So this weekend I went for my first ever night trek. I’m not a regular trekker; so I would have never opted for a night trek if it was just about that. Every loyal employee of any MNC stays loyal only as long as he/she gets bonuses and incentives on a regular basis. For us trekkers, the bonus this time was trees and fields decorated with hundreds of lightning bugs. I had seen the pictures on Google, but I wanted to see the spectacle and experience it. These fireflies flock together on different plateaus across Maharashtra just before Monsoon. They have this special ability, that their bums are actually set on fire! 😛 They use this characteristic to attract mates or prey. I’ve seen these little creatures fly across our bus or car whenever we used to travel through Konkan during my childhood. But I never had a chance to hold one in my hand. Trek Mates India brought us this opportunity and I was ready to take it!

I got to know it from a friend of mine. I know TMI as my close friend used to work there a few months ago. We registered and waited for the day to arrive. I’ve never went for a trek with any professional trekking group before. We friends used to plan out our own treks and go. When the day arrived, we all gathered near the ticket window at Panvel station. There were people from other trek groups as well. So there was bound to be confusion. But fortunately, we all gathered without much delay and started our journey together. First was the Tum-tum ride. I’ve travelled in these six-seater rickshaws before. My mom-dad used to take me and my sister in these tum-tums for shopping whenever we used to visit my native place near Baramati. These tum-tums can hypothetically accommodate any number of people. If you ever get to see this in rural areas, you probably won’t see the rickshaw at all. There will be people hanging on for their dear lives holding every inch of the tum-tum. But again fortunately we did not have to go through any such thing. There were five tum-tums waiting for us just outside Panvel station. We split in groups of eight and the five tum-tums began their journey to the base village of Thakurwadi.

En route to Thakurwadi, I passed my time chatting with the rickshaw-wallah for a while. I was sharing the seat with a girl, so even we had a little chat along the way. I like this thing about treks. People tend to open up. It’s good because we meet new people, make new friends, learn new things and most importantly enjoy! When we reached the base, it was almost dark. The Trek Mates team took us under a big banyan tree and we had a small introduction round under it. To their surprise, almost everyone was a first timer. Only few of us had prior experience of trekking. They gave us clear instructions and we began climbing at 8:15 PM. Every now and then one of the members from TMI would send out their trademark ‘AOOO’ shout. If they got a response, it meant that all was okay! It was completely dark now, so these shouts and our torches were the only helping accessories we had. Some groups/trekkers (including myself) also took help from music. We took a few short intervals along the way and made it to the top at around 10:15 PM. There were fireflies along the way too. It was a beautiful sight to see them blink away. They would flicker like an aeroplane and vanish in a second. Then the light would reappear a few feet ahead. I wanted to take photos of them, but sadly my cousin’s camera wasn’t much of help.

After reaching the Prabal Machi, we saw several tents lined up. A group of trekkers had lit a bonfire and they were singing songs with bongo being the perfect accompaniment. The mood was festive and already set! The fresh and cold breeze swept our tiredness away in a flash. There was only one house on that plateau. They served food, tea, coffee & cold-drinks for the trekkers at any time of the day. We had our non veg dinner at around 11 PM, followed by dinner for vegans which went on for another thirty odd minutes. TMI had booked a room for us which was a long walk away. The Trekmates walked in darkness led by the local guy who showed us the way. We kept our bags in the room and left immediately to be a part of the main event of the night, Seeing Fireflies.

The news came that there aren’t many fireflies left to see. I had read somewhere that they don’t show up if it rains. In my mind, I cursed the rain which had just arrived that morning. How sad would it be, if we couldn’t see the thing we all came for. It would have been like climbing the mountains to see Vaishodevi’s Idol and not finding it there. But luckily for us, we weren’t disappointed. A villager, who had been sent in the jungle in search of the lightning bugs, had found success. He guided us effortlessly through the jungle and brought us to the point where he had spotted them. We were told to switch all our torches off. And there they were, on trees in front of us, inside the bushes nearby, on the field, they were everywhere.

I took out my cousin’s camera and tried clicking pictures. But it wasn’t meant to be. I wasn’t supposed to store them like that. There were not enough of them to fill the frame. So I decided to put the camera away and enjoy the spectacle with the most powerful cameras in the world, our eyes. And the images of the fireflies got stored in the permanent hard-disk of my brain forever. It was amazing. The team leader went near the tree and gave it a jerk. As the branches moved, the bugs flew away from the branches for a few moments and returned back when the tree stopped moving. The scene was just mesmerising. Some of them fell down. The team leader then caught hold of a few of them. We all gathered around him as he caught one and handed it over to one of us to have a look at them closely. I got one myself, but it flew as soon as it landed on my palm. Then I caught another one. It was a great experience! We could have stayed there looking at the fireflies forever. But another group came and we had to leave. I had one last look at the tree. It was much more beautiful than any of the Christmas Trees we see. That was nature’s way of celebration.

We all returned with the images of the most beautifully decorated tree in our minds. Back at the Prabal Machi, we were welcomed by the breeze again. It was almost chilling now, so we all sat at the edge of the Machi and enjoyed the cold for a while. Me and my friends even took a Power-nap there. And by the time we returned to our room, the rest of them had already fallen asleep. Still a few of them were sitting in the front room and talking. We joined the conversation which soon shifted to various topics from Ghost stories to stories about thieves, then about rats and insects and most importantly, A Blanket (more specifically, A Chadar! :P) That must have been around 2:30 AM when the word Chadar was said for the first time. And by the time it was 6:30 AM, we had said it at least a few hundred times and named out little gang after it! By that time, the sleeping trekkers woke up and soon we started our journey back. Before starting our descend, we had Kandepohe and Chai at the same house on Prabal Machi, which was now packed with morning trekkers. There were roughly two-three hundred people there and the Family who were serving breakfast had a tough time doing it.

Then all along the journey back to Thakurwadi, our little gang took selfies and cracked a few more jokes about the legendary Chadar! 😛 Only one lucky lady apart from us knew what it was about!

At the base, tum-tums were waiting for us again. We said our goodbyes and parted ways, thus ending a memorable trek to Prabal Machi. It was memorable in many ways for me. My first night trek, my first with TMI, my first experience with fireflies and last and definitely not the least, the newly made friends who stayed up all night cracking absolutely senseless and rubbish jokes about blankets and laughed till our cheeks and stomachs started paining!

It was a TrExperience!! Now I’m eagerly waiting for the time when I’ll get to go on another trek with TMI. 😀

This was my first attempt at writing a travelogue. I hope you enjoyed it. I think you might have missed the chance to see fireflies this season as we are expecting monsoon any time now. But do mark it in your calendar and visit the nearest spot next season to witness the wonder yourself!

Let me know if you liked the post by commenting below! I wish you a happy monsoon! I’ll be back with another post soon! Until then goodbye & take care!

-Abhijeet Jog