Lazy Weekend Ride with BikeNomads

Had planned this ride with Bengalooru BN chapter as per our earlier BN ride. The ride was done on Saturday, May 31st 2008 with lots of surprises thrown in!

Firstly, most of the regular riders were tied up with professional/personal work and dropped out, the confirmed list shrinked to 7 riders with 2 tentatives thrown in :P The place to ride to itself was debated and finalised on the last day as per confirmed riders choosing. But alas, there were drop outs as the D day neared.
4 BNers ended up starting the ride and 2 BNers finished the ride :P But towards the end of the ride, it was one of most enjoyable 1 day rides i had done till date! explored unknown places and found some new routes and places, with the ride culminating in heavy rains!

Riders and Bikes:

1. Sachin Koppikar - Pulsar 150
2. Prasanna - Pulsar 180
3. Professor Nanjundappa - Unicorn
4. Vasanth - Karizma

Route:
Bangalore>Kanakapura>Bheemeshwari>Muthati>Kanakapura>Thalli(TN)>Hosur>Bangalore

Distance:
275 Kms for me

Pics:
My Pics: Click here

The Ride Log:

Lots of regulars backed out at the last moment and communicated through mail/group/sms about their inability to make it to the ride. The only last moment joinee was Sachin, he informed me the previous day that he would join in provided his bike was in shape, he suspected some engine related problems, he said that he would hitch pillion with me if his bike gave haath. With Balaji being around (he was confirmed) to show the exact location to spend time in Bheemeshwari and with Professor being around to take us through unexplored interior routes, i braced myself for an exciting ride ahead and tried to catch few winks of sleep.

Woke up at 5 Am. The meeting time was 6.15 AM opp to METRO in Kanakapura road, i had to go to Sachin's place as he had doubted about his bike's condition. After sometime sachin gave a green signal about his bike and we both were just about to start towards meeting point, balaji called and expressed his inability to join in for the ride :( looked like the previous night's food had upset his internals :P Poor guy had packed up his cramsters and riding gears and was all set for the ride earlier night, but his internals gave haath on the ride day. I told him that shouldn't be a problem and he should take rest, off we went to meet Professor and Prasanna (or so we thought!) at the meeting point.

We reached there at 6.20Am only to find Professor waiting for us. Checked my cell to find prasanna's message that he would catch up with us later on. I apologised to professor for making him wait, we started off at 6.45 Am after some chitchat and fag break. The weather was cloudy and cool, the irritants were truck/bus traffic as we proceeded. With me leading and Sachin tailing, we munched kms. I was busy enjoying the curvy kanakapura road and started to see that the duo behind me were slowing down considerably, so decided to cruise at 40 kmph for sometime :P After sometime, i saw Sachin in the RVM and tried to speedup, but i saw him honking and flashing his headlamps, signing me to pull over.

Professor caught up too. Looked like Sachin's pulsar had decided to become Autogeared bike! His bike was automatically downshifting from 4th gear to 3rd gear unexpectedly while riding. Now he had second thoughts, I assured him that he could manage as we were hardly 15 kms from Kanakapura, our breakfast point. But he was still skeptical about the bike, I adviced him to park the bike off at some secure place on the highway (near a hotel or school) and then he could hop pillion on my Bike or i could be pillion on my bike and he could ride. He agreed initially and later we proceeded slowly, i found an old school with secure compound, found it an ideal place to park his bike, so we could proceed ahead and then pick up the bike on the way back. Sachin changed his mind suddenly and said that we could proceed with the ride and he would manage with his bike's tantrums :P

We rolled in to Kanakapura, our breakfast destination was the famous "Vasu Hotel" to savour their masala dosas. I had got introduced to this hotel around 3 years back through Bangalore Xbhp guys, who used to plan Masala Dosa rides to this hotel :P After some enquiring with locals (my memory is becoming weak :( ) We found the hotel's spacious back entrance, parked our bikes and went in. The Hotel was not crowded to my surprise! Then i realised that we had gone there on a Saturday, while all my earlier visits earlier were on sundays, it used to be so crowded, that we had to wait for close to 20 mins sometimes to get a seat, or have the dosas standing ala darshini hotels style :P

We found a table and settled in. Prasanna called up and he was enquiring for directions, we gave him specific directions, but still he ended up at another hotel :P Again the telephonic guiding helped him to locate us safely :P We savoured tasty masala dosas/pooris and what nots! The taste was heavenly, so was the price! :P looked like inflation had caught up with this joint too :( But it was still comparitively cheaper compared to any hotel in bangalore. Having filled our tanks :P we were about to proceed, when sachin had a change of heart again! He was determined to ride back to bangalore, cutting short the ride, so that he could handover his bike to AutoService for fixing the issue. All our convincing efforts were waste, the "Humble Giant" :P had made up his mind. So we bid byes to him and the remaining three of us proceeded towards bheemeshwari.

