Random Musings of a Bikenomad

Looong break

2008-11-29T05:16:00.004+05:30

Well, there's no excuse for such a long break from blogging, it's a mixture of office work + watching tons of torrent downloaded movies (good ones, not what some dirty minds might be thinking of :P ) + Laziness + poor time management which has led to this sorry state of affairs. It's not that biking suffered all the while, i managed 2 rides from the time i last posted. One was a one day ride, while the other was a 5 day ride, got lots to post about, i hope someday i will get back the groove and the posts shall flow.

Getting back to the daily grind till then.

My Miniature Garage

2008-08-16T11:50:00.002+05:30

After weeks of playing GTA San Andreas, after killing N number of people in it and blowing up cars and bashing up cops :P Iam doing a write up, Got lots of to post about, will start off with a smaller one this time.

Added few more miniatures to my small collection of 1:12 scale models. This time caught them at Shoppers stop in Garuda mall. What I didn’t notice while buying them was that these maals are old stock (almost a year old!) and they are selling at Mrp of Rs 375/- while the earlier ones I bought from Coupons store near my old office in Hosur road were of new stock and I had bought them for Rs 345/- each :( Well, i guess I will have to hunt coupons store next time onwards. This time I added two bikes and a jeep. The Two bikes are Suzuki GSX R1000 and my first tourer bike Yamaha FJR1300

The Jeep is a 1:27 scale model, it costed Rs 495/- I bought it for the colour and the finishing. I liked the detailing that went in to the bonnet (literally!) and the tyres! The jeep looks very real indeed! The red and black combo was irresistible, next iam looking for a decent looking Hummer or a SUV like pajero.

Now these additions bring up the population of miniatures to six 1:12 bikes and one 1:27 cage. While there is one more 1:18 Honda CBR 600RR which i consider irrelevant due to it’s poor finishing. The bikes in my miniature garage so far are:
Honda CBR 1000RR
Aprilia RSV R1000
Suzuki GSX 1300 R (Hayabusa)
Suzuki GSX R1000
Yamaha YZF R1000
Yamaha FJR1300

My elusive hunt for BMW GS1200 continues, I guess these stores don’t stock it coz it is “ugly” bike compared to the other “dhoom” bikes :P Need to find more touring bikes in future. Did a small photo shoot one night with all the miniatures using my N73, was too lazy to reach out for my camera :P but the pics turned out to be good. Few pics from the photo shoot:

For the entire album, click here
For older photo shoot, click here

R1Fived!

2008-08-02T23:22:00.002+05:30

No, not me, but one person whom I least expected to! Santoosh got R1fived few days back and it was a shocker to me.

Why? Because he already had one of a kind beast bike, which I had ridden earlier. On asking why, I realized that he hardly had any options.
Broadly, he had considered these bikes:
Karizma, Bullet (unit construction TB) and R15 (as it is the latest in market)
Yes, no Pulsar 220 :P coz it’s just not reliable enough for him or for that matter, me.

Karizma:
This would give him just smoothness and refinement over his torque machine Pulsar. No power difference. Plus the headache of costly spares and Rs 80K plus for a 5 plus year old model in market didn’t make sense.

Bullet:
Well, he did try out a thunderbird in earlier ride, but he was not impressed with vibes. He also test rode the new Thunderbird with unit construction engine, but he felt that it was bike with identity crisis, as it didn’t sound a like a bull any more, the thump was missing, the “feel” was missing. Also the over all package didn’t appeal to him. Also paying 1 lakh plus for a vintage looking bike didn’t make sense. I don’t blame him either, he’s still a young chap and needs to have a fancy looking bike for obvious reasons :P

R15:
This one impressed him not because of it’s power or blah blah. Purely because it is a ground breaking product. He took the test ride with a pinch of salt and the usual sarcasm that it is technologically overloaded poser bike, but one ride made him change his mind. Now that is one aspect that I didn’t get, for a guy who’s bored out his Pulsar 180 to 200 cc and earlier ran with an Esteem’s piston (!!) how can a 150cc poser looking bike impress such a sound bike techie guy?

So we decided to find out. Me and sachin had gone to Cramster to buy some gear for our mangalore friend sujay, Santoosh stays near by so we dropped by to his place to take a look at his new set of wheels. It was the first time I saw a R15 in flesh, must say, it left quite an impression!

Pics: Click here

SBK owners should be cursing themselves! Coz R15 is no less than a SBK when seen from side and front. The entire front and side is Ala the bigger brother R1.It’s easy to get fooled that it’s a SBK when seen from front :P

The fit and finish on this bike is something unmatched by ANY Indian bike that I have seen till date. Plus it’s loaded with technology like FI, Daisil cylinder, Delta frame, mono shock (different from unicorn mechanism) Liquid cooled engine! It’s got it’s own radiator! Not to forgot the full faring unlike the bikini and thong farings on Karizma and Pulsar 220 :P

The rear of the bike is not that exciting, looks like Yamaha limited to copying only to front and sides of the bike, the rear looks like a normal Indian bike. The fit and finish impressed me, the joints are not awkward, plastic panels don’t have shitty gaps, The paint quality and plastic quality is mind blowing.

While I was still taking pics and admiring it, sachin literally jumped on to it :P He wanted a ride badly to see what is that Yamaha chaps are yapping about and how santoosh got coverted to a Yamaha owner. One ride and back, sachin didn’t want to get down from the bike :P I was like, what is there in this bike that made him not to get down from the saddle. While, I wanted to try out the bike, I was also thinking of santoosh, it was just a 2 day old bike and any one who’s bought a new bike, that too costing 1 lakh plus, wouldn’t like to give any one a ride so soon. But santoosh generously asked me to take it for a ride, I was bit hesistant initially, and just wanted to sit on it and feel the riding posture and stuff.

Hmm, the riding posture is unlike any other Indian bike, the footrests are way way beyond than Karizma, The split on handle bars appeared very narrow for me. Sachin clarified that the posture is similar to Yamaha YZF R6, which he had ridden earlier. But then, I have never ridden or even sat on a sbk, so I guess all sbks have such narrow handle bars. Then I took it on a short spin. It was initially difficult to judge the turn due to shorter handlebar and it’s small movement would make the wheel turn a lot, later I got used to it. The engine is very very silent, the gears are like Honda, butter smooth, throttle is crisp and very precise. Gear shifting is something very very precise and enjoyable. The rear view mirrors are functional unlike pulsar 220’s show piece mirrors. No vibes nothing! I forgot to mention, as soon as ignition is turned on, the rpm needle rises to the max and drops :P Just like self test or something.

Bike is full DC. Has 35 watts dual headlamp. One comes on in lowbeam and both are on in high beam. The clock was missing from console : ( that’s something I’ve gotten addicted to in karizma. The horn was typical wimpy single horn like herohonda : ( But apart from these minor glitches, the bike is indeed a marvel in Indian market. Yamaha claims atleast 130 or 135 kmph on this 150cc pocket rocket, I don’t doubt that either, with it’s 6 speed gearbox and all the gizmos, it will rape all Indian bikes in straight line and corners. The rear tyre looks deceptive but gives excellent Pirelli/Michelin kinda grip. But they are surprisingly zappers and are tubeless. The rear disc break is very much like drum brake, no nasty rear wheel locks. The front brake is very Karizmaish, I got the same progressive feel in R15 front brake.

Ground clearance looked acceptable, but I was apprehensive about the front shocks. The gap between the front faring and front mudguard looked inadequate to swallow Indian road humps and craters, but I guess we will have to find out in one of the rides. Yes, rides! Santoosh intends to use this track machine for touring! Now that is something we will have to see. The riding posture and limited space to carry lugguage is something iam not sure about, but then again, he will figure out a way soon I guess.

Well, finally I can sum up by saying that R15 excited me as a bike enthusiast with all it’s ground breaking technology, fit and finish, performance etc, but as a tourer, Karizma still makes sense to me. I guess Karizma will continue to be my touring machine till some worthwhile upgrade in terms of a tourer comes in to market. But R15 makes sense for that perfect weekend ride out of town and to ride around town. If I was in Santoosh’s position, I guess my choices would have been limited to new Thunderbird or R15. Not a Karizma as it’s 5 year old model and over priced. I guess the tourer side of me would have made me bite the bullet and take my chances :P

That being said, I congratulate Santoosh on his new procession. Let the kms flow brother!

Ride to Kailashagiri and Unisey Thopu

2008-07-14T11:47:00.002+05:30

Wanted to do a short ride on a lazy Sunday. Had left the planning to professor, but with a condition that this time the route and place should be new. Trust the professor for routes and as usual the ride plan was in place with Professor in lead. As usual there were last minute drop outs and four of us ended up doing this short ride. Professor had east ward plans towards chintamani (AP) route, I hadn’t ventured towards that route so I readily agreed.

Riders and Bikes:

1. Professor – Unicorn
2. Vasanth – Karizma
3. Balaji – Thunderbird
4. Santoosh – Pulsar 180/200 :P

Route:
Bangalore>Hoskote>Chitamani Road>Kaivara>kailashagiri>Devanahalli>Bangalore

Pics:
My Pics: Click here

Ride Log:

Met up with Santoosh first near ulsoor and waited for my colleague :P Balaji. Then we three proceeded towards the hanging bridge where professor was waiting for us. The road towards hoskote from there was full of traffic and with odd potholes and humps. It was frustrating initially to ride, later got in to the groove. Just after hoskote, the tarmac improved and traffic dwindled. Santoosh and Balaji were ahead of me and professor was tailing me, so I proceeded further, happy that I could raise the throttle after a long time. Then I could see Balaji behind me honking! I had over shot the deviation and went straight seeing the good roads! So took a U turn and joined the junction were the other 2 were waiting. This was chintamani road and it was fabulous to ride on. No potholes, no traffic and no road humps! Good smooth tarmac and some good short curves. We stopped at a curve to take a butt break.

I started taking pics. I wanted to try out the bull, so off I went for a short spin on it. On my return, all were suggesting that I dump my zma and get a bull as it was suiting my profile! Balaji was using all his convincing skills to make me a bulleteer :P But, iam not a bull type person, it’s fun for me to take a bull for a spin once in a while, but a bull cannot replace my zma’s practicality and ease of use. Santoosh felt the bull pangs :P Off he went with the bull, while we tried to take few “bull riding” shots of his :P

He had another point of view, that of vibes! Well bull and vibes are part of it’s character, but he seemed to have hard time accepting it :P Next it was professor’s turn to take the bull for a spin! Bull’s seating was higher than professor’s unicorn, so it was difficult for professor to keep his foot on ground. After the initial discomfort, professor took off with the bull roaring while we took a few pics of professor with bull :P

Professor was excited about bull’s different feel, but the practical problem of seating height made his reconsider bull as his next choice. Even we felt that it would be difficult for professor to manage a bike with high seating height. We all suggest professor to try out Avenger 200. It was time to move. Balaji wanted few orkut profile snaps, so we obliged :P It was already 8.30 Am and we were feeling hunger pangs, so we moved from there towards Kaivara. We reached Kaivara by 9 Am and found a local hotel there. Had tasty Dosa, lemon rice, bondas and all munchable stuff. We decided to hit a park cum zoo in the outskirts there. The Zoo is maintained by forest department and has monuments galore. Ranging from 9 planets to astrological signs to gods to even streets named after seasons! Few Monuments had old poetry written on them.

After walking for a while, we found few interesting monkeys under a tree and Balaji was trying to get a close up pic of the primate :P

Then we found a Crocodile resting in it’s enclosure followed by a peacock enclosure.

Later we found couple of wolves in their enclosure, it was difficult to get a good pic of these fellows as they were restless and running all around.

Next up was porcupine! I had never seen one, it was difficult initially to see it as I mistook it for shade and broom :P and also make out whether I was clicking it’s ass or face :P both looked the same :P thankfully the fellow was eating and I could click!

Next up was a huge open enclosure for deers. I had only seen two variety of deers during my outing to kerala and bandipur. Those were spotted deer and sambar deer. Here, there were close to 5 different species.

One young deer was very friendly and Balaji was feeding grass to it through the fence.

After that we saw few Cobras coiled up in their enclosure. The python was not to be seen at it’s enclose so dropped by a lazy bear in it’s enclosure.

We had completed one huge round of the zoo and it was time to move on to kailashagiri. After a cool drinks break at a shop near by, we moved on. The approach road towards kailashagiri was mini ghat road, it was fun taking corners. Soon we approached the entrance. We had to park the bikes and walk for a km or so. We dumped our stuff at a near by temple office and we climbed the steps towards the cave temple. Kailashagiri is a series of temples inside a monolith cave. The huge rock has been carved out using some high tech equipments. I forgot how many years they took to drill such a huge hole inside the monolith rock! But the entrance was deceptive, once inside the carved out space was as big as a huge hall!

Work is still in progress in cave and they are still digging and drilling. The completed portions are open for public. We came out after the visit and rested for a while, the scenery outside was good too.

We moved on and on our way down from there, found a small dam. We parked for a while there, but had to move on as there was no shade. We hit chintamani main road after sometime and hit a dhaba for lunch. After heavy lunch and chat sessions, we moved on towards Unisey thopu or tamarind groove. Professor was telling that the trees were very old, prolly some centuries together. Before moving out after lunch, I swapped my zma with Balaji for his bull. It was fun riding a bull for close to 30 kms. The riding posture, feel etc were exact opposite of my zma.

We stopped midway to enquire routes, this time santoosh wanted to try the bull, so I hopped on to his torquey pulsar. I was surprised seeing the direction boards pointing to devanahalli as it led towards the new international airport. It turned out that this tamarind groove is situated near the new airport! We found the first of trees by the road side and went in for snaps.

The trees were huge and old, but had strange formations. Each had number stapled on them. We moved on and we towards the number 1 tree, it is the oldest of the lot there. We parked the bikes underneath the tree.

Few trees were dying out due to old age, but their offsprings were hale and healthy. I was glad that atleast this part of greenery escaped from the airport work. The scenery was good, calm and cool with birds chirping, interrupted frequently by planes taking off or landing.

After whiling time there, it was time to move on. While Santoosh and me felt that going via new airport highway would be nearer, Balaji and professor had to go via KR Puram hanging bridge. After a final tea break, we parted ways. Santoosh wanted to check out the new Airport, so he ventured towards airport while I headed home and reached by 6 pm. Over all it was a short sweet weekend ride. Thanks to professor for this discovery!

50000 kms in 3.3 years!

2008-06-20T22:37:00.001+05:30

It had to happen :P I was on my way to office today on my Zma, nearing whitefield, my moment of joy flashed on the speedo console, the reading was 50000 kms in odo meter. It was time for Kodak moment :P so pulled over to the side and clicked the momento picture on my phone camera.

It’s been 3 years and 3 months since I became a tourer, Zma transformed me from a city commuter on a splendor to a tourer. I still remember the day when me and good friend of mine had gone to Prakash motors during lunch break on a week day straight from office to book and choose my zma from the lot :P there were 3 Silver Zmas, I didn’t start or even touch any of those, just saw the three of them and chose mine, I had this gut feeling that this bike is the one among the lot :P Haven’t regretted till date, won’t regret in future either.

Googling for Zma’s feed back introduced me to biking groups like Xbhp and touring group BikeNomads. I made many friends over all these years through these two groups and met interesting people. I opened a new chapter of touring after I bought zma, she has taken me through various places, places I had earlier seen on map or seen only through Tv :P She gave me freedom to fly on two wheels to any destination that earlier were “so far” :P I honed my riding skills on zma over a period of time and she was very forgiving whenever I erred, never ever let me down even in the worst of the scenarios.

Even when I crashed for the first time in Kemmangundi’s horrible roads, she took all the brunt and spared me the injuries. At the same time, she didn’t get crippled, after minor repairs at a local service center there for 1 hour, she was ready to be ridden back with a pillion and cramster saddle bags to boot! Sachin was belting her at 90 – 100 kmph on the way back from crash, still she didn’t make a fuss out of it. Gave her a complete make over after reaching Bangalore and now she’s as good as a new bike. Didn’t mind that getting her back to old self after the crash drained me financially, It was my way of saying thanks to the trusty old battle scarred war horse.

Each Km of the 50k kms have been bliss so far, she’s been an excellent commuter in city for my office – home commutes so far in my earlier office and a reliable tourer machine in all my rides out of town. I will be getting a Cab now on for my daily office commutes in new office, so she’s going to be spared of horrible city commutes, which she had to bear the brunt of all these years. Now on she’s gonna much kms only on highways majorly. Over a period I did pamper her with usual spares that get worn out, after the crash, I got a entire new set of “clothes” :P new set of tyres, 55/60w headlamp bulb and recently added a custom made crashguard to save her costly “clothes” :P from damage. Am planning to gift her twin horns soon and a HID later.

I can sum up by saying that Zma’s an excellent machine which is an excellent commuter and tourer if ridden and maintained properly. It does have it’s own share of flaws like flimsy plastic panels, astronomically priced spares, shortage of spares etc, but I guess all logic fails when I see the pics from all my rides and imagine the fun I had in each of those rides! Those moments are priceless!

An Encounter with a Cheetah!

2008-06-10T20:24:00.000+05:30

Nah, not of the four legged variety, but a two wheeled one :P Iam talking about the Patrol bikes of Police in Bangalore, they are called Cheetah and are also painted like cheetah. Well, I didn’t get on the wrong side of the law or any such thing, I just happened to get a closer look on one of the police Cheetahs today.

Me and my friend Girish (he’s a cop) were on our way to Whitefield, I wanted to do trial runs from home to Whitefield as my new office is situated there :P Wanted to get familiarized with the Potholes, road humps, danger zones etc from a biker’s point of view, which will facilitate me in getting in to “auto pilot” mode during my future home – office commutes (for few days till iam provided a cab) I wouldn’t want to be happily cruising in my comfort speed and spot an unexpected pothole or road hump at the last moment, I wanted the same kind of comfort level that I had for 5.5 years while commuting through Hosur Road to my earlier office. (Yeah, iam psychotic :P )

This was my second venture towards that route, I was getting familiarized with the N number of Road humps in Whitefield, made a mental note of those and was returning back home, when girish spotted one of his colleague on the Cheetah Patrol bike of Whitefield Police station. I stopped the bike and both the cop friends started talking. My attention turned towards this “mama” bike :P I had an excellent opportunity to get a deeper look at the various gizmos attached to it, so I started clicking few pics with my Phone Camera.

Then Girish’s Cop friend told me that I could take close up pics of the gizmos if I wanted to! So, I started clicking. The bike was of newer batch, it was a Pulsar 150 V3 (digital meter one) The standard fittings were the noticeable side box (to carry papers and the dreaded Fine book! :P) The two prominent Siren lights, a loud speaker, an amplifier for the sirens (with various modes in it) and a walkie talkie holder. The lathi is kept between the gap of sidebox, seat and footpeg.
I got curious as to how all these devices were mounted and started to take a closer look.

The Siren lights (2) are mounted on to a Bull bar type Crash guard on each side. The loudspeaker is connected is held by a small nut on the Starter motor! The Amplifier and Walkie talkie stand are made of metal and are fixed crudely between two rear view mirror mounting nuts! But they do their job though. The Amp is pretty heavy, but it sits steadily in this jugaad. The Amplifier is for the Siren Lights, the Amplifier has Volume control for the siren sound, different type of siren modes eg, Ambulance, fire, police! There’s even a microphone input for cops to plugin a microphone for announcements!

I was thinking that all these devices would have some additional battery as power source, I was surprised when the Cop told me that they all run on Pulsar’s stock 9 amps battery! I asked him then how does it handle the load, he told me that if they use the sirens a lot, then the battery goes kaput in a month or two and then they need to replace it! The cop also told that’s why they don’t use those sirens or speaker that much as it ends up killing the battery! I guess that’s why these devices are always a show piece in traffic as well as crime police vehicles.

I guess it’s the same story with older police bikes like the bullets. The cop also told me that now they are issuing Pulsar 180s and Apache 150s to crime as well as traffic departments. The day is not far when we are doing 80 -100 kmph in Ring road and we get pulled over by a traffic cop on a white Pulsar 200/220 for overspeeding!

It was time to move on, so i thanked the cop for letting me take the pics and patiently answering my queries and we both moved on towards home. Thanks to my friend Girish, I got a closer look at the cheetah from a biker’s point of view. Will try to get a closer view of police four wheeler Hoysala next time if I get a chance, but with out getting into it! :P

Lazy Weekend ride with Professor

2008-06-08T23:29:00.004+05:30

This was supposed to be a CCD meet and ended up being a srirangapatna meet :P Weekend was approaching, called professor to see if we could meet up to discuss future ride prospects, while I proposed a meet in our usual ccd on Sunday, professor had a ride plan in mind, Srirangapatna is famous for it’s heritage and equally famous for it’s non-veg Military hotels! Professor suggested that we start the lazy ride on Sunday morning by 7.30 Am, move towards Mandya, from there take deviation towards temple town Melukote and from there hit Srirangapatna. Have lunch there at a famous military hotel and return back to Bangalore with a pit stop in Maddur CCD.

Plan sounded too tempting and I gave in, so the last minute ride was decided on Saturday! Last minute sms sent to riders predictably evinced zero interest as most of the guys had already planned up events for their Sundays. But Praveen T responded that he would join us half way through have breakfast in maddur and head back to Bangalore as he had some work. So it just 3 of us who were going to be in this ride and 2 riders were going to complete the ride, looked like the trend of riders breaking off midway in the ride was gonna continue from my earlier ride :P

Riders and Bikes:

1. Professor - Unicorn
2. Vasanth – Karizma
3. Praveen T – Unicorn

Route:
Bangalore>Maddur>Mandya>Melukote>Srirangapatna>Maddur>Bangalore

Pics:
My Pics: Click here

Ride Log:

I reached the meeting point bang on time, Praveen T informed me that he was at NICE road junction, so I headed there after smsing professor about the change of meeting point. Praveen is moving out of Bangalore the coming week :( as he got placed in IIM Ahmedabad :) Bangalore BN is loosing out on of it’s best tourers :( So we got talking and looked at the watch, it was 8 and no sign of professor! Turned out that professor was not carrying his cell and he was waiting at the old meet up point for us! Finally professor called me from a local landline and got the message. Soon he met up with us and wasting no more time, we moved on towards maddur.

Mysore road is always challenging, it’s a tricky road, it’s tempts you to throw all caution to the wind and twist your right wrist, but this curvy 4 laned road is where most of the people loose their sense of limit and push themselves and their vehicles to limits and shit happens sometimes. The initial josh of getting out of city’s chockablock traffic settles down with in 10 kms of hitting this road for me and I get back to my cautious riding self, at the same time it’s a pleasure to cruise in constant 90-100 kmph on butter smooth curvy road on a zma.

We hit maddur Tiffany’s by 9 Am and settled down for our much deserved breakfast. Savoured tasty dosas, maddur vadas and idlies. We were discussing praveen’s shift of base from Bangalore to Ahmedabad, also we were reliving some memorable rides that he was part of us with us here. Ah, Nostaligia :(

It was time for Praveen to split up, he bid byes to us and headed towards Bangalore while professor and me headed towards mandya. From mandya, professor lead and took me through the deviation road towards Melukote. The road was is in ok condition, sparse traffic and compensated with beautiful views of sugarcane fields (Mandya is Sugarcane town) We cruised merrily and stopped over near a field for a butt break, I got clicking while professor was trying to adjust the air fuel mixture screw of his unicorn.

After a long sutta/butt break, we decided to move and headed towards melukote. On the way after some time, we found a good scenic stretch of road, so I stopped to click pics. Professor was not happy with unicorn’s Air fuel mixture screw and again went about trying to get back a proper feel.

After 5 mins, Professor gave up and decided that he would get the setting done on the way by some mech, I couldn’t lend a hand coz I myself am novice when it comes to carbs. Something’s are best left untouched I guess! We hit temple town Melukote by 12Pm, on the way towards temple, there’s a short twisty ghat section, which is fun, especially some 3 curves are pure bliss to corner on. We moved on and parked our bikes near the temple. We felt that carry our riding gear+lids+tankbags in to the temple for a Darshan wasn’t the best idea after all! So we quickly clicked some pics. I had been to melukote earlier by cage, so I was satisfied with few pics of temple from outside.

Did some experiments with the reflection on visor of my lid :P

We moved after few snaps, on the way down, there was a huge lake by roadside, but the entrance towards the lake was some what camouflaged, we made our way through and got an ideal spot for relaxing on a hot sunny day. While I went about relaxing and clicking few pics of zma and surroundings, professor went towards a mech shop that he had spotted on the way to get his unicorn’s carb tuned properly.

After sometime professor returned and seemed to be happy with the mech’s work on carb. I again experimented with the lake’s reflection on visor of my lid :P

After that it was just chit chat on all sundry things, couple of fags followed. It was getting hot and hunger pans started, so we decided to move towards srirangapatna for lunch and packed out from there by 1 pm. The road from melukote to srirangapatna is one of the best State highways, with clean wide tarmac with road markings etc. We hit srirangapatna in no time and Professor towards the famed military hotel. It was a really old place, definitely not for the typicial urban IT Crowd, but for localites who savour the taste. I was delighted at being at such a nostalgic place. After indulging in the speciality meals and loads of gup shup, we saw the time was already 4 pm! We scooted towards Bangalore, thinking of a pit stop in between in maddur CCD. We hit Maddur CCD by 4.45 Pm and cooled down with a mocha drink.

It was a perfect lazy Sunday ride for me! After some time pass there, few fags later we moved on towards Bangalore. I hit home by 7pm, thanks to crawling city traffic in mysore road. Not a ride to boast about kms done in a day or to boast about being through scenic places or capturing scenic pics, it was a lazy ride which recharged my batteries, especially now that I was a bit low coz Iam jobless for next few days till I join my new company!

There is nothing that a Motorcycle ride can’t cure! :P

Changing Gear after 5.5 years!

