Sir Ed Hillary in the Sahyadris

About twenty years ago, my friend and partner in many adventures, Avi, sprang yet another bright one at me. An opportunity to meet the conqueror of Sagarmatha, the friend of the Sherpas and poster boy of all of us who grew up in the shadows of the Himalayas, Sir Edmund Hillary.

He was reading a small news item tucked away in a Bombay newspaper which announced that our childhood hero, Ed Hillary was going to speak in the city and also inaugurate a Lonavla- Mahabaleshwar hiking trail in the Western Ghats aka Sahyadri mountains.

Both of us, although just out of college, had managed to sell a couple of travel features to local newspapers to qualify as freelance journalists. A half-page travel feature in that morning's Sunday Observer, gave us the guts to gatecrash into the Rotary fund raising function at a five star hotel where he was going to speak.

To a packed hall, Hillary spoke of the majesty of the Himalayas, the humility of Sherpas, the joy of standing at the top of the world, his friend Tenzing, his love for nature and his desire to improve the lives of the Sherpas. He also spoke about the natural beauty of his home country New Zealand and how he was looking forward to discover the Sahyadri range over the next few days in a private visit.

When he uttered the word 'private visit' again later at the press conference, Avi and I were convinced that we had to, absolutely had to gatecrash the 'private' part of Hillary's trip. Both of us were adept gate crashers, we regularly gatecrashed weddings along marine drive for free food, private parties for free drinks and homes of girlfriends for free TLC.

While I shamelessly flirted with a matronly Rotarian lady to tease out more details about the trip, Avi worked on making a good impression on the most senior Rotarian around, doing his best to look like an intense and bright young journalist, chased by the best editors in town and the future of travel writing. Our insidious persistence paid off and the organizers more to get rid of us, said alright , if we turn up at 4 am at the railway station, they will consider taking us along

Next morning at crack of dawn, to their disbelief, both of us were at Victoria Terminus Station. There were a bunch of Rotary exchange students from US, NZ and UK, a few Rotarians, Ed Hillary and his wife,a kindly lady who convinced the organizers that it was okay for two of us to travel with them until Lonavla. We were grateful and got on to the train to begin a journey that I knew I would remember fondly for ever. The hosts had grudgingly resigned themselves to having us 'parasites' on board until Mahabaleshwar, whether they liked it or not and informed their contacts ahead of the journey about our presence to ensure boarding and lodging arrangements.

From Lonavla, after a hearty breakfast, we started walking into the heart of Sahyadris, on a lesser known and even less traveled trail. Edmund Hillary , despite his age was fitter than we imagined and soon he had left the official guide and the rest of the huffing-puffing bunch far behind. I had sworn that I would use my expensive Kodachrome sparingly, but soon found myself burning film , after all I was the only photographer around and the only one who would have pictures of the old man with the Sahyadris in the backdrop.

At the subsequent stops during the day's trek, Avi and I managed to sneak short conversations, mostly polite, with our hero. Hillary of course was a total gentleman. Gangly, dark hair, bushy eyebrows, a towering ,brooding and yet energetic presence. Sometimes we would hear him grunt in appreciation of the gorgeous vistas of the western ghats and occasionally he would ask us to identify a bird, a peak in the distance, read Marathi and Hindi signs. Awestruck, we followed him for next two days, until we reached Mahabaleshwar, where he finally granted us an hour long interview.

The interview with one tiny black and white photo was eventually published in an eveninger published by Times of India many weeks later. I never saved the clipping but savor memories of my ascent of Mahabaleshwar in the company of none other than the first man on Mount Everest. I still remember giggling with Avi and repeating " Well George, we finally knocked the bastard off" -Hillary's first words to lifelong friend George Lowe on returning from Everest's summit.
RIP Sir Ed !
(Photo of Sahyadri range around Lonavla shot last week during my train ride from Bombay to Bangalore)