Sathuragiri - Ashram's first Trip - Part I

We all had been debating in Gujiliashram on deciding the place for our first tour. After thinking over for almost two weeks we finalized on Sathuragiri - A hill top , abode of Lord Shiva which has no proper road/ means to g up. the only way to reach the temple is to climb the 11 km trek path .None of us had been to this place before and the excitement began on the day it was announced in the blog.

venkat and nagesh in the bus

Friday 9th Sep 2011, evening 6 pm . I was waiting in saidapet for other sishyas to join. I Satish,Praneeth,venkatesham and balaji started from saidapet by 6.30 and joined the remaining people of Ashram at tambaram station by 7pm. The fire of excitement picked up when we all joined together to kick start the tour from Tambaram railway station.The 13 member Ashram gang including I, Sairam,jayachandran,pradeep kishore,santosh,Srini,Nagesh,Paramesh,Satish,Praneeth,venkatesham and balaji reached the bus stop just in time by a share auto where all of were dumped seated on each other. There was no time for us to have dinner but still some of were hungry and so wanted to eat as quick as possible before the bus comes. so 6 of us went and were about to start the dinner just then pradeep called us as the bus had arrived. we stopped eating and rushed to the spot but the bus was for a different location.

within next 5 minutes our bus came and started our fun before even the bus started from the place. the center of attraction was Nagesh who was given the title of "Megastar" The bus was running at its own speed but we were chatting and having fun inside. It was a good time as the excitement of journey made us feel it like a College tour and we felt like having become students once again. The bus stopped for dinner around 10.30 and megastar was the first person to get down to lead the way to the hotel. the dinner table was filled with laughter and fun ignoring the tiredness of having worked in office the entire day. the bus resumed at 11pm and people were fast asleep in the next 30 minutes. i tried my best to sleep but somehow there was some difficulty. Ram who was seated next to me also was finding it difficult to sleep. we finally tried to sleep around 1.30 am.

on the way to find a lodge at Srivilliputhur

our Auto journey

It was 5.45am when we reached Srivilliputhur ( the town from where we need to go to the foothills) . after walking for around 1 km we finally found a lodge and took four rooms . i then announced that we should get read yin a hours time so people were rushing to take their turns in using the bathroom. finally by 7.45 we all were ready and proceeded to have break fast . It was a small mess where only 7 seats were available. so we split into two groups and had breakfast . finally we hired two autos to reach the foothills which was 26 kms from the place where we stayed. It was around 9.30 when we reached the foothills( a place called Thaniparai) of the Sathuragiri hills. It was from here our trek began and by the way we all were first time trekkers.

At the Foothills