The weather was cloudy and cool breeze welcomed us. It was ideal day to ride on. Soon we found a place for a pic break and settled down for few pics and fag. Prasanna was not carrying his cam, so he was taking pics in my cam, giving me ample free time to soak in to the surroundings :P



After the pitstop, we proceeded again. Sun started to show up, the clouds were gone. Smooth roads all the way with lots of greenery around due to rains the earlier day, we were busy enjoying the scenic views and munching kms. Soon we hit Bheemeshwari fishing camp area, found the usual spots too crowded, lots of tourist junta had ambuished good spots near river :( We enquired with locals and they told we could head to Muthati for better isolated spots. So off we went in search of such isolated river bed spots. We noted down few such spots on the way, but still the hope of finding better spots made us go further ahead, not that i was complaining :P the roads were too good and sparce traffic made it a biker's delight.

We saw a Car trying go through one of the paths in to the jungle, so we decided to follow. The "road" was nothing but full of sand/gravel and rocks, predictably the car guy gave up after some distance and they parked to alight and walk all the way through that path. While we decided to explore further, it was a steep climb, had some scary moments. Prasanna and Me were riding on while professor wisely stopped at the foothill seeing the terrain. The path seemed to go on and on, so we stopped, i got a scare while alighting from the bike, my foot just slipped! there was no grip to give traction in that gravel and mud. Somehow managed to balance myself and safely put the bike on sidestand. Prasanna went to look ahead while i clicked a few snaps of the unforgiving offroad.



Prasanna came back and said that the path further ahead was motorable to someextent and later we had to trek, we ditched the idea and decided to climb down the offroad towards the mainroad. The fun began! I was the first to go, turning my bike was huge task given the limited width and uneven path, once turned, it was downward spiral in gravel/sand and rock, i was shit scared, i didn't want to drop my bike. I took my bike towards the downward journey, i saw professor positioning his cam and recording video of my antics! :P My bike's rear was dancing all over with out any traction due to stock zapper tyres, I switched off ignition and tried to control the bike downward using gears, after lots of scary moments, i managed to get down from the nightmarish path. Prasanna followed, he somewhat easily glided down, i guess he has offroading experience. Phew! we were glad that we made it down in one piece, we decided to have a fag break, when we noticed a monkey family looking at us amused!



:P After taking few "daring" pics with the monkey khaandaan, we proceeded towards muthati spot, which we had noted down earlier. There was a temple nearby, the priest offered to guard our lids, so we dropped off our lids in temple and carried on towards the river bed. We were the only ones there and it was calm and scenic with the river flowing and birds chirping. Prasanna went click happy capturing the scenery and few butterflies which were hovering around.



The calmness was shattered with the arrival of "honeymoon travels" kinda bus! Filled with all newly married junta and entire khaandaan, which was much worse than the khaandaan we had encountered earlier :P Needless to say, the photo-ops and silence was ruined with few monkeys from that family. We got the clue that it was time to move on, so we decided to head back to Kanakpura for lunch and from there to take the new route back to bangalore. Went back to the temple, picked up our stuff and rode on, we were passing through some amazing twisty roads, I could see prasanna honking. I let him overtake and he pointed towards the road ahead, Viola! It was a very smooth tempting curve with a slight elevation! Perfect place to take some cornering pics!



So out came our Cameras, It was prasanna’s turn first, so off he went while professor picked a nice spot to shoot his share of pics, I ventured towards a elevated point after doing some “offroading” walking :P I was still in my full gear as I had to go next, so dangling the camera over my neck and walking with the helmet and gloves on took some effort and needless to say, I was sweating like a pig inside after few seconds. But it was worth it, the angle i got was good, I could capture the entire curve in one frame so I waited for prasanna to approach. Clicked some good shots, but prasanna was not satisfied with his approach, so off he went for his second try and this time he took the curve nicely and the pics too came out good.



It was my turn next, Handed over my camera to prasanna and I insisted that he climb up to the elevation point that I was at to get the same angle :P Poor chap did climb and perched on top while I got on to my zma and zoomed off towards starting point. I wasn’t too happy with my first try at the curve, so off I went again and the second time I managed to tilt the bike to my satisfaction with a wide grin plastered under my helmet after the effort :P It was time to look at the pics and they had come out very well, one of the best pics of my taking curves indeed!



