“Suvela Machi” on the Rajgad fort

On the weekend of 6-7 Oct 2018, we did the Rajgadh and Torna trek from Pune.

In summary, and a detailed blog should follow, we left Pune around 0730 and drove towards the Rajgadh base village – Gunjavane. Climbed Rajgadh and visited the various points on the fort (and there are quite a few to see, especially the Suvela Machi and Bale Killa, historic gates (darwaja) to the fort, besides some temples and cisterns, enough to take about half a day). There is also Sanjeevani Machi but since we were going to encounter it anyways on our way to Torna, we did not visit it on the first day.

We slept overnight in the temple – Padmavati temple – amidst a crowd of trekkers, and woke up early the next day to commence our partial decent from Rajgadh to get on the ridge towards Torna.

Barring the last 100 meters or so of  Torna climb, at a point called Budhla Machi, the trail to Torna is rather straightforward. Once on the top, it is quite a walk of nearly an hour to reach the peak of the fort, which is marked by a temple and some villagers offer home-cooked basic meals there.

Climbing down from Torna was a breeze albeit a bit steep. But there were railings nearly all the way, and the van could be brought quite close to the base of the hill, which was a relief after nearly 8-9 hours of being on our legs!

An awesome way to spend a post-monsoon weekend in the lap of nature! The ideal time for these forts is right after monsoon – late Sep to mid Oct. The trail and the mountains are still green, and abloom with a variety of flowers!