Team-BHP - Smoke On The Water, Fire In The Sky (Into Lonar Lake And Crater)

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- - Smoke On The Water, Fire In The Sky (Into Lonar Lake And Crater) (https://www.team-bhp.com/forum/travelogues/70820-smoke-water-fire-sky-into-lonar-lake-crater.html)

Smoke On The Water

Fire In The Sky

Smoke On The Water

...guitar riffs...song plays... fingers stab the air guitar...

No Matter What We Get Out Of This

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I Know We Will Never Forget

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Thus begins a story of what happened last Independence Day...

Lovely pics hain saab

aur pics banao ji! Very good stuff!

Nestled in the middle of the world's largest hypervelocity crater of balastic rock, lies the mysterious lake of Lonar a place of myth, reality and nature.

Lonar had been floating in my subconscious for a while, so when a long weekend presented itself, we added an extra day and took off for the over 500 km drive. (Lonar is 150 km from Aurangbad which in turn is 400km from Mumbai).

But why go straight when you can twist? The drizzling rain suggested perfect weather to view the charms of Malshej Ghat and so we decided to take the non mainstream route via Malshej through Ahmednagar (NH222) to Paithan, Jalna, Sindkhed Raja and Lonar. A decision we were initially very glad we took...

Road to Malshej

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Chasing Waterfalls

Smoke On The Water, Fire In The Sky (Into Lonar Lake And Crater)-waterfall.jpg

Into the hills and beyond

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Maid of the mist

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A Mossy Affair

Smoke On The Water, Fire In The Sky (Into Lonar Lake And Crater)-moss.jpg

Keeping Faith

Smoke On The Water, Fire In The Sky (Into Lonar Lake And Crater)-malshej_temple.jpg

Keeping Dry

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Keeping Time

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Vada Pav in belly, mist in my face, it was time to pick up some speed and head for the plains...

Great pics, great song title which fits the place you visited. Waiting for more info and pics on Lonar itself!

great pics there!
But where are the lonar pics? i had been to lonar this diwali but i guess due to the weather there was not much to appreciate. as it is i was enroute from nagpur and planned only an hour's halt.
The road that u talked about (through malshej) is it the same that goes to ahmednagar without touching pune? how is the road condition.

Hello there, nice narration and wonderful pictures, you have my undivided attention, please continue posting more

Thanks for the appreciation! Responses inline

Quote:

Originally Posted by SX4LOVER (Post 1615220)

great pics there!
But where are the lonar pics?

Have not reached Lonar yet! :)

Quote:

Originally Posted by SX4LOVER (Post 1615220)

i had been to lonar this diwali but i guess due to the weather there was not much to appreciate. as it is i was enroute from nagpur and planned only an hour's halt.

You need atleast a day in Lonar. Tons to appreciate, even other than the crater. It takes an hour for the MTDC in Lonar to cook lunch!

Quote:

Originally Posted by SX4LOVER (Post 1615220)

The road that u talked about (through malshej) is it the same that goes to ahmednagar without touching pune? how is the road condition.

Yes this is the road which goes to Ahmednagar without touching Pune. It is great till Ahmednagar and quite scenic. You do lose some time in Ahmednagar city once you get in.

It is the midway stretch of the road, (I think it was after Paithan which is a mess). From Ahmednagar I would recommend taking the 4 laned highway to Aurgangabad and taking the road to Lonar from there rather than bypassing Aurangabad.

If you dont like twisties, you can take the Mumbai - Pune expressway from Mumbai, get off at Chakan go past the Bajaj Plants and come out on the Pune Ahmednagar Highway having bypassed Pune.

It was the time of the swine flu scare, hence we decided to give Pune as wide a berth as possible

@Abhay, @Majic: Thanks! Yes there is more to come, but a day job to do also :)

This place is on my radar for sometime now.

I will wait for your travelogue and photos to unleash. Hope I can do that in coming long weekends. More pics please. And, A great title to the thread, very apt.

Quote:

Originally Posted by genesis (Post 1615118)

Vada Pav in belly, mist in my face, it was time to pick up some speed and head for the plains...

As the road descended from the hills, the landscape changed from green to brown.

Smoke On The Water, Fire In The Sky (Into Lonar Lake And Crater)-descending_plains.jpg

Pulling over on a curve to admire the scenery we heard a distant drumming coming towards us. A perfect spot to meet some villagers going to the local temple.

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And also admire the relationship between man and his best friend

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After Ahmednagar, we encountered a few road blocks

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Passed through the gateways of some small towns

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After lunch in a bar near Paithan (no kidding! that was the only place we could find who served food), we drove by those paitently waiting for buses

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And those who were not

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And the appearance of turban's started indicating that we were now firmly in the plains

Smoke On The Water, Fire In The Sky (Into Lonar Lake And Crater)-turban1.jpg

Smoke On The Water, Fire In The Sky (Into Lonar Lake And Crater)-turban2.jpg

And after some really bumpy patches we came to the final winding stretch to Lonar

Smoke On The Water, Fire In The Sky (Into Lonar Lake And Crater)-lonar_road.jpg

And checked in at the MTDC from where we got our first view of the crater

Smoke On The Water, Fire In The Sky (Into Lonar Lake And Crater)-lonar_first_view.jpg

Awesome! haven't heard of this place.. any more information that you can pass on would be great.

Really nice please continue with more pictures and narrations!

Amazing snaps.. now waiting for the travelogue to come..

You have me glued on to the fantastic narration and wonderful pics. Have been planning to go to Lonar for a long time.

Keep posting.....

Good Pics and narration keep it coming.

@genesis, fantastic pics and narration!

Now you have given me another place to visit over a long weekend, so thanks for that :D

Looking forward to the rest of your travelogue.

Btw, thats one of my all time fav songs too :)