Dudhsagar Falls

USP – India’s fifth largest waterfall. Picture a four tiered waterfall in the background and a train passing by underneath it. Incredible!

The Pic which got Dudhsagar on my bucket list!

Legend of Dudhsagar

The Konkani name for the falls, which literally translated means “sea of milk”, derives from clouds of milky foam which rises up at the bottom of the falls.

The legend tells the story of a powerful and wealthy king who ruled a kingdom in the Western Ghats. The King had a beautiful daughter, who used to enjoy taking a bath during the hot summers in the picturesque lake near the forest on the edge of the King’s palace grounds. It was her habit to finish her bath and have a jug of sugared milk.

One day, when she was finishing her usual jug of milk she found herself being watched by a handsome prince standing amongst the trees. Embarassed by her inadequate bathing attire, the resourceful Princess poured the sugared milk in front of her to form an improvised curtain to hide her body, while one of the maids rushed to cover her with a dress.

Thus was the legend born; the sugared milk (dudh) poured down the mountainside and continued to flow as a tribute to the everlasting virtue and modesty of the Princess.

Trek Grade – Easy but Lengthy

Path to waterfall – Walking on railway tracks – Dudhsagar lies between two railway stations – Kulem and Castle Rock. You can start walking on railway tracks from either of the two stations and reach Dudhsagar. Distance varies on the basis of route you take.

Reaching Dudhsagar (Weekend Trek)
1.       Catch 17318 Hubli Express from LTT on Saturday Morning at 9.05 AM and reach Londha station on Sunday early morning at 12.08 AM. From there catch 06948 Ubl Vsg Link Express at 2.15 AM and reach castle rock at 3.05 AM. Get down 10-15 minutes after castle rock station when train halts and start walking towards
Dudhsagar.

2.       Instead of the above, book a train to Pune and catch 06948 train from Pune to Castle Rock.

3.       Catch 12201 LTTKCVL Express on Saturday 4.55 PM and reach Madgaon station around 2.15 AM. From Madgaon reach Kulem via road. Start walking on tracks from Kulem. Approx distance one side is 14 KM.

Way back
1.       One side walk to Dudhsagar falls can range from 12-15 KM. After reaching there, one can walk back to Sonalium Station (approx. 5 KM) and from there board a train and get down at either Kullem / Madgoan

2.       From Madgaon catch either the10112 Konkan Kanya Express which leaves Madgaon at 4.45 PM and reaches Dadar at 5.30 AM next day or 12620 Matsyagandha Express which leaves Madgaon at 7.15 PM and reaches LTT at 6.35 AM next day.

How we did it

We decided to catch Saturday Morning Hubli express and reach Londa station and from there catch train to castle rock. However, since connecting train to castle rock was running late due to a derailment incident in Madhya Pradesh a week ago, we had to book cars which picked us up at Londa and dropped us at Kulem. We started walking from Kulem at 2.30 in the morning and reached the waterfall by 6.30 (approx. 14 KM). From there, we took the jungle trail and finally reached Sonalium station, boarded a train to Madgoan and reached Madgaon by 1 PM. Our connecting train was Konkan Kanya Express scheduled at 4.45 PM.

Our Story – Raj Vora and Associates

Dudhsagar was on my bucket list since 2014. A random chat with college friends in May led to initiation of the plan and everyone was game for it! As planned, tickets were booked in the
coming week. After lot of browsing, we finalised to not do the trek through known trekking organisations since they take 100 people+ in a batch but manage it on our own and hire a guide at the falls. Dudhsagar was the first trek organised by my friend Jugal and me! After months of discussions, listing down things to be carried, making food, travel and other arrangements, finally we were a night away from the journey day; I wasn’t able to sleep,  butterflies running in my stomach – hoping this trek goes as planned and we all enjoy together.

S4 coach

We assembled LTT platform 2 near S4 coach on Saturday at 8.30 AM to board Hubli Express. Jugal had made a sheet having details of seating arrangement, and named it Raj Vora & Associates – The Trekker’s Choice; hence the name! There were shy hellos between people who met first time on one side and long hugs between people catching up after a long time on the other. After initial round of introduction and chats our train journey started towards Londa station, making its way through green rice fields and vast expanses of skylines filled with banana and coconut trees.

Our train rushing beside rows of well cultivated fields

Some people slept, rest stayed awake, for they couldn’t miss any moment – be it interesting conversations or watching clouds pass by or reading a book by the window seat.

Picturesque landscapes

The sunset was scenic with sky hitting neon notes towards the end as we digged into theplas and cheese dips followed by sweetness of soan papdi and ice halwa 😛

Between our conversations on paragliding, adventure sports, start ups, photo printing, college days, articleship stories, go pro, dogs, random somethings we arrived at Londa station at 12.08 AM Sunday morning – our bags filled with food and water, our hearts brimming enthusiasm. We had hired three cars to Kulem as our connecting train to Castle Rock was running late by eight hours.

