Tikona

Location: 25 km from Kamshet near Lonavala.

Base village: Tikona Peth.

Altitude: 3500 ft

How to reach: From Mumbai drive towards Lonavala. Keep further driving towards Kamshet. After crossing Kamshet keep driving on pawananagar-kamshet road. Ask the locals for Tikona peth. The trail head is located near Tikona peth. There is a small temple where you can park your car.

Grade: Easy

Trekking time: 1 – 1.5 hour climb and 45 min -1 hour descent.

History: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tikona

Trip report:

I had been to Tikona earlier and had found that it is a pretty simple mountain to trek. So when the moms were planning to take their little ones to trek, I suggested Tikona. I planned this trip with my daughter Paehel’s school friends. It was my effort to introduce folks around me to the concept of trekking.

So here we were, I had 9 kids, 5 moms trekking for the first time and 3 volunteer friends to help me handle the moms and kids 🙂

We started our day at 6.30 am divided into 2 cars. Sometimes things are not perfect and this was one of those days. One of our cars met with an accident ( not serious) on the Pawnanagar road and we reached the base village at 12.00 pm! We were very late.

Luckily it wasnt sunny and the weather Gods were by our side. After parking our cars we started the walk. The trek is easy but it has almost 1 km walk through the dirt road until you reach the base of the mountain from where the climbing starts.

Here’s what happens on the first part of the trek. Moms start complaining of the muck while the kids happily run through it! See what urbanisation has done to us. We no more like our mud :). We have the usual talk session before the trek where everyone talks a little about themselves. After briefing the kids about safety and do’s and dont’s we start climbing.

Tikona is a simple and gentle mountain. The trail starts with a gentle climb uphill with a few scattered big rocks.

After about 30 min we reached on top of a small hill with drops on both sides. This was my favourite spot of the trek. Its a nice spot to catch some breath and soak in before continuing the climb.

After resting here for some time we started on the trail again which now starts climbing a little steeply. We were very cautious here with the kids.

There is a small Hanuman temple just at the entrance of the fort.

The climb becomes steeper and then there are steep steps you have to climb to reach the top. There are railings and ropes for support along the steps.

On the top there is a Trimbakeshwar Shiva temple. We walked around the fort on the top and relaxed before starting the descent. You can see the Pawna lake from the top.

After a small picnic of homemade cakes, khakras, sandwiches we start our descent. An adventure is not an adventure until there are goof ups. Mansi’s shoe gave up while coming down and we had to do some engineering so that she reaches the base. Well who says the sock has to be inside? LOL

After about 2 hours we reached the parking lot. Generally if you are not with so many kids and want to just rush down without soaking it on the way,  it would take you only 1 hour to come down. I prefer taking it slow 😉

When asked the moms whether they were ready for the next trek? Well I shall let you guess the answer 🙂