2008-06-07T16:54:00.003+05:30

It was time to move on professional after a long long time, It was one of those changes that are turning points in one’s life. It was a hard decision for me to take personally, but I had to take the decision to move on for brighter prospects in future. I had seen lots of people send their goodbye mails while I was in Htmt and those were usual corporate lingo loaded crap messages, which wouldn’t have any life of meaning in those words, so I thought why not write a good bye mail in biker style :P after all, people in my office knew me as the crazy chap who always goes off to places on bike and wastes money on petrol :P So, here’s the goodbye mail that I came up with and sent to my office people:

Hola People!
This isn't a fwd mail about biking gyaan :P rather, it is my surprising goodbye mail :( After 5.5 Years in Htmt, it was time for me to switch off the ignition, hopefully to cruise in the powerband of my career, to gradually raise the speed and scale greater heights in my career's speedometer in future.

I realized that change is essence of life, no matter how hard we try to resist change, it invariably catches up with us, that being said, all changes in life aren't easy to to accept initially, it does take time for us to move. So with a heavy heart, iam parting my ways with you all, after sailing along this far. At the end of it, iam content that I was part of a small family, which grew
manifolds and today, has it's roots spread all across the world.

I would like to thank each of you and the organization for the support and
cooperation extended towards me during all these days.

Companies may change, but people remain the same. I shall always be known to
you all as the silent TSG guy around :P
Do keep in touch.
With loads of emotions and fulfillment,

Thanks!

PS: Was surprised by responses I received for this style of bidding goodbye! Am glad that people felt good reading a different themed good bye mail.

Few snaps with colleagues on my last working day:

Lazy Weekend Ride with BikeNomads

2008-06-01T16:14:00.001+05:30

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

Busy bee....

2008-05-26T08:40:00.001+05:30

As much as i hate change in life, this one's being forced down my throat :(
Not that it was unexpected, but i was always procastinating on this particular change in life, I always thought that it would happen "sometime in future"
Well, the "future" turned out to be this month and it hit me quite hard when i had to face the facts. Iam talking about my professional life.

Finally, Iam quitting my job in my existing company, after close to 5 plus years! Time just flies indeed! I never thought that this day would come so soon (yeah 5 years is soon :P) I learnt a lot of things, met a lot of people and made many friends for life here in my existing company, but all good things come to an end in life and this chapter of my life is coming to an end unexpectedly :(

It's been an emotional roller coaster ride for me from past few weeks, ever since i had to make the hard decision to move on with my professional life seeking greener pastures. Haven't found time to blog in between, had to take many hard decisions and face up to realities of life. This feels like iam breaking up from a relationship!
I guess this is one of those turning points/defining moments of life, where the purpose of life is answered to me by the one above.

It will take sometime for me settle down in my new work place, Iam serving my last few painful days (emotionally) in my current company, end of one chapter in life is beginning of a new chapter in life they say, so in June, i will be beginning a new chapter of my professional life, till then, I will be a busybee, buzzing around here with formalities and stuff.

Will be back with a ride report soon though! This weekend, Bangalore BikeNomads chapter is going out on another one day ride/meet like last month's ride. Am looking forward for this weekend's ride to recharge my batteries.

Long time no see Ride

2008-05-14T10:08:00.002+05:30

Been ages since i had gone for one of the Xbhp G2Gs. Saw a post in Xbhp about weekend ride to nowhere (literally!) so thought of joining in as it was supposed to be a chota breakfast ride to BigBanyan Tree. Santoosh too joined in and so did murugesh, 3 is a crowd indeed :P We three met up as usual and rode on to meeting point, The Nice road - Mysore road intersection by early morning 6.30. Soon we found company with two sbk riders, all decked up with riding gear (for a change!) We found a MV Augusta! Later came to know that they were from Red roosters SBK group.

The Xbhp troupe joined us, they had taken NICE road. I was in for a surprise! After close to 6 months, i saw Professor there! He had joined the ride through Xbhpian John's contact. I was overjoyed bumping in to him, we had loads of things to catch up since our Last ride together was the Gokarna Ride in October 2007! That was one heck of a ride to say the least! Newayz, Soon, we all rode to Bigbanyan Tree, in absolute formation, with me and professor as Tail and Santoosh as lead. With in no time, we were there, near the Huge banyan Tree.

Had a vella time there, before our hunger pans started. There were no hotels near by, John was talking of going back to mysore road, catching up breakfast and leaving for home. Me and professor felt that we needed more from this ride, so we all informed that it would be better if we could go to Manchanabele dam, which was very nearby. Most of them agreed, few of them turned back. Soon, with santoosh as lead, we all rode in formation towards the Dam, through villages. The roads were nonexistant! It was total offroading to the core! The roads were akin to the ones i had encountered during Kemmangundi ride After prolonged offroading, we hit nice tarmac with awesome twisties! Few more kms in to it, we saw the first view of dam, it was beautiful.

Took some pics and joined the gang, we ventured deep in to the interiors towards the dam, offroading began again! Then john found a path way which lead us in to the backwaters, it was just too steep. While most of the bravehearts ventured in to the deep steep with their steeds, me, professor and few others bailed out and parked our bikes in safer places, we walked our way down, only to find a biker civilization near the back waters :P

Fellas were enjoying in the water like small kids :P not to mention overjoyed John, who took his P220 in to water like a ship! Santoosh too ventured deep in to water and parked his bike. Loads of laughter and chit chat followed, not to mention the photo session and john did his role of tickling everyone's funny bones. Me and professor caught up with loads of things since our last ride together. Met new members of xbhp and made new friends :) After more than an hour there, everyone got hungry, john and co wanted to head back towards bangalore and catch up breakfast on the way. While we four (santooh, murugesh, professor and me) decided to check out interior roads and do a lazy ride. We bid byes to everyone and took the interior roads towards Savandurga.

The roads were bliss, excellent tarmac with greenery all around. We soon hit the intersection of savandurga and ramnagaram. We had excellent breakfast in one of the local hotels, awesome "thatte Idlis" and fresh Lemon rice, few cups of tea. Total bill? Close to Rs 30! It was worth the wait breakfast :P We decided to ditch savandurga, which was 4 kms from where we were, instead, we took the route towards Ramnagaram, which would join mysore road. The road was dream come true! Excellent twisties with well laid tarmac. Santoosh and me had swapped bikes and santoosh was literally scraping his shoes on my zma! I was enjoying his hooligan bike after few months and enjoyed riding the torquey beast.

We found a nice shady spot under a tree, which overlooked a curve and decided to take cornering pics. Murugesh popped few wheelies, i couldn't capture it in full glory :( Santoosh managed to capture it properly in his cam. Soon, we were taking good cornering pics, professor even took my zma for the cornering pic :P as expected, he was impressed with zma's flickability and handling (next bike saar? :P) We were relaxing after the tiring photosession under the shade, when we found ourselves an unexpected host. We found ourselves being questioned by a bangalore kid, he was amused by our bikes and riding gear :P He wanted to know if we would like tender coconuts! We took couple of pics of the overjoyed kid, posing on my zma :)

We then found out that the kid and his father owned a farm house, which was bang opposite to the spot from where we were standing! We got invited by his dad to their farm house, it was beautiful, acres of land with coconut trees and mango trees! Kid's father was very humble, despite being a big shot in bangalore, he was very friendly and treated us to N number of tender coconuts! plucked fresh from trees! I had never had such tasty tender coconuts! We all had rounds of it and soon got full!
Santoosh managed to get one "mileage" tender coconut, which was going on and on! Looked like the tree had dumped all the water in to his single tender coconut! :P

We relaxed under a coconut tree in their farmhouse chatting with the kid's father and not to mention, answering the innumerable questions by the kid :P His father also was kinda surprised at our ride for no reason :P He found it difficult to believe that professor at his age was riding a bike :) It was well spent time there, after more than 2 hours of chit chatting and consuming many tender coconuts, we had to move on, We bid byes to our hosts, who had treated us very well. The kid's father even gave his contact number to us and gave us an offer to use the farmhouse if we wanted in future! :P Advantages of being a biker i guess!

Everyone was happy at the turn of events. It was totally unplanned ride, which was throwing up pleasant surprises. We soon headed towards ramnagaram, enjoying the curvy road and we hit mysore road. We stopped near Kamat hotel for late lunch. Found it too crowded, so Professor suggested that we check out "jaanapadha loka" which was right next to it. We found a Canteen inside. To our surprise, we found out that it was Kamat Hotel's canteen and the rates blew us away! Rs 15 for full meals! while the same meal costed Rs 90 inside Kamat! We immediately grabbed our plates, we were given Ragi ball meals (Ragi muddey) Santoosh was trying ragi ball for the first time :P We had to give him instructions about eating it and even demonstrated couple of times :P He gave up on eating it after few bites :P

Enjoyed our meals, with ducks for company, found the ducks amusing coz they were literally poking us for dropping some food for them like domestic dogs! trained ducks i guess! We then spent few more minutes relaxing there and pondered over the way this ride had turned out. All of us felt that this was a perfect lazed out weekend ride. We decided to move and hit mysore road towards bangalore. I lead, with santoosh as tail. The highspeed ride came to an end just before we hit bangalore, bumper to bumper traffic welcomed us. Santoosh and murugesh parted ways. While me and professor decided to hit CCD in jayanagar to meet up with Sachin and his friend. After struggling through the traffic for close to an hour, we hit CCD.

Met up sachin and his friend for a loong chat session. Decided to do some rides together in near future. Professor bid adieu after sometime, while me and sachin stuck on in CCD for some more time. Finally, i left CCD and reached home by 9 pm. It was a wonderful weekend ride, the overall pleasant surprises made me smile at the end of the day, bumping in to professor after a loong time was one among them :)
The trip meter read "165 kms" it was 165 kms of pure joyful ride!

My Best Friend's Wedding

2008-05-06T10:46:00.006+05:30

Not a review of the movie by same name :P
Literally, my best friend kicked the bucket (of bachelorhood!) last week. The victim in this case is Girish, my first "cramster pillion" :P or my "cop friend" as he's known to my biker friends :P

He got married last week in his native, Kunigal. I didn't go by Karizma for a change, got caged with friends. Hopped on to one of my friend's Ikon car and 4 of us had a whale of time all the while driving till kunigal, one advantage of car is that you can talk with your friends who are accompanying you while on the move, samething is not possibile in bike rides, atleast till Bike intercoms are made available here.

He got married on May 1st, since it was an off for me (labour day ki jai!) and for my friends, we all made it in time. We left bangy on April 30th for his reception (had taken off for one day :P) Got stuck in horrible traffic near dasarahalli circle in NH4, after scraping our way through bumper to bumper traffic, my friend kartik aka Rossi on 4 wheels :P made sure that we reached kunigal in hardly 1 hour.
Caught up with college gang, they had come in another car. After reception, we headed to nearest daaru point, grabbed our beers and hit an isolated part of highway and drowned our sorrowness through beer :P reached hotel and the fun started, fellas were meeting each other after many years, few were meeting eachother for the first time since they had left college!

Obviously lot of catching up was done, not to forget leg pulling and wise ass comments!:P I was left capturing all the moments on my cam, the chat session was hilarious and comical most of the times, time flew and it was 2.30 am when i hit the sack! Caught up with few winks of sleep and wokeup early morning to be there for muhurtham. Few kumbhakarans were still sleeping, left them in their lalaland and 5 of us who were ready, headed to choultry. Girish was all decked up like a goat who is decorated before being sacrificed :P he was going through rituals and traditional ceremonies, I went click happy with my cam and captured some good off beat shots :P

The best uninterrupted spot for me to take pics was right behind the marriage photographer who was taking pics, so i stood behind him all the while, used my height advantage :P and craned over and got good shots. With in 15 mins in to muhurtam time (7.30 Am onwards) girish tied one of the most important knot of his life and lost his bachelorhood, needless to say, i captured the moment :P later, My friends and ExHtmtians RaminderSingh and Ganapathy arrived, they were followed by my colleague Ravindra and his wife. After wishing the couple, i escorted them for breakfast downstairs. It was too crowded, somehow managed to get seats and chaps had breakfast, i had already had it early morning when it was less crowded :P

By 10 am, Ex Htmtians and my colleague bid byes and left, By 11 Am, we started to move, but girish wanted us to stay further, but we felt that we could cover Melukote on the way back to bangy, so we bid byes to him and moved out of choultry by 11.30 Am. I had taken the State highway during one of my earlier rides from srirangapatna on mysore road to Kunigal on NH 48. The 60 plus kms of it was pure bliss with serene countryside scenery, i wanted to show my friends in cage the same route, but ended up taking wrong deviation from kunigal! We took the first left pointing towards Maddur, we should have taken second left instead to hit that state highway. But this new route took us further through interior villages and country side and lots of offroading too! it was first time for me, offroading in a cage :P My friend kartik, who was driving, thoroughly enjoyed this route, others didn't complain either. The serene country side with village folks going about their daily life was a treat to see. We stopped on the way to take some pics, i was missing my bike already :(

The only reason i felt good was due to Cage comforts like AC and plushy seats, AC was giving us much needed relief from outside heat and hot weather.
We finally hit Nagamangala and from there melukote was just 6kms. Savoured jackfruit sold on the way and stopped to take pic of melukote temple seen on top of hill.

The narrow roads led us in to the temple complex and we set out to explore by 2pm. The temple was well maintained and painted too, found some similarities to other temples i have visited.

Took pic of the Rath which was parked in a giant enclosure and tried to have darshan, temple was closed for darshan, so off we went towards "shooting spot" as it's called. The task involved climbing a small hill, i was too lazy to venture out, so was kartik. The other two fellas went exploring and came back sunburnt and dehydrated :P We moved on and hit nagamangala, from there on we were on the correct route towards srirangapatna-mysore road, the road was ala US style, with road side markers running parallel to each other. It was difficult for fellas to believe that it was a statehighway!

We hit Mysore road-srirangapatna and proceeded to Maddur Tiffany's hotel for much needed lunch. Savoured local speciality maddur vada and couple of dosas. It was the same hotel, where we had breakfast during the BN bangalore meet few weeks back. After my friends had finished oogling at few pretty faces there :P we moved on to Cafe Coffee Day near channapatna, more known as maddur CCD or 24hrs CCD. It as again the same CCD which we had haunted during the BN bangalore meet. Got to witness PDA (public display of affection) by one couple whose hormones were working overtime i guess! :P much to the amusement of everyone present there, the couple stirred up lot of hushed whispers there and not to mention my friends drooling over the moderate babe :P

Found a cutie kid near our table and kartik snapped a pic of hers.

Kid's mom was overtly exposing types with complete backless kinda Party wear dress, she was looking like she was dressed to go to a disco party or something! we couldn't believe that she was mom of that kid, could have said kid's cousin by her looks :P Kartik's flirting instincts kicked in and he made a small talk with the mom of kid by showing her kid's pic, he even got her addy! (or so claimed by him, not verified :P) thankfully not the phone number :P All the while, her hubby was not around, so not to worry :P (sorry Mr Hubby!) After savouring mochas and some CCD crap, we decided to move on.

Kartik was belting his Ikon through out, this guy's got some awesome driving skills, he has all those thousands of kms of highway driving experience under his belt (or seat belt :P) i strapped on my seatbelt and watched the "Video game" through the windscreen. He as hitting 150/160 kmph few times, gave me goosebumps sometimes, but being in a cage alters your perception, only time i could feel the speed was when i tried to stick out my hand through the window or watch the speedo :P In no time we were in bangalore's bumper to bumper traffic. I reached home at 7.30PM and the rest of the guys carried on to their places.

Overall, it was a nice occassion for old friends to get together and bitch collectively :P will get another such occassion soon, another college friend of mine is tying the knot this month, so the gang will meet up soon, camaan the enjayment! :P

Dharmambudhi Kere - Revisted! :P

2008-04-28T19:16:00.007+05:30

No, this was not another ride to an undiscovered lake like my earlier ride but it was a rather nostalgic visit to Majestic/KempeGowda Bus Stand! :P (The existing bus stand was built on Dharmambudhi lake in 80s) The Majestic Bus stand is hardly 1 km from my house, but ever since i have become mobile on 2 wheels, i had stopped bothering about our great BMTC public mass transport system or formerly known as BTS Bus service. I had visited the bus stand just last month, when i had given my Karizma for repairs last month, i had gone to Bus stand to catch a bus to Katriguppe, to go to Sai Motors. But it has almost been more than a decade since i had walked on the elevated walkway in Majestic Bus stand.

I happened to be there today as i had to go to KG Road for picking up some clothes from Raymonds showroom with my friend Girish, who's getting hitched this week. It was gonna be too much of a hassle to take my Karizma to crowded Majestic area, find a parking space and to park and not to worry about the bike! So we decided to go by bus instead! The Raymonds showroom is just below Santosh theatre on KG Road, so after getting down from bus in the Majestic bus stand in some platform, we took the elevated walkway to cross over to the other side. I distinctly remember that last time i had walked "over" the bus stand was when i was a kid, with my parents, i don't remember exactly when, but i just know that it's been more than a decade since i had seen the famed "semi circle" shape of the bus stand from top.

Took few pics from the "view" point" :P reclaimed part of my childhood, somethings never change in Bangalore, no matter how much the city progresses. The walkway had the trade mark paan masala spit marks, Cig stubs, dirt and dust and not to forget, hoards of hawkers selling all kinda wares! Even the Subway, which connects to KG road is full of hawkers and stinks like public toilet! the whole place has the infamous defamation of walls by Small posters, which range from "Astrologers" to "Sex doctors" :O to "Wanted urgently" type ads. After we were through with picking up Girish's Reception clothes, we took a loong stroll in Majestic area, specifically KG Road. Changes are that the famed "Burma Bazaar" is no more, the whole rickety building is being demolished to make way for one more Junk-mall building with glass and AC. The Infamous "Sangam" theatre, which used to screen only Adult movies :P in those pre Cable tv-internet days, has made way to a swanky "Sangam Mall"

Only occupant of Sangam seems to be KFC chicken eatery outlet, most of the mall is empty and yet to be occupied, commercialism of bangalore is trying hard to catch up with Majestic area, but the old city is refusing to loose it's charm that easily, get in to the bylanes of chikpet and surrounding areas, you can see and smell old Bangalore of 1980s and earlier, even today! After recharging my nostalgic batteries, boarded a rickety battered BMTC bus and came back home. Want to get back to real bangalore? make a quick dash to the crowded Majestic Bus stand and spend a day in the surrounding areas, amidst the organised chaos all around you, you won't believe that you are in the famed and hyped Silicon valley, the land of Forum mall-garuda mall-Eva mall and what nots! :P

Page3 Express!

2008-04-25T10:39:00.012+05:30

Not a review about a new newspaper :P Rather, a reflection on pathetic state of degradation of one of most reputed newspapers in india, The New Indian Express!
I have been an Express loyalist due to hardhitting, no nonsense stories, minus ads and titillating pics of almost naked babes plastered allover in colour :P I had briefly subscribed to TOI-let ;) paper when they launched their bangalore edition six years ago. Times lowered their price to unbelievable 1 buck! and later to 1.50 bucks, plus they had 6 or 4 page City specific seperate add on supplement with the main newspaper. Most of their paper was in colour.

The subscription to TOI-let paper didn't last coz they lived up to their nick name of TOI-let paper! What i found was shit loads of ads plastered all over the main paper, Editiorials were a joke and heavily Pro congress, Pseudosecular and Anti BJP/Majority/Hindu in nature. The city specific supplement "Bangalore Times" was plastered with pictures of semi nude females and PAGE 3 culture was cultivated with Page 3 of Bangalore Times showing the "happening" parties and Page 3 celebs and gossips. I got sick and tired of TOI-let paper's glorification of non entities and their motto of publicising morons who were nobody or irrelevant to bangalore. Who the fuck cares which party took place where, which bitch wore what, with whom she flirted with, with whom she arrived with or who slept with whom! TOI-let paper turned out to be a glorified soft porn paper, rather an extention of filmi magazines and lifestyle magazines.

I switched back to Indian Express happily and found solace in their "to the point" stories and non existant ads. The city specific supplement "City Express" was informative and carried truely relevant stories. Thankfully Page 3 culture was not encouraged and whole paper was full of what a newspaper should have, only news and facts, Editorials were neutral and very much mature and not biased. Their scoop news and investigating news were a treat, Express broke so many new stories, carried out sting operations and sometimes ran 1 week series of articles of various burning issues of the nation.

Slowly, they transformed in to "The New Indian Express" I found no change in their content, more welcome additions like better fonts, new layout for columns and bonus supplements on fridays and wednesdays were included. I was happy and life was peaceful for all these years, until i saw Ads in hoardings and also in Express by fag end of march and beginning of April, stating that From April 11th 2008, Express will reinvent itself. I thought, like the earlier facelift, this might be loaded with add ons, but finally when the D day came, i was saddened beyond belief! April 11th 2008, must be marked as the day, when Express lost it's dignity.
Their "new" version of Indian Express shocked me. The Masthead was altered beyond belief, they screwed the capital "I" in Indian word and "E" in Express word. "I" looked like "1" and "E" was looking like "e" (Microsoft's Internet Explorer "e")

More horror awaited me, the fonts were so fucking small, it was too hard to read the articles, the entire layout of express had gone for a toss, it looked more like a webpage than a newspaper! the grand finale was "Expresso"! No, not the coffee types :P Their "City Express" had got renamed to "Expresso". Worst thing was that the City edition was no longer in conventional paper format, it was more like a mag format, shorter in size and many pages. Pages full of CRAP!
Am sure Ramnath Goenka will be turning in his grave, coz express finally managed to match up to TOI-let paper, They have Expresso PAGE 3 now! Page 3 parties, celebs, dumb fucks and bitches are all over the city edition and more specifically in Page 3 of expresso! Not to mention, all pages in Expresso are in colour and 70% of it is full of pics of semi nude chicks (Page 3 bitches, Bollywood bitches and hollywood bitches!) I was deeply disappointed by this so called "reincarnation"

Now, Express is nothing but a clone of TOI-let paper, heck, if i wanted such crappy softporn suppliements and Page3 world info, i would have bought TOI-let paper itself, why would i buy Indian Express? The very soul of Indian Express has been buried, Am sure old timers who have stuck with Express from decades will be disillusioned and feel let down, how can such a sensible and responsible National daily, which has gone through much shit earlier and with stood all kind of bullshit from so many decades, suddenly sink to the low levels of TOI-let paper? Am sure it must due to change of guard at the higher ups. Google baba gave me this link.

From that link, it is very clear that due to internal politics and back stabbing, a reputed national daily has been given an improper, untimely burial. I just hope that they stop degrading this paper and either revert back to old form with a public apology to their loyal oldtimer subscribers or stop publishing under Indian Express name! The whole "re incarnation" feels like an April fool joke gone too far.

The Various Incarnations before the demise:

Ride to Maddur Lake with BikeNomads

2008-04-21T18:11:00.017+05:30

Did a small weekend ride on Sunday, 20th April 2008 with Bengalooru BN . Sachin and me planned this meetup-ride with oldtimers of BN. It was ages since Bangalore chapter of Bikenomads had gone on a breakfast ride, the last i remember was in 2006! that was to Hosur A1 Plaza. Since then lot of new members had joined Bangalore BN chapter, so we wanted this ride to be a platform to meet new members and oldtimers.

Old timers of BN like Dr Prithvi, Rocky aka Rakesh Barua, VenkatShyam and JSR aka dada joined in. The final turn out was 18 plus bikes and 20 plus people! this was one of the biggest groups i have ridden with so far! Over all it was an enjoyable small ride. I was back home by 3.30 pm!

Riders and bikes:

1. Dr Prithvi Raval - Avenger200
2. RakeshBarua - R/E Thunder Bird
3. Sachin Koppikar - Pulsar 150
4. Santoosh - Pulsar180&200 :P
5. Kartik Ayyar + Pillion - R/E ThunderBird
6. LoveJoshi+Pillion - R/E Thunderbird Aka Redeye :P
7. Lohith - Bullet 500
8. Praveen T - Honda Unicorn
9. Vasanth + Pillion - Karizma with crashguard :P
10. Muneesh - Pulsar 180 (kartik's Friend)
11. KrishnaDevanur - Karizma R
12. Murugesh aka rossi :P - Apache 150 (santoosh's friend and BNer)
13. Gururaj - Avenger

(following people met us on the way in maddur tiffany's for breakfast
and joined in)

14. Vijay - Pulsar 220 (new BN member)
15. Jayan SR aka JSR - Bullet 500
16. GK - Bullet (From Silverbullets)
17. Ajey aka Shidke - Bullet (From Silverbullets)

(met these people on the way back and in Maddur CCD)

18. Venkatshyam - Pulsar 220
19. Prasanna aka flyin - Pulsar 180

Pics:

My pics: Click Here
Doc's pics: Click here
Rocky's Pics: Click here
Kartik's Pics: Click here
Love Joshi's Pics: Click here

The Ride log:

I had a pillion this time, My friend Girish. This was truly gonna be his last ride as bachelor as he's getting hitched this month end. I started touring in 2006, when we both went for my first loong ride on my zma. Met up Santoosh and his friend Rossi aka murugesh :P and started off towards meeting point Rajarajeshwarinagar Arch. We reached there exactly at 7 AM, it was our starting time. Took a group pic, 9 bikes had already reached there. With santoosh as lead and Rocky as tail, we started off by 7.10 AM.

I was tailing murugesh, who in turn was tailing Santoosh. Santoosh lead well at constant speed and we reached maddur tiffany's by 8.20 Am. Here, JSR and two of his friends on bulls joined us, they had started late from bangalore and caught up with us. Found the hotel crowded, so went to tiffany's hotel on the other side of the road. I was sweating like a pig :P, i was wearing my full gear, minus the CAT shoes, which were damaged in my earlier ride. I was also wearing my cramster backprotector, which helped me very much, i didn't have slightest sign of back ache. I was also wearing my riding jacket with inner liner, as i wanted the armour to be secure and in place. Found out that the hotel didn't have enough space to fit in entire crowd, so we decided to have breakfast outside hotel, standing!

