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| Saanarappan Malai Trek |
- Place: Saanarappan Malai Trek
- Difficulty: Easy to Moderate.
- Distance: 120 km x 2 = 240 km.
- Directions: Bangalore > Hosur > Krishanagiri > Saanarapan Malai Trek
- Krew: Datta (Dattu), Anwar (Bhai), Gundachar (Gunda), Karthik (Sp).
- Bikes: Enfield, Pulsar.
- Previous Visit: Musatu Malai trek
- Budget: Rs 321/head (Petrol = 1056/4; Breakfast = 230/4)
IN LESS THAN 50 WORDS:
Alright, Saanarappan Malai, is an off-beat, beautiful trek in the Thiruvannamalai route. It sits right behind Jagadevi Fort and offers great views from the summit. The trail is well marked and simple. The climb can get technical at certain stretches. A great trek all in all.
And this marked 44 weeks, 45 treks, ~10 months, non-stop, since Oct 12th, 2025. This was our 33rd trek in 32 weeks for 2026, with 30 first ascents. :)
INTRO & PLAN:
Well, the Grand TN expedition was in full roar (Rayakottai, Anchetty Durgam, Ratnagiri Malaikottai, Udedurgam, Mallapadi, Jagadevi Fort, Thattakal Fort, Ankushagiri, Periyamalai , Virabhadra Fort, Maharajakadai Fort Trek, Musattu Malai Trek).
Regarding the plan. Initially, Dattu and myself had planned a short hill climb on the Mysore road. Then Bhai and Gunda also said they are up for a climb. Scouring through my diary, found Saanarapan Malai, well this was an totally off-beat. And four of us having different climbing styles made the perfect team to hit this one and drive the Grand TN expedition deeper!
TIME: 20:00 (31 July, 2026)
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| The boulder route |
ASSEMBLE & LEAVE:
Yeah I was up by 01:30, fresh and ready. Then messaged others and obviously got not reply haha. Put some some slow doom metal and was pacing myself up and down my room waiting to get of my home. At about 03:45, called up Dattu and asked if he was ready for the pick up. He said give me 15 minutes. I left my home totally towards opposite direction 10-15km to pick up Dattu from Mahalakshmi layout and return back and then headed towards Hosur to meet Bhai and Gunda about 30-40km away from Bangalore at the Tamil Nadu border.
TIME: 05:30
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| TN Omelets are the best - End of discussion |
RIDE 1: (Bangalore > Krishnagiri > Saanarappan Malai)
Well, with the strict NO GOOGLE MAPS rule in place, we cruised along at a decent pace. We had a rough idea that this hillock lied behind Jagadevi and we had marked and plotted this hillock from the Musattu Malai trek last week. The ride until Krishnagiri was pretty straightforward. Post which, we decided to re-visit the hotel from the Jagadevi Fort trek for some omelets. We had really enjoyed it last time. So, we searched for the hotel and then finally found it. Sat down and belted 6 idlis, 1pongal, 3 half boiled omelets, 2 normal omelets amongst us four and felt so happy. We ate to our heart content, re-calling all tamil words, we thanked the lady running the establishment in broken Tamil. A genuine smile radiated from her face. In TN, the food, the warmth is something we have never been short off :)
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| Ancient Dolmens :) |
Post a grand breakfast, we spotted the mighty Jagadevi Fort and looking for a massive hillock behind it, we could spot the mighty Saanarappan hillock, there was no mistaking it. Asking the locals for directions to hill, we cruised along to reach some ancient dolmens at the base of the hill (Start point of trek). The dolmens were also used as kennel by a few dogs (very nice to see this). They came running towards us and jumping all over us, a few biscuits calmed them down and there were ready to join us for the trek. Awakening the the "lizard's spirit" within us, we were ready for the trek.
