Lonavala: Pavana Dam Boating Trip

Pavana/ Pawana Dam is about 45 mins drive from Lonavala. Since we were already based in Lonavala it served as an ideal place to spend time.
The drive as expected is entirely through hilly narrow one lane roads, so just be careful. Nevertheless the scenery is quite picturesque green especially since we were going at end of monsoon.

The main attraction here is the boating in the lake. View from the parking lot:




There's a garden near the boating club. It also houses a cafeteria which was a relief considering the hot sun.







It has some peacocks and ducks in the free. Nice to see them without cages. However beware of them. Peacocks are not domestic birds but rather wild birds. These ones were in a real attacking mode all the time (one peacock sat on the head and hit its beak in the bald scalp of one of my grandad).








Aah and finally to the main place we made this trip for. There are no paddle/ oat boats that we wanted. Only motor-beats, speed-boats and jet skis. Motor ones being noisy ruin the calmness that could have been experienced during the voyage.




First view of our boat:




We negotiated at Rs. 100 per head for a 18 mins ride by hiring an entire boat and fitting 11 people on it (half of them children so was fine). Life jackets being compulsory is a good thing.
Not that anyone showed us what to do in case of emergency.




Some views from the boat:








Shows the wall of Pavana dam:




Some islands within the lake:






Towards the end of our voyage.




If you drive a little further from the boating point; you can get a view of the dam. Entry is restricted so can only be seen from the outside.