Raid De Sigandur-Jogfalls-Gokarna-NH4

Well, after the mangalore - calicut ride, it was inevitable Goa ride season, unfortunately my co rider sachin's leaves got cancelled and we had to junk goa plans and i had to figure out alternate plans. Most guys were ok with 4 day ride (constraint was getting leaves not riding :P) So i chartered plans with my xbhp and bikenomads friends.
We almost finalised Pondicherry, but opted out as it was too boring for 4 days. Then it was decided as Rameshwaram!
We were done and next day (2 days before ride or so) i see news and TN bandh is announced on Oct1st or something, which exactly fell on our ride time, now who would want to get stuck in TN with a KA bike and that too on a bandh day??
So the last minute planning led us to the following ride, which by all my ride standards was through THE WORST ROADS i have EVER ridden.


Time for stats:

Ride duration: 29th Sept 07 (Saturday) to 2nd Oct 07 (Tuesday)
Riders and Bikes:


Vasanth - Zma
Venu - Zma
Balaji+nandish - Thunderbird
Manas+Arpita - Thunderbird
Prof.Nanjundappa - Unicorn
Ho0ligaN aka Chetan - Unicorn

Total Kms covered: 1119.7 Kms

Route taken:
Bangalore-tumkur-arsikere-bhadravati-shimoga-sagar-Jogfalls-honnavar-kumta-gokarna-kumta-sirsi-haveri-ranibennur-davengere-chitradurga-tumkur-Bangalore

Pics:
My pics:
http://picasaweb.google.com/vaas2000/SigandurJogfallsGokarnaNH4Ride

Manas's Pics:
http://picasaweb.google.com/manas.saran/GokarnaRide29thSep2ndOct07

Hooligan aka Chetan's Pics:
http://picasaweb.google.ca/chethan.krishna/Gokarna

Pics from other riders awaited.


Retrospection of ride:
Can say that this was my first ride that i enjoyed in rains, it was perfect mixture of light to very light drizzle, sun was playing peek a boo and nature at it's best and all places covered with carpet of greenery. The foggy ghat roads and Foggy views was just amazing! It was first time that we had two bikes of 3 models and taking group pics was fun as we parked same model bikes parallel to each other.
Prof Nanjundappa (English Literature - Christ college) new Bikenomads member, joined us for the first time,This was prof's first group ride, he's been a solo rider all along. We thoroughly enjoyed his company and prof too liked the group attitude and went along with kids like us :P
In the end, me, prof along with manas and arpita rode back to bangalore,while the other three covered Yana and caught up with us late night. Our ride back from kumta to bangalore was uneventful, we took plenty of stops along the way and did a leisurely ride and hit chitradurga by evening and Kamat by 8.45Pm and waited for yana riders to catch up with us. The log is from chetan who did yana along with balaji and venu, Am too lazy to write one of my own :P

Log from Chetan aka Hooligan (xbhp):

Day 1 Saturday
===========
Woke up at 3.30am when my alarm went off, took a quick shower and got ready to leave by 4am. Our meeting point was Metro at yeshwantpur, went there to find vaas,venu,manas and arpita waiting. Since, I had originally planned to leave in the noon, I hadn't filled up fuel, changed engine oil or washed my bike. However, I had kept a liter can of oil thinking that I will have it changed enroute. From metro, I went to the shell pump on Dr.raj road(which is open 24hrs) and tanked up with 900 rupees of fuel(17.8 liters) and went back to metro to find that the other riders still hadn't arrived. so, I told vaas that I will move ahead and wait for them along the way as I had a 10 minute job at hand(I had to give some stuff to my friend as I had changed plans at the last minute). I instantly regretted having forced so much fuel into the tank as my Bike started jerking violently once in a while. The rest of the gang arrived and we moved towards tumkur with me leading, we reached tumkur very soon and waited for manas to catch up as he was(is) still running his bike(bird) in..

We continued riding with prof leading while vaas and balaji tagged along with manas to give him company. We halted at Arsikere and had breakfast. We took a second place at some other place where me and venu had a tender coconut each. The roads from here onwards were totally bad-ass with unending potholes, we made steady progress and halted yet again to have tea at a roadside shop. we reached shimoga and took a break, I found a small mech and had my engine oil changed, we also had lunch at a small time shop(manas couldn't distinguish between mandakki and chitranna that was server, shame on you man ).