TIME: 07:45
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| We had two companions for the Saanarappan Malai Trek |
SAANARAPPAN MALAI TREK
ASCENT:
Well, we took about 60 minutes to reach the summit. The trail of Saanarappan is straightforward with clear paint marks on the rocks. However, yes, there is a caveat. Do not lose your way at the start itself. This is where the four person crew came in handy. The mud trail from the dolmens split two ways one goes to left and one goes into the fields to the right, we split up into twos and scouted both and whistled to signal the right route. The one that goes to the right is the correct and route. Like always, I have divided the trek into phases, so, yeah LETS GO \m/
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| Initial trails through the forest with clear markers |
Phase 1: The Initial Trail
Now, the initial trails is clear and clean. But the fact that forest enwrapped us, made us sweat like pigs. And the sweat, it doesn't evaporate, it stays dripping like a stream from our body, which is such a mental drainer. Thankfully we had the dogs accompanying us, playing with it uplifted our moods. Clearly Dattu was in his element leading the way hauling us all up the trail. And the tail end of this trail, the path became really boulder filled, and the dogs couldn't get past. We wanted to carry it, but didnt knew if the further trail would be more difficult, hence had to leave them standing whining. It was hurting but had to be done :)
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| The grinder begins |
Phase 2: The Grinder
When the canopy lifted to a rock face. And there was a section, where we had to cross traverse across the rock face. There were railings. The rock offered a good grip, so it was easy to get across it. Then finally we we had to grind out another 10min on the rock face. Well, this section might drain you but at the end of this section we found a hidden cave. It was so beautiful. And the summit? well it lies above the cave.
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| The cave section, just below the summit. |
Phase 3: Boulder climb to the summit.
Now, through caves we went and spotted boulders. Well we had to climb this to reach the summit. And this section is short, fun but intense. Intense because, there are steep drops which would break a limb on all sides. Hence carefully taking turns and looking for each other we hauled each other up to reach the summit.
TIME: 08:45
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| Summit of Saanarappan Malai |
TOP:
Upon reaching the summit, the winds embraced us like an old friend. The sweat was being cooled down. We could spot a lot of hillocks of the past (Jagadevi Fort, Thattakal Fort, Periyamalai , Musattu Malai Trek). Whew, what a view it was!
We hydrated ourselves and then, yeah we crashed. Slept upon the boulder like babies. After about 30 minutes, we woke up, fresh and the whole world looks blue, sometimes wondering how the hell we got up here and why haha. We discussed some of our previous treks eating some Anjur that I had packed from home. It was fun recollecting the massive streak, has taught us a lot and moulded us into different human beings. After a solid 60 minutes at the top, we decided to leave it before the aura of the place faded.
TIME: 09:45
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| The fun descent begins :) |
DESCENT:
The descent was an easy one and took us another 30 minutes. It was a non-stop one and fun one. The boulder and rock face had to be done with precision and carefully. We took turns and lead the group one by one carefully and once we were back in the forest, we could not find the dogs. We continued down, at a good pace. As we descended the sun was up, but the canopy was preventing any sunlight from hitting the floor completely. Nevertheless, sweat was pouring down our faces like a stream.
As we made it to the base of the hill, a small bump I got from behind. It was the small dog from earlier :) Our hearts melted, it was overjoyed to see us. And I was over-over joyed to see it as well. Not sure who acted more hyper that point of time haha. We made it back to the dolmens, and there was well-pump, which drew ground water. We pumped water out of it, washed our face and it really cooled us down. Quenched our thirsts, filled up our water bottles and just sat at the dolmens with dogs looking up at the massive hillock. It was such a peaceful sitting. Absorbing the last ounce of goodness that we could, we thanked her for the rich experience and more importantly "LETTING US GO BACK".
TIME: 11:15
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| The post trek cooling :) |
RIDE 2: Saanarappan Malai > Krishnagiri > Bangalore
The ride back was a smooth one. As we left the base of the hillock, we kept looking back her admiring the magnitude and the raw beauty she possessed. It was just hitting us hard. We cruised through Krishnagiri in a jiffy and then continued to reach back Bangalore for some ice-cold beers and lunch :)
TIME: 13:00
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| Konohamaru and Sippy playing in dirt. |
CONCLUSION:
Well, this was a beauty for sure. A massive hillock with clear trails, a little pinch of technicality, and we got ourselves one of the most beautiful trek of this season. Well the four member krew was a gamble that paid of well.
Past 44 weeks, we have pulled off 45 treks, ~9100 kms in total, 10 months, non-stop. The Flame lives on \m/
KREW:
Sippy: Was hovering from first to last, left to right and playing with his dogs all the time haha. With 45 done, lets go towards 52/52 on the FLYING NIMBUS \m/
Until next time, Ta-da Cia \m/
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| Wish us luck for the 52/52 |
2 comments:
👏
Thank you Rama :)
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