Savouring tasty idly vada and famed Maddur vadas, sachin set the ball rolling and asked everyone to give a mini intro about themselves. Soon, everyone was through with their intros and knew each other by their names. After much required tasty breakfast, we decided to hit our destination, maddur lake, which was just 5kms from there. Just as we were wearing our gears, we witnessed a nasty pile up accident right in front of us! There was a U turn in front of the hotel, one tata indica guy took the right turn after over taking an Eicher canter from left. The canter guy tried to avoid the car, but failed and slammed the rear of indica and tried to come to extreme right to avoid a pile up, but it was a waste effort, right behind him, a KSRTC bus rammed in to the canter's rear and the whole bus went back by 1 feet after impact! In the process, a Toyota Qualis which was right behind the bus, got it's entire front bonnet stuck under the bus's rear! Behind him was a Radio City Tavera, he avoided rear ending the qualis, but scrapped his entire right side with qualis and managed to pull over.

The indica had a fucked rear, the canter was undamaged! only a broken indicator. The ksrtc bus's windscreen had cracked. Qualis had it's entire front screwed! The Tavera had fugly scrape marks and dents on the right side. Thankfully no one was injuried, few people in bus had busted lips though. Soon it got crowded and the indica chaps bore the brunt of the crowd. Cops arrived to control the situation. We witnessed the whole thing and started to move out. Soon, 18 bikes snaked through maddur interiors, much to the surprise of localites. The road was winding at someplaces, my pillion Girish took lots of videos on my N73 phone of the whole bike train :P Soon, we reached the lake. Initially we parked beneath the elevated portion of the lake, later we found a trail that would take us on to the road running parallel to the lake.

So, we all took our bikes through the narrow trail and took our bikes on the road parallel to the lake, to our left was the huge lake and to our right was the road through which we had ridden, it was a good view. We parked our bikes underneath a huge tree with lots of shade and unwinded. Rocky gave good tips to people about safe riding and techniques on highway, rocky also corrected few people's mistakes, which they had committed while riding as a group. After that, it was gala time :P we just hung around savouring the lake's view and the peaceful surroundings. Later, JSR and two of his friends bid byes to us and left for bangalore as they had some work. After some time, we parked our bikes in order with lake as backdrop to the lineup pic. The line up pic turned out to be amazing.

Sachin was made the object of photography by everyone! He was still wearing his gear, with cramster riding boots, kneeguards and cramster jacket, he was looking like a character from the videogame, Mortal Kombat! :P Everyone gave ideas for funny poses and he willingly obliged :P Everyone went click happy. Rocky and LJ gave some "Special effects" too by literally lending their hands to sachin:P

After the photosession, it was time to move, we decided against kanva dam, which was planned earlier as the weather was too sunny and too hot. We decided to hit Maddur Cafe Coffee Day from there, as it was on the way back to bangalore. Meanwhile, Venkat sir called up sachin and informed him that he was near by mandya, sachin asked him to wait near maddur and we would catch up. Even Prasanna called up and informed us that he was waiting near kanva dam (he had started late from bangalore) we informed him to come to maddur CCD as we had junked plans of going to kanva.

There was a small bridge near the lake, which was in really bad condition, we riders lined up on the bridge for group pic, as 10 plus guys climbed on, the bridge was vibrating even if someone laughed or hit the bridge with their legs :P Sachin was apprehensive of getting on the bridge for obvious reasons :P He got on to the bridge after much cajoling but was holding on to one of the cement blocks and wanted to get off the bridge asap! he was shouting at guys taking pics to windup soon, so he could get off the rickety bridge :P

Later, We all packed up and rode back in formation till maddur junction. Met venkat sir there, he had gone on a relaxing ride till chitradurga and was back to meet us! Started moving towards Maddur CCD, it was getting too hot and i was sweating like a pig! Thanks to the inner liner of the riding jacket. We reached CCD in no time and everyone unwinded. Prasanna called up sachin and he was telling that he couldn't see our bikes in CCD. It turned out that he had reached the wrong CCD, which was some 20kms from the ccd we were in! he was pissed off predictably as he had ride back again to meet us. Finally he joined in, after sometime he cooled down :P The smokers were outside while the nonsmokers were sitting inside :P The nonsmokers started to make a move, me and others in group wanted to relax for some more time. So, we bid goodbyes. Finally Me, sachin, santoosh, praveent, prasanna, murugesh and krishna left CCD at 2.00 pm. We were the last ones to leave from there.

This time i led and was doing constant 100 or 90 kmph. I was being tailed by praveen and krishna, while the remaining guys were cruising slowly. We 3 stopped just short of NICE road junction and had refreshments and fag break. The remaining guys rolled in later, we all bid byes there and headed back home. I reached home at 3.30 Pm after dodging the horrible traffic in mysore road.

This was one of the shortest rides i have ever been to! It was more of a ride to meet and catch up with people. I thoroughly enjoyed the ride as well as interacting with oldtimers, regulars and newbees. Am looking forward to more such Bangalore BN ride-meets in future.

Crashguard - Pics

2008-04-17T17:47:00.001+05:30

Finally took pics of the crashguard, which i had installed earlier this week. Took these pics in my N73 phone after upgrading it's firmware using Nokia software update tool, now it's blazing fast! :P
Enuff of Offtopic talk :P here are the pics of my Zma with the crashguard:

Closeup pics:

Front/Back View:

Click here for more pics.

Been close to 3 days since i fixed the crashguard and it hasn't touched the front mudguard, even tried hard braking :P Since it's not heavy, the front end of the bike is same as earlier, doesn't feel heavy or such. I haven't stopped wearing my Kneeguards :P am kinda used to wearing them from all these days, will continue to wear them in city, i consider crashguard as protection only for the bike :P yet to clean up my gears, gotto do it soon.

Guarded after 3 Years!

2008-04-15T18:38:00.006+05:30

Finally! After 3 years since i bought my Zma, I managed to fit a CrashGuard today! All thanks to my friend in Mangalore, Sujay, now a fellow BNer. I first saw his Zma in mangalore fitted with this crashguard, he had fabricated a CBZ Extreme's crashguard to fit to his Zma, it was his mech's idea. I had seen it almost a year back, but i was procastinating on it. My crash last month and post crash repairs of Zma, especially the big FAT bill, got me working on this long pending addon. Sujay fabricated this crashguard in mangalore and i got it fixed here.

Went to local mech today morning and got it fitted to Zma, it was a perfect fit! No touchings anywhere :P brilliant design by Sujay's mech indeed! Since the Crashguard is black in colour, it gels well with the Zma as all lower parts of Zma are black. The Crashguard is sturdy and wide enough to prevent damage to plastics and also to some extent the rider's legs. The local mech too was appreciative of the design and said that it was one of the best 'designed to fit' crashguards for zma that he has seen so far. No pics as of now, my N73 Cam phone is screwed up due to lot of software and old buggy firmware, it took ages to open Camera app and then to click a pic :( Will upgrade the firmware by this week and click the pics of crashguard and post. Too lazy to use my Kodak cam :P

Came home after fitting the crashguard and got another surprise. My insurance claim cheque had come! Heaved a sigh of relief, out of 15k odd crashdamage repair bill, ICICILOMBARD guys have paid me 9k change. Even though it looks less, it's due to plastic parts which i had replaced, 50% is all they pay for plastics :( plus the depreciation for 3 years. Even though i got claims for everything, majority of the parts replaced were plastics (front faring, cowls etc) i lost out money on those.
Got 80% reimbursement on metal parts like alloywheel, footpeg unit etc. It was much needed breather for me. I had settled the repair bill through creditcard :P

Next up will be Horn upgrade, will have to get the same Bosch twin horns that are on Santoosh's Bike Will have to go to Metro with santoosh sometime next week and get those horns. Santoosh has Metro card in his name :P so, the horns are gonna cost much lesser than the MRP. Will prolly hunt for a good Spot lamp next to be fixed on the crash guard. The pending work for this week is to clean up my riding gears, haven't touched them since my earlier ride, the crash left the gears with lot of mud on them, will have clean them up for coming sunday's BikeNomads Bangalore meet. Am eagerly looking forward for the chota ride this sunday, to meet up with old timers in BN.

Am a Hooligan!

2008-04-10T10:37:00.006+05:30

Not me :p, I was referring to Santoosh's souped up Pulsar180! Due to my Crash few weeks back, my zma was stuck in service center for repairs and i was stuck with my old splendor for commuting to office. After i had bought my zma, my dad was using the splendor and i had almost stopped riding it from past 3 years, the sudden prospect of me having to putter around on it for few days that too at night to office in dreaded hosur road scared the daylights out of me. But thanks to Santoosh's generosity i got the opportunity to taste the competition :P The souped up Pulsar 180 V1!

I have been doing my daily rounds between office and home on his Pulsar from almost 10 days and this is the first time i've ridden any other bike for this long after i had got my Zma. Now, santoosh isn't referred to as "engineer santoosh" :P in Xbhp for nothing, he has done so much R&D on his bike and souped it up right from engine/lights/wheels and tyres!It's just a name sake Pulsar180, actually it's a 200cc :P Coz currently this bike is running with a Pulsar 200's block and piston! At one point of time, it was running one of Maruti esteem's piston! Now, on to other features of the bike, It's got Santro car's twin horns :P Powerful 100/90 Headlamp! no, it ain't just plug and play, santoosh has tweaked the electricals such that the 100/90 bulb gives out 100% output with stock coil and rectifier! :P

It's running on 18inch alloys! This bike is actually the first version of Dtsi Pulsars with faring, commonly referred to as P180 V1 with spoke wheels. The alloys are same as Zma's alloys! (same company) but cost half of zma's alloys! The rubber is Ceat, front is stock size while rear is 120/80! The rear tyre is so fucking wide, that it sticks to the road in all terrains. The tyre is of medium compound, so it neither wears out like michelins, nor is puncture prone, but gives michelin, pirelli like grip even on wet surfaces! Even though it's of 120/80 size, the tyre weights same as stock 100/90! The tyres costs almost as Zma's stock MRF Zappers!

Riding this bike is fun, it's a torque monster! thanks to the engine mods done by santoosh, the bike just pulls crazy in any gear! Iam so used to downshifting in zma for slow speeds, but this bike just manages it in 4th gear! so, if i need to slowdown, just decrease the throttle and if i want to accelerate, twist the right wrist!:P no changing gears or nothing! The front end is amazingly light compared to the newer generations of 17inch wheeled pulsars, it almost feels like my zma's front, it's very agile in traffic and cuts through traffic just like zma. The conventional front faring is a boon as i can squeeze through tight spots in traffic, which is not possible with my zma. The Engine growls like a rottweiler!:P After riding around Zma, which purrs like a cat, riding this bike brings a wide grin to my face as the engine and silencer make the raw grunting noise.

Now, on to the best part, night riding! As i mentioned earlier, this monster has 100/90 headlight, it's akin to a one eyed sumo at night! coupled with santro car's twin horns, i have fooled many auto chaps, tataindica callcenter cabs and cagers at night :P With a mere flashing of the lights at night, the autowallahs make way and pull to left lane, with the combo of honking twin horns and flashing of lights, many cagers and indica walas give way immediately, they get fooled that an one eyed sumo is behind them! :P Am loving the role reversal from past few days! :P Also, santoosh has very thoughtfully plastered this bike with reflective 3m stickers at vantage points. At night, this bike's visibility is not to be missed to oncoming vehicles.

Am truly blown away by this bike's performance and adaptability, am riding it from past 10 days, not once did i encounter any heart in mouth moments, i had heard a lot of bad things about pulsar's front brakes, but in this bike, they feel the same as zma, the stopping power is also the same. After i got back my Zma from repairs earlier this week, i offered my Zma to santoosh for few days, he was surprised that i was giving him my bike, on which i had just spent quite a large sum and it was hardly 2 hours since i had got it back :P but i know that it is in safe hands, my way of saying thanks to this amazing large hearted person who helped me out during and post my crash.

So, that means, i have his pulsar till this weekend for my commutes:P Am loving every minute of the rides on this beast, Truly, this beast is a hooligan on road!

3 Years of bliss!

2008-04-08T18:41:00.007+05:30

First off, I finally got my Karizma back today from repairs! yay!
Been riding around in Santoosh's souped up Pulsar 180 since i had given my Zma for repairs, thanks to his generosity and helpfulness post my crash. Am loving the daily commutes on his Pulsar 180, it's so very different from Zma, but it gives different kind of pleasure compared to riding a Zma. Will post on his pulsar's riding report later.

Picked up my zma after repairs today by noon from SaiMotors, was happy to see her like a brand new bike, with almost all plastics replaced. I had to get the engine checked and done up too as she has clocked almost 47000 kms. So the engine work was done with, now she's got new set of clutch plates, new valves and new O ring seals. Engine is decarbonised too. Mr Kiran of SaiMotors has done a really fantastic job, engine noise is almost negligible now, gears are too smooth, she's purring like a cat now :P

The Bill was a shocker indeed! The body work after the crash with new plastics and new alloys came up to Rs 15784/- The Engine work came up to Rs 2850/- Total bill was whopping Rs 18634/- !
I had anticipated a max bill of 15k including everything, but it overshot my estimates, Have claimed insurance on the bodywork bill of 15k change, should see how much i will be getting back. Santoosh dropped in to see the bike after i got her by evening and it was he who reminded that today was my zma's 3rd birthday after going through the RC Book. I guess i gifted my bike with 18k worth goodies and a makeover for her birthday :P

Here's a pic of Zma that i took immediately after getting her back, the arrows point to the parts which were replaced:

These are the external parts which were replaced:
1. Cone set
2. Fork oil and oilseals
3. Front Alloy Wheel
4. Rear Brake Pedal
5. Headlight Reflector unit
6. Right and left front farings (includes inner plastics)
7. Right and left Rear Cowls
8. Battery Cover cowl
9. Silencer heat shield
10. Front Mudguard
11. Handlebar barend weights
12. Winker Relay
13. Right Footpeg unit
14. Right Rear View Mirror.

The Engine related internal parts:
1. Clutch plates (full set)
2. Inlet Valve
3. Outer and Inner Valves
4. Clutch friction disk
5. O Ring seals

Point to note is that the Plastics are horrendly overpriced! Looks like HeroHonda is fleecing their premium bike customers to generate revenue. Front mudguard costs Rs 850! Each cowl (front or rear) costs almost 1000 bucks! Maruti's Alto car's bumper would be cheaper compared to 4 cowls (2 front and 2 rear) of zma! The front alloy wheel alone costs whopping 4000 bucks! I can get 3 alloys of pulsars for that price! The engine components are reasonably priced though.
Silver lining is i got back all the old parts :) now i have a spare slightly bent front alloy, lots of plastics (cowls) spare headlamp unit and much more! :P Most of the stuff can be used in emergencies or for R&D :P

3 years went by like a breeze, Zma took me to many places that i had only seen in maps :P She gave me freedom on 2 wheels. She never let me down in any of my rides and always stood by me even in worst of terrains and situations. She took my riding skills to a new level and transformed me in to a mature rider from the novice that i was initially. She's one of a kind bike, who switches between a commuter to a tourer with just an oil change :P She's almost 47000 kms old now, am looking forward for many more thousands of kms of pure bliss and joy with her.

She's gonna be with me for many many years to come for sure, even if i upgrade to any other new bike in future. But no matter what bikes i buy in future, none of those bikes will ever take her special place in my life.

Hectic Weekend - Two more additions to my Riding Gears

2008-03-31T17:16:00.007+05:30

Back to the daily grind of office-Home routine after my previous ride. I had decided to give my bike for repairs on weekend. I had also mentally prepared for the repair bill :P it would surely cost a bomb for plastics :( Was riding around wounded Zma for 1 whole week and she didn't complain, only felt light wobble in front end at slow speeds, she seemed happier at higher speeds though.

Saturday, I went straight to Sachin's house from office, from there sachin took his bike and accompanied me to SaiMotors Thankfully, we happened to meet Mr Vandhan, who is the service head there and known to us from our earlier Safe Riding workshop. After inspection, found out that the alloy wheel had a bend :( since it costs a bomb of 4K, decided to claim for insurance and filled up necessary forms and left the bike with Mr kiran there. Krishna dropped in to service his bike, all 3 of us went to a CCD near by for a chat session :P

With in half an hour near CCD, we witnessed two accidents, in both cases bikers were hit by cages! Both the riders had nasty injuries on their knees! Witnessing these two accidents in such a short span of time, sachin decided to buy kneeguards. So we wound up the CCD session and bid byes to krishna, I hitched a ride on sachin's bike as pillion and we landed up in Cramster shop by noon. Met KJ there, Sachin bought Cramster External Kneeguards for himself. I tried on the Spine Protector, i had used sachin's spine protector in the ride, it had helped my back a lot. Tried on different sizes and found that the L size of spine protector was perfect for me. Bought the spine protector for myself. Another important gear got added to my existing Riding gears list. This is an important addition, like my riding pants as it helps my back a lot. This will lead to increase on saddle time for me during rides.

We moved on to have lunch at Chung's Restaurant in Malleshwaram, it was the first time i had gone there, the quantity was too much, couldn't finish the entire dish :P We had to go to Motomania store to check out DSG Nero Jacket for my mangalore friend Zahin, so off we went to towards indiranagar. We got stuck in horrible traffic jam near MG Road, thanks to so called Vvip visit. I wonder why these idiots drive through heart of the city and make our lives miserable, they can as well fly in a chopper and spare us mortals! Finally wrestled our way through airport road, 100 feet road and reached motomania store in Indiranagar. The ambience of the shop was good (with AC and all :P) the displayed stuff were mostly of Alpinestar brand. The Alpinestar riding boots range they had there was too good, some day, i will own one of those :P

Unfortunately, they didn't have stock of DSG Nero Jackets, they only had one Yellow/black display piece. I tried them on and liked them, was tempted to buy, they assured us that fresh stocks would be arriving the next day and we could visit them on sunday morning. They are open full time on sundays too! kewl!
They had few KBC and AGV Rossi lids, sachin tried them on, the look and feel were many times better than my current GPR Lid, but they were pricey at 8k! We checked out gloves for my mangalore friend Sujay and found DSG Leather Mesh Short Gloves they were reasonably priced at Rs 1200 and they were much better than my old Angels racing B Zero City glove, so we picked it up for my friend. That was the last piece there :P

I was looking for Full length Leather Touring glove with Kevlar stuff in it. I was specifically looking for gloves that had secure straps on the wrist and forearms. From my crash, i learnt that when the riding jacket cuff is even a bit loose, they slide up in case of a fall and that's how i ended up scraping my forearm. The gloves they had were again mostly of Alpinestar stuff, which was again too costly for my budget, but finally we found DSG Primal Leather Gloves which fit my requirement and budget, it had three level secure straps on wrists and forearm, Kevlar in places prone to impact, most importantly, it was made of genuine leather and it didn't have the dreaded thick foaming inside the gloves, i tried L Sized Gloves and found them very comfortable and secure. My cramster mesh jacket's cuff was tucked in and the velcro straps of the gloves sealed tight, the jacket's cuff didn't come out even when i tried to pull it out :P I bought them for Rs 2300/- No discounts in motomania unfortunately :( But no regrets, post my crash, i don't think twice before investing in riding gear.

Oh yeah, forgot the important info, the motomania chaps didn't accept any type of cards, they accept only hard cash! It meant that sachin and me had to do rounds to Atm and we came back to the store and bought the 2 gloves. It almost 6 pm, time indeed flies! We had to go to koramangala for CCD meet with fellow riders for exchanging our pics taken during our last week's ride. We fought our way back through traffic from indiranagar to koramangala and reached CCD at 7. Met up with Prasanna/LJ and Tana/Krishna/Praveen. Praveen donated his laptop for photo tranfers :P and we all exchanged our pics and saw each others set of pics. All pics had come out very well. Loads of coffee, cigs, talk, jokes went on and on before everyone realised that it was well past 9.30 pm! Since i didn't have my bike, i had to take a rick, that would mean bloody fleecing at night, so sachin decided to lend his bike to me. We all bid byes to each other and i hitched a ride with sachin as pillion till his home. From there, borrowed his bike and his lid, Wore the new DSG Primal Leather Gloves that i had bought and reached home well past 11 much to ire of my parents :P The gloves were very comfy to say the least, i decided that i would use them for few days in city to "run in" them for future rides :P

Woke up early on sunday morning, i had to take back sachin's bike to his place and from there we had to go to Motomania again as the chaps there had told us to come by morning for DSG jackets. Reached sachin's home by 11, from there again sachin rode through same fucked up traffic and ensured that we reached Motomania store well past 12. Thankfully, the chaps there had got new lot and stocks of DSG Nero jackets. They had four colour combos. Red/Black (best looking ones) Blue/Black, Yellow/Black (too flashy) and Grey/Black. They had 3 sizes of M/L/XL. I tried all three sizes, but even M size shoulder armour was dropping for me :( Also, they didn't have all Black jacket, so ditched the idea of buying one for myself. Called up My Mangalore friend Zahin and informed him of colours and sizes, he asked us to buy Red/Black combo of size XL. We bought it for Rs 4500/- The jackets looked better than Cramster Meteor, but sachin was not convinced that they were of better quality than cramster jackets. They looked like they were of same quality as cramster jackets to me though.

Left Motomania by 2 and reached sachin's home by 3. Met up sachin's friend's Venky and chala, venky was flying to UK, so he was making last minute purchases in Jaynagar. It started to rain heavily, we were stuck in jayanagar for more than an hour and half, while waiting for rains to stop. Venky was through with winter wear shopping and wanted shoes, so we went to Katriguppe Bigbazaar area and hunted for shoes unsuccessfully, Sachin and Venky decided to head to Forum for shoes, while me and Chala shared a rick back home. My old splendor was going to be my ride for next week till i get back my zma from repairs. I had to go to Sai Motors on monday to submit more insurance docs on monday morning, was thinking whether to take splendor or not, decided against it and thought of travelling by bus!

Woke up pretty early on monday morning and boarded a bus to majestic, it's been ages since i have travelled in BMTC bus inside city :P relieved my college days :P Boarded another bus from teeming majestic bus stand and reached Sai motors by 11 Am. Mr kiran told me that they would be working on engine today, decarbonising and checking valves as my zma has run 47 K. Since i knew that i had to use my splendor for next 1 week for commute, that too at night, i decided to upgrade it's headlamp with that of new splendor's clear lens reflector. I enquired with Mr kiran if it was gonna be a straight fit and he confirmed the same. The new Reflector unit with H4 socket costed close to 400 bux. Bought one and decided to fix it in splendor after i reached home. Handed over the insurance documents in sai motors and again boarded a bus back home :P Total kharcha for commute in bus was Rs 30/- wonlee :P

Santoosh called up when i landed at home, he wanted to know if i had my old GP ONE lid as spare. I had stopped using GPONE lid after i bought a new all black GPR lid for city commutes, the GPONE had pathetic visor, all i could see was only stars at night! Santoosh needed a spare lid for his girl, I told him that he could pick it up.
He dropped in and checked the lid for fit, it was was fitting him fine, but he had to change the inner paddings as the paddings had lost their fluffyness after 2 years of use. As he was leaving, he noticed the new reflector unit, i told him that i was gonna fix it to my old splendor as the old headlamp in it was pathetic. He then surprised me by telling me that he can lend his Pulsar 180 for office commutes if i was interested and he will manage his college commutes in my splendor. I was really surprised and humbled by his helping nature even after my crash.

I confirmed and reconfirmed if he was really serious about his offer and he told me dead faced that he has no issues riding a splendor to his college! He told that i could pick up his bike by evening after dropping in my splendor at his place. I was really overjoyed and relieved, as riding a Splendor after these many years of riding Zma, in hosur road would have been nightmare for me, with his pulsar 180, it would be same as riding my zma. I thanked him and gave him the GPONE the lid. After he left, i changed the reflector unit of my old splendor with the new reflector unit and used my stock zma 35w H4 halogen bulb in it, fitted everything back. Light was marginally better than the stock old splendor crappy headlight. Slept pretty late post 1pm.

Started blogging after i wokeup :P Should get ready now and take the splendor to santoosh's home and pickup his pulsar 180. Next few days should be interesting riding his souped up Pulsar 180. Will get to see how this beast differs from my Zma.

Chikmagalur-Kemmangundi-Belur

2008-03-26T11:17:00.004+05:30

My First loong ride of 2008 started off with this ride. My earlier ride was 2 days ride, so that doesn't count as a loong ride :P I was really looking forward to meet my Mangalore xbhp friends Zahin and sujay, whom we had met last year during our Ride to calicut. Also, Kemmangundi and Chikmagalur area had eluded me for long, so we decided that this time it's gonna be total offroading ride :P I had done some preparations for the ride, little did i know that this ride would take it's own twists and turns!

The stats:

Ride Duration: 3 days, 21st March 2008 Friday - 23rd March 2008 Sunday

Riders and Bikes:

Santoosh - Pulsar 180
Prasanna - Pulsar 180
Sunil Dhummi - Pulsar150
Gaurav - Avenger
Vaibhav - Avenger
Kartik Ayyar - Thunderbird
Praveen T - Unicorn
Vasanth - Zma

Total Kms covered: 640 kms for me, close to 1000 kms for others.