We stopped at a nice place along the way to sagara to click some pics, manas' bird had a flat tyre, mounted manas' saddlebags on my bike. prof and manas went back to a small town which we had passed while the rest of the gang carried on towards sagara..

We suffered some more crappy roads and made it to sagara, found a hotel and crashed. After some much needed rest,sleep and tea we went to vardamoola, where river varada originates.. walked around a bit and came back to a place where there was some yakshagana show going on(recommended by prof's old time friend, who is staying in sagara). The style of yakshagana we saw there was very different from what we usually see on tv etc. We came back, had dinner at hotel and went to sleep.

Day 2 - Sunday
===========
Got up at 6.30 or so and got ready to head towards sigandur where you can cross the river on a ferry along with bikes/cars/buses etc. The others went to tank up some petrol, in the meanwhile me and vaas downed a cup of tea. The road from sagara to sigandur is again horrible, we stopped along the way for some pics, then moved ahead. reached the boat place and had breakfast, the ferry arrived by then, we put our bikes on the boat and went to the other side, dint even get off the boat(much to the annoyment of the boat crew) and came back to this side again ..
came back, packed up checked outa hotel and started heading towards jog falls, the roads from here onwards is excellent with fast and flowing curves, we reached a small bridge just before the jog falls and waited for the others to catch up, took some snaps and then moved on to jog. We were reluctant to leave our bags on the bikes, but couldn't carry it along with us either, so balaji and nandeesh spoke to 2 cops who were standing nearby and asked em to keep an eye on our bikes(nandeesh even slid 20bucks into 1 of the cops pocket ). Much to our disappointment, it was completely misty and we couldnt see the falls, it cleared just for a few minutes however. We decided to push ahead, come back to the parking lot to learn that those 2 cops are nowhere to be seen , but all our bags were intact.. we had lunch at jog itself and moved towards honnavar. Manas felt he should top up engine oil, but we couldnt find oil anywhere, so continued.. its ghat section from here onwards, it was competely misty, it was tremendous fun to ride in that atmosphere etc. we stopped along the way for some pics . Slightly after the ghats, the roads were freshly laid and very wide so we started belting heavily, I asked vasant to click few snaps of me cornering but donno what settings to keep(borrowed cam u see ) as most of the images came blurred.. then reached honnavar and took another break for pepsi/tea..

From here onwards to Gokarna we had to take NH17 which has trecherous potholes, me and venu saw balaji going *dhandhana* over 3 successive huge blind potholes at 80kmph with his saddlebags pillion bouncing all over the place. to be frank, we both were little shocked so we hardly exceeded 60kmph after that. we regrouped 20 kms from gokarna, manas' misfortune with flats wasn't over yet, so he was filling up air every 15-20kms and moving ahead while his bags and pillion were strapped to venu's Bike for the ride till gokarna. The gang moved ahead to find accomodation while I tagged along with manas, finding places along the way for him to fill air into his tyre. when we were 4kms from gokarna, called up vasant to ask directions to the hotel. When I got into gokarna, a person standing at the corner of the road which vasant asked me to take to get to the hotel, said "you guys are from bangalore right? 6 bikes, i own the resort I'll show you the way".. we went along with him to find the rest of the gang waiting, It was raining heavily since sometime already and we could see the sea whenever the sky lit up with huge lightnings.

To get to the hotel the owner was taking us to, the following has to be done- do about 1km of hard downhill offroading on slippery gravels(no lights, ur headlamps only) park the Bike at the bottom in the middle of nowhere with no shelter/security, walk 15 mins in some (paddy)fields along with all over luggages. while doing the downhill part, prof even dropped his bike, this seemed like a ridiculous option so we went back up the off road thing in the dark in the rains, on the way up a gate had to be opened, so I stopped my Bike on the uphill while vaas opened the gate and went ahead, but I had stopped on very slippery gravels under both my front and rear tyres, couldnt even get off the Bike coz it was uphill and slipping, venu put his front tyre against the rear tyre of my Bike and I managed to go up without any more issues.. we exchanged some words with the hotel/resort ppl and went off to find some other place to stay.. found some crappy hotel and crashed for the day... rented 2 rooms for 6 of us, but ended up using only 1, coz the other room was riddled with all kinds of insects on the bed..

