India: Matheran- It's a jungle out there

By the time we got cleaned up and ready to leave it was 10 am. The horse riding guides, touts and porters were out in force looking for work. Because I was at the front I was the main target. The first guy would ask me if I wanted a horse ride and the guy behind him would ask as well just encase I had changed my mind in the few seconds it took me to say no.

Despite the touts Matheran was a really nice peaceful place. No traffic noise and no blaring horns. We headed out to Garbut point which offered a fantastic view. Kathryn and Lynne turned back and Stuart and I dropped down the cliff, scrambling in sandals to continue along the rock promontory. Once out of the shade of the trees it got really hot. Stuart K started to burn and tried to use toilet paper as a face mask. We continued for about another KM and came across a couple of water buffalo wallowing in a pool on our way back.

Avoiding the cliff we had descended we found a path leading to a small village on a flat bit of ground with cliffs above and bellow. We stumbled into the middle of a game of cricket. It was nice to walk through a normal village. There were no tourists so there were no touts. Everyone was very friendly and they all seemed to speak English. They directed us back to Matheran by way of a steep cliff path. Stuart collapsed when we reached the shade at the top. We were out of water and feeling the heat. We stopped at the first cafe we found for a pepsi.

Lynne and Kathryn didn't fair so well. First they got themselves lost so ended up hot and tired. When they got back to the village they bought themselves ice creams. They had just taken their first taste when Kathryn had hers stolen out of her hands by a monkey. Lynne, trying to avoid the same fate, ran around in circles with Kathryn protecting her by fending of the monkeys. They made it back to our hotel only to find a big male monkey waiting on the steps for them. After it hissed and swiped at her Lynne through her ice cream at it and made a run for the door.

When Stuart K and I got back they told us what had happened. There were lots of monkeys around so I gathered up a few stones encase they tried to steal anything else. I left a bottle of pepsi on the bench outside our room. When no one was looking a couple of monkeys rushed in and grabbed it. It threw a stone and it dropped the bottle but before I could get to it the monkey had picked it up again. Kathryn and I both threw stones and Lynne rushed in and grabbed my pepsi. We now knew why the locals disliked the monkeys. The American in the room next door also had problems. When he first arrived he left his door open and went to the toilet. He came out to find a monkey in his room standing over his bag with a bottle of vitamins in its hand. Later he went outside and took a cushion to sit on. He left it outside and the monkeys tore it to pieces. There was fluff everywhere. We spent the rest of the evening chasing of every monkey that came near. An Indian guy was doing the same thing in the next garden. I quite enjoyed our spot of gang warfare. We had a great dinner that night at the plushest hotel in Matheran. We sat at the side of their swimming pool drinking beer and looking out across cliffs until dinner was served. In the middle of the night I was wakened by Kathryn turning on the light. Everyone else had been kept awake by a constant banging on our corrugated iron roof and the tiled balcony at the front of our room. Kathryn thought the monkeys were back and playing with the stones we had gathered to throw at them. She looked outside but couldn't see anything. Now that I was awake I couldn't ignore the noise and couldn't get back to sleep. I sat in the dark peering out the window. In my semi concious state it was disturbing to think that the monkeys could have the intelligence to come back in the middle of the night for their revenge. As I wakened up I thought that maybe someone had seen us chasing the monkeys and didn't like it so had decided to throw a few stones our way. If it was a human then I figured they would stop if they saw a light. I shined my torch out of the window and the noise continued. After another 5 minutes I'd had enough. I grabbed my trekking pole which we had been using earlier to chase the monkeys with and went outside to find out what was happening. The balcony was empty and so was the roof. Then I noticed noise coming from the large tree in front of our room. I shone my torch up at the tree and there was a flap of wings. I could see eyes reflecting in the light. One pair of eyes were swaying beneath a branch and initially I thought it was a snake. I pressed the boost button on my torch and saw that the tree was full of giant fruit bats. They must have been dropping seeds or fruit stones from the tree. Mystery solved I went back to bed. The noise stopped but it took a long time to get back to sleep.