Sandhan Valley

Height : Not quite relevant; this one's more about the terrain. You actually climb down all the way, from about 700 m. to about 200 m.

Wow factor : Offbeat - probably the only ravine trek in the region. Ghostly (especially if you don't make it out of the jungle by dusk), and adventurous if you like bouldering.

Difficulty : Moderate with a few difficult / puzzling patches, up to 3 of them technical (- rappelling involved). Lots of bouldering involved. Practically impossible in the rains.

Endurance : 5-8 hours (depending on the number of people, and breaks) of downhill bouldering and rappelling, followed by 2 hours of flat walk.

Travel mode : Local (+ bus/jeep)
Cost : Rs. 1100+ (- we had a professional group manage the entire trip including the jeeps, the snacks, and the rappelling)

Region : Bhandardara / Igatpuri / Kasara

Trek route : Samrad -> Sandhan valley -> Varpadi/Dehane

My trek date(s) : 27-Apr-2014 / 22-Mar-2015

Diary (of 27-Apr-2014 dotted with updates from 22-Mar-2015) :
Overconfident after a few independent treks last year, I was contemplating doing this trek similarly - without a professional group. Thought I'll buy myself some rope, learn knots and rappelling from Youtube, look up the trek route on blogs, and just get going. Turned out that it wasn't a tough trek, but in retrospect, I'm glad I didn't give in to my foolish ideas. Here's how our day looked:

4:00 AM : Three-hour local and two-hour jeep journey ends at Samrad; the pothole circling Bhandardara lake has a lot of roads in it. Sky's brilliantly dotted with stars. We try to take a nap in an empty mud and dung floored room; roosters outside are awake already... And quite excited to have us.

6:30 AM : Someone in the room farts; we wake up. The village has solar panels and satellite TV. There's no toilet. There's a dog that doesn't know when to let go off your trousers and so gets kicked around a bit.

7:30 AM : We set off towards the valley, stomachs and water bottles full.

On the way from Samrad village to Sandhan valley.
Left: Ratangad Khutta at the centre
Right: Range between Alang and Kalsubai in the background of Samrad

7:45 AM : At the valley's entrance. Uneventful so far.

Entrance of the valley

8:00 AM : At two-feet deep pool of dirty water. Some fellow trekkers take our advice of 'step into the pool at that point' seriously. You have to walk through a second pool, about 4-5 feet deep, if you go just after the rains, but it's practically dry in summer.

The first pool

The second pool - waist deep in March
(Also see mumbaihikers.org, vishalgadkari.com and images towards the bottom of the page at shrikantescapades.com)

9:00 AM : End of the ravine; starting point of the first major descent that is colloquially known as 'nalichi vaat'.

Left: Typical path for the first hour
Right: Downhill path after an hour

Left: Descent (through nalichi vaat) to the rappelling point
Right: The rappelling point

11:00 AM : We start gearing up for rappelling. It takes about 5-10 minutes per person to rappel down; 20 minutes for a certain baby elephant in our group (- no offence meant).

2:00 PM : The last of our group of 20 rappels down the first patch. Part of the group's already begun moving down the second tall rock patch, which is about half an hour downstream.

3:00 PM : People are almost done getting across the second rock patch. It's about 15-feet high. Takes 5 minutes for each person that is belayed down with a rope. Some, like yours truly, just slip and fall down, fortunately landing on two feet. A lot of honeybees say hi. There's a tiny stream of clear water at this point. Despite being told that it's the last drinking water source on the trail, and that there's no shade in rest of the trail, most people don't refill all their water bottles thinking the trek's practically done; they've never heard of Murphy's law.

4:00 PM : The planned trek completion time. We're across the third (also the last) 15-feet rock patch. Here again, some use rope for safety, some don't. No one falls. Lunch happens. Practically all water bottles are emptied. We skip a nice pool of water (- see trekmatesdiary.blogspot.in and images titled 'Camp Site' at shrikantescapades.com) since we're late, and start walking along the left bank of a dry river bed towards our destination village, Dehane, which should ideally take less than 2 hours...

Nalichi vaat from the bottom of Sandhan valley

Nothing's ideal. Baby elephant's injured a muscle during bouldering and needs support to raise itself and its spirits. The group's pace slows down. The sweltering summer sun is relentless; we're completely parched. Two gruelling hours later, we find manna - wild blueberries, not too many left on the trees, but enough to see us through an hour without water. By sunset, we are almost out of the jungle and not too far from farms. Despite specific instructions, only one in four people have brought torch lights.

9:00 PM : We reach Varpadi, which is about 200 metres to the left of the trail we've been following (because we don't strictly walk along an almost clear trail on the left bank, sometimes stepping into the river bed and farms), and is not where distant lights straight ahead lead us to believe it is. The local villagers are quite hospitable. Our trek coordinator asks for our return transportation, rebooked at higher rates since we reach about 6 hours late, to pick us from Varpadi instead of Dehane, which is less than a half hour walk further ahead.