Day 3 - Monday
===========

Got up early morning and headed towards om beach, the same way that had taken us the crappy resort the previuos night, we stopped along the way for some snaps and moved ahead and saw the off road course we had done the previuos night, no man in his right sense of mind would have done that in day light, we simply fell for it the previuos night

anyway, we got to om beach, went to namaste restaurant and had breakfast, after which vaas,prof,balaji and nandeesh went to play in the water..
I dont get into water, I've never liked it, donno why, I hate getting wet.. so I stayed out, even venu decided to stay off it.. so we both decided we'll walk along the beach. It started raining heavily after a while, after the guys were done with playing we came back and some bhel puri and left to the room, in heavy rains.. we decided to leave our bikes in the hotel and started walking towards gokarna beach, took some snaps along the way and reached the beach to find that it was totally unclean, so we just had tender coconuts. on the way back vaas,prof,venu found some hotel which serves good fish, me being strict veggie went back to hotel along with balaji and nandeesh.. had a bath then we went and ate lunch at some veg hotel.
balaji's bird was also having low pressure in the Bike so we decided to go have it checkd and found that there were 2 punctures, got it fixed. came back to hotel packed up everything and then went towards sirsi.. on the way we found the yana checkpost, stopped at the side of it for 1.5hr long discussion on what should be our plan, should we go ahead to sirsi, halt and then come back to yana or go back now and stay in kumta and go to yana or should we skip yana altogether.

Finally it was decided that we should get back to kumta as that was closer to yana than coming all the way back from sirsi, on the way back I had my very on *dhandhana* on huge successive potholes(only this time I was blinded by a truck's headlights so I locked up my rear wheel just before the potholes, and it happened at the entrance of a corner), I observed everything around me in slow motion and just held on to my Bike while it jumped all around the place.. I came outa it unscathed, I was totally shaken, went ahead slowly and stopped venu and told him what happened stopped at the side for a while. We found a nice hotel and halted there for the night(best hotel we stayed in on the trip), had dinner and went to bed

day 4 - Tuesday
============
We got up early and checked outa the hotel by 5.15am. Me, venu and balaji with nandeesh would go to yana and then to bangalore while the rest of the gang left directly to bangalore along with us.. we reached yana checkpost by 5.50am and dumped our luggage there and waited for it get little brighter as per the checkpost person's advice, we left by 6.15 and started the 16kms of offroading to yana..it was not a difficult course, total gravels + small slushy (not so deep) patches, we made the first 8 kms with no probs, here is the only house along the way where we can get jeep/food etc but since we went this early it was closed, we felt since we did the first half pretty easily we can easily go all the way up, shortly after that I got 1 step closer to being a nomad when I answered nature's call in the forest itself , we continued up the hill and came across more some water streams, etc etc which we negotiated easily.. then came the hardest part, suddenly we encountered 300+ meters long slushy patch with very deep bus/jeep tracks, we struggled real hard for the first 2-3 of such long slushy patches, with our bikes getting stuck, wheels getting buried into the slushy ground completely, we did a lot of physical work to lift the bikes back up onto whatver dry patches were available and continued..

little later we realised its best if we got off the Bike and walked it on such slushy patches, we did some more of those slushy patches and came across a really super bad-ass one, all the bikes got badly stuck at different places, nandeesh said I shud better push my Bike all the way back till the beginnin of the slushy patch and walk it on the other side of the road, while pushing it back, I lost balance on the slush(as it was making my feet sink) and leant the Bike away from me onto the sidewall, my right hand mirror took the beating and got loose, I decided enough is enough, I wont take any more chances and walk till yana rock formations as it was only 3kms ahead, and found a dry bit of land there and parked my bike, we got the other two bikes going and I rode pillion with venu, at the very end of the off road course the whole path was filled with fresh slippery moss, bakaji's Bike did like 270 degree turn, when the rear slipped on the slush and the front tyre stayed as is.. his left peg got bent, finally yana.. it had taken us 1hr 45 mins to do the 16kms of offroading