Route taken:

Day 1 : Bangalore>Kunigal>Channarayapattana>Hassan>Belur>Chikmagalur>Kemmangundi>
Chikmagalur
Total = 365 kms

Day 2: 6 guys took this route.
Chimagalur>Kudremukh>Karkala>Mangalore
Total = 185 kms

Day 3: Santoosh/me/sachin joined the 6 guys at channarayapatna.
Mangalore>uppinangady>sakleshpur>Hassan>channarayapatna>kunigal>Nelamangala>Bangalore
Total = 347 kms

Pics: Click here for my pics
Click here for Gaurav's pics

Retrospection of the Ride:

Kinda trivia, so figure it out!
1. When we left bangalore, we were 8 guys on 8 bikes.
2. People who reached Mangalore were 6 guys on 6 bikes.
3. People who came back to bangalore on last day were 10 guys on 8 bikes.
4. Renu and gang who were supposed to meet us on day 2 and ride to mangalore, didn't turn up, they rode to karwar or something.
5. Krishna dropped out on friday morning due to personal probs and Sachin dropped out due to his bike issues. His bike's piston rings were goner.
6. But sachin was one of the guys who rode back in the group on last day (sunday) to bangalore :P

Ok, let me let the cat out of the bag. Things in brief:

1. I CRASHED for the first time in my riding tenure on Friday night near kemmangundi exit at 8.30 pm or so :(
2. Santoosh and me stayed back in Chikmagalur on saturday and got my zma fixed, the rest of the guys left to mangalore in rain.
3. Sachin and his friend chalapathy came to chikmagalur in a bus from bangalore. They reached chikmagalur on saturday night.
4. Sachin and Chalapathy on zma and Santoosh and me on santoosh's pulsar.
5. We 4 went to Belur and took guided tour and pics on sunday morning :P
6. Met the guys who were riding back from mangalore in Kamat near Channrayapatna (we had coordinated our timings)
7. The entire gang rode back in formation with santoosh as lead and me as his pillion. I have taken lots of videos and pics of group riding.

Iam fine, My riding gears saved my ass. Caterpillar boots + fieldsheerpants + fieldsheerjacket + cramstertwistergloves +GPR Lid took the abuse very well. Zma's Right side front faring cracked and broke. Handlebar and front brake lever was bent, they were replaced in chikmagalur, no fork issues or anything else.

The fall was like from 50 kmph to zero in 1 second, i had jammed my front brakes instintively, the road was full of stones and mud, no tar, i saw a huge crater in front of me at nth moment and jammed front brake and fell on my right side, skidded for some 10 plus feet, ended up with bike on my leg.
Just a slight bruise on my right arm as the jacket slid up as i had not secured it properly :( Slight muscle pain near the right hip area due to the impact. Not a scratch on leg inspite of bike lying on my leg.

Lessons learnt:
1. Caterpillar boots rock, buying another pair for city use. The curent pair got ripped so badly that the steel toe is visible.
2. Get cramster spine protector, used sachin's back protector while sitting pillion, it did wonders to my back.
3. Get a good gloves with kevlar stuff in it and which has good wrist guard which can be secured (DSG Stuff in motomania)
4. Get a crashguard fixed on Zma.

The Ride log:

Day1 - 21st March 2007, Friday :

Since i was in night shift, i had to go to office at 10 pm. Checked mails only to know that Lovejoshi had dropped due to personal problems. Krishna had sent lot of weather updates in mail, looked like chikmagalur was under heavy downpour. Later krishna smsed me that he was dropping out due to personal problems. Got a call from Sachin, his bike's piston rings were gone unfortunately, so he was dropping out too. With riders dropping out like flies at the last moment, the total list of riders stood at 8. I hoped that there shouldn't be any more dropouts due to rains. Left office at 2 Am. Reached home and did packing and stuff. Was all ready to leave by 4.15 Am. Parents did the usual pooja for bike and i was on road by 4.30Am. I was supposed to meet santoosh at Yeshwantpur metro and team up with him to nelamangala crossing meeting point by 5.30 Am. Reached metro and santoosh showed up in 10 mins. We started towards Nelamangala crossing by 4.50 Am.

First surprise of the day, traffic jam! There was horrible truck traffic as soon as we hit NH4 right from Jindhal. Two rows of trucks were moving at stop and go pace. There was very little space to overtake from left as there was some construction going on and they had put up barracades. We somehow squeezed through and made our way through the maze of trucks. The jam lasted for half and hour and we reached NH4 Nice road junction. Found a huge 20 plus wheeler truck slowly crawling occupying both lanes, it was the culprit for the traffic jam behind! Once we over took that monster, it was smooth sailing, Santoosh wanted to get his front tyre's air checked as he suspected that it was over filled, we tried 3 bunks, none had air at that time. So moved toward nelamangala crossing. We both reached the Nelamangala crossing first and it was 5.40 Am. I knew we would be getting delayed as others had to pass through the same jam and come to the meeting point. I waited while santoosh went off in search of a bunk which had air.

Finally by close to 6, the junta started to drop in. Only Prasanna was expected to reach the meeting point alone. So we all waited and took our chai/sutta break. Finally prasanna showed up past 6 Am and santoosh too was back from air checking :P We started off finally at 6.20 Am with santoosh as lead and me as tail. It was a convoy of 8 bikes on NH 48. The weather was cloudy and looked it could rain any moment, so all of us were already wearing our rain gear, i even put rain cover for the cramster tank bag on my bike and we were off. We were doing good speeds as santoosh was leading constantly at 80. I had to catch up sometimes ripping as overtaking was slowing the group down sometimes. Santoosh's Jinga reflective jacket was working perfectly, he had a jacket like the traffic police in radium green colour, i could see him in my sight easily and it was easy for me to see if the lead was always in my view, so the entire pack is together.

We hit kunigal before 7 Am. We had done good speeds. Santoosh wanted to know if we needed to take a break, but with just 40 kms on odo from starting point, everyone was enthusiastic to continue, so santoosh said that our buttbreak/breakfast will be in Kamat hotel in Channarayapatna. That was around 75 kms more to go. We started off. Then on it was butt sore ride. The weather was still pleasant but unpredicatable, i just hoped that it shouldn't start pouring. We did good speeds, some 50 kms in it, cramps started, everyone was flexing their arms and legs :P Kamat hotel was no where in sight, prasanna slowed down and asked me how far was the hotel, i didn't know the exact distance so i told him it was another 5 kms or so, then he went back to his position. Finally after 20 more mins or so, we found kamat on the right side, it was like a mirage, everyone was hungry for breakfast, we rolled in to kamat at around 8.15 Am

Had Hearty breakfast, idli vadas never tasted so good :P after filling our tummies, we started from kamat at around 9.15 Am towards Chikmagalur. We had decided that our next butt break would be in fabulous Hassan-Belur road. 40 more kms to go. So we again rode in formation with me tailing. Hassan town traffic slowed us down a bit and we managed to squeeze past the town traffic and hit the fabulous Belur road.
I had been through this road in one of my earlier rides there is awesome photographic opportunity in the curves there. So i had told santoosh to stop in one of such scenic places. Santoosh stopped at 2 curves, but i didn't like that spot, i wanted the same spot where we had stopped in my earlier ride. Soon we found that spot with 10kms to belur. It was 10.30 Am and we had ample time on our hands to hit chikmagalur (35 kms to go) So we decided to take butt break and photographic break there.

Kartik hit upon the idea of taking pics of the whole group riding in formation and taking the curve. So prasanna and Kartik positioned their cameras and waited, the rest of us (6 bikes) went back and approached the curve with formation. The photographers were not happy with the result, we were too fast and too far from each other, so it was time for retake :P off we went again, this time there was some issue. Finally, we ended up doing the same stretch for around 6 to 7 times before the shutter bugs were satisfied :P It was time for me and santoosh to play shutterbugs, so we sent prasanna and kartik with the rest of the group to take the curve. We too asked for a number of retakes :P finally i got some good shots in prasanna's DSLR. Then it was time for Pulsars :P Prasanna and Santoosh's Pulsar 180s alone taking curves, that came out good too. By the time we packed up our photoshoot :P it was past 11 Am. So we decided to hit chikmagalur.

The road from Belur to chikmagalur was fun, with sharp curves and narrow tankbund roads. We hit chikmagalur in no time. Landed up in Hotel Rajmahal, where krishna had booked rooms. Found the rooms were pretty nominal at Rs 400 with tv! So we took 4 rooms and took quick rest and teamed up for lunch. We had awesome thaali lunch for just 40 bux! it came with 10 items with icecream in the end! It was time to move from hotel to kemmangundi, the offroading heaven :P We were out of hotel at 2.15 Pm towards Kemmangundi. The weather was still pleasant and cloudy, it looked like it could rain any moment, but it didn't :P We were enjoying the ride, the first sight of mountains excited prasanna, he stopped praveen (his cramster for the day :P) got his dslr out of praveen's tankbag and got a good shot of the mountain ahead. Then we moved ahead. Santoosh and rest of the gang were waiting in the deviation for Bababudangiri/Dattapeeta, the southern Ayodhya. Santoosh had already been to kemmangundi more than once, so he knew the in and outs of the place, he led again with me tailing the group.

One the way up, we found breathtaking views, for the first time in my life, i saw actual cloud burst and rain falling somewhere far from where i stood! it was just beautiful, you could hear the sound of rain but it was not raining where we stood, we could see the downpour in front of us. It looked like a painting! Everyone was excited, at the same time our rain gear came out for just in case scenario :P I had taken just the Tank bag and left the cramster saddle bags at hotel, i put the rain cover on the tank bag and after clicking many pics to our heart's content, we packed up and moved on. Dattapeeta is 25 kms from chikmagalur. We were stopping every 15 mins as the views were getting better and better! Finally we hit bad patches of offroading heaven:P it was just full of slush and mud and with water flowing across the roads, there were some crossings with up to 1 feet plus of muddy slushy water :P

The final 10kms or so to Dattapeeta was very narrow curvy roads, the road quality was okaish compared to the slushy roads earlier, that day was a muslim festival, so we encountered lot of tempo trax and sumos in this final route. some 5 kms to Dattapeeta we found an elevated spot, from there the scenery was too good. So the shutterbugs went click happy, i took some shots of zma with backdrop of mountains, while Vaibhav was up to his posing antics :P He even climbed up rocky walls of mountain to someextent and gave spiderman pose as santoosh suggested, while kartik captured his moment of glory :P It was still 3.50 Pm and we had loads of time (or so we thought!) Santoosh wanted to click pics of entire group riding together from far in those ghat roads, so off went everyone and did some 2 trial rides, till santoosh got a good shot in kartik's camera :P

We packed up and rode to Dattapeeta The entrance was huge iron gates, after paying entry fee, to our left we saw a HUGE area of land with secure fencing, i had seen such fencing in TV in Ramjanmabhoomi this was something similar to that. There was huge crowd of Tempo traxs and Sumos with lot of people around as it was festival. We stopped at a vantage point and saw the controversial entrance to the shrine. The actual shrine was underground, the loong entrance was surrounded by 6 foot high iron barricade with fencing. I gave up the idea of a visit to the shrine as it would take lot of time due to crowd, we were about to take a snap of entrance, when a police man shouted at us to move on and not stand at that point, not wanting trouble in a troubled land, we moved on and went to the back entrance of the shrine. I took a pic there of the Shrine from back and the barricades. Sad state of affairs when it comes to matters of faith indeed :(

It was 4.10 Pm. Santoosh asked everyone if we should continue to kemmangundi (40 kms more) or turn back to hotel. Everyone was tempted by the views and excited at prospects of seeing greener pastures ahead, so everyone voted to proceed to kemmangundi. Santoosh led and i tailed, we left Dattapeeta towards kemmangundi. For next 1 hour, we rode and rode, road was getting from bad to worse, muddy to slushy, inclines and slopes! it was mad bad offroading of a life time! Everyone got tired in half and hour, we took a quick butt break in between, at this juncture i realised that i had forgotten my lighter at hotel, while I had my ciggies, i desperately wanted a fag as the offroading took it's toll on me, none in the group had a light (damn these nonsmokers! :P) to our amusement, we found two kids staring at us, they overheard about my requirement, gaurav just approached them and they promptly handed over a matchbox! ah, bliss of a fag! These kids were amused seeing a bunch of wierdly dressed people on bikes in the middle of nowhere, wanting to light a fag :P

Seeing my moment of joy, gaurav lit a fag :P that pissed off many in the group :P We were urged to finish our fags soon as everyone had got there energy back, we both took our own sweet time to finish the fag (much to the irritation of nonsmokers :P) Here i explained the meaning of the word Kemmangundi to Gaurav, In Kannada, it meant Pothole of Redsoil! :P Gaurav in his typical unfazed response told "It's not a pothole man! it's Red soil Ditch!":P Finally ended the 10min extended break and moved on. At around 5.15 Pm, me, prasanna, kartik and praveen found a nice spot to take pics and stopped, but there was no sign of others who were ahead of us. We thought they would have gone ahead and will turn back. but when we went towards the incline for a photoop, we saw the reamining 4 riders in the opp mountain :P they had stopped some 1 km frm where we had stopped, but they were on another mountain! I wanted to click, but realised that my tank bag was on santoosh's bike (he wanted to try the tankbag) and My camera was in it, i frantically waved and yelled at santoosh who was in another mountain to come back :P but he couldn't hear or see me i guess! :P so i resigned to my fate and started to admire the scenery.

Thankfully, Kartik and Prasanna had their cams, so they took lot of pics. Kartik was busy clicking pics of his bull with the background, while praveen/me and prasanna were clicking in his cam. We 3 realised that all of our bikes were of silver colour :P So we started clicking the silver beasts with background. Meanwhile, we saw that vaibhav, sunil and santoosh had trekked the mountain on their side! they were standing on the edge on top of mountain! We four packed up and rode towards the rest of the guys who were high on mountain :p The scenery from there was the best i had seen, the elevation was too good and on all sides we were covered with short mountains with very small grass grown on them, looked like windows xp wallpaper :P Santoosh came down from mountain and showed me the snaps he had taken in my cam, to my surprise i found snaps of me and others riding in the mountains :P He had clicked from top and captured us riding through the winding mountain roads, kewl!

By then, the mountain climbers had come down :P people were making fun of them asking what was on the other side of the mountain, prompt came the reply, "another mountain!" some one said "bay of bengal!" that was hilarious indeed! I then noticed that we had parked our bikes in a perfect lineup, so i immediately snapped pics of the line up of bikes with the background, this turned out to be one of the best pics of the ride :) Then i hit upon a idea of road level shot with timer, so all riders can be captured with their steeds. First shot was through, but i wanted another one, this time i ran after setting the timer on cam but i did not have time to go to the other side of my bike, stand and pose, so i squatted on the ground! :P Both the pics came out very well. This break had got extended to more than half an hour, we finally packed up and started to move by 5.50 Pm. 15 plus kms to go!

Finally as the sun was beginning to set, we hit kemmangundi guesthouse area at around 6.15 Pm. Funny thing was it had only one hotel/canteen, nothing much available to eat. Only biscuits,coffee/Tea. Few guys wanted Idli/Vada, santoosh who has been there earlier, told them that they will take order and give it for morning breakfast :P Seriously, this place was strange and spooky. Also Santoosh gave a countdown and bang at 6.30 Pm the lights went out! Looks like they have electricity only during day and not night! so power was expected only the next day. We ordered coffee/Tea, i shared the chocolates i had bought from home, next few mins were spent with gadgets, santoosh showing some funny videos and listening to a hilarious xxx song from his phone :P After much needed relaxation, we set out at 7.20 Pm. Chikmagalur Hotel from there was 45 plus kms.

It was pitch dark, our bike headlights were the only source of lights around, the roads were bad, there was no tar, only stones and mud! initially it was difficult to ride, but later on everyone got the hang of it, we were doing slow speeds, meanwhile reducing distance between eachother and chugging along like a train of bikes to get better visibility. At every turn, i had to use high beam for a short burst and then back to low beam to see the road surface, continuing in highbeam would mean glaring the rider in front of me, so used to dip it back to low beam. The road surface was pathetic, the little bit signs of tar which were there initially vanished and the road became a dirt track with lot of stones, very rarely we encountered vehicles on our way, at one point, i found only 2 localites in 2 bikes commuting, we over took them. I over took them and the road was curving, kartik was ahead of me, used highbeam for a split second and them dipped back to low beam, only to see a HUGE pothole the size of a crater ahead of me. I was doing 50kmph, what happened next, changed a whole lot of things for me.

I saw the crater ahead of me at the last minute and instintively did something, next thing that i noticed was that something was wrong because my view changed, i was not seeing my bike's console in front me, i felt strange, i heard sounds of screeching and metal rubbing round, i felt my right hip hitting something, right side of lid hitting something, my view changed, i was seeing the road from ground level, i was wondering what was happening, at this time my right arm started to burn, then i saw my bike's tail lamp with it's rear wheel spinning, i was wondering why i was seeing my bike's tail lamp when iam riding! Then my view got clouded in dust and the taillamp of my bike which was the only light visible to me, started to fade in that cloud of dust. It then hit me that i had crashed!

I lay there for few seconds, it again hit me that i had crashed for the very first time in my biking tenure of 6 years! I was on ground on my right side, i tried to get up, but my leg was not free, felt something on my leg, it was my bike, my leg was stuck under my bike, whose tail lamp I was seeing. I knew that i would have been hurt badly, i wondered what damage the bike would have suffered, what would i do next, how would i reach back home with a broken bike, what would i tell my parents, so many thoughts ran in my head. Meanwhile, the localites on 2 bikes, whom we had overtaken earlier, reached and one of them lifted my bike. I didn't even see who lifted my bike at that moment, i stood up as soon as possible, i felt burning sensation on my right forearm inside my riding jacket, as i stood up, my right hip joint pained a bit. I thought i had fractured my hip or something!

I turned around to see that kartik had come back along with vaibhav and they both hastily parked their bikes and came towards me, kartik/vaibhav and the 2 localites were asking me something, but i couldn't hear them, my ears had a strange ringing sound, i thought i was in a bad dream, as a last ditch effort to "wake up myself" from the bad dream, i shook my head very strongly, then i started to hear what all of these guys were telling me, they were asking me if i was all right, but i myself didn't know if i was allright! I took few steps and tried to walk, i was able to walk, but with each step my right hip pained, i thought that i should have had hairline fracture there. The burning sensation on my right forearm inside my riding jacket got worse, so i knew that i would have scrapped my forearm above my elbow. Kartik got worried that i might have got head injuries coz i was still shaking my head, i then told him that i was all right and i was shaking my head coz i thought it was a bad dream. He asked me to remove my helmet, i removed my helmet and soaked in the aftermath of crash.

Others had gone ahead, i knew that they would be waiting ahead. The localites were asking the same questions and i assured them that i was fine and thanked them. They told me that just as i was about to fall, they saw my rear brake lights lightup, they believed that i had jammed my front brakes instintively seeing the crater and i fell. I still don't know what i did at that point of time or how i fell! They left later. I told kartik that i couldn't believe that i had crashed. Vaibhav and kartik tried to console me, but then i remembered my bike, i went near it and turned on ignition, thankfully it came on. Saw some engine oil had leaked on to ground, my fear was that the forks or front disc might have been bent, i asked kartik to check if my bike was moving, he pushed it a bit forward and confirmed that front wheel was rotating. I was relieved to some extent. Then he tried to start my bike, it was not starting, the headlight was not coming on. I got worried. Then i asked kartik to press the headlight socket inside the faring once, it might have got loose, he did that and the headlight came on, but it was still not starting. Told him to leave it for sometime. After few seconds, he tried again and the bike started, then i noticed that the handlebar was bent very badly towards the right side.

It was too crooked to ride, to keep the bike straight, the handle had to be turned to the extreme right, the front brake lever was bent downwards to such an extent that a light touch was enough to engage the front brake. I asked kartik to ride my bike and check if fork had got busted or such, he rode for some distance and came back, he told me that fork seemed to have bent but it was rideable, at this point santoosh came to the scene. He first enquired what had happened and once he came to know that i was shaken beyond myself, he took charge of things. He checked my bike and rode for a short distance and told that fork seemed to be okay and only handle bar and brake lever were bent. He told that others were waiting few meters ahead near a petrol bunk and suggested to move till there to check on things as there was no light where i had crashed. I hopped on to my bike and my heart broke seeing the bike's condition.

The entire handlebar was crooked, the right side front faring was shattered, again many thoughts came to my head as to how i was going to deal with this post crash scene. My right hip joint was still paining with every pothole we took. Santoosh then stopped and asked me if was able to ride my bike, i was not able to ride with a crooked handlebar properly, so he took my bike and i rode the pulsar. We slowly rode for some 100 mts and i saw a petrol bunk on the right of the road, everyone was waiting there, We rolled in to the bunk. I had difficulty in getting off the bike as my right hip was paining. Removed the lid and sat near a stone. I noticed that the Cramster tank bag was still on my bike, i had forgotten that it was there! It hadn't budged even when i crashed! had it come off or such, my Camera kept in it would have become history! Gaurav started to talk to me and i kept on telling him and others that i couldn't believe that i had crashed. Time was around 7.40 Pm, we still had some 40kms to reach hotel. Meanwhile santoosh took my bike to the road and was doing something to it.

I decided to take stock of things, i removed my jacket and noticed my right forearm which was burning had scrape marks and i had peeled skin for 2 inches are so, removed my riding pants a bit and check on my hip, the right side had swelled a bit, But the pain was bit less than what i felt when i had tried to stand up for the first time after the fall. Praveen asked me to clean my right forearm wound with water and apply cotton, the petrol pump chaps gave us water and i washed and dressed up the wound with cotton. Then i went towards santoosh, he had magically straightened the handle to a large extent! He assured me that the bike was and rideable, only the handlebar and front brake lever were bent. Then i realised that everyone was getting delayed because of my crash so i told everyone that we need to move and reach hotel, but everyone told me to relax for a while and forget about reaching hotel. I again sat down and all the thoughts came to my head. I was getting rest less and worried about the next course of action, i cursed myself for crashing.

Time flew and after more than an hour since i crashed, i told everyone that we can ride back to hotel, everyone again enquired me if i was ok, i assured them that i was ok to get back on saddle. So we all packed up and started to move. Santoosh asked everyone to move ahead and asked me to ride my bike while he would lead, we got out of the petrol pump and there it was! Well tarred road! I had ridden in bad roads from afternoon and i crashed just 100mts short of good roads! my luck was bad! :( Santoosh was doing 40kmph and i was following him, after some time, he stopped and asked if i could ride my bike. I was still having problems with the crooked handle, so he told me to ride his pulsar and he would ride my bike. I asked him how far we were from hotel and he said 40 change kms to go, he told the road ahead was good (it was NH) and it was a straight road, that calmed me down to someextent and we switched bikes. I hopped on to his bike with slight pain in right hip and he lead me at constant 40 kmph, gradually he increased speed and caught up with everyone ahead, he told me to tail him and others would tail me.

It was longish ride, the longest 40kms of my life! all the while, thousands of thoughts ran in my head, the road was curvy, uphill and downhill mix of both, very less on coming traffic. He was doing 60kmph for sometime and later pushed it to 80kmph. He was indicating every turn with indicators, so i could follow him easily, the entire gang were riding behind me very cooperatively, no one honked even once or over took me. It started to drizzle after sometime, but santoosh's technique of indicating every curve and turn helped me a lot and i managed to follow him. It was well past 9.30 pm and we were riding for more than half an hour, i couldn't see any signboards or see the odo meter reading in his bike as it was drizzling, i just made it a point to keep tailing him and follow his signals. We rode and rode, after 45 mins in to ride, i signalled for a break near a shop, santoosh told me that we were hardly 10 mins from our hotel at that point, that pepped me up and using every last bit of energy and focus, i rode and finally we reached our hotel!

It was 10.30pm. The moment we entered the hotel, it started to rain heavily! raingods were with me atleast for that moment, i thanked my stars that i managed to reach hotel after my crash, riding for more than an hour! climbing the stairs to reach our room took some effort with the pain. Santoosh came to the room, that's when i started to notice the damage on riding gears. The fieldhsheer jacket was intact, not a single tear, there was mud on right shoulder, elbow and back of the jacket. My riding pants had mud all over them, but two small holes near the right knee armour, i felt bad that i had damaged my new Fieldsheer adventure riding pants, but was thankful that they saved my leg, there was not a single scratch on my legs, thanks to them. Then i noticed that my Caterpillar boots had some damage. The right boot had severe scrape marks near the toe area and just above the toe area, the leather had ripped off and the steel toe of the boot was visible! it looked like my bike's silencer headshield had cut my boots, but the CAT boots did their job and protected my feet, my riding gears had proven themselves to be effective!

The Cramster twist glove that i was wearing didn't tear, they had also taken a beating, but were still intact. My forearm had scraped as i hadn't tightened the cuff of my riding jacket tightly. During the impact, the elbow guards of the jacket took the impact, but as my hand came parallel to the road and as i was sliding, the riding jacket slid up my hand and i had the scrape injury, entirely my fault. Also the riding pants hip armour had taken the impact initially, but as i slid on the road, the hip armour moved to the side as i was wearing my riding pant a bit loose, hence my right hip area muscles had got strained. The GPR helmet that i was wearing had scrape marks on the right chin part, the visor had got scratched badly and taken the whole impact. But still the visor hadn't come loose/broke, the visor mechanism was still intact! I had successfully crashtested GPR Helmet, Cramster Twist Gloves, Fieldsheer Congo sport riding jacket, Fieldhsheer adventure riding pants, Caterpillar boots and cramster tankbag! The tank bag didn't have a single scratch on it, it had latched on to my bike's tank and didn't loosen up even a bit after my fall.

I removed all my riding gear and slipped on the tshirt and cargos. Santoosh assured me that my right hip joint swelling was due to muscle strain/damage and not because of hairline fracture. I used Relispray over the affected part and rested for a while. I told santoosh that i would stay back in chikmagalur, fix my bike's handlebar and front brake lever on saturday, get the bike checked and go back to bangalore on sunday. But he told me that it was not in my best interest to ride my bike myself all the way to bangalore. He told that he would stay back with me to fix the bike and we could inform Sachin about my crash and if he was free, he could come down to chikmagalur on saturday in bus and we all could ride back to bangalore on sunday with me riding as pillion. I was feeling guilty that i had ruined santoosh's ride, but he assured me again that it was not an issue with him and since it was raining heavily, he wasn't in mood to ride till mangalore. I didn't want to disturb sachin either, but santoosh convinced me to call sachin and see, if he couldn't make it, then we both could ride back.

