without ticket! But there was not much time to wonder about all these aspects. The train arrived at 2.45 pm and stopped for some work though that was not a scheduled stop. It wasn’t all that crowded and we got places to sit. We were worried about how we were going the face the TC when he comes, but fortunately there was no sight of TC till we reached Sakaleshpur. The train travelled on the same tracks that we had trekked on. When it was passing through the tunnels, we realised that there was hardly any space for standing on the ground next to the train. Obviously these tunnels were not built for broad gauge trains, though they are in use now. We were really lucky not to encounter a train when we were in one of the tunnels. We decided that we will not do this ‘adventure’ again.

 

At Sakaleshpur, Vishwas and Vijender got down and bought tickets and that brought us lot of relief. Though things went very smoothly so far, we had to have our quota of problems as the train stopped at Arasikere for many hours due to blocked track and we reached Yeshwantpur at 12.30 am instead of scheduled 10 pm.

Overall, it was a wonderful trek which took us to another world of hills, valleys, streams and never seen before-birds.

I won’t write here customary “things to carry” as we don’t recommend people to do this trek keeping the safety aspects in mind. We feel fortunate not only to have witnessed it, but also for coming back safely.