9:30 PM : We leave for Asangaon. The driver doesn't know he's not a pilot. I hear Marathi hard rock (- yes, that genre exists!) for the first time in my life.

11:00 PM : Asangaon station. Just in time to catch the 11 PM local to CST.

Pointers :
Note that except for the 3 tall rock patches mentioned above, there's none that's more than 3-4 feet high, 5 feet at the most. So if you reach a point where you think you'll have to jump more than that, go back a few metres and try to find an alternate route. The bouldering is not difficult (except for a couple of tricky spots where you have to slide down large rocks or through narrow crevices), but one shouldn't be careless; it won't be difficult to get hurt - maybe pull a muscle, sprain an ankle or bruise an arm - if you're careless.

Odd crevices and boulders on the way.
The one on the left is tricky for people who're short or fat.

The first few pictures on shrikantescapades.com will give you a good idea of what the first rappelling patch is like. You can rappel down from multiple points. Do not use old ropes that people have left there; they're most likely very weak. There's a chimney at this patch that some of the locals use to climb back up after they're done guiding trek groups to the plains below.

The first (and potentially only) rappelling patch

At the second point where you think there's no way ahead, look left and you'll see a crevice below a huge rock. You practically have to crawl underneath the big rock to get to a window from where you either belay down or climb down using an odd hidden foothold.

Second rock patch accessible from below a huge rock.
Top: The entrance. Bottom: The exit.
(See trekmatesdiary.blogspot.in for a front view)

The fourth image at shrikantescapades.com (assuming the write-up isn't updated) has yellow arrows that tell you how you can climb down this patch. The tiny stream of water noted above (- 3:00 PM) is on the left in this image.

The 3rd tall rock patch shouldn't be a problem if you're more than about 5'5''; you could support yourself by spreading your legs between the left wall and the big round rock on the right while climbing down. Others can either belay down or be guided/supported by someone else.

Third tall rock patch

A few minutes after this patch, you'll get to a flat resting area. To get to the large pool of water alluded to earlier, you need to descend down the next small patch and turn right at the river bed, upstream. To get to the villages, you need to walk along a trail on the left bank; you might have to cross the bed a couple of times initially though.

Words of caution :
Do not attempt this trek in the rains; the boulders are large and would be slippery, and apparently there's a rapid stream flowing through the ravine in this season. The walls above keep eroding in this season and large rocks could fall down anytime - every year you see new rock patches and crevices.

Make sure your shoes have a good grip. Most importantly, when in doubt - sit. (One guy in our 2015 group slipped on a tall rock and fell, but luckily wasn't hurt too bad.)

People who're not physically fit and active are likely to slow down the pace of the group, causing your timelines to go astray. Our group of 20 took 14 hours to complete the trek instead of the planned 9 hours. Take this into account while planning. A consequence is that you must carry torches and fill up your water bottles at every chance (- you may not get water at all once you're out of the bouldering patch; the stream starting from the large pool dries up in summer), and secondly, you must have someone who knows the way out of the jungle and across the farms very well, as it's difficult to find directions in the dark.

We were told that wild carnivorous animals come out in the jungle at night; try to get out of it before dusk.

This trek can be attempted without a professional group only if you have sufficient prior experience in rappelling independently (- books and youtube aren't good enough!). A (not so reliable) alternative would be to hire the services of a couple of locals in Samrad, who usually assist trekking groups cross the rappelling patch; these locals keep their own rappelling equipment too. If you're doing this, make sure you are capable of judging the condition of the equipment! If I remember correctly, our group had made arrangements with Kalu Bande from Samrad; decent chap. (Must mention that our group leader found some flaws in his harnessing techniques. And I've heard from some trekking groups that the locals are not all that careful unless supervised by someone responsible.)

Before you decide to do this on your own, it would be helpful to take a quick look at the following links that talk about some locals trying to fleece trekking groups (which apparently has been sorted out for good since), and some drunk trekking group causing trouble:
http://mumbaihikers.net/2014/01/beware-con-men-travelling-samrad-village-base-village-sandhan-valley / https://www.facebook.com/vikroooom/posts/10202763033027757
https://www.facebook.com/groups/bhramanti365/permalink/805415049472557

Other references :
The following write-ups will give you travel directions, more information, advice, alternative route options, and a decent feel of the trek:

http://www.shrikantescapades.com/2011/05/sandhan-valley-to-karoli-ghat-trek.html (- good indicative maps of the area)
http://trekshitiz.com/Ei/Sandan_Valley_-_Karoli_Ghat-Trek-Hard-Grade.html
http://www.vishalgadkari.com/blog/2011/12/23/sandhan-valley-trek
http://trekmatesdiary.blogspot.in/2012/04/sandhan-valley-summer-trek.html
http://blog.odati.com/2012/05/up-karoli-down-sandhaan.html