A Walk In The Borivali National Park

The Sanjay Gandhi National Park or Borivali National Park, as it is popularly known, lies in the Northern suburb of Borivali, Mumbai. It is acres of forest surrounded by the traffic, noise and the chaos of one of the most populated cities in India. It is remarkable that such a large National Park exists INSIDE a city! It has a vast population of flora and fauna; some rare butterflies, deers and even 22 leopards! It is close to the UNESCO heritage site – Kanheri caves, built around 2400 years ago! It is the home to two lakes Vihar and Tulsi, that provide drinking water to the people of Mumbai.

104 km² is just a figure,  right? Well, Central Park in New York is a mere 3.41 km²  and the famous Ranthambore is just  three times larger at 392 km²! The Borivali National Park is aptly called the ‘lungs of Mumbai.’ Yet, it is a place that most locals like me forget about. We travel far away from Mumbai searching for nature, culture, history without realising it is all enclosed within the Borivali National Park. The Shilonda trail here is a thing of beauty in monsoon. It’s a walk, not really a trek that ends at a beautiful, slow river. The monsoons arrived in all their pomp and splendour this year in Mumbai and on the designated day of the trek, around 8.30 am, over 60 people walked in! Any kind of walk cannot be done with such a large group, I firmly believe and there is no silence to observe, someone is always talking… and well, when you want to listen to the guide you can’t as you are really somewhere and the guide is somewhere else.

We decided to be smarter, booked a private guide, asked some friends over and finally last Saturday,  we  got together the umbrellas and raincoats, stocked up on water and went for a walk in the National Park. We finally did the Shilonda trail.  It was a simple walk… and as jungles always surprise me, this forest surprised me too… beautiful trees, a great guide who told us heaps of stories, lovely company and a slow and quiet walk to the stream. I learnt about hornbills and their marvelous parenting techniques. I learnt about how to conduct a census for leopards and that it happens every year in May and that they need volunteers .

I saw a HUGE hooded grasshopper, renamed it in my head – leafhopper and I jumped away and bypassed scurrying ground crabs. Searched amongst half eaten leaves for the larvae of the world’s largest moth and in the midst of this, heard the ‘brain fever’ bird call out ‘brain fever’! I walked in squishy-squashy mud and watched bubbles rise to the surface… that area has bubbles every monsoon and no one has figured why. I learnt about how some imported plants are used to turn arid soil into fertile soil, so that local trees can grow. I walked through the buffer zone and entered the reserved forest… ending the walk by sitting by the river on tree trunks, roots and rocks and talking about how to teach children to respect and value the environment.

It was a lovely way to spend a Saturday morning.  Walk done, I  came out of the park to loud sounds and the craziness that characterizes  Mumbai roads! It almost assaulted my senses, but made me also wonder at the beauty that was accessible to me all this while. I am coming back  soon to climb to the  Kanheri caves and to all of you out there, who delayed the visit like me… if you live in Mumbai  and have been postponing that trip to the Borivali National Park,  just go this weekend. It is beautiful, vast and in your backyard!

For more pics..click here http://merrytogoaround.com/2013/08/01/borivali-national-park-mumbai-the-urban-jungle/

Bhavani Ramesh is a traveler by choice, photographer by interest and writer by desire. She works at audiocompass.in. She blogs at merrytogoaround.com  and tweets @bhavan1.