Matheran Hill Station

On my last weekend in Bombay, I went with my friend Swarup to the Matheran hill station, some 100 km from the city. Seeing that it was a Sunday, and overlooking the fact that it was the May Day long weekend, we foolishly decided that the Suburban Lines commuter train from the 7th Circle of Hell, would be our chosen means of transport. As it would happen, although we got confused and lost some time in transfers, we made it there unscathed in just a few hours.

I was already getting down on Bombay. Don't get me wrong. It is a fantastic city. But it is always mobbed and getting anywhere is an inevitable ordeal. What’s more, all the fun and temptations have their price. In fact, I reckon that Bombay is not too much cheaper than Tel Aviv.

So how welcome a trip to a cool hill station sounded. Indeed, it turned out to be splendid. Set in the hills, full of verdant vegetation, not too many people, nature all around, it was literally a breath of badly needed fresh air. Above all, there was a well-worn footpath through the tropical forest that brought me back to Grandpa’s cottage on Lake Sunapee. The walk was a classic holy moment.

We had walked quite a few kilometers and were getting tired. We decided to hire horses to take us back the remaining four or five clicks. Upon finally reaching the hill station’s entrance, we were offered a taxi all the way back to Bombay for Rs 1300. Although the trip up had gone more or less smoothly, we should have quit while we were ahead and coughed up the dough. If there’s one thing I’ve learned in India, and especially in Bombay, it’s that transport is not the thing to be thrifty with. Every rupee saved is a tear shed. But we made our way back to the Suburban Lines, as we had bought return tickets.

It was about 4:30 PM, and I sat down on a bench in the train station, listening to music and wading through the hefty tome on Mao. Filthy from the trek and the profuse sweating it engendered, it was an hour or so before the right train came. I wasn’t minding the stifling, breezeless late afternoon heat so much, since I mistakenly thought I would be enjoying a cool shower, spicy veg thali and the air conditioned comfort of my tiny room, all within about two hours.

Alas, once in the train, sitting at least, some six or seven kilometers into the trip, the we stopped. Mao still had me engrossed up to this point. But the densely packed passenger car, with no movement and nary a whiff of incoming fresh air, after some time, began to produce a multitude of inconsolable infants, accompanied by much sweating and a splitting headache on my part. We sat patiently for what seemed like hours. At long last, Swarup suggested that we get out and find a taxi.

There were none.

We were totally out in the sticks, nearly 90 km from the city, and the few remaining rickshaw drivers wouldn’t go anywhere for reasonable sums. We walked all the way to the nearest station in our weakened state, where we found a rickshaw driver to take us to the next major station, whence we could find a taxi. At this point however, I was ready to fork over the price of a first class air ticket with perhaps just a sigh and a pang of minor loss.

In the event, we got stuck in traffic. When we did move, the heavy bumping combined with my fearless horseback adventure synergistically conspired to produce aching welts on my buttocks, and for all the wrong reasons. It literally took hours of fits and starts, as well as the non-stop breathing in of thick, black diesel fumes belched out by the trucks and buses that were inevitably ahead of us.

By the time we reached the station, I was a filthy and exhausted wreck. The Rs 600 taxi ride took 90 minutes and went unhindered, seeing that it was already 11:30 PM by the time we departed on the final leg of the journey.

Everything was closed in Colaba, save the Barista, where I had an expensive and particularly disappointing snack. Then, nearly falling over myself, I had a no-matter-what scrubbing shower to get off the worst of the grime.

In seclusion of my room, I fell into a long, deep sleep, in fetal position. I didn’t emerge till the next evening.