Mahabaleshwar-Part 3

Before Table Land was Kate's Point. You have Echo Point also here. Most of the people couldn’t extract an echo. Yours vocally did. Needle's Hole is right below Kate's Point and you need to walk to the right and look back. It is certainly a huge needle shaped hole in the rock. Soon we realised that we were close to a bee hive. The bees started attacking one at a time. They would get stuck in the hair and start buzzing violently as if it wanted to drill its way into the head. Even slapping at it hard wouldn’t get rid of it. So, we ran. Anyway, if a bee stings, do you need an operation or just a cremation? Is that operation called a sting operation?


From Kate's Point you look at the Krishna Valley and right below is a multi-layered dam. You can see Pandavgad and Mandardevi's Hill, but we couldn’t see/identify either.

All this while, we were gorging on baby carrots, red radish, strawberries and whole lot of bhuttas. Some of the juciest , milkiest roasted corn can be had at MB.


Some where, we also visited Wilson Point, which is the top most point of Mahabaleshwar, 360 degree view of MB, and great sunrise spot.

But overall, we hardly covered the popular spots of MB in the first two days. So, early next morning, we started for Arthur's Seat. On the way is Elphistone Point, Elephant's head (doesn’t look so much like an elephant). Castle Rock, Savitri Point (Savitri river bed was dry, Mahad Polapur Mumbai snakes parallel to it) and Marjorie Point. Arthur's Seat alone has about 6 points. All these points have look to offer similar views, but its still spectacular to see mountains and mountains just streching on till your eyes can see. Raigad (not visible due to the fog), Madhumakarandgad (its dog eared peaks visible from almost anywhere in Mahabaleshwar) and Pratapgad are visible from this place.


On the way back is Old (Kshetra) Mahabaleshwar. It has 3 important temples - Mahabal and Atibal (the two demons who ruled this place and were later killed by the Gods) and Panchaganga Temple. It is said that 7 rivers originate from this point, disappear into the caverns and reappear at various places. Koyna(south-west), Krishna (north-east), Venna(south-east), Savitri (north-west), Gayatri (don't know where). The other two rivers, Bhagirathi and Saraswati make an appearance every 12 and 60 years respectively. If it’s a fact that the origins of all the rivers are in a single spot, then its truly amazing. But I don’t think it is possible to verify this with certainty.