Note: The name Tavli is not well known for many villagers on the Badlapur side. This adds to the route finding problems. There is no water anywhere on this mountain except at the top. So one should carry a lot of water if one is attempting it in the dry season. In the monsoon, the route finding difficulties increase, and there are mosquitoes in the forested parts.
From Badlapur station, the main Tavli peak is mostly hidden from view. What one sees instead, are three pinnacles, almost the same height as the main peak. We shall call these pinnacles as tbe Tavli pinnacles. There is a saddle between the main Tavli peak, and another peak to its south called the Badlapur hill. We shall call this as the SADDLE.
The most important stopping point for almost 90% of the routes to Tavli from Badlapur side, is a small grassy meadow 650m high, right at the base of the Tavli pinnacles. Henceforth, we shall call this the MEADOW. The MEADOW is at the northeast end of the Tavli pinnacles. Most of the ridges climbing from Badlapur side to Tavli reach some point on the MEADOW. An exception is a ridge from Kakuli lake (a lake north-northwest of Tavli, approachable by auto/bus from Ambernath station) climbing directly to the Tavli pinnacles, on their northwestern end. One can climb the Kakuli ridge without much diffculty, reach the base of the Tavli pinnacles, turn left, traverse to the MEADOW, and join the usual route from the MEADOW to Tavli top described below. However, in the rest of the article, we shall concentrate on the more interesting routes from Badlapur station to the MEADOW.
In this paragraph, we describe how to reach the main Tavli peak from the MEADOW. Reaching Tavli peak from the MEADOW is relatively straightforward, and does not involve route finding problems. Almost all the route finding difficulty lies in reaching the MEADOW from Badlapur station. The Badlapur station-MEADOW routes are described in the later paragraphs. Looking from the MEADOW, the Tavli peak is hidden behind the Tavli pinnacles. Once you are at the MEADOW, walk towards the Tavli pinnacles. There is a faint trail on the MEADOW approaching towards the Tavli pinnacles which initially descends and then climbs up very steeply bang to the rock face at the base of the first (northernmost) pinnacle. Turning left (south) here, look for the natural caves in the rock face of the first pinnacle. That is where a traverse south to the SADDLE begins. We shall henceforth refer to this as the TRAVERSE. It is important to hit the rock face of the pinnacle and find the caves, so that one starts the TRAVERSE at the proper point, or else one can quickly end up in a scree slope. The TRAVERSE goes around all the three pinnacles and all of the Tavli mountain to get to the SADDLE between Tavli and Badlapur hill. The narrow TRAVERSE brushes along the rock face to the right, and falls steeply away on the left. The TRAVERSE is not quite a trail and you continue along it by faith. There is enough jungle cover on the TRAVERSE to help you aid the walk, by using the roots of the plants as support. It takes about an hour to do the TRAVERSE. Once you get to the SADDLE, it is an easy 20 minutes walk to the top of Tavli peak. You will find a Maulvi (sort of) living in a house at the top, who will give u black tea, and there is a well with fairly clean water. One can also climb Badlapur Hill from the SADDLE.
For descending from Tavli top, it is better to descend on the western side of Tavli, on the Haji Malang side. Get back to the SADDLE between Badlapur hill and Tavli, and descend down gently on the western side of the SADDLE a bit, till you get close to the edge, and then there is a long traverse on a broad and well defined trail heading towards Haji Malang. On this broad traverse one gets some good views of Badlapur hill and Navra-Navri and not to mention the amazing looking pinnacle which one gets very close to called Baman. Continuing on the traverse all the way leads one to the lower plateau of Haji Malang. This is the route to Tavli taken by Haji Malang villagers, and the name Tavli is much more well known here than on Badlapur side. From the lower plateau, one can descend to the base of Haji Malang, and take a bus back to Kalyan. However there is a quicker way to descend and get to Kalyan. After walking on the broad traverse for about half an hour or so, one should look for a well defined trail turning sharply to the right. Take this trail, which descends quickly to a village called Kusuli. From Kusuli, one gets a bus to Kalyan. Of course, one can also go up this way, but it is interesting to rough it out while ascending and then enjoy the (well earned!) smooth descent.
Note: Every route approaching Tavli from the Badlapur side passes initially alongside small hillocks. There are forest covers on some of them, and they block Tavli and the Tavli pinncales from view. There are paths made by woodcutters in the jungles on the hillocks. One should take care not to waste time by going up and down these hillocks too much. One should try to go around and avoid these hillocks and head towards Tavli as efficiently as possible.