yana is a very beautiful place, I cant describe it, so I wont even start with it. It's just such a beautiful places within lush green forests, untouched.. virgin beauty I should say..we left our helmets, gloves on the bikes itself without any locks etc.. we started walking up the steps, on the way we took a break at a small temple, few minutes later saw that there was a leach sucking my blood outa from my leg.. got rid of it and moved ahead, my watch stopped working, do fastrack watches stop working at such measly altitudes? .. anyway we totally enjoyed the place till 9.40 and started climbing the flight of stairs down, we were super hungry after all this, and wanted to get back to civilization and eat something.. our helmets, gloves were totally untouched.. there were only few ppl ther and nobody had even bothered to touch our stuff outa curiosity either..

this time we knew the trick about dealing with those long slushy patches, we walked our bikes back, this time venu went too far near the edge and lost balance the same way I did, this time there was no wall on the outside from stopping his Bike crashing completely to the ground... me nandeesh and venu lifted his Bike back up, no damage except bent brake lever, we went ahead and reached the only house there at the 8km mark.. he offered to make us fresh chitranna and we got our bikes water washed from the person, ZMA had special offroading problems, mud/slush/stones had gotten everywhere.. front mud guard specially, which prevented the wheel from moving completely, venu had a tough time getting all that out.. nice food it was, we gulped a lot.. the others were tempted to stay back at his place for the day, but I had to get back and it was getting late already.

we made back to the check post by 12.45, collected our luggage and mounted it onto our bikes, balaji got his footpeg straightened while I got my mirror fixed, we left to sirsi by 1.15 .. its ghat roads again and we did some real good speeds and made it to sirsi in just 50 mins.. got, took a small break in sirsi, network coverage was back so we got msgs from the other group which had left ahead.. they were hardly 100 odd kms ahead of us.. hmm, we belted till haveri in the next stretch and were on the NH4 by 4.10.. it started raining badly now, but we kept riding, doing some decent speeds and stopped at ranebennur reliance pump where the other gang had had lunch in the noon at 5pm.. had some food, filled up enough to reach bangalore and started ripping again, this stretch of NH is very pathetic, 1 stretch of 4 lane and sddenly 1 long stretch of very bad roads with no warning plus trucks and rains really hampered our speeds, we made it to outskirts of chitradurga by 7.45. Now the discussion started, me and balaji were having no probs with riding in the dark, but venu's visor was holding him back and he was doing 40-50kmph.. so balaji suggested we take a room in chitradurga, leave the next morning early and make it bangalore(230kms) by breakfast time, but I wanted to get back home so I suggested they both can stay, I'll ride solo till tumkur where the other gang was having dinner and tag along with them.. we wasted some 30 mins on thinking about wat to do, finally balaji said we'll try riding till sira, if venu is comfortable we'll go ahead else we'll find a nice place and sleep.. the NH4 from chitradurga is fully complete and well lit, so its really a nice stretch, we let venu go ahead and we started 5 mins later.. balaji took the lead and I hung on to his tail, with a safe distance of course, mainly coz my right rear hand indicator had snapped sometime during the ride and the indicators werent functioning as a result.. we started belting the crap outa our bikes, we held a steady 100-110kmph and overtook venu sometime later, and took a break near a reliance pump near sira.. the road is superb, markings and all, sexy it was.. we waited for venu to catch up and left again, balaji doing 90-110kmph and me hanging onto his tail(again with a safe distance of course ).. we made it to tumkur(kamat near dobbspet) by 10.50.. 170kms in 2 hrs, real fun it was.. Manas and Arpita had already left, met vaas and prof, had dinner, settled all the bills, balance and stuff and we left kamat by 12.15am, I was feeling very sleepy after the dinner, I shudnt have eaten I guess.. anyway, I just tailed vasant with droopy eyes till bangalore.. reached yeshwantpur by 12.50, we shook hands and exchanged greetings and went home by 1.15 am