It was dark, foggy and sound of small waterfalls kept humming in the background as we moved swiftly towards Kulem under sky full of stars, braving the harsh winds. As we glanced up at the sky filled with stars, we hummed along counting stars!

‘Lately I’ve been, I’ve been losing sleep
Dreaming about the things that we could be
But, baby I’ve been, I’ve been praying hard
Said no more counting dollars, we’ll be counting stars
Yeah, we’ll be counting stars’

After a couple of Ed Sheeran songs (Nikita Manral’s deep meaning songs :P), late 70s Jazz (Yash’s favourites), Adele’s lovebites, Ylvis’s The Fox (special mention for the Ring-ding-ding-ding-dingeringeding! chorus by Shubham, Suraj) we shifted back to desi tunes (sung by all of us)!!

At Kulem, equipped with torches, walking on the tracks felt manageable, taking the cement rods and avoiding the pebbles. And then rains lashed us! It got cold, foggy and unpleasantly wet. Our feet were wet within first half hour of the trek! Luckily, rains stopped after that for some time giving us a breather. Walking in pairs of two, we followed the trail as it went through tunnels formed by trees. We switched off the torches for some time to soak in the darkness and let the dim moonlight guide us. Suddenly we saw flashes of green, orange and red here and there – fireflies!! It was beautiful. Shubham followed Nikita leg-by-leg; never missing a beat proving why he’s such an awesome dancer 😀

The tunnels we passed through were enormous, made of bauxite. Trains would sound horns as they neared and we would move sideways to make way. It was like old hindi movies. First, darkness
and just the sound of train coming and somewhere from the corner, a bright yellow light slowly advancing towards you… the sound getting louder and the light getting brighter.

Arpit guided the way with his Marauder’s map tattoo on his fist! Finally we were 4 Km away from the falls and saw the break of dawn. Things started getting brighter and sound of magnanimous falls echoed around. This acted as a motivation to move ahead and we kept walking ahead, managing our way through the tracks, not caring much for the pebbles in our way.

Each turning was a frame to capture

Break of dawn added life to our aching toes and made us feel like dancing our way to the falls.

Nature at its best!

As we passed the last tunnel before we reached Dudhsagar, we started brisk walking and then practically running towards the destination. It lured us with its sound. It was sheer love – not being able to see it but could feel it all over 😛

Crossing tunnels can be tricky when trains pass by

We had to wait at view point for some time for the fog to clear in order to see the gushing waterfall.  I could recollect William Henry quoting –

‘No time to see, in broad daylight,
Streams full of stars, like skies at night’

And then finally we got to see it… My knees gave way and I bent down to honour the sheer force of nature. So pure. So white. So divine.

Love at first sight..

I almost felt like I’ve entered a movie and Bahubali is playing. THe sheer grandeur of Dudhsagar though, is more than graphical waterfall in Bahubali movie.

Waterfall ke saath selfie to banta hai!

After spending half hour admiring the waterfall and watching monkeys raid our food bags, we then proceeded towards the jungle trail. We were extremely tired and wished if we could board a train. And voila, a goods train arrived having railings both sides for people to stand. The driver was kind enough to allow us to board the train and gave us a free ride till for about 10-15 minutes. The sheer fun of getting into a goods train was out of the world!

Aaj main Upar!! All aboard the train

As we then proceeded towards the base of the waterfall following the jungle trail, we encountered a small rivulet joining the waterfall and jumped in! We played around, calming our overworked legs and throwing water on each other.

Into the woods… In a rivulet

We then had tea, poha and theplas and began a three kilometre easy walk to Sonalium station which had come on our way earlier.We took in the last view of the waterfall and bid adieu!

The last view!

On our way to Sonalium station, we stopped by at a place and clicked a lot of pics. Little did we know, we would have a leech attack there!

The one before the Leech Attack!

Sohini, was everyone’ s best friend after the leech attack. 😛 She treated everyone, running with salt grains and turmeric the moment she heard some shrills or loud screeches. Leeches were found on legs, hands, neck and even head! So be careful and avoid clicking pics in the jungle near Sonalium.

After an eventful photoshoot we waited at Sonalium station and caught the first train to Madgaon station from there. We reached Madgoan at 1 PM and checked the cloak rooms. They were extremely clean and had Goa street art by Mario de Miranda!! At 5 bucks a person (ya supercheap and decent!), we bathed there and finally sat awaiting our train at 4.45 PM. It felt like we sat after ages! So much relief just by removing wet shoes and feeling our numb toes! We got lunch from a nearby punjabi restaurant and had it at the station itself.

Graffiti on Walls

Finally we boarded our train and all went to sleep, got up to have dinner and again went to sleep :P. The trip was awesome and everyone had big smiles on their faces in spite of the pain in their toes!!

With our Precious!!!

Photo Credits – Geet for awesome GoPro clicks, Jugal for pics clicked from his HTC phone.