In the remaining part of the article, we describe various approaches from Badlapur station to the MEADOW. Henceforth, ridges are described by the direction along which they descend. A very prominent ridge descending from Tavli in the south-north direction actually comes down close to the railway tracks near Badlapur station. We shall call this the MAIN RIDGE. On the west of Badlapur station, there is a main road. Ask the people there how to get to Kulgaon of the Vraddha Ashram (Ashramcha Kulgaon). These days, there might be autorickshaws to take one there, or else it is about 45min. walk by foot. One should take care not to follow the main road for too long, for it finally goes towards Bhoj lake. From Ashramcha Kulgaon, the simplest possibility is to head more or less straight towards the MAIN RIDGE. Try to go around and avoid the small hillocks on the way. There is a low (50m high), long and flat section on the MAIN RIDGE which one can approach directly from Ashramcha Kulgaon. Walking from Ashramcha Kulgaon, one can reach just below the flat section of the MAIN RIDGE in about 30min. From here, there are trails in the forest which climb to the flat section in about 20min. Once you reach the flat section of the MAIN RIDGE, turn left (south) and start climbing the MAIN RIDGE. Notice that the MAIN RIDGE is grassy and does not have forest cover. So climbing it in sunny weather can be a bit exhausting. On the other hand, the route along the MAIN RIDGE is very clear. The MAIN RIDGE climbs to the northern tip of the MEADOW. However, there are long sections on the MAIN RIDGE where the gradient is about 45 degrees, two easy rock climbing patches (one of the patches looks impossible to climb, but traverse to its left a bit, and then do an easy rock climb there), some scree sections etc. So climbing the entire length of the MAIN RIDGE is inefficent, long and tiring (2.5-3 hours). Hence, it is advisable to take one of the alternate routes which to reach the MEADOW, which we describe below. These alternate routes avoid most of the walk on the MAIN RIDGE, and some avoid the MAIN RIDGE completely.
The first alternate route we describe, avoids 75% of the walk on the MAIN RIDGE. The aim of this route is to reach a point on the MAIN RIDGE, which we shall henceforth call the CUT POINT. The CUT POINT is distinguishable by the fact that to the south of it, the MAIN RIDGE climbs very steeply towards Tavli, and to the north of it, the MAIN RIDGE climbs a little before it starts descending slowly. There is a route starting behind the Vradha Ashram of Kulgaon, going next to some hillocks, approaching perpendicularly towards the MAIN RIDGE (but aiming at a point south of the flat section described above). The route goes thru some Adivasi wadis on the hillocks and one should confirm the route from the people there. From these wadis, the route climbs thru jungle, along a small spur, approaching the MAIN RIDGE perpendicularly. One might have to cut thru the jungle at a few places, unless the Adivasi villagers have burnt shrubs to mark the route. Soon, the route meets a prominent bullock cart track, and following the bullock cart track, one initially turns right (north) and then the track takes a U-turn and quickly approaches very close to the wall of the MAIN RIDGE. After this, the track turns south and keeps going parallel to the wall of the MAIN RIDGE, almost brushing it. Continue along the bullock cart track to reach a position just below the CUT POINT. Here there is a nala climbing to the CUT POINT in about 20min. The CUT POINT is 40m above the track here. Reaching this point from the Vradha Ashram takes about 2 hrs, because of the intial jungle cutting and hillock negotiating that one might have to do. From the CUT POINT, turn left (north) and climb the MAIN RIDGE (one has to do the two rock climbs mentioned above, and some steep walking) to reach the MEADOW. It takes about 45min. to reach the MEADOW from the CUT POINT.
The alternate routes we now describe, avoid the MAIN RIDGE totally. The second alternate route starts from Ashramcha Kulgaon, but goes in a south west direction, alongside small hillocks. It soon climbs up along a small nala between the hillocks and Tavli to reach a plateau. Reaching the plateau takes about 1-1.5 hrs, because of the initial route finding difficulties. Here one finds that there is a reasonably well defined trail traversing from north to south and this trail goes all the way to Chanderi. Walk south on this trail for about 10 minutes and notice that there is a faint ridge descending approx. in the west-east direction. One has to some how notice this ridge (it is not easy!) and scramble up it using the plants as holds. This ridge reaches the MEADOW directly. Even if one misses this ridge, one can traverse further south on the trail for about half an hour and look for another faint ridge in the west-east direction. And a similar climb on the ridge leads one directly to the MEADOW. Actually there are many west-east ridges here, and they all climb to some part of the MEADOW. From the plateau, all these ridges take about 1.5-2 hrs to climb, because they involve jungle cutting, scrambling up using plants as holds etc.
The third alternate route is to continue on this trail even more (about 1-1.5 hrs.), and then one gets to places where there are nalas coming down from the Tavli pinnacles, or from the SADDLE between Tavli and Badlapur hill. Some of these nalas are climbable, and get you to the base of the pinnacles, where one can join the TRAVERSE mentioned above. Some others take you directly to the SADDLE. In fact, there is a prominent nala from the western end of Bhoj lake (approachable by bus/auto from Badlapur station), which climbs to the base of the Tavli pinnacles.
Because of route finding difficulties, all of the
above routes take something like four hours to reach the MEADOW from Ashramcha
Kulgaon.