Hyderabad City, rooted in the Deccan Plateau, has always been considered as a great place for people who love adventure, climbing rocks, and trekking. Khajaguda Hills, near the IT hub in Khajaguda village, is a popular spot for trekking and rock climbing, and it’s really close to HiTech city, just about 5 to 10 minutes’ drive. I’ve seen these hills with big rocks for many decades, but I never took a close look at them, or explored them via trekking and hiking.

Hyderabad is lucky to have lots of natural rocks scattered around the city, even in busy areas. These rocks are supposedly about 2500 million years old, formed when the Earth’s surface cooled down, per internet sources. This makes Hyderabad’s rocks some of the oldest in the world!  Unfortunately, these old rocks are getting pushed out today. As the city grows, the rocks are being removed to make space for new roads, buildings, and homes. They’re disappearing fast, and soon these heritage rocks might be gone.

This Sunday, I went on a small trek with Praveen Muthyala to try out his Mavic Mini drone. We used Google Maps to get to Khajaguda Hills and parked our car where it said, ‘You have arrived’.  A quick 10-minute walk brought us to the top of the hill, showing us some amazing views. The trek to the top was easy, with no set path, so we could go wherever we wanted.

As we went up, we saw people already there, climbing rocks without any gear, just using gaps and cracks like human lizards—it was amazing! Hyderabad’s mix of nature and adventure is really special, and we got to see it up close that day.