So i called sachin and informed him that i had crashed. He couldn't believe that i had crashed! To my surprise, he told that he would come to chikmagalur by bus and meet me! It was like he read my mind! but I was again feeling guilty that i was troubling too many people at one go, but he brushed aside my concerns and told me that he would be in chikmagalur on saturday. With next course of action clear, i was relieved a bit, but still i was feeling guilty that i was troubling so many people due to my stupid crash. Then santoosh and me decided to inform others about our plan and went to their room. Guys had ordered food in advance as they had known that we would be delayed to reach hotel after my crash, so everyone started having our well deserved dinner, albiet a bit late. I informed about my plan for the next day and asked the guys to carry on to mangalore as per our original ride plan. After some convincing, the guys decided to move on as per ride plan as they knew that santoosh and sachin would be there to deal with my post crash scene.

I somehow didn't feel hungry, had light dinner. After some light talk realised that it was well past 12, so wished the guys good luck and retired to our room. The remaining guys (6 bikes) had decided to start from chikmagalur towards mangalore at 8.30 AM the next day. In room i lighted up cig and tried to do a postmortem of the events that had unfolded, it made me realise that i was damn lucky to have escaped with minimal injuries and even the bike was rideable after the crash. But no matter what i did, i couldn't remember how i managed to crash! My next thoughts were how to deal with parents and how would i manage my office commutes as my bike had to fixed in bangalore for major damages. Santoosh told me to calm down and not to worry too much, he told that he's used to dealing with post crash scenes and knew that things would get better as time progresses and went to sleep.I finished my fag and tried hard to sleep, but the same thoughts came back to haunt me, but later, slowly i drifted to sleep.

Day2 - 22nd March 2007, Saturday :

I woke up at 7 AM. I had forgotten about previous day's crash for like 5 mins :) after that it hit me and i started my day with a smoke. Thankfully, the swelling on my right hip had gone down considerably, so was the pain, now i believed santoosh's words that i didn't have hair line fracture :P Saw flurry of activities in the other room, the guys who were to leave to mangalore were getting ready, they enquired about me and i assured that i was feeling better after good night's sleep. Everyone packed up at 8 Am but it was still raining heavily, so we decided to have breakfast together. After breakfast, everyone started to mount their saddle bags and tankbags for the long ride ahead, rain didn't seem to slow down. I went towards my bike to survey the damage with my cam, the extent of damage did shock me.

My Zma had taken lot of impact, but still she was rideable for 40 kms. My riding gears had saved my ass. Thanked my stars a day late!:P Meanwhile the 6 Guys were ready to brave the rains and start their long journey to mangalore. Santoosh had briefed them about the route details and landmarks. 6 bikes rolled out of hotel at 9.30 Am in heavy rains, while we wished them luck.

Santoosh and me headed back to our rooms. Sachin called me and informed that he would be reaching chikmagalur by 8.00 Pm. We had lot of time on our hands, so we decided to take it easy. It was still pouring cats and dogs, we got ready and left hotel by 11.00 Am, upon enquiring, we found a fairly big Herohonda showroom in the city. We reached the showroom by 11.30 Am. Santoosh was riding my bike while i sat pillion. The service supervisor there was very helpful and friendly. Despite it being saturday, he took my bike in and assigned mechs to fix things. He looked in to all the concerned areas. He even let us inside the service area to take a look at the work being done.

Handle bar and front brake lever were available, but plastics were not. So they replaced the handlebar and brake lever. They checked the front forks and assured us that nothing was amiss and bike was very much rideable to bangalore. They even removed the front faring on my request so i could inspect the extent of damage. The entire right front cowl plastics were gone, one of the reflector's mounting points was also broken. They did a neat job of securing the broken parts to some extent and let us try the new handle postion and brake lever level etc. They finished their job in 1 hour and the bike was ready by 12.30 PM! Engine oil level was low as some oil had leaked after fall, we bought Castrol power1 from near by store and oil was changed too.

Amazingly, the supervisor knew Mr vandhan from Saimotors in bangalore! He also informed me that they had sold only one Karizma from past one year! so much for a 5 year old model :P The bill was for Rs 296/- i was indeed surprised by everything. We thanked the supervisor and tried to tip him for his excellent quick work, but he wouldn't take it! after lot of convincing, he accepted my tip, he even invited me to visit them if i come back to chikmagalur in future :) Wish all Herohonda service centers were like this!

Santoosh rode and i sat as pillion, we went to a doctor to check my forearm wound. The doc was skin specialist. He dressed up the wound and gave me a tetanus shot. Gave me pain killer tablets for the right hip area and charged just 100 bucks! Imagine what it would have costed for the same treatment in bangalore! It was well past 1.30 by then and me and santoosh headed for lunch. We got excellent northindian thali with 10 items including icecream to boot for just 40 bucks! The taste was too good. Chikmagalur is an amazing place to be in, the cost of living is very less compared to the looting in bangalore! We headed back to our hotel and rested. All the while it was still pouring cats and dogs. We got update from the guys who left for mangalore that they were taking Kudremukh route from balehonnur, and it was still pouring there. They had covered good distance compared to the time they started.

By evening, sachin called and informed me that he was in bus and would reach by 8, his friend Chala was also accompanying him. So me and santoosh decided to explore chikmagalur city and also buy famous coffee powder from there. Santoosh was wearing my riding gear as i found it easier to wear his Duckback rain suit. Took a pic of him fully kitted up.

The rain was still heavy. It was as if someone had turned on the shower and had forgotten to turn it off! :P from morning it was raining in constant speed with out any variations! Santoosh wanted to get his bike's air checked at an indian oil petrol pump, since he believed that only IOC bunks air pressure guages are accurate. So we started our hunt for an IOC bunk. Believe it or not, with in a stretch of 4 kms, we found 5 BPCL bunks, 4 HP bunks, but not a single IOC bunk! After more than 45 mins of city riding, we found one bunk on the outskirts! They hadn't turned on the air compressor! finally after santoosh talked to them about our hunt for IOC bunks, they turned on the air compressor and he filled in air and also topped up petrol. We headed back to hotel and took my bike to bunk to fill up fuel. After filling up, we found a coffee works shop and bought natural coffee powder for folks at home, picked up a duct tape and headed back to hotel.

At hotel, taped up zma's broken plastics to hold things together using duct tape. It held up things pretty neatly. At around 6.45 pm the guys who left in the morning, messaged us that they had reached mangalore safely, but it was pouring all through their route. At 8.30 Pm. Sachin called up and informed us that he had reached chikmagalur bus stand, which was walkable distance from our hotel. Santoosh and me walked up to the bus stand and met sachin and chala, at this point the rain slowed down to a drizzle thankfully! After sachin settled down, we all went to a near by hotel for a much required booze cum dinner session :P I narrated my crash story to sachin with complete rewind and playback type details :P We were about to wrap up our session at 11.30 Pm, when prasanna called from mangalore. It turned out that they were boozing too after a wet wet ride of 200 kms in 9 hours! Poor souls were too tired to do anything and it was still raining in mangalore, so instead of hitting the beach, they hit a bar :P We wound up our sessions and headed back to our rooms at 12, we had decided that we would try to tag with the guys starting from mangalore the next day, so we had lot of time on our hands, we decided to go to Belur next day (30 kms)

Day3 - 23rd March 2007, Sunday :

Wokeup lazily at 7 Am only to see that rain had returned in full form! We decided to have breakfast and then decide about Belur, by the time we had breakfast, rains stopped completely! Rain gods were blessing us i guess! We checked out of hotel in chikmagalur and started towards belur at 8.30 Am. Santoosh riding my zma and me as pillion and Sachin riding santoosh's bike with chala as pillion. Santoosh wanted to try my cramster saddle bags on his pulsar, so the saddle bags were on his bike. But with the saddle bags on, there was very little space for pillion to keep his leg in pulsar, so we switched back the saddle bag to my zma and switched bikes too. So i was pillion with santoosh on his pulsar while sachin rode my zma with chala as pillion. The ride out of chikmagalur was good, since the rains had stopped, it was still cloudy and at far off mountains we could see amazing cloud cover moving around like thick layer of smoke.

We rode leisurely and reached Belur in 40 mins at 9.15 Am. We decided to take guided tour of the temple. Sachin found a guide for 150 bucks and our guided tour started. I have been to belur earlier, but at that time, we hadn't taken a guide, i felt we should have taken a guide during my last visit because there is just so much details about the temple and the carvings that with out a guide, we won't understand them. The guide explained lot of things about the temple, the carvings, the architecture etc. I was just spell bound seeing few scientific techniques which were used in few sculptures.

We were through with our Belur guided tour and photography by 10.30 Am. We got message from Kartik that they had started from Mangalore at 8Am and would be reaching Sakleshpur by around 12. We still had plenty of time, so we took a big break in KSTDC Mayura Hotel in Belur, much to amusement of the hotel staff, they were curious about Cramster Spine protector which i was wearing (borrowed from sachin) They even checked out our riding gear and i was like a live example to them about the effectiveness of riding gear :P We moved towards hassan after the break and were in Reliance Petrol bunk in Hassan by 12 Pm. Kartik messaged that they were taking lunch break in Sakleshpur, so we decided to Head towards Kamat Hotel near Channarayapatna for lunch. The Spine protector was really doing it's job very well, My back was totally relaxed inspite of me wearing a backpack sitting as pillion.

Santoosh's riding style took sometime to get used to :P I was shit scared initially sitting as pillion behind him, but later on i got the hang of it. He used to maintain a constant speed and slow down only when necessary, very different from the way i ride, but he was riding very cautiously too. I was getting bugged sitting as pillion in a ride for the first time, so used my Nokia N73 Phone Cam for capturing video/photos, they surprisingly came well! We reached Kamat Hotel in 45 mins and proceeded with our lunch. Finally, Kartik and gang reached Kamat, just as we were through with our lunch. While we were chit chatting in parking lot, we saw few fully loaded bulleteers riding in to hotel, they parked beside us. They too were fully kitted up and bulls were LOADED to max with their panniers on :P

One of the riders spoke to us and we came to know that they were RTMC Bullet group members. We introduced ourselves as from Bikenomads. Santoosh briefed everyone that we were going to ride in formation now on till bangalore and he would lead, sachin would follow and the rest would be behind sachin. The mangalore troupe were dog tired from all the wet riding they had done from the previous day, so they agreed to his idea. We started off in formation, i was using my Phone cam to capture videos and photos again, the videos came out very well, with all the remaining 7 bikes riding in perfect formation with headlights on. We took two butt breaks on the way and reached Nelamangala crossing by 5.45 PM. Few guys from here would take NICE Road, while few would take the inner roads.

Next up, we stopped at NICE road junction. Here kartik, sunil, vaibhav and Gaurav parted ways, while Sachin, prasanna, Santoosh and praveen carried on through the city roads. Traffic jam welcomed us with open arms as we entered NH4 towards city. After gruelling ride through the stop and go traffic, we all reached Malleshwaram by 7.00 Pm We hit the CCD there and chilled out for a while. It started to drizzle after we reached CCD :P Rain gods had blessed us for a long time indeed!

After lot of talks and smokes and cold coffees and snacks, we decided to move. From here Sachin hopped on to prasanna's bike as they stayed near by to each other. Santoosh bid goodbye early and left as he had some work. I had to ride for the first time after i crashed. Initially i felt the bike was kind of rough, but later got used to it. I dropped Sachin's friend Chala on the way home and reached home at 9 Pm. I just sat on the bike for 5 mins or so doing nothing after i reached home, i was letting it sink in that i reached home in one piece after all the fuckups :P Then proceeded to removed the saddle bags and tankbag.

An extraordinaary ride came to an end. My investments on riding gears saved my ass big time, i decided to buy the cramster spine protector as it helped my back a lot and get myself a good leather touring gloves with kevlar which extends till forearm.
I don't know how i will ever express my gratitude to santoosh, sachin and all the other co riders in this ride. Everyone stood by me, helped me pull up my socks and complete this ride and reach home in one piece. Santoosh and Sachin especially went out of their way to help me and ensured that i reached home in one piece, i can't thank these two guys enough. Iam thankful to have such helpful selfless souls as my friends and co riders.

Coming back to my bike, she's bruised and hurt, but still she didn't let me down. After the crash, she hauled a rider with pillion and cramster saddle bags, all the while she was being belted at 100 kmph. My love and respect for her went up, will be fixing her up soon, most probably by this weekend.

Bandaged Beauty all set for the Ride!

2008-03-19T13:04:00.004+05:30

No, it ain't a pic of a babe in hospital :P but pic of my zma's tank after my "hard work" yesterday with scotch tape to start using Cramster tank bank for this weekend's ride. This jugaad is to prevent more scratches getting added to the tank from tankbag. Even though the tankbag has soft material on the contact patches, dust enters the gap between the tank and tankbag while riding and it results in scratches as i have seen in sachin's bike. Zma's tank has lot of battle scars already, prominent ones thanks to my kneeguards, which i wore over the pants once and they neatly scraped off paint from the sides of tank :(

I don't want any more nasty contributions. So had to do this ugly jugaad. While i was taping up the tank, i decided to tape up the side panels too as the cramster saddle bags rub against the side panels and leave lot of scratches.

As a followup of my last post i took these pics in office parking lot. The "bandages" will go after this ride, May be after this weekend's ride, where, i will be using the tank bag for the first time, i will get an idea as to where exactly i have put the "bandages" for future rides :P This first time effort is surely a work which is overdone to say the least :P

It rained cats and dogs & tankbag :P

2008-03-18T12:19:00.002+05:30

Last weekend was complete washout to say the least!
Saturday started out as usual as a lazy day, had to get Zma's Engine oil changed, went to mech and got the liquid drained out, it was very very dirty and jet black! Need to give the bike for engine flushing soon, after 45k kms, it's high team for zma to get her internals cleaned :P In went the new castrol power1 bottle contents and immediately started to feel smooth, Went to castrol distributor and picked up two castrol power1 1 ltr bottles for 200 bucks each (cheaper by 30 bucks than mrp) and came home and caught up with much need sleep.

Woke up evening, had to meet sachin in Koramangala CCD along with other BN guys to discuss ride plans for the coming weekend. At 5 PM, the skies were all dark and it was pretty windy, sachin called up later and informed that he was already in CCD and it was raining heavily. Thanks to his early warning :P i kitted up with cramster's waterproof liner for my city riding jacket and also wore the liner of my Fieldsheer Adventure pant, which looked like waterproof material as over pants and set off. Half way through, it started to drizzle, then it started to pour heavily as i reached near shoolay circle.

The roads were like swimming pool! After 5 mins i was the only crazy biker on road, all two wheeler junta had parked on roadsides and taken shelter in bus stops and shops. It was getting dark and visibility was pathetic, the audugodi stretch was water logged coupled with horrible traffic snarls, finally i made it to CCD dripping with rain water. Few people were taken aback seeing me walk in like a mad guy with complete gear but still dripping with water all over :P The overpants had withstood for half and hour, later they gave way and let the water seep in :( The cramster's rain liner did it's job well, the gloves had given up and they were soaked in water.
All the other BN guys were stuck in rains and started to msg us that they won't be able to make it. Then on we got on to discussions about ride plans and finally came up with final ride details. All the while, it was still raining heavily and there was no sign of rains slowing down or even stopping.

Finally at around 9pm, started to ride back in rains to home, it was a horrible ride back, with rain lashing, cars splashing the stagnant water from road, managed to reach home after 1 hour of literally wading through water, ended up with water soaked woodlands boots and jeans :P After much needed dinner, caught up with idiot box for sometime and hit the sack.

Sunday was off to a promising start. I had to go to marathhalli near Airport to pickup some spares for my mangalore friend Zahin's RD. My friend girish was free, so took him as pillion and off we went. From majestic to Airport through MG road it was flat 20 mins! i couldn't believe it! traffic was nil and the roads were empty, bliss of riding on a sunday afternoon i guess! Met up Mohith, the guy who was handing over the spares to me, chatted with him for a while and found out that he was on BN sometime back in 2003, that was even before i joined BN! later found out that he was active in RD Dreams and Team BHP. After an hour's talk and collecting the spares, we pushed off aimlessly, called up sachin, he informed that he was going to Cramster shop in RT Nagar to buy Cramster's Riding boots, so decided to join him to check out the boots.

Met KJ (owner of Cramster) and sachin in Cramster Shop in RT Nagar. Even Santoosh showed up as he stays nearby. Checked the Boots, they are awesome! KJ was kind enough to let me try boots too, so i tried my first riding boots :P It felt solid and good :) I was tempted to buy them, but my near zero bank balance prevented me from doing so :P Creditcard was too tempting, but thankfully KJ was not accepting cards :) Sachin too tried them on and he felt comfy in the boots, KJ had three sizes of boots 44, 45 and 46. 44 was perfit fit for sachin. He bought them finally.

I was in two minds about going in for Tank Bag, found a new tank bag in Cramster shop and talked to sachin as he already has one, he suggested to go in for one. So finally i bought myself a Tankbag! Checked out Kneeguards, New Touring jackets and also new mesh jacket there, after the purchases, we bid byes to KJ and hit CCD near by. After loads of coffee+smoke sessions, it was time to leave, but it again started to rain! Damn these rain gods, they login at odd times :P

Again kitted up with cramster's waterproof liner (no overpants this time :( ) Rode back carefully, thankfully it stopped raining near malleshwaram and i hit home safely. Today morning i did some trial fittings of Tankbag on zma, at first it felt rather odd to have it as i was always used to seeing the flat tank on rides. Later, positioned it properly and it blended it. Sachin had suggested to use scotch tape on tank to prevent scratches from tank bag, so bought scotch tape from medical store and spend one hour in sticking it to contact points of tankbag on tank. Also stuck the tape to side panels where cramster saddle bags rub against it.

After my scotch tape work :P, i saw my zma and she started looking like a bandaged beauty :P Will post the pics sometime tomorrow. Iam all set for weekend's ride, it's gonna be a 3 day ride. Iam totally geared now interms of hauling capability with my old saddle bags and the new tank bag.Now, Zma is a fully loaded touring machine :P This is gonna be my first ride with out any backpack, during all my earlier rides, i used to carry my wildcraft bag on my back with sparevisor/glasses/camera etc, now with the tank bag, it will be less taxing on my back i hope.

PulsarMania!

2008-03-13T10:21:00.004+05:30

What an ad!
Was flicking channels few days back and saw this awesome Pulsarmania ad on Tv! I was left gaping :P The stunts are just unbelievable and crazy! Group wheelies, group stoppies, group doughnuts holding hands!
It's like these guys are performing ballet on their bikes! Watch the youtube version of the ad below:

Read in Biking groups later that this Ad was shot in Capetown, South Africa. Stunts were performed by few of world's best stunters like Acfarias and Matte Griffin. An Indian bike ad shot in Africa with European stunters! Now, that's truly Global integration! :P

Kudos to Bajaj for setting standards in Ads for other manufacturers. I hope the likes of Herohonda learn from Bajaj about how to make ads for bikes, Hope Mr Munjal understands that you don't need Mr six fingers performing an assisted wheelie and Shit loads of CG for selling a bike :P Herohonda's current ads are amusing only to a 10 year old kid! :P

Through this Ad, Bajaj is showcasing all their performance horses like Pulsar 180/200/220. It is not an Ad for any specific bike, but it is to showcase their range of power bikes (in indian terms :P) I like the word PulsarMania! Am not a bajaj fan boy and don't like their bikes either as they lack refinement and their quality levels are not up to the mark of Honda. They are succesful in masking the weakness of their products and are creating an aura around their bikes. But i love this ad for sure!

I just hope that none of the local street Rossis try to imitate this ad and land in soup, we already have enough such lame asses doing wheelie and stuff in crowded roads. I also hope that Yamaha ups the bar further with a fantastic Ad for their much awaited Yzf R15 Bike.

You can also download High resolution Video in MP4 Format of this Ad below:

Click here for Video

Click here for Mp3

Both the links are courtesy of Payeng.

Spares Shopping Weekend!

2008-03-11T10:42:00.004+05:30

Last weekend was spent majorly shopping for spares. Not that i needed any immediately, But my Xbhp friend Krishna needed spares for his Zma, which are must have while touring. So, we hit Jc Road on saturday morning and ended up hoarding stuff :P I was itching to change the headlamp bulb too, not that i had the stock crap bulb, i had got rid of it long back and was using Osram SilverStar 55/60w Bulb, It was great, but the highbeam was narrow. Then i read in Bcmtouring about Philips Vision plus 55/60w Bulb. One of the members had tried it and found that the high beam too was as wider compared to other bulbs. So, i wanted to try that. Krishna's Zma was still on the stock crap 35w bulb, so he too was ready to buy it.

But before that, Krishna needed a new helmet. He had lost his earlier AGV helmet (some one had whacked it from helmet lock of his bike :( ) So I took him to our usual place and got him a GPR Lid for Rs 2600 with mercury and plain visor. Now he too owns a similar helmet like me, GPR black lid. Then i tried my hunt for Barclavas and luckily found black baraclava, but they had jacked up the price to Rs 90! i had earlier bought White baraclavas for Rs 35. My bargaining skills failed and i picked up 2 baraclavas for myself, 2 for my friend sachin and needless to say, Krishna too picked up 2 for himself. The shopkeeper made a lot of moolah indeed :(

Then the hunt for bulb started. We went to the shop, from where i had bought osram bulb few months back, but that shop had stopped selling bulbs less than 100w. But, the shopkeeper asked us to wait and got the Philips vision plus bulb for us. We paid Rs 225 for each bulb, it was expensive compared to osram (Rs 120) but i decided to give it a try. While we were waiting, i found 2 customers buying bulbs and stuff from that shop, the amount of 100w bulbs and reflectors they were buying was too many, later we found out that they were buying all that stuff for a brand new truck! :P Four 100w Bulbs with reflectors and 2 Fog lamps! No wonder we bikers get blinded at night by truckies! HID is the only way to pay back these guys in their own coin! coming soon in future, on a zma near you :P Truckies/buses/Cagers, be afraid....very afraid... :P

After the bulb, it was time to get spares for krishna's Zma. We went to Navin Associates in JC Road, this chap is the authorised distributor and stockist for all HeroHonda bike spares. Bought throttle cables, Clutch cables. Unfortunately spare fuses were not available. I had read in Xbhp that HeroHonda chaps had increased the front disc pads cost to Rs 1500 now from Earlier Rs 770 change, I had ranted about it few days back. Few guys had posted that some dealers had old stocks and were giving it for old rates. So, i casually asked the chaps there about the price of the disc pads, to our luck, he told us the old price! We were overjoyed. They had old stocks of disc pads. So we both bought a set each immediately! We verified about the chain sprocket set cost and thankfully it was still in Rs 800 change territory. But knowing Herohonda's past record of insane price variations of few spares of Zma, iam not gonna take chance, will have to get a spare chain sprocket set by next month.

Went to Castrol Bike Zone in Jc road and got the Philips bulb fitted on Krishna's Zma. I was keen on doing it myself in my bike, so i just watched. Later, we did some testing in dark corners there and the result was good indeed. The highbeam of this bulb is wider than my Osram bulb. Krishna was very happy with the lights now, his night life had lit up for good :P

Bought a few rubber bushes which were worn out near the fuel tank from honda spares shop! they were not available in Herohonda spares shop! Bid byes to krishna and reached home dead tired. Managed to fit the bulb yesterday by myself. It was another DIY Session for me, like the earlier session. Surprisingly it took just 15 mins for me to remove the front faring of Zma, unplug the osram bulb and plonk in the new philips bulb and fit back the faring. Now, am truly becoming a part time mech for sure! :P The rubber bushes from honda were a perfit fit on Zma :P Tested the bulb on my way to work at night. As i had noticed in Krishna's Zma, the philips vision plus bulb has wider high beam and equally wider Low beam. But the distance between Low and hi beam is less. It's also lot whiter and brighter than the earlier Osram Silverstar bulb. Over all am satisfied, need to see how this bulb performs over a period of time. However, mission HID is very much on cards, till then, have to do with Halogens :(

It's that time of the year :P

2008-03-07T10:48:00.006+05:30

Well, Well, it's that time of year again :P didn't get it? Let me give you some clues:

1. All your colleagues are extra nice to you.

2. All employees in the company are at their behavioural best.

3. Everyone is on time to office and "willingly" stay back most of the time to finish some new found pending work :P

4. No one takes a single day's leave.

5. Everyone is buttering up to their managers and Bosses :P

No, it's not start of Valentine season in office! (Wish there was one!:P) It's the Annual Appraisal time! It's time for IT Slaves to be on their best behaviour and in the good books of their bosses, lest their appraisal becomes a joke. Suddenly all pending works are tended to and resolved in record time, various reports start to flow to bosses, which had stopped exactly one year back :P Then comes the D Day of filling up the appraisal form. You will have to fill up your entire year's achievements in one column :P not a difficult task for many coz they would have hardly achieved anything :P But to hardworkers like me (just being modest here :P) it takes quite a bit of effort to squeeze it all in to a box. Then there is the dreaded, what i call, "Honesty tick boxes". You will have to choose/rate yourself on how good you are as a team player, how good you are when it comes to interpersonal skills.

You have to choose between 1 to 5 and rate yourself, the gentleman's agreement is not to rate yourself more than 4 and less than 3 for ANY of the options :P Coz your boss will ALWAYS rate you one grade lesser than what you have rated yourself :P Noobs and colleagues who have kept changing companies every year, who have never filled appraisal forms need to be guided by you to fill in the form as they are flummoxed by the endless categories of disection :P Finally when you do manage to complete all the sheets and send that mail to your manager with your appraisal form attached, you are just half way through. The dreaded waiting period begins :P

Now on, you are extra cautious, extra nice to everyone:P, you take temporary political sanyas from office politics :P and wait for the day when out of the blue, you will be informed by manager to drop in to the cabin for "discussions" you go with your heart in your mouth, you notice the envelope on the table, if you were me, you would already know how much you got (not how much you deserve :P, you never what you deserve, life is not fair, remember? :P) Your bosses then talk and talk and talk, the envelope seems to have been forgotten, you suddenly realise that bosses have plans for your future, they have plans for your well being, plans, which will make you a better contributor to company. Notice that there is no talk of the dirty word "monitory compensation" Then your boss thrusts you the envelope and conveniently gets on to an "important" phone call. You open the envelope, with expectations, you can almost visualise your family budget in it :P

You take out the letter and read. Read it again, it looks like last year's appraisal letter, oh no, wait, the date is correct, hmm, there seems to be a fine change in some numerals somewhere, but in the end the CTC seems to have jumped by quite a few numbers, now where did all that money go! You read the fine prints and resign to your fate, your monthly take home is gonna be almost same, your tax bracket has increased, you will be paying Mr chidambaram more and that's about it! You are dejected and question yourself, is this what i slogged my ass for? suddenly, all the earlier talk of plans for your future starts to feel like fake words, your plans to buy that new tv, bike/car have to be shelved. You wait to talk to boss, but no, he's engrossed in the phone, you wait and wait.