We moved on as it was getting hot, We rode on and reached Kanakpura town by 2 pm. Professor and me decided to have lunch in one of hotels there. But prasanna had to get back to Bangalore as he had some work, so off he went after bidding us goodbyes. This was a strange ride indeed with riders dropping off right from morning, first it was sachin as his pulsar decided to become “auto gear” bike :P now it was prasanna, Me and professor carried on, we spotted a nice hotel near by and decided to fill up to brim :P After loads of Chicken and mutton with a few chappatis and rice thrown in, we were full :P We spent more time discussing about all sundry things.
We moved on from there by 3.30 pm and professor’s route was to be taken, professor had found a relatively unexplored route from kanakpura towards Anekal, so we took the deviation from kanakpura and proceeded towards Anekal The roads were butter smooth, I was delighted to see such good roads after the kanakpura roads, that too with almost little or no traffic! After some time we found a nice village and took a butt break there much to the curiosity of the villagers there :P Found a cute calf and future mode of transport there :P



Village folks were overjoyed when they heard us speak in kannada and more when they found out that we were localities, they were having lengthy talks with professor who had hard time explaining to them about why “simply” we were riding from Bangalore from morning only to end up in Bangalore again! :P While I got busy clicking after a fag, trying to capture the smooth roads and the surroundings




We got going from there after a couple of minutes after bidding bye to the localities there, the rain gods were taunting us with slight drizzle, so we put on rain coats for our tank bags. But the drizzle stopped and it was just cloudy later on. I had to tank up on the way and we found a rickety old bunk, had no choice, so I filled up for 200 bucks and we moved on. The roads and scenery were just amazing, professor and me were signing to each other many times showing our appreciation towards the whole scenery and the route. Soon we approached the deviation towards Anekal, only to be told by localities that a Bandh was announced in that town and there was some tension. Professor immediately had another route in mind, that would go via a place called “thalli” in TN and from there to Hosur! Professor is a walking talking Atlas I tell you! :P

So off we went towards “thalli” The scenery was again mesmerizing, no traffic yet again except for an odd truck or bus. The cloud cover was still there and at one point, the clouds too good with the sun trying to play hide and seek, it was time for out butt break too, so by 5 pm, we stopped at that spot and started clicking some amazing pics!




We got going after the clicks and by 5.30 we found another amazing stretch of road with good scenery too! Since it was already evening, we decided to take last of pics at this spot and proceeded with the clicking session.



A shepherd boy there got curious and got talking to us, we realized after talking to him that we had stopped exactly at the Karnataka – TamilNadu border! The border was marked by a 3 foot stick planted on road side which was painted in white and green :P We were technically clicking pics from Karnataka though! :P Some shots came out real good, thanks to the straight long road ahead.




We got going by 5.45 pm. We decided to stop at Hosur directly which was still some 45 kms ahead. It was already getting dark, so resigned to our fate that we will be hitting Bangalore only by night. One the way to hosur, rain gods lost their patience and the down pour started! We rode in rain and it was already 7 pm. I struggled a bit due to my spectacles getting fogged, managed to drag myself till hosur. Ride till hosur was okish as the two lane road had sparse traffic and street lights to some extent, but the moment we hit the NH in Hosur, things got screwed, visibility was zero due to rain and to top it up, we had to be on left lane, the slow moving trucks ahead were spraying rain water from their tyres towards us. I was finding it extremely difficult to even see the rear view mirrors the traffic was heavy too. So I signed to professor to pull up ahead.

We thankfully found a hotel which was situated inside a large complex with a spacious compound with trees and all. It was still pouring cats and dogs, so we parked our bikes and ran for cover. Found seats and savioured hot bonda and bajjis :P They never tasted so good. We thought we will make a move when the rains slow down. So we waited there and gulped down god knows how many plates of hot spicy munchy eatables and loads of tea, we even found maddur vada there! I hadn’t imagined that I will be eating maddur vada in hosur one day! The rains showed no signs of abating so me and professor had a nice chit chat about every topic under the sun :P before we could realize, it was already 9 pm! Still it was pouring, we decided to move on slowly and reach Bangalore.

The next few kms were the most horrible ride for me, I absolutely hated it being there at that time! With loads of trucks/buses/cars and Suvs racing past me with their blinding headlamps and shitting shrill horns, my spectacles getting fogged, my puny 55/60w headlamp not illuminating enough for me to gauge the road ahead of me. It got worse once we crossed over to Karnataka, the elevated flyover construction going on had made the roads water logged and there were no clear markings on the road shoulders! Veering to extreme left made me go through nasty potholes while trying to stay in middle lane meant the cages zooming past me by inches, I rode on by guess work and found professor once or twice on the way, he was somehow better off than me riding in that situation. So I signed to professor near bommanahalli that I would move on and we parted ways. From there on, it was “Auto pilot” mode for me as it is my usual route to and fro office :P
Reached home around 11 Pm. Totally drenched and with all the dirt on hosur road sprayed on my lid, riding gear and bike, but still I had a big wide grin under the helmet :P