For the uninformed, Kaas Plateau is a UNESCO Heritage site in Satara, Maharashtra popular for a kaleidoscope of floral blooms every year, towards end of monsoon lasting for about a month (typically early September to beginning October). The Google images and online Insta reels prompted the gang of 8 to embark on a weekend trip (11-12 October) to Kaas Plateau.
Overview of our iterinary
- We all started early morning from Mumbai and after a couple pit-stops for breakfast, tea and lunch, we reached Satara.
- Before checking into the homestay, we decided to take a short detour to Baramotichi Vihir, a historic stepwell located in Limb village, at the outskirts of Satara.
- We checked into the homestay at about 6:30 pm and retired way past midnight after an evening filled with karaoke, impromptu dances, drinks, fun chats etc etc.
- Next day, post breakfast and checkout, we reached the Kaas Plateau around 9:30am and explored the place for ~2.5-3 hours.
- The trip ended with me reaching home by 8 pm.
Now this trip was not the first (and hopefully not the last) of this gang of colleagues-friends who had done others like Andharban trek (Link to the blog here : Andharban Trek blog), Nashik and Yeoor Hills. So there were few constants - songs, dance, bantering, camaderie, drinks and good food etc. That's what kept the 14 hours on road and the 6 awake-hours at the homestay enjoyable.
As for the trip highlight - the Kaas Plateau hike - The trip started with sky-high expectations of the entire plateau being covered up in a floral blanket of varied colours, with clear blue skies as backdrop. We envisioned ourselves soaking up the cool breeze and nice fragrance of the flowers. We were the subject matter of envy for our friends & families when we told about our plan, as we headed out to the Valley of Flowers!!!
But nature had her own plans! Instead of the vibrant pinks, lavenders, blues and purples we had imagined, we were greeted mostly by yellow blooms dotting the landscape. The person at the entrance gate mentioned that the yellow flowers indicate the end of the flowering season!
For a moment, we felt the familiar twinge of disappointment with expectations not aligning with reality :-(
Now when one is faced with such an instance, there are 2 options - either (a) to criticise/frown about the missed flowers or (b) soak in what's on offer.
I chose the later and soon started to see some finer details :
🌞The warm sunlight making the yellow flowers glow like tiny flames in the green.
These flowers are called as Mickey Mouse flowers (scientific name : Smithia hirsuta), for the round & cheerful face-like petals.
🐝 Gentle humming of the bees as they hovered on the flowers.
(Photo by Prashant Agawane)
🍃The cool breeze in the open valley made even the afternoon sun bearable & pleasant.
🌷Though 90-95% of the valley was yellow, there were several spots of some different types of flowers - patches of purple, whites, pink ones nestled between the swathe of yellow.
🦅Flock of birds flying over the beautiful Kaas Lake situated near the plateau & surrounded by lush green hills. We didn't get down to the lake though given the time constraint, but clicked few group-fies!
🤳📸 Like us, the Plateau had many other groups (old and young) who were also busy clicking selfies and making reels/videos for YouTube/Insta/FB etc. I too shot couple of reels for some group of strangers dancing with the yellow flower backdrop!!
🏞️ One other highlight of the Plateau were the Kumudini flowers or water lilies. While it's an aquatic plant similar to the lotus, it has very distinct petals & much smaller in size.
These floating flora is situated 2-2.5 kms away from Gate 4 and there are buggies/mini open buses to ferry tourists. We decided to walk instead to Kumudini lake, a serene & tranquil place with a rich aquatic plants. It was indeed a beautiful experience and felt quite refreshing/ peaceful.
In the end, it wasn't the explosion of colours as we had imagined but the experience felt real, raw and exciting !! I did try to pass on these happy mental sights to few friends who refused to budge. Well, you are lucky to have landed on my side of the story instead of their sad versions of the trip! 😁
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Before ending the blog, I wanted to go back to the ancient stepwell - Baramotichi Vihir (stepwell with 12 moats) made up of black stone. The stepwell was constructed in early 1700s by Virubai Bhosale, wife of Chatrapati Shahu Maharaj. It's 110 feet deep and we managed to go down 2-3 levels and the others were submerged in water.
This stepwell had some good stone sculpture and definitely worth a visit. The stone architecture is still well preserved fortunately, however the water was not clean and filled with algae. Possibly better maintenance & approach through collection of some entry tickets could help in preservation & attract more tourists.
I seriously feel that Maharashtra tourism department need to do much much more to showcase the beautiful impressive historical inheritance the State has. This stepwell being one of the examples.
On that note, it's time for me to sign-off. Over to you wonderful readers for sharing your good thoughts in the comments section below. 🙏
Cheers
Sunil
6 comments:
You have made it a habit by now Sunil to jot down the experience and very nicely articulated. Thanks for sharing the experience.. keep writing and inspiring 👍
Thanks Pramod 🙏
Journey is more important than the destination was prime example of this trip..bond became much stronger and zeal to explore more in coming years. Beautifully written as always with entire zest.
Lovely read Sunil
Sums up our experience of the trip perfectly! It was a sight like no other.
That was nice visit to Kaas and a frank writeup with some humour thrown in,Sunil :)
I liked your attitude of looking at the bright side of things. The google pic of flowers look captivating. Hope your group will be able to visot during the peak flowering season. The Mickey mouse flowers and white lilies do have their own beauty, though.The step well is amazing! Hope MTDC will work towards bringing such places on the tourism map.
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