Finally walk out of the cabin accepting your fate. Sounds familiar? Was inspired by one of my appraisals :P But seriously though, i think the appraisal shouldn't be an once a year ritual, the self development and reviews and other blahs blahs have to be done periodically so that the actual ritual doesn't become a mundane money expecting task. People should feel really good after appraisal and not like they got shot in their chest! :P

Few cartoons which sum up the mood :P

Iam on MotorTrend Mag!

2008-03-06T10:37:00.004+05:30

Great news! International Automobile Magazine MotorTrend has featured me in their Magazine this month! I don't blame you if you don't believe me, coz i myself can't believe it! Proof, you ask? Check out the pic!

Well, that was a bad PJ :P Actually it's chamatkar of Google baba :P Was aimless surfing at home yesterday and found a site that allows you to create your own Magazine cover pics! You can get yourself featured in any magazine cover of your choice!, but it's virtual only :P I found interesting magazine covers like NationalGeographic, Life, Cosmopolitan, Maxim etc. Next, i will be featured in TIME magazine as, man of the year!:P Nice way to become a celebrity for a moment eh? :P

To get your own moment of fame click here

DIY Saturday!

2008-03-04T11:13:00.007+05:30

I was free last weekend, so decided to give my bike a wash. She deserved a nice wash after the previous weekend's ride. So much muck and dust had got collected, i spent a good 2 plus hours in cleaning her up and ended up giving a good coat of Formula1 Wax polish. At the end of the ordeal, she was sparkling like a new babe :P Then the DIY (Do It Yourself) keeda bit me. I had got the ignition switch kit replaced after the previous ride, the connecting wires underneath the tank were not routed properly to my satisfaction, the two wire ends coming out from underneath the tank were protruding outside. I had thought of going to a local mech, get the tank removed and route the wire properly.But after the washing process, i was in no mood to ride in hot sun to mech and get the stuff done, so just armed with Zma's Company tool kit, i set out to dismantle the front faring and Tank and do the job myself!

I had observed mechs earlier removing the front faring and tank, so i knew that i could manage it myself. After struggling a bit to loosen the bolts holding the front faring, beneath the faring, i managed to unscrew the bolts and with a gentle nudge, the front faring was removed. I was happy with the progress so far, next i set out for the tank, I disconnected the fuel pipe connecting to carb and then unscrewed the bolt holding the tank to the chassis. I had filled in the previous night, almost to 90% of the tank's capacity, so that made the tank heavier and it was struggling to hold it, i found the float connector and removed it, but got stuck with another tube connected to the tank's underbelly. A quick call to my DIY friend Zahin, solved the mystery, it was the drain pipe for water collected at the fuel cap. So promptly disconnected it and the tank came loose. Placed it on a smooth surface and watched my achievement with glee :P

Found lot of taped wires were loosing their tape due to the weak adhesive, promptly retaped them with electrical duct tape, then found the ignition wire jetting out. Routed that wire in various combos in the chasis and checked if it was getting stressed by turning of the handle bars. Finally found one good spot in the chassis to route the ignition wire, where it was not getting pulled or stressed due to turning of handle bar. Rechecked everything, secured the joints of the wires and with great difficulty, mounted the fuel tank again on the bike! It was damn heavy due to almost 14 Litres of fuel in it, but managed some how. I noticed that the front faring had some vibes, on closer inspection found the both the sides of the plastics had broken notches inside, i unscrewed the Headlamp assembly from the faring and in a minute, i had the headlamp assembly in my hand! :P

Did some tightening of screws inside the faring and started the circus of mounting back the headlamp unit to the faring, found that the headlamp unit gets fixed to the faring in 6 screws, but couldn't get the alignment to fix all screws properly, dropped few screws in to the deep hollows spaces in the faring some times :( after struggling a lot, managed to fit back the headlamp assembly to the faring and the faring to the bike! In the process noticed that most of the rubber hinges near the fuel tank/front faring were worn out or missing. That's where the vibes creep in when i ride. Should go out this weekend and get those rubber hinges and fix them myself, another small DIY activity awaits this weekend.

So, what did i learn from last weekend's DIY activity? well, as a tourer, i must know to diagnise a problem in case my bike breaksdown in the middle of nowhere. Atleast, i should be able to do a first level check of things and fiddle with problem prone areas of the bike. Last weekend's DIY gave me a bit more confidence that i can fix minor things in my bike myself with out the mech's intervention, that too with company supplied basic tool kit! Kinda like first aid with basic first aid kit :P I should upgrade my toolkit now and take this DIY to more depths so that i can become a part time mech and tune my bike to my satisfaction and fix chota mota things.

Ride through jungles and a hill station!

2008-02-26T13:00:00.015+05:30

As per our last weekend's plan I went on my first ride of this year! My last ride was way back in November 07 to Hampi. In 2 days, I rode 600 kms plus! this is the longest distance i've covered for a 2 day ride. Manas joined us till bandipur, he was doing solo ride to ooty, so he rode with us oneway. It was total of 7 bikes and 8 guys while going and 6 bikes and 7 guys while coming back.

The stats:

Ride Duration: 2 days, 23rd Feb 2008 Saturday - 24th Feb 2008 Sunday

Riders and Bikes:

Vasanth - Zma
Balaji+ Raj - Thunderbird
Kartik Ayyar - Thunderbird
Gaurav - Avenger
Vishal - Avenger
Sunil Dhummi - Pulsar 150
Manas - Thunderbird (one way till bandipur)

Total Kms covered: 600 plus Kms (my trip meter conked! that story follows)

Route taken:

Day 1: Bangalore>Mysore>Nanjangud>Gundlupet>bandipur>masinagudi>ooty(!!)>masinagudi>Bandipur

Day 2: Bandipur>gopalswamybetta>Bandipur>Gundlupet>nanjangud>Mysore>Bangalore

Pics: Click here

Retrospection of the ride:
What to say! Rode my ass off the first day! We managed to hit ooty, the 36 hairpin bends after masinagudi towards ooty, tested our bike's endurace and our riding skills to limits! We climbed down the same hair pin bends at night! rode through masinagudi and bandipur forest area at night! i missed sighting at tusker at night :( This ride was with 2 dramatic events. One of the riders hit an Ox near gundlupet on the first day, thankfully there were no injuries to the rider due to his riding gear and on second day, my zma's ignition switch went kaput!

Had to do some jugaad to ride back. The ride back was awesome! we did good speeds, especially balaji and me were frustrating cagers :P Balaji led and i followed him and it was rip fest at 110 and 120 till outskirts of bangy! Many cagers would have assumed that something was wrong with their cages coz no matter what they did, they could never over take us :P balaji frustrated a tata indica guy so much, that the cager gave up after many kms of trying to tail us :P (with hand guesture to overtake him!) thanks to mysore road's curves, dumb cagers couldn't keep their acceleration at curves, they used to slow down, while we used to flick our bikes at constact speeds :P Over all it was a good ride, marred with two breakdowns, kinda my first ride, where some one crashed and my bike conked temporarily. Also this was my first ride with my new riding pants, Fieldsheer adventure riding pants. The pants rock! they are comfy enough even in hot weather, the knee armour which is adjustable is really a boon, the knee armour was positioned exactly on my knee when i rode my bike and it didn't move around. Overall a good investment!

The Ride log:
Day 1 - 23rd Feb 2007, Saturday:

Left office early from friday's night shift at 2.30 Am and reached home at 3.15 Am, I had already packed most of the things the previous day, so did final packing and rested for a while. Our meet time was 5 AM in Rajajeshwarinagar Arch on mysore road, which was 10kms for me from my place. By 4.15 AM, i was ready after i mounted the cramsters and wore my gear. Parents did the usual pooja for bike and i was on road by 4.40Am. I reached the meeting point at 5 AM. Manas rolled in at 5.10. Finally rest of the guys rolled in by 5.25 Am. Kartik was the last to join and we started the ride at 5.40 AM, with manas leading (he likes to ride at high speeds) followed by balaji and then me, with the rest of junta behind me and kartik was the tail as he had footpump.

Early morning ride through mysore road was great, we did good speeds and gobbled up kms. It was still dark, so the headlamps were doing their job, but still i felt my 55/60w Bulb wasn't enough, time for HID i think :P our first pit stop for breakfast was tiffany's hotel near maddur, we rolled in there at around 6.30 Am, but it turned out that we were too early and the hotel was not yet open. So we took a tea break there. Spotted a yellow Zma R guy with cramster jacket and all, he pulled over seeing our parked bikes. It turned out to be a xbhp member. After some chitchat and introduction to our group, exchanged numbers. He was riding towards mysore, but he was riding leisurely, so bid goodbyes to him and we started off again towards mysore.

The ride till mysore was again done in good speeds. We were in outskirts of mysore by 8.30 AM. We regrouped there and decided to have breakfast in Nanjangud. The ride to nanjangud was manageable through the 2 laned road as it was early morning and there was not much traffic. We stopped at a hotel there and had tasty breakfast. The owner was very enthu about us landing there on our bikes :P he gave us a discount on the final bill on his own! :P We started off towards bandipur by 10.00 Am and the ride was good, but crowded with village folk and cattles at some places. At this point, i was tailing balaji and just kept an eye on the rider behind me. We crossed gundlupet and the bad roads started towards bandipur.

It was bone rattling ride for 20 kms or so from there to our hotel in bandipur. Road was worse than lunar craters and gravel, bikes were bouncing up and down, cages were doing around 20 or 10 kmph avoiding the craters. I did constant 40 kmph with my bum slightly raised from the seat and zma gobbled up nasty craters easily. Then the nightmare ended! Smooth tarmac with light curves started. Balaji started ripping and he was gone in no time, i was in 80 enjoying the curves. Managed to find a nice spot to pee (:P) just before our hotel and i was taking the much needed break, when i heard my mobile ring. It was sunil dhummi calling. He gave us the shocking news.

One of the riders had hit a cow (we found out that it was an ox later!:P) the problem was neither sunil nor the rider who crashed knew kannada and they were surrounded by kannada speaking localities. Only me and balaji knew kannada. So i rang up balaji, he was already in hotel, he came back with manas to join me. We found out from sunil that the incident had taken place before gundlupet! that was good 25 kms plus from where we were! how could these guys miss from the group? It turned out that the rider behind me was not keeping an eye on the bikes coming behind him and also the rider who crashed had slowed down considerably to keep up with sunil who was riding a bit slow and cautious.

Once we realised that they were far, we adviced manas to carry to ooty as he was solo, it wouldn't make sense for him to ride 25 kms towards the fallen rider, through bad roads and again go back, he would get late. He agreed after lot of reasoning from me and balaji and finally left halfhearted towards ooty. I sent off Gaurav and Vaibhav to hotel, so that they can take up the rooms. Me and balaji rode back to the place of crash, through the bad roads and we were relieved to see the fallen rider standing, with out any injuries. His riding gear saved his ass big time. Me and balaji starting talking to locals in kannada and they even let us inspect the "cow" It turned out to be an ox! The rider was around 80kmph, when this ox, led by it's owner was on the side of the road, as he neared it, it had come towards the road, he had tried his best to avoid it, but the left part of the handle bar and crashguard hit the ox and the rider fell the bike took the impact. The ox skated on the road due to impact and had lots of scrapped skin and a broken teeth (!!!)

After getting the picture and making few calls to my cop friend in bangalore, we knew that the way out was to pay nominal cash for injuries of the cow. After negotiating with the localities, we managed to pay them off and took the bike to a near by mech for fixing it as it was not starting. The mech there did all he could and gave up! Thankfully the front forks and wheels were not misaligned, the bike was ridable, the front headlight, speedo consoles had taken the impact, the handlebar was crooked. crashguard bent. Balaji finally figured out the problem to few cut wires, the wires that pass underneath the tank had got cut at a point due to the crash, once we joined those wires, the bike roared back to life. It was 1.30 Pm by this time, more than 2 hours from the time of crash. I had told gaurav and vibhav earlier over phone to start exploring the place as we were getting late. So by the time we reached our hotel, it was 2 PM. Freshened up, had lunch at the hotel and we were doing postmartem of the crash and reliving the incident.

We had to go to Kalahatti falls. Since the crashed bike was not in good condition for ghat roads, the crashed rider rode pillion with balaji and balaji's pillion Raj rode with me. Sunil dhummi was on this Pulsar 150, we started off towards masinagudi, we spotted few domesticated elephants few kms from our hotel and stopped to take pics. The jumbos were crossing the road, two small baby elephants were playing in clay, they were so cute:P We met gaurav and vaibhav, they were riding back from masinagudi and were going for jungle safari, we told them that we would meet them at hotel by evening and we carried on. The roads were too good, we were doing good speeds. Surprisingly, the Tamilnadu checkpost cops didn't stop us for inspecting our documents, we were let through. As we rode through Tamilnadu, we hit place called "theppakaadu" from here, two routes were there to kalahatti falls and ooty, one with 36 hair pin bends and one with 30 kms round about. We chose the shorter one with 36 hair pin bends. This was the point till which gaurav and vaibhav had ridden earlier, they had turned back from that point towards bandipur for safari.

The nilgiris mountain was visible from far, the winding roads with trees covered on both sides were beautiful, we stopped in between for a photo break, took few pics and carried on. Then the hairpin bends started! This ghat section is only for four wheelers and 2 wheelers, buses are not allowed (they take the 30 kms round about route) i could understand why! These roads were so damn narrow, hardly enough for a cage and a bike to pass each other! also the inclines were 60 degree in most of the places, that too right at the hairpin bend! These were the most difficult curves i have ever ridden on! Loaded with pillion and with the steep climb, the bikes were pushed to their limits! at few slopes i was in full throttle in second gear and zma was doing 20kmph! Cages were even worse, i found a honda civic struggling to go past 10kmph! We were the only "Fastest" vehicles to be climbing up the steep roads :P

Finally found the deviation to kalahatti falls and it was big disappointment! there was hardly any water flowing, just a thin stream of water, if we had to go near the falls, it would mean a trek of another 1/2 km. We just took zoomed pics of the water falls (god bless optical zoom! :P) and decided to head back, when we saw a board which read - "OOTY - 13 KMS" We looked at each other and the watch, it was around 4.30 PM. ooty was too near to be missed (last time i missed it when me and sachin were in gundlupet, as he was reluctant) this time thankfully everyone got tempted and we decided to hit ooty! we climbed the remaining hairpin bends and we encountered really bad stretches, some stretches were being tarred, so there was just gravel and stones! after all that, we hit ooty by 5.00 Pm.

Stopped at a shop which had the special ooty chocolates in different flavours. We all bought loads of chocolates and sunil called up gaurav (who was in hotel at bandipur with vaibhav) to inform him that we were in ooty, gaurav didn't believe him! :P then sunil asked gaurav if he wanted any chocolates from ooty as proof, so gaurav asked him to read out the flavours available, sunil promptly read out all the flavours (20 plus) then gaurav believed us with his words "You guys are really in ooty!" we all had a hearty laugh, but later felt bad that they were left behind. Newayz, we had to head back before darkness! we had resigned to the fate that we had to ride through the jungle during night as it would get dark as we rode. So we fueled up a bit in ooty's bunks (Cheaper compared to karnataka) and started the ride back to bandipur at 5.30 PM

The steep hairpin bends were a nightmare when riding down, that too with pillion! engine braking alone wasn't slowing down our bikes, we had to use liberal brakes too! zma was hitting 50/60 kmph in those downward slopes in 2nd gear with out clutch! so much for engine braking! I used lot of brakes, but was cautious as the curves were filled with gravel too! half way through those 36 hairpin bends, darkness descended! we rode very carefully and managed to ride out of the hairpin bends successfully! Was that some ride or what! then the fun started, jungle on both sides and riding through the well tarred road. We were excited as well as scared about encountering elephants in these stretches, so we rode in formation close to each other. We encountered lot of dumb fucks in cages, who didn't know the meaning of dippers! these fuckers used to come straight at us on the opposite lane with highbeams! we would get temporarily blinded due to their highbeam headlamps, frantic use of pass switch by us didn't get the message through to these dumb fucks in cages. Am really looking forward to install HID kit lights in my Zma, so i can show these morons how it feels to be in the recieving end!

We passed Tamilnadu checkpost and till then we hadn't encountered any Tuskers or wildlife, the cops again didn't stop us, they generously opened the checkpost to let us through, but one tata indica guy passed us in the opposite direction, he informed us that there was a group of elephants ahead and told us to watch out. We were really excited, at the same time scared, but we rode on cautiously, but to my bad luck, we didn't see any elephants (i was told that i was wrong later!) we hit the hotel by 9.30 Pm. Gaurav and vaibhav were visibly pissed off that we had ridden so far :P but i apologised to them for the goofup and told them that it was last minute plan. Later we had dinner and booze session, that's when sunil told me that we had sighted an elephant while coming back! i was surprised and asked him when did we ever see it? it turned out that the moment they had spotted it, some dumb fuck cage driver was coming towards us with highbeam, so i was temporarily blinded and missed seeing the elephant, which was standing by the roadside, right in my lane! How dumb was that? They also told me that i passed the tusker with in 1 foot distance from it! that really made me shudder! The cagers are gonna get it big time from me! HID, here i come! After the booze session we hit the bed with plans to wake up early and move by 5.30 Am towards gopalswamy betta to catch sunrise.

Day 2 - 24th Feb 2007, Sunday:

I was up by 4.30 Am, thanks to balaji's phone alarm, he had hid it in his cramster saddlebags, so had to get up to find it! surpisingly, i wasn't feeling tired or sleepy after the previous day's back breaking ride, which i had done with out any sleep on friday, as i had started this ride after finishing work in office. The booze really helped i guess! :P Woke up the lazy bums and all were ready by 5.30 Am. We set out to gopalswamy betta, which was hardly 16 kms from our hotel. It was still dark, so we rode cautiously and we hit the checkpost to find out that they let vehicles in only from 7 AM! last time i had been there with my friends in a cage, we had entered at 6 AM, i totally forgot that we got that entry becoz of my cop friend :P So we decided head back a bit and there was a lake on the way, stopped there and waited for sunrise.

The view was breathtaking, right in front of our eyes, we could see the transition from night to day. The dark black sky started to fade in to orangish colour, later blue as the sun started to rise, the entire scene was breathtaking. Needless to say, we all went click happy, Balaji got spectacular pics taken by his pillion in his DSC H9 sony cam, which captured shots very realistically. Few of the guys went towards the lake to capture the scenery. I started to get click happy too, found good angles with zma and scenery blending in, also with sun rising, i explored various modes in cam and got good pics. Then, the sun rose, with in seconds, it just kinda popped up! we were all surprised seeing how fast the sun rose, it was hardly 30 seconds in total! Then as it was 6.50 Am, we rode towards the checkpost. It opened by 7Am and after paying the entry fee, we all rode up gopalswamy betta.

The Road was straight, with incline, we found a stretch which gave breathtaking view of the entire scenery around, so stopped there, took group pics and pics of the landscape below, then rode on. The roads started to get a bit curvy, but there was too much loose gravel and bad road, we reached the top part of the betta soon. We went to the gopalswamy temple which is on top of the hill and it was closed, so balaji led us through trekking path to spots where he had sighted elephants during his earlier visits. We trekked, huffed and puffed through the way, i was dog tired by the trek (ITC effect i guess!) Managed to reach the top most part of a beautiful hill, far from the tourist crowd. I rested there, while the rest of the guys went further ahead to try their luck and see if they could spot any tuskers. I guarded our stuff which we had carried (helmets, jackets) and took lots of scenic pics from there. Then just lazed around, the silence, the sound of birds chirping, the sound of wind blowing, you don't get that in city no matter how much you are willing to pay! Nature has it's own acquostics, i liked being there, just lazing around and letting the place sink in to me.

After some time, the junta who had gone on a trek to see tuskers came back with disappointment, they couldn't see any elephants :( So we just started taking group pics and few funny pics :P it was time to move, so we hit the hotel and started packing for our ride back. Took a group pic with bikes and riders outside the hotel room and we started from bandipur towards bangalore by 12.00 Pm. We covered good distances with minimal stops, rode in formation, We soon passed nanjangud and mysore. We had crossed mysore by 1.15 PM. We decided to have lunch and proceed to bangalore, so pulled over in to a dhaba on mysore road, just after mysore. Kartik split from here as he wanted to reach bangalore early, so we bid byes to him and the rest of us (6 guys) had relaxed lunch there. We were allset to ride out of the dhaba at 2 pm. That's when we had our second breakdown of this ride!

My zma's ignition was not coming on, I put the key in ignition and turned it to "on" position, but still things were not lighting up in the speedo console. Everyone came back again inside dhaba and we started to inspect things. My first doubt was that the ignition wire which had got cut earlier must have come loose. But to my surprise, i found that one of the wires which was soldered to the ignition switch, had got ripped from the switch itself! now that was trouble! i panicked, i didn't know what to do. Then i called Mr kiran from Sai Motors, whom i had known from the safe riding workshop conducted last month. Thankfully, he answered my call and he adviced me to cut the other wire, which was still soldered to the ignition switch and join it with the wire which had come out of the soldered end. I did that and viola! the electricals came up! I informed kiran that it was working and thanked him for his help. The wires were at odd spot, hard to reach, so i was not able to secure the joint properly, since i had to reach bangalore, i had to ensure that the joint was secure, so i pulled out the wire, by mistake, one of the ends touched the metal body of the bike and i blew the main fuse!

Meanwhile, the entire junta were still witnessing the antics and standing by me and helping me, i told them to carry on was it was getting late for everyone, but they didn't agree and stood by me to give moral support. (thanks guys!) Then gaurav lent electrical tape and i routed the wire to a spot in the front faring, where it won't touch any metal part and neatly secured the joint and taped it. Since i had blown the main fuse, i had to unmount the cramster saddle bags, remove the side panels and replace the fuse ( i was carrying spare fuses) once the fuse was replaced, the bike was ready, everyone heaved a sigh of relief! We had chai and just as we were about to start, balaji had stuck his key in his bull's side box! I had borrowed toolkit from him as my own tool kit was in cramsters, he had lent me the toolkit from his Bull's side utility box, after we fixed my bike, he had put the toolkit back in the side utility box and while locking it, his bike's key got stuck in the side box's lock! He didn't have a spare key either! After some heart in mouth moments, we managed free the key with noseplier. To be on safer side, i borrowed electrical tape from sunil, if the joint loosened again. My electrical tape was used liberally the previous day on the crashed bike.

So after all the fixing, we started at 3 Pm, one hour was lost in fixing the problem. On our way back, balaji was leading, i was behind him, followed by gaurav, vaibhav and sunil. We did good speeds, especially balaji and me, we were finding gaps between cages and quickly overtaking them as we didn't want to get stuck with cages riding parallel to us. Some cagers were extermely frustrated so see two bikes leaving them behind, one of them took it to his ego and tried to tail us, but we didn't bother, we did our usual speeds and stuck to our focussed riding, the cager finally gave up :P We were near Ramanagaram, i signalled for a break, we pulled over and waited for the rest of the guys to catch up. Once everyone showed up, we bid goodbyes as we were taking different routes to home from mysore road. We thanked each other for the wonderful ride and support and rode on. Again balaji led and i tailed. Finally balaji turned towards padmanabhnagar ringroad and i rode on.

Reached home at 6.30 Pm. Thanked god that the jugaad i did din't fail me. Cursed myself for not replacing the ignition set before the ride, miserliness could have cost me big time! But inspite of the fuckups, at the end of the day, every one was safe and reached home in one piece. This ride showed how unpredictable biking can be. But if you treat your bike well and never push yourself to limits, you can come out unscathed. My respect for my bike went up again, she didn't let me down at any odd place, she had warned me earlier about the problem, but i had ignored the warning signs. This ride taught me how to handle the worst of scenarios with out loosing focus or cool in a ride.

Update:

Went to SaiMotors on monday and replaced the entire ignition set. Now i have new fuel cap, new ignition lock and helmet lock. Also a new set of keys :P Costed Rs 850/- had i replaced it earlier, it would have saved me the hassles i faced in the ride. Well, a lesson learnt, replace any spare when you get the warning signs, never do jugaad and wait till it's worn out completely, else as tourer, you can get stranded when you least expect it or worse, in the middle of nowhere!

Nostalgia Returns!

2008-02-20T11:37:00.006+05:30

Iam a sucker for old Tv shows. The Tv shows which gave us the first taste of the land of mcdonald, during the early days of cable Tv revolution in india. Iam talking about post 1994 onwards, When StarTV gave us Star plus Channel, which was a true blue English channel unlike the crap it is today. I remember, as a kid, i used to eagerly look forward to few shows which were my favorites at that time. Shows, that had substance, which you could enjoy watching and you would actually be eager to watch the next episode, shows which will always hold a special place in the hearts of people of my generation. The trash these days that are being aired in star world are no match for these classics! Starplus has gone to dogs for sure when took the worst decision to become a half baked hindi channel and now are nothing but Ekta Kapoor and Shahrukh Khan's butt kissers for Trp Ratings. I always used to wonder, if at all the classic Tv Shows that i grew up with, will make a return? wasn't there a sensible soul in Star TV, who the brains to bring back these classics for a rerun?

Well, Some one in Zeetv had brains! Now, thankfully, we have reruns of the classics, classic serials that i grew up with and everytime i watch them, it's like travelling through time machine and going back to the era, when life was simple, the era when mobile phones were nonexistant or were in it's infancy. Ahh, i miss those days! :( But Watching ZeeCafe after i reach home early morning from work, brings me smile and few memories back from my childhood. They have this OldSkool series running everyday, where they air most of my favourite Tv shows of the 90s. Early mornings by the time i reach home, iam lucky enough to watch reruns of three of my favourite serials from 90s.

My Favourite Classic TV Shows:

Papapa Papapa papa paapapa .... Mind Your Language begins with this song :) I get my smile back whenever i get hear this show's jingle. Set in the Early 80s, this show is about an adult class full of migrants in London, who have come to learn english. The teacher is Brit and he is Mr Brown. What i like about the show is the comedy which is derived out of the english language itself! The way these migrants who are of various nationalities, speak english and phrase sentences, has me in splits. But this show is clean of any form of racial remarks or abuse. It pokes fun through multi culturalism and the way these people interact with each other. I always loved the 70s to early 90s period when life was simple and people were more humane, this show is so simple and drives home the point with out any unnecessary drama. It's more of spontaneous humour. Even though there are 2 indians and a pakistani as students, there are no swear words even when there are humourous verbal duels between these two, especially between indian sardarji Ranjeetsingh and the Pakistani Ali Nadim. I like our ranjeetsingh's trademark phrase "a thousand apologies" !:P Life was simple and liveable those days!

Doogie Howser, M.D Set in the early 90s, this show is seen through the eyes of Doogie, who's a normal teenager, but is also a doctor! The whole show revolves around doogie, being a normal teenager and a child prodigy, who becomes a doctor and works as surgeon in a hospital. It shows the lessons of life learnt through his interaction with his patients, his friends and classmates. He struggles as he copes up to be a normal teenager and doctor. His best friend is Vinnie, who always drops by doogie's room through the window :P never through the door! Also vinnie is light headed and a flirt, the way he blurts out things, gives doogie a perspective of a normal teenager's point of view. At the end of each episode, doogie writes his thoughts in his dairy, which by the way is on the computer of those days, in MSDOS (!!) the camera follows the blue screen background and white text he enters, he sums up the entire episode in two lines max, what he learnt from that day's experience, which has it's relevance to us too and holds true even today.

Full House
Set in early 80s in Sanfancisco, is a story of a windowed father who has to raise 3 girls with the help of his friends. This show really has the 80s theme written all over it! be it the locations or costumes, they really take me back to 80s. This show promotes family values. The show if full of cute kids, Michelle is the cutie, who out of her innocense, lands some adults in embarassing situations :P Also the twin boys, Alex and Nicky, they are oh soo cute :P The entire show is full of goody goody feeling and is set in an ideal world where all people are good and good things happen always, Family comes first, no matter what and each member of the family always backs up others. Show, that makes your drool and makes you wish that your childhood should have been on that lines.

Lastly, my Favourite Show of all time, The Wonder Years Well, what is there to tell about this show? it's a masterpiece and one of it's kind, no other show can ever replace it's place. Set in late 60s and early 70s, it is about the life of Kevin Arnold, Who is born in a typical american middle class family of those years and how he copes with his life, deals with his problems related to growing up! I used to watch this show every single day when it was being aired on TV in early 90s. I could relate to Kevin in so many ways, so could others, it was realistic, the lessons he learns through his Dad, Jack Arnold was fabulous. Kevin's best friend paul is a nerd and geeky. Kevin's brother wayne, is a bully and dumb when it comes to studies, Kevin's sister Karen, is a hippie and a confused teenager almost ruining her life, Kevin's mom Norma, is the most loveable mom in the world to him and who can forget Kevin's love interest, Winnie cooper! The way he describes or the way he tells us his thoughts running in his head is simply superb. Iam fortunate enough of get my hands on All seasons DVD set of this show through one of my contacts! I no longer have to endure commerical breaks in zee cafe to watch Kevin's life. Whenever i feel down and out, i pop in a DVD of this show and watch to my heart's content. This show always leaves me with a heavy heart and also with feel good factor. This show is a must watch for all!

Phew! that was one heck of a nostalgic ride! :P But i never get tired of it, these shows will always hold a special place in my heart, especially The Wonder Years because, they give a option to go back in time and seek comfort and solace in a world, which was simple, whenever i want to get off my mind from the rat race that iam in to and from my monotonous life, i watch one of these shows and always, i end up feeling better.

God bless the soul in Zee Cafe, who had the heart to bring back these classics. Am sure that person would have grown up watching these shows, only people who grew up watching these classics will understand their timeless importance.

Disaster Averted!

2008-02-19T13:05:00.004+05:30

Phew! I almost got stranded in office today. As usual, i was in parking lot, all set to leave after my shift and i wore my gear and put the key in ignition lock and turn, nothing! i thought, lemme try once more and i turn the key again and again there was no display in the digital meter on dashboard of zma. I thought one of fuses would have blown, so set to work on it, removed the helmet and gear and removed the seat and checked the fuses, they were intact, loose contact of fuses i thought and just pressed them again, but still there was no response from the bike! I wanted to check the battery connectors, but i didn't have my toolkit! (I realised that i should have my toolkit back in my bike from my cramster bags!) What else could have gone wrong? I thought my CDI unit could have conked off! But that would mean the bike won't start, but atleast the electricals should work, so i realised it's must be loose contact of some wire somewhere.

Then just happened to check beneath the ignition lock, to my surprise, i found out of the two wires that go from the ignition lock towards the electricals, one wire had got cut! wtf! how could it get cut? I noticed that it had got cut earlier and someone had neatly taped it! I suspect my earlier Herohonda service center chaps to have done that! The contact point of the joint had got loose, so i just twisted both the ends and checked ignition and viola! the electricals work! But the problem was, how to secure the two ends with out any tools, if i turned the handle towards the left side, the electricals failed as the contact points of the wires got loose, that was scary! what would have happened if it had come loose when i was riding the bike! The bike would have stalled and rear wheel locked due to electrical failure and i would have met with a nasty crash! I thanked god that my bike showed me the problem only in the parking lot! Major disaster was averted!

So, I did some desi jugad, messed up my hands and some how from underneath the front faring, managed to secure the two ends of the joint of the wire and used the old tape for insulation, now my task was to ride some 10 kms to SAI Motors with out turning the handlebar towards the left side, else the joint would come loose and i would get stranded! I started my journey, hoping and praying that the bike shouldn't let me down. It was already 8AM by the time i started, so traffic was building up and i managed to crawl initially and later ripped towards the destination. All the while i ensured that my handlebars were straight with minimum turns! I had to turn few times, i prayed each time i had to take a turn!

Finally i managed to reach Sai Motors by 8.45 AM. Showed the bike there to Mr kiran, Thanks to the Saferiding Workshop, which i had attended last month, i got this contact and i thanked my stars that i got a reliable mech to work on my bike and address these issues! Kiran was surprised about how i managed to diagnise the problem! (thanks to the gyaan from biking communities!) Later, he told me that they could either replace the whole Unit (ignition lock/fueltank lid/helmetlock with new set of keys) or tape the same thing after doing some jugaad. I asked them to take a look at wiring once, so they removed the faring, tank and routed the wires properly, joined the two ends of the cut wire securely and taped it after that checked and ensured that the joints don't get stressed due to handlebar movement. Also found that my Fuel guage was behaving erratically, so replaced the float and it was all done!

I thanked him for his patience and working on this issue and reached home at 12.30 PM! Was that some adventure or what! I think i will get the wire checked again with a local mech and use an extra piece of wire to secure the joint properly after coming weekend's ride. Am thanking my stars that i could avert a possible disaster on road!

Needless to say, the toolkit is back in my bike :P

MTV Roadies Stupidity!

2008-02-18T10:53:00.004+05:30

All the planning on saturday regarding the ride for coming weekend ended up in me sleeping only on saturday night, i had extended my day from Friday morning till saturday night! that meant, i spent most part of sunday sleepingzzz. Blogged a bit @ noon and had to spend the evening at home as most of my friends were busy, watched Tv on sunday for a change :P Happened to catch MTV Roadies 5.0 Episode No 2. I had watched few auditions last month while channel surfing and found it hilarious in terms of the antics the "Judges" ask the hopefuls to perform and i also happened to see to what extent people can go to get a chance at becoming famous! I had also caught on Episode 1 of this series and found it funny.

But my take on the whole fiasco is, it's based on reality shows like FearFactor, but what i hate is the name they have chosen for themselves "roadies" Wtf has it do with the word Road? ah, i forgot, they happen to ride brandnew, always clean karizmas wearing those horrible open faced "wrangler" helmets! So they are roadies, coz they ride these "big" bikes on Highways for cameras and sit the rest of the time in a cab!
The way those chooths talk about the "roadie spirit" which really pisses off a tourer like me, what hardships that have to endure? does it have any thing at all to do with touring on bikes? heck not! they do all fear factor type stunts when they are not riding the bikes, infact riding the bike is the last thing they do! and they hardly show that too! ok, if at all they really ride their bikes in that show, how much distance are they covering per day? Point is, the bike is secondary, while the show's fearfactor image is primary, then why name the goddamn show as "roadies"? The entire gullible junta should get false image of these kids as somekinda demigods on bikes wearing the "wrangler" helmet!

This show basically can survive if they take out the bike element out of it. After all it's more to do with dares and bitching and politics and plotting, why ruin a bike's image for all that? What were munjals thinking when they sponsored this horseshit? Dear munjals, as an owner of your premium bike from almost 3 years, iam goddamn pissed about the way you increase the prices of spare parts! For eg, the front disc pads of a zma till the other day was costing Rs 850, coincidentally after the Roadies started airing, the prices have increased to Rs 1500! It's the same goddamn brake pad, same make, why the price hike? Are you guys taxing your premium bike owners like me to sponsor these morons on MTV? If you feel this is the only way, then please please stop sponsoring half of the indian cricket team and hoping to increase the sales of your restickered crap with 1950s tech in them! You want to generate more sales? then give us the tech and good bikes, not the same restickered crap and proclaiming world no1 blah blah..

Now back to the show, i was watching in utter disbelief when they showcased next week's episode, looks like on 1 of the riders manages to crash his zma and that too with a pillion on board! Guess what riding gear he was wearing? Just a half arm tee with jeans and "wrangler" helmet! The pillion is dressed like she's going to a disco! The pillion is injured badly and both the kids are shown bleeding with the rider denying and shouting that it wasn't his fault! Well, in any accident, no one ever accepts their fault! The least munjals could have done is to provide these kids with riding gear, since it's their bike which is being showcased as poser toy, but no! their responsibility ends after they provide 6 or 5 sparkling clean karizmas for each episode, apart from shit loads of money to MTV.

I do enjoy watching the show, but as a reality series and fear factor oriented show. But my blood boils when they show these posers as riders and that they ride all through their destinations with out proper riding gear! This year, they seem to be taking this show abroad, so am wondering if Herohonda will fly their sparkling clean karizmas and use them only during their "vote outs" part of episode or will they go through the legal hassles of getting permits and what nots to let these kids ride the zmas in thailand and malaysia. What ever they do, I seriously pray that Herohonda stops sponsoring such horseshit wanna be biker shows and instead concentrates more on their safe riding workshops. They can even sponsor such workshops in association with biking clubs, like they did earlier with bikenomads.

Now back to the show, Iam watching the show for the entertainment factor in it and NOT becoz it has to do something with bikes! Biking forums and clubs are taking humouristic approach towards this show, In BCMtouring for example, they have an hilarious thread for this show. I just hope that the biking fraternity's displeasure is made visible to Herohonda and MTV and some good sense dawns in to Herohonda's MBA chaps, who decided to sponsor such crap and instead they do some events with biker clubs, which won't cost even a fraction of what they pay to sponsor such horse shit wannabe biker shows.

Weekend Ride planned finally!

2008-02-17T15:11:00.004+05:30

The above pics are from my last ride to Gopalswamybetta with Sachin

Finally met few Bikenomads friends and other regular Tourers yesterday and decided ride plan for coming weekend. Belum caves was voted out enmasse as it was ride through boring plain straight roads and nothing much to see there either. Yercaud didn't find many takers. So finally it was decided that we are gonna hit Bandipur, masinagudi and Gopalaswamybetta in 2 days leisurely ride.

Am looking forward to this ride, I will get to test me new Fieldsheer riding pants in this ride. Since we would be starting early on saturday morning would mean, i would have to leave early from office on Friday's night shift and continue riding till noon or evening atleast with out sleep or rest in between, it's gonna be an endurance ride for sure! I have already been to Gopalaswamy betta twice, once with Sachin and some time in October last year in a cage with friends. During the cage ride, we managed to hit the foothill at 5.30 AM after night ride and it was breathtaking to see the views and sunrise there. So the plan is to start very early on 2nd day morning and catch the sunrise there.

The plan is:

Day1: 23rd Feb Sat: We will be leaving by 5.15 AM.

Route:
Bangalore>Mysore>Nanjangud>Gundlupet>Bandipur>masinagudi>bandipur.

Day2: 24th Feb Sun:
Route: Bandipur>gopalswamybetta>bandipur>Gundlupet>mysore>bangalore (cover the waterfalls or Kanva dam seeing the time available)

As of now 4 Riders are confirmed, Two zmas, 1 Bull Thunderbird and 1 Pulsar 150.

Lets see how this one turns out. Catching the sunrise on a bike ride in gopalswamybetta will be a good photo opp for sure!

The itch for a Ride

2008-02-16T09:30:00.001+05:30

The itch for a ride has begun. The last ride i did was in Way back in November 2007. Plans are cooking up for a 2 day ride in Feb end weekend. As of now places that are hovering in mind are Belum caves and Chikmagalur area. Iam trying to figure a destination which doesn't have too much riding involved as it is going to be a 2 day ride. Belum caves looks ideal, but the landscape turns of many riders. Boring straights and barren flat lands are bore.
Am meeting Bikenomads guys this weekend to chalk out a final plan. If all goes well, by next weekend, i should be riding :P Let's see what place gets finalised, Am raring to go! Destination any where! just ride!

My Riding Gears - Mini Review

2008-02-15T18:52:00.017+05:30

Riding gears are a biker's second skin, it is the most important investment any serious bike enthusiast should make after the bike itself! Helmet saves your head, what about the rest of your body? Good investment in riding gear is never a waste of money, it is a long term investment, which will save you some major damages in case of an accident. Ever since i started touring on my bike two years back, i started to invest in riding gears, right from the basics to the other accessories required by a long distance tourer. Thanks to Biking communities, i came across right persons who guided me in to buying the right stuff and also from the right places. Here are my gears and a mini review about them:

Fieldsheer Adventure Pant:

Finally! after months of wait and nail biting moments, i got my new riding pants! The hunt for this pant took me close to 4 months. This is a major addition to my Riding gear. I was using my friend shashi's riding pants for my earlier rides that was a First gear riding pant, with leather and foam padding, I used it with my Kneeguards worn inside the pant. I was amazed at the practicality of riding pants, I could sit anywhere i want during the butt breaks in rides, i didn't have to worry about pants getting dirty or such. It helped during rains, my torso and limbs were dry even in downpours and i was not feeling the cold chilly winds while riding during night times.

So i decided to buy a riding pant. But i had to figure out which model would suit me. I had seen Lovejoshi's Cramster Riding pants during the hampi ride and i had almost decided on buying the cramster pants, but then i felt at around Rs 5500/- they were bit pricy and decided to explore the options. I asked Dada (Jsr, biking veteran) who had earlier got me my gears from abroad, dada gave me good options in Fieldsheer. Finally I choose the adventure pant as i didn't need a over pant type riding pants. Thankfully, my colleague was in usa this time and i managed to order them online. But when i went to order at my usual site the rates were up from earlier $130 to $162.
I was disappointed that i would have to pay more, but thanks to google baba, i came across another site which was still selling this pant at old rate of $130 and they weren't charging for shipping with in usa and no other hidden tax as well. So i bought this pant for $130 0r Rs 5135/- all inclusive! from this site (now they have increased the price to $145!)

It's been hardly 24hrs since i got this pant and haven't even seen them properly, so the review will have to wait :P But the build quality, materials used and feel of the pant is top notch! way better than cramster pants and am happy that i could get it at a cheaper price than the cramster wala pant. Few features:

1. They have a inner liner pant too, which can be worn as seperate pant
2. The liner pant is also waterproof, can be used it over formals during rains in city
3.The pant's insides is kinda rubberish, so not comfy for hot weather, but iam not bothered as i love sweating like a pig :P
4.Even with out liners, the pant is water proof
5.The knee armour is adjustable, Three velcros are there in bottom and top of knee armour, you can remove the velcros and adjust the armour to suit your knee's position.
6.Only the inner liner pant has open space near the fly area, while the pant doesn't have open space near the fly area, but there is a zip! even if you open the zip, there's a wall of cloth inside, so technically to pee, you have remove the pant or you have to cut that piece of cloth :P

Coming to my other riding gears:

Fieldsheer Congo Mesh Jacket:

This was/is my First riding jacket, that too a videshi brand :P All thanks to Dada. Dada was in usa, when he was upgrading his riding gears. He bought Feildsheer Kilimanjaro riding jacket, so his Congo sport riding jacket was idle. So i jokingly asked him if he would sell it to me, guess what? he agreed! This was bought from dada in early 2007 and it has been part of my rides ever since, Dada gave me a very good price for it, i was hardly 8 months at that point of time. Now it is retailing for $90 here. All in all, a very good jacket, it has a seperate inner liner, i haven't used it in any of my rides, decent waterproofing, but needs inner liner to stay dry during heavy downpours. Again the fit and finish is superb! The icing on the cake was the price i got it for! (no, iam not revealing that here! :P)

FirstGear Mesh-Tex Gloves:
Got these touring gloves in early 2007 and it's been part of my riding gear while touring ever since. Dada got it for me from usa when he was there in early 2007. These are excellent gloves for indian weather, extremely comfortable during summer and humid seasons. Even though they are not waterproof, they dry very quickly when drenched in rains. I had paid Rs 1400/- for these babies then, Now they are retailing for $30 here. These gloves have with stood the abuse of my rides so far, there are no signs of wear and tear yet. But they don't have solid protection on fingers, just leather patches, they have plastic protection on knuckles and the lower palm area has very good quality leather, which gives excellent grip and obsorb sweat from hands easily.

The above gears are the ones i use while i go on long rides/tours. I managed to build city riding gears too. Call me nut case, but i don't feel that spending money on riding gears is waste of money or such, i feel they are long term investments which will save my ass one day if my luck runs out! :P

Cramster Breezer Mesh Jacket:

Got this cramster mesh jacket in mid 2007 from Cramster I was looking out for a decent city riding jacket as i had got my first taste of comfort from the fieldsheer jacket. City riding is risky compared to my long rides, because you tend loose your focus and get lost in thoughts as you know the roads and each and every pothole on your daily commute route. So i happened to be at cramster shop one fine weekend to assist balaji, who wanted to pick up a Cramster touring jacket. I saw this mesh jacket there and tried it on, The "M" size was perfect fit for me, the arms were bit short, but more importantly, the armours were fitting where they were supposed to be there. I paid Rs 4400/- for this jacket and have been using it daily from so many months. It's a real confidence booster and a must have for horrid city commute. Since it is mesh, the air flow is good and not that uncomfortable during hot days. Mine is an all black jacket, but retains the same pattern as the one in the pic. Decent armour protection and worth for daily rough use.

Angel's Racing BZero Glove:
This was my first addition in terms of proper riding gear. I bought these in 2006. Used these gloves for daily commute and they really took a lot of abuse, have ridden in rain and these have got wet more than once! They dry pretty quickly too. These gloves have excellent Armour protection on knuckles and rubberised protection on fingers. Another advantage is these gloves cover the entire wrist unlike most of city riding gloves. The only disadvantage is, the palm area has very thin leather and the left glove tore near the thumb/palm area once and i managed to repair it with a desi jugaad. Now the finger tips have started to show holes, the mesh has worn off due to constant use. These lasted me more than 1.5 yrs with daily use. I had paid Rs 1600/- then including shipping. Am trying to repair these gloves again, so i can use this in emergencies. This holds a special place as it was the first proper riding gear i bought. Angels racing has come out with 2008 edition, the Bzero has got a face lift now, but i don't like this new avatar, i liked the old one that i have. These can be bought from here.

Progrip Knee Guards from Krp:

For me, knee guards were essential as My Zma doesn't have crashguard unlike other bikes. I had earlier tried unsuccessfully to do some jugaad to fix a crash guard on my zma, but the various examples i came across didn't exactly convince me. So i decided to stop wasting my time in trying to find a crashguard for my bike and bought these knee guards. I paid Rs 1800/- then for these including postage. I saw these knee guards in Xbhp's Krp Site. i bought these in mid 2007 and have been using these for my long rides as well as city commutes. I wear them under the pants for a reason! When i had newly bought these, i went on a small ride wearing these like normal kneeguards above my jeans, during our first butt break, i discovered to my horror, that these kneeguards have scrapped off paint from my zma's tank sides! That happened because in zma, iam used to hug the tank as i ride and these kneeguards have a metal piece at the joint, the exposed metal nut had rubbed to the tank and the paint had scrapped off! :( So ever since then, i started to wear them under the pants. I use them for daily commute too, much to the amazement of my colleagues :P After periodical daily use, the elastic bands have expanded, apart from that, there is no other issue with this. My only grouse is the joint of the knee pads should have had a rubber mould or such to cover the exposed nut, which would have prevented the tank paint scrapping off problem.

Shift Chaos Gloves:

I bought these sometime in May 2007 through my friend who was in usa. This was one of those instinctive purchases! :P I even managed to convince sachin to get one! I was just browsing for city riding gloves and i chanced upon these. I paid Rs 1800/- then. Now they are retailing for $40 here. The feel and comfort is class apart. This glove has lot of leather on the palm area (goat skin) and hardened leather near the impact areas of palm. Also knuckle protection. These fit like second skin and are extremely snug, unlike other gloves. Sore point is thumb lacks any protection, just the mesh material compensates. Also it doesn't cover your wrist. I use these very rarely, keep them safe in sealable covers :P coz i want to avoid dust and dirt on these. These haven't been exposed to rains, the leather will go for a toss if they are exposed to water. Ideal for dry weather and city cruising. Kinda pricey, but the quality is top notch. This is the best city riding glove i have as of now.

Cramster Twist Touring Gloves:

I never had a faint idea that i would buy these, till Sunil Dhummi of bikenomads posted about it in one of our ride planning threads. He had bought these gloves from cramster but these turned out to be a tad big for him. So he had posted if anyone wanted to buy those, there was even a try and use and then pay offer! :P So i thought lemme have a look and see and tried these on. It was a perfit for me, but i felt the gloves were too thick and throttle control seemed to be difficult. But i liked the warmth of the glove when you wear it and also the comfort factor so i decided to buy it. Sunil on his part, gave me a nice discount on them and I happily bought them. (no, i won't tell how much i paid :P) These retail in cramster for Around Rs 1300/- Even though it is listed as touring glove, i find it comfortable for city rides. What i like in this glove is the Cuff area, it neatly swallows the end of the jacket cuff and when you ride, it doesn't allow cold winds to go through the jacket from the cuff area. It was a blessing during the winter season and i love them during early morning rides and late night rides to office during night shifts. Have been using these from close to 3 months every day, they have taken the abuse well. They are surprisingly water proof too, have got drenched twice in rain wearing these, but not a drop of water went it! Over a period of time, the thickness has gone down considerably and now throttle operation or clutch usage is easy with these gloves on. It lacks any real leather look, looks 99% fake leather and doesn't have hard armour on knuckles either. But for the price i paid, these are a steal, Recommended for rainy season and winters. Can be used for touring too.

Well, there you have it, sort of mini review of my riding gears. No, i don't mint money or earn hordes of it either! So before you think iam some cash rich candidate, lemme clarify that all these gears were bought over a period of 2 years, one by one and i have invested a major chunk of my earnings in them. Have gone totally dry financially few times due to one major buy too!

I haven't posted about my Helmets coz i don't have pictures of my helmets as of now, will edit this post and add details about my helmets after i get the pics. Briefly though, i use GPR helmet for touring and recently bought another GPR helmet for daily use. I was earlier using GPone. I would recommend GPR over any brand in the sub Rs 3000 budget as of date because of GPR's top notch finish and quality. The visor is a treat and almost on part with AGV's Rs 600 visor. GPR's visors cost Rs 330/- . I will save the Helmet review for another day :P

Valentine's day Rip off!

2008-02-14T10:21:00.002+05:30

Here comes another so called valentine's day! This day is eagerly awaited by all businesses to make the golden kill. Right from greeting card companies to Hotels and eatout joints, they all seem to have some or the other offer on this particular to squeeze out that money from your wallet. The mass hysteria on this day has to be seen to be believed! Yet another intelligent plot by the corporate suits to con the common man and make him truly believe that all the love in the world comes out in open on this day and all it takes to show your love is few mega bucks from your pocket! How gullible are the masses? You don't need anyone preaching you how/when to show your love and appreciation to your loved ones.

Scanning through newspaper today had me in splits, seriously, almost every tom dick and harry establishment seemed to have some "offer" going on for the love couples. Right from the cheesy "take you valentine to the best dining experience" to "gift your valentine an everlasting symbol of love" (diamonds!) and not to forget the funny ones like the one from one of the health spas which claimed to have slashed their rates for couples herbal theraphy to few fitness gyms asking wives to enrol their fatsy hubbies in to some valentine special scheme of turning them back in to shape regime. Malls ofcourse have variety of activities, they claim that you can win a diamond necklace by playing "know your valentine" game, then there is another ridiculous offer of winning a limo ride with your loved one if you answer some shitty questions.

The whole consumerist approach towards this lovey dovey thing makes me sad. The whole concept of love is being weighed in terms of how much money you can blow on your sweet heart today. Aren't we missing the point here? love doesn't cost money, it just needs nuturing, small guestures, appreciating your partner's efforts, making her feel special by saying "thank you" for the Routine things she's doing for you etc, doesn't all that count? should i take her to a mall, spend megabucks in shopping and blow money on candle light dinner eating dishes which are "specially" priced (meant jacked up prices) for this day? Well, peer pressure comes in, your partner won't appreciate if you don't do anything "special" for her today and she won't have the bragging rights with her pals about "you know, he took me to such and such place, we had so much fun, he surprised me by presenting me xyz , blah blah "

Or you risk being called a miser, to whom money is more important than the relationship. I fail to comprehend why people can't see through this consumerist noise generated today and realise that it's all nothing but corporate generated lovey dowey syndrome. As i said earlier, i don't think i need to be told when and how i should show my love to my loved ones. No, iam not buying anything today or taking her out for shopping or such crap, call me what ever, iam a practical person and don't subscribe to this bullshit.

These fuckers haven't spared stags either, so what if you don't have a special one of opposite sex with you? why don't you appreciate your parents! give me a break! for god's sake, spare your parents! You want to make them feel special? Be good to them and appreciate them once in a while, don't be rude to them! Gift them on their birthdays and anniversaries, send them off on vacation if affordable, but spare them today please! Next what? they will drag your pets and brothers and sisters in to this crap. Any one practical enough in life, will realise that all the hype surrounding this day is bullshit!

This is a western concept borrowed by mncs and pushed down our throats so they can make money. So what's the big deal in it? see through this crap and rise and shine!
St valentine must be turning in his grave!

Why i ride my bike?

2008-02-12T10:33:00.000+05:30

Have been asked this question many times, Why do it prefer to go places on my motorcycle rather than a cage or in other modes of "comfortable" transportation. All my reasoning were met with disbelief and "you are nutcase" kinda stares.

Came across a beautiful post in Xbhp which tries to explain the biker's point of view as to why we prefer to go places on our bikes:

The Pleasures of Motorcycling

The pleasure is in doing three-digit speeds for hours on end when most consider 60 as dangerous and 80 as fatal!!

The pleasure is in tying the luggage so well on the back seat that the Bike seems to have come fitted with it from the showroom!

The pleasure is starting your bike's engine for a long-distance ride on a cold morning and listening to its steady comforting idle while you prepare for the ride.

The pleasure is in listening to the crackling clicks from the hot engine and exhaust as they cool after a fast blast on the road.

The pleasure is in racing a train speeding along parallel to the road and beating it, at beyond a 100 kmph!!

The pleasure is in watching a row of several single headlights trailing in your mirrors, the group on the move.

The pleasure is in watching a bunch of gleaming bikes knifing together through fast highway traffic.

The pleasure is in knowing a split second before the car in front panic-brakes. You were more focussed than the driver of that car. You survive and smile!!

The pleasure is when your upshifts and downshifts are so smooth that the Bike feels auto-geared.

The pleasure is in tooting a salute to truckers who safely wave you past on a blind mountain curve.

The pleasure is in glancing up at the cloud-darkened sky for a moment and guessing correctly how far ahead the rain will catch up with you.

The pleasure is in riding with a bug splattered visor for long, trying to look from between the squashed mosquitoes.

The pleasure is in cleaning the visor at a tea stop and seeing the world clearer through it as it had never been before.

The pleasure is in greeting a dhaba-owner you meet after 2 years on a remote highway, like you greet an old lost friend.

The pleasure is in washing your muck-covered Bike beside a cool mountain stream.

The pleasure is in being treated as special because you are on a bike, something that would never happen if you arrive in a car.

The pleasure is in knowing that your wife loves riding as much as you do, even as a pillion!!!

The pleasure is in the easy companionship of a riding group.

The pleasure is when the group gets together weeks after a long ride and talks about it like it happened just yesterday.

The pleasure is in seeing photos of a re-grouping stop when everyone in the group with helmets on look like astronauts with overgrown heads!!

The pleasure is in hearing seven identical bikes start and rumble together while warming up for a long day on the road.

The pleasure is in smelling spilled diesel on the road before your tyre hits it.

The pleasure is in watching other road users gawking wide-eyed as the group does three-digit speeds together in formation.

The pleasure is in entering a road-tunnel on a bright day with your sunglasses on and remembering the fear of riding blind for even a few moments.

The pleasure is when you fix a puncture by the roadside in the dark and nothing goes wrong with it for months afterwards.

The pleasure is in having just the right tool and spares at hand when something goes wrong with the Bike in the middle of nowhere.

The pleasure is when you finish your day’s ride, and reach in one piece. You’re the smallest vehicle on the road, and you’ve survived.

The pleasure is when you take off your wristwatch, and see a band of untanned skin.

The pleasure is when your motorcycle and you move as one single united form. Whatever shape the road takes, whichever end of the compass it leads to.

The pleasure is when you use your hands, arms, thighs, knees and feet to steer.

The pleasure is when you take off your riding jacket for a break, and feel the breeze dry your sweat.

The pleasure is when you sing to yourself on an empty road. You’re the world’s best rock star.

The pleasure is when your rear wheel slides, and you bring it back, when the front wheel lifts, and you take your time bringing it back.

The pleasure is when you cut through air, at 50 kph or 100.

The pleasure is when you reach a place you’ve never been before, and someone you’ve never seen before asks you for a ride. And comes back grinning.

The pleasure is when you wave to village kids, and they wave back.

The pleasure is when you almost, almost fall. But don’t.

The pleasure is when you fight the wind, and win.

The pleasure is when you get up that narrow path for the view you’ll never forget.

The pleasure is when you view the world at an angle.

The pleasure is when you eat bugs at 90 kph.

The pleasure is when you look at a dust-streaked face in the mirror after a 12-hour ride, and don’t want to wash up.

The pleasure is when your pillion moves with you.

The pleasure is when you can see the petrol after a top-up.

The pleasure is when your throttle hand has calluses.

The pleasure is when you jump a speedbreaker.

The pleasure is when you stop to help push a stranded car to the side of the road when you had the choice of riding past but didn’t.

The pleasure is when you stop at the smallest of towns, and somebody asks you deep technical questions about your bike.

The pleasure is when your roadmaps gets dog-eared, rain-splashed and tea-stained.

The pleasure is when you give a stranger a lift and he loves it.

The pleasure is when you have battle-scars, each one a lesson in survival on two wheels.

The pleasure is when you can feel the cool morning and the hot afternoon, the light rain and the damp fog.

The pleasure is when you leave four-wheeler traffic standing in a jam.

The pleasure is when you aren’t lulled by an air-conditioner.

The pleasure is when you are free. Open. Independent. Liberated.

The pleasures, ladies and gentle, are all yours for the taking. Just ride.

Ride long and safe...

Amen!

Safe Riding Workshop

2008-01-24T17:55:00.000+05:30

It it all started with Me getting a Sms from Venkat sir that we were to meet in Autoservice for "bringing in a change" I thought i got the sms by mistake initially :P Later i called up Sachin and he too confirmed of recieving the same sms. Now i thought there must be something and decided to see what was in store. Funny thing is i had never been to autoservice, so i didn't know the route! Called up venkat sir few times and he tried to guide me, but with my pathetic sense of directions and knowledge of places in bangalore, i ended up else where!

Finally, Sachin met me from my stranded place and guided me to Autoservice, where it turned out it was just us and Venkat sir. What followed was kind of surprising discussions, We were later joined my Venkat sir's friend who works with competitor of bajaj (will reveal later :P) We came to know that the idea was to conduct a Safe riding workshop, which would be sponsored by a major two wheeler manufacturer and learn the basics first and progressively learn the various aspects of biking.
The aim was to cultivate a core group, who have passion for biking, touring and are willing to pickup to skills and become part time instructors in such future trainings.
Soon, Santoosh from Xbhp, our dear/beloved/bajajhating friend Renukumar :P was also involved in the coming weeks. Details were posted in various forums like Xbhp and Bikenomads soon responses started to trickle in and the list of aspirants grew to 40!

Now, we had imagined that the starter batch would be of 15 People plus the usual guys like me, sachin, santoosh etc so the total crowd was expected to be 20 max. So we had to filter out some guys and choose around 15 so that the remaining guys can be accomodated in the next batch.
Later due to Autoexpo, Venkat sir got busy and the date and venue were left to be decided. Once boss was in town, things started to happen and it was decided that date would be 19th January saturday and Venue was near Happy Layout on the Padmanabhnagar- Kengeri road.

On the D day, we all met up in Autoservice. The suspense part to others was, who was the sponsorer for this event, we had kept it a secret so that the junta who make it to the workshop alone will be able to find that out.
Now remember that i mentioned Venkat sir's friend had joined us for discussions on day one? and that he worked for a competitor of bajaj? Guess what it was HeroHonda! Venkat sir's friend was Mr manjunath and he works in Herohonda Regional office of Bangalore. Herohonda conducts Safe rider sessions sometimes on their own as per their company policy, this time due to venkat sir's efforts, they conducted it for us bunch of enthusiastic bikers!

The Workshop went very well, Am too lazy to do write up on the nitty gritties.
Pictures from Sachin
Pictures from Prasanna

So here's the details of the workshop taken from Sachin's blog:

The ground zero guys from HH were from Sai Motors. They started out by selecting a patch of side roads away from the main road.
Poof!! appear nosy cops enquiring about what’s going on and all! Upon their advice one of the Sai Motors technician went to the nearby police station and got an acknowledgement/ permission for the workshop.
Next the bikes were brought and a van full of equipment like wooden planks and rumble strips and traffic cones.

1. Basic Tips for riding: First off was the correct posture and stance.
• Do not wear any flowing clothes that might tangle in the bikes running parts.
• Sit on a comfortable position, with a relaxed stance.
• Keep your knees tucked into the tank recesses this centralizes the bike-rider mass..
• Hold the handle such that you do not grip the handle tight but in a comfortable grip.
• Bend your elbows at 120 degrees so that the shocks from the front suspension do not get transmitted to your shoulders and tire you down.
• Your feet should be placed at a position where you can apply the brake or change gears easily. Feet should always be aligned along the bike and should not protrude out.
• Use all the fingers except the thumb to grasp the hand controlled levers. This helps in getting a better grip and faster reaction.

2. Ride On/Ride Off techniques: These are tips when you start off riding and stop and park.
• When taking a bike off its stand hold front brake and then mount the bike. Remove the stand and then mount the bike[this habit helps to take the stand off every time before you move out]
• Once on the bike leave the front brake and hold the rear brake.
• Check both rearview mirrors are set to the right position.
• Before moving off look over your shoulders and check if there is any traffic coming from behind.
Repeat the same procedure in reverse order for ride off i.e. when coming to a stop and parking the bike.

3. Panic braking: This activity basically helps you in case of panic braking i.e. when you brake all of a sudden to avoid a car or something ahead. Here are the steps.
• In case you need to brake all of a sudden then always remember to apply both front and rear brakes and ease off totally from the accelerator.
• Do not press the clutch until the last moment so that you also use engine braking for coming to a complete stop.
• Once you come to a complete stop check over your shoulders if there is any traffic coming form behind you and then using the appropriate indicator before moving off.

4. Tackling rumble strips/off-roading: When you go over a rough surface the bumps are transmitted straight to your back and sometimes can cause injury! To avoid this we were advised to stand on the foot pegs with slightly bent knees and incline our body forward, then move slowly over the rumble strips, using the accelerator and clutch in tandem to accelerate over the crest of the bumps and declutch on the way down. The whole exercise was done in 2nd gear.

5. Balancing on a plank: Here we were supposed to ride the plank in second gear without using the clutch. The aim was to ride very slow and learn to balance our weights on the bike. The important thing to note here was that the mass of our body had to be as close to the bike as possible. So we were advised to keep our knees as close to the tank a possible.

6. Slalom Course: This determines our control over clutch accelerates and brakes. We were supposed to accelerate in between the cones and brake near the cones. The aim was to cross the cones without hitting any one of them.

During all these activities the Sai motors team was scoring us. They had chosen 5 participants based on their performance and they did a lucky dip. And Voila! Prasanna [flyingfiddlestick] won the lottery. He got a boxed brand new helmet.

After all these fun activities in the hot sun we headed to a restaurant along with Mr. Venkat Raghavan and Mr. Vandan from HH and had a hearty meal.
We cannot thank those guys enough for all the patience they had for the workshop. They totally bowled us out with their professionalism and kindness.
Hats off to Mr. Venkat Raghavan and Mr. Vandan!!!!
After lunch they left for their work and we discussed a bit about the next Safe Riding workshop we were going to conduct.
Then after that we parted ways back to enjoy the remaining weekend.

Marriage! Am i old enough for that?

2008-01-13T21:40:00.000+05:30

As per the cartoon, iam already married :P This rant pertains to the female species:P

It all started few months back, My company gave me name sake promotion of "Assistant Manager - Systems" (only the first three letters fo the quoted text are true :P) Name sake i call it because i was neither given responsibilities that goes by that post and definitely not the moolah worth it!
Ok, that was the appraisal story of 2007 april, Now folks at home always expect that you will increase your "quota" of moolah that you give home per month after each hike. Now in my case, apart from the designation given, i had no effective hike and moolah remained almost the same, worse was my tax bracket went up with grade and i was paying more to Mr chidambaram!

So what do i do, i know tempers will flare at home, parents will be like, what the fuck! you can't give more money to home? not even this year? why can't you stop spending on wasteful things and stop your stupid bike rides (:P) and save some money atleast!So i neatly went home and showed my folks the promotion letter with the visiting card that was thrown in free with it :P Now imagine the joy of my folks, in their world, the word "manager" associated with any thing means i have my own cabin, with few people to lord over and i the work i do is work on my machine (comp) and see through files! I still have hard time to give them a clearer picture of what work i do at office :P They fail to understand each time, can't blame them, the generation gap is all that has to be blamed.

Well, coming back to the story, my folks were overjoyed that their son was some manager now and lo, he had his own visiting card! :P i was happy that they didn't talk about moolah part :P the promotion part worked! i managed to keep them quite for 1 more year from asking for more money from me while my earnings remain the same. Heaved a sigh of relief that i can continue with the same juggaad with my finance and still do my bike rides once in a while :P
Then after few weeks, i was going through newpaper and my mom was trying to tell me something but was hesistant, i could make that out from her reluctance and the way she was changing channels so frequently. But trust me, i never imagined that she will tell what she told me!

She first asked me for my err "biodata" :P My my, why would my mom want my "biodata" for? i already came to know that i was going to face the most embarassing moment in my life soon! So i pushed it around and asked her if she's gonna find me a better job with that :P Then comes the bombshell :
"you know, now that you have become manager and all, there is a nice girl who's done her studies and is working as a software engineer.........."
Yikes! heck no! pls pls don't make me feel old, iam not ready for it yet! (my thoughts ran so) still pretending to read the newspaper, i asked her, "So is the girl known to you? you want me to find a job for her in our company?"
Hehe
But mom was determined, she had enough of my bullshit:P
"No, she's one of our far relatives, i think she'll be a perfect match for you"
Now i had no where to run, i couldn't manage to give smartass replies now that she had finally dropped the bombshell.
I was embarassed (NO!!! not becoz i was happy!!!) i didn't know how to tell her what i had in mind. We are such a non emotional/silent family, that we never had "bonding" thing or family time crap. Both my parents were non expressive and i grew up most of the time getting used to being alone and they both being at work. They are god like people no doubt, but we maintained our distance from as far as i could remember, we never discussed any thing so personal till that fateful day.

This was my life and i had to reclaim it, more importantly, not let my parents get any false notions from my actions. So i managed to put an expressionless dead face and looked at her and told that marriage is something that iam not ready for yet and even if i was ready, iam dead against the concept of arranged marriage and iam capable of finding my own wife myself! I promised her that my wife that i find for myself will be of same religion for sure!
My mom was totally caught unawares by my reply, she felt as uncomfortable as i felt when she dropped the bombshell on me, then she had to tell something to end the conversation, so she told " you people have become very forward" and she went in to kitchen and i went to my room.

The events of that day, made me thing hajaar things. From as long as i remember, marriage was something that used to happen to older people, older than me, my cousins of earlier generation or that neighbourhood senior etc. Now, from when did i start getting slotted to that category? No, iam not averse to getting old, it's what we are programmed for, getting old! But the grouse is, are you supposed to marry just coz have reached a certain age, which as per the society is the correct age to find your match and get in to holy matrimony?
or are you supposed to feel the need to settle down with in you and then marry? I believe in the latter ideology. I tried to pose this question to my colleague who got married recently (arranged marriage ofcourse!:P) and to my best friend girish, who is getting married by april, surprising, they all spoke the same language as my parents. They feel that you have get married because you are old enough for it! parents will find you a suitable match as per horoscope and astrology, then you marry the girl of their choice (sometimes your choice if you are lucky :P) and "adjust" to her and try to live happily ever after, with 1 or max 2 kids thrown in in due course!

Whatta idea! I ofcourse felt that they were talking to me like brain washed zombies. But fact is they are not risk takers, they don't want to "risk it" coz they say later you won't find "decent" girls. You gotto get married by 27/28 they say.
Hmm, i think i would rather "risk" it. After all it is this "risk" which i took in to biking, i was able to go to the most wonderful places and meet various like minded people and learnt a thing or two about life.
No, i won't say that iam 18 till i die like bryan adams :P I would rather say that iam getting old and my time is running out for my next ride! Marriage can wait at this stage of my life, i have bigger fish to fry, like say get a better paying job for once! :P

Bikenomads Hampi Meet covered in Autocar!

2008-01-12T15:00:00.000+05:30

It is a pleasant surprise indeed!
Bikenomads Hampi meet is featured in Autocar Magazine! I was surprised indeed when i heard about it from my good old friend Renu. Infact, later i came to know that, it was Renu's contacts in AutoCar mag which made this possible. Posted on the forum too, We are being noticed i say :P

Here's the scanned copy of the article:

Till next time!

Stag partying sucks!

2008-01-02T23:00:00.000+05:30

Well, whatta way to start newyear! with a rant ofcourse!For me newyear's eve meant another excuse to get drunk and party at friend's place. No big deal i say, it's just a friggin number change in our calendar! As usual, for this year too i thought my friends and me will go through the usual drill of boozing at my friend's place.But no! my fiends had a brilliant idea, they wanted to go to one of those newyear parties organised by pubs. Now as most of you know, these parties are strictly for couples only. In our case, we were the much hated stags!

I knew this wasn't gonna take off, so i tried to talk some sense in to my friends and told them let's stick to our routine drill, instead of ending up embarassing ourselves outside the pub. They suddenly seemed have been stuck by optimistic streak, they won't hear any of my words, my friend had a "contact" in one of the pubs and since he's a regular there, we can be assured of an "Entry" inspite of being stags. Well, i gave up, anyway i had informed folks at home that i was going out, so i had to go through their plans.

We all caged up and next thing we know we are stuck in bumper to bumper traffic in sankey road. It was already 8pm and traffic was horrible, just when i thought things couldn't get worse, bang! what was that!My overenthusiastic friend had banged his Ikon in to the rear end of a Getz! Geez! there goes my new year party money i thought! thankfully both the drivers got out of their vehicles to inspect the damage and both stared at each other and walked back to their cars! i was surprised! turns out there was no visible damage! Newyear spirit or was the other driver in spirits? well whatever, i just wanted to get off there and soon we were parking in the pub.

My friend neatly goes up to bouncer and says something, next thing i know, it was the usual stuff. The bouncer shaking his head and focusing else where, my friend trying to maintain his composure and false sense of pride and i can see him literally pleading with him! I had enough, i just wanted to go back to his place so we could get back to our routine drill. But no, these chaps won't have any of it, they wanted to get in by hook or crook! Then my friend's "contact" shows up, silver lining? But even his words to bouncers are met with cold stares. They way the bouncers would look at us made me feel ashamed, they would look at us as if we were street urchins! Then somehow after some time, They let my friend in and my other friend and me were left standing outside!

I thought that was it, we had to take a rick back to his place, while this guy who got in is gonna be partying. Then after about 15 mins, my friend came out and took us in, not before we coughed up the usual fee, yeah, we had to fork out for "couple" entry tickets, inspite of being stags. I paid and told myself, now that i've blown my money, i better enjoy it! :P
We are met with a chap who had laid out welcome drink, now what the fuck was that? Well, it turned out to be small glass or rather the ones you take it as a shot (bottoms up!) They had choice of wine or vodka. Me being totally allergic to wine, i took vodka. I mistook the vodka to be mixed, how wrong i was! Freaks had kept raw vodka and i took it bottoms up!

Welcome to hell! My insides started to burn, i felt like a raging fire was burning inside me, i wanted water, but no, they didn't have water, we were told to get in to the pub. We got it. I was still searching for water, but finally resigned to my fate that there was no water available immediately, so i lit up a cig.
Hmm, now after the initiation ceremony, things started to clear up, the cig did help, i was slightly in trance state :P I hadn't had dinner either and the vodka +cig combo didn't do any good. I was surveying my surroundings, Gawd! was i really there? there were just too many chicks around, outnumbering guys infact!
It was like each guy had come with two chicks! and there we were, 3 stags all oogling like a kid at a candy store!:P

The hunger pans started, it was already 10pm. So i asked for the menu and there was the real horror! all prices jacked up! courtesy of newyear's eve! I was literally searching for something that costed below three digits in rupees, but no, they all were in 3 digits, resigned to my fate, i didn't want to ruin this with my miserliness after having forked out the entry fee! My friends neatly proclaimed that they had emptied their valets for the entry fee, so the party was on me! Heck, this was just too much and i wanted to just get through the damn newyear party. Then we ordered for couple of over priced beers and over priced chicken and other over priced dishes. As soon as i got my hands on beer and food, i gobbled up and drank to my heart's content. After satisfying my hunger pangs, i started surveying the surroundings again.

The atmosphere was cool, Dimlights, candle lights on tables, open air dance floor with dj playing some good numbers and beautiful skimpily clad drunk chicks shaking their stuff all around! Now, i was having fun :P My friends wanted to shake their leg in the dance floor and try to hit with one of the pretty young things, while i was happy just gazing around. I settled down near the dance floor with my beer and snacks while my friends were making fools out of themselves with their ridiculous "look at me" kind of dance steps :P I wanted to just fade in to the crowd and didn't want to be associated with these fanatics dancing like idiots!

Then, i spent somemore time observing people around, apart from chicks, i notice a couple, they had their hardly 6 month old baby in their arms and these two were dancing away to glory, while the baby was trying to sleep! Poor thing, it was being made to go through this jig just coz it's parents wanted to party! There was a chap sitting next to me and he was smoking, next thing i know, the smoke coming from him reeks of very icky smell, turns out this guy is doping! with in few minutes, the same smoke starts everyone, it looks like iam in some joint heaven!
Then there were a group of 5 guys, all dressed in white blazers and white pants (!!) but they had a very attractive skimpily clad chick with them. All 6 were blown and were high on dope, the girl was really shaking her stuff, that too right in front of me! These guys used to take turns in dancing with her and when they got tired, they used to sit next to my table and dope. But girl really had lots of energy, she just didn't care who was dancing with her and it was free for all!

It was like watching one of those B grade films, that too live! i was the director :P or so i felt. Meanwhile, the two dancing idiots (my friends) had gone in to the crowd and got lost for sometime. Then suddenly they came back, thoroughly exhausted. Their animated conversation followed and it was the usual story, how close they got a chick and when they were almost gonna hit on her, she lost interest or her guy came in and such stuff. Well, i was feeling miserable, firstly, i didn't want to witness this free for all show, secondly, i was getting ripped off for being there and thirdly, i was not enjoying it! Well, it was another 10 more mins to go for the clock to hit 12, so i knew that my ordeal would end soon.

Predictably, the clock stuck 12, with a count down and with fireworks. People suddenly had energitic boost and they all started to howl and cat calls and cries filled the air, greeting each other. Couples smooching each other etc...
Ok, it was done and i wanted to get out, 20 mins past 12, i dragged my friends out of there and we started our drive back to my friend's place in his cage, i was smoking in back seat and watched as both my friends started their animated conversation of how good the party was and how the chicks were happening etc.

We reached his place and had food. As i hit the bed, i decided, in future, if at all iam going to any goddamn newyear party, which is couple's only, i would go there only if had a member of female species for my company, definitely not as a stag! no matter how much my friends force me. I would rather reach home early from work and watch tv, than go through the embarassment as a stag in a couples only party!

Happy new year!

Looking back at 2007

2007-12-29T11:02:00.000+05:30

What a year it was!

I matured as a tourer this year, When i started out, i always used to wonder why most of the tourers like Ghat roads compared to the easy straight roads! I always felt that ghat roads were Pain in the ass! :P you have to concentrate so much in each turn and it's no fun bending the bike at each turn, watching out for oncoming traffic, taking the curve, lots of calculations going on in head etc. While the Straight roads (especially the NH4 types) with 4 lanes were bliss! full throttle, sit back and watch the world go by in highspeed!
I had to eat my own words, 2007 showed me the bliss of ghat roads and the fun in riding curvy roads, am no longer worried about getting the "chicken strips" on my tyres :P

Another problematic area was Night riding! Dang, that was hard, what fun is it when you have the truckers flashing all their 4 * 100w headlamps at you and you are temporarily blinded! I always used to ensure that i never end up riding in night in any of my rides. But this year, most of my rides ended with night riding! rather unintentionally! But i learnt a thing or two about riding in nights this year, can't say iam comfortable, but if iam forced to, then can manage pretty well. Thanks to the Headlamp upgrade from lousy 35w candlelight to 55/60w tubelight. More is never enough i guess, it's time to upgrade to HID i think :P

Looking back at 2007, i had a pretty good time riding with few very talented riders. I kicked off my first ride of 2007 with Sachin whom i had met in Xbhp's gtg. I had never imagined that i will find my ghat section guru in that gtg! Even though i had spent more than a week in Kerala during my Loong Kerala Ride at the fag end of 2006, i was not comfortable taking on the ghat sections/twisties. Then Sachin and me planned our ride to Waynad in kerala and with in one day, sachin taught me the technique to take on ghat sections and i started getting the hang of it, albiet the ride was cut short and i ventured towards belur and halebeedu, but i had got my first lesson in tackling ghats and i was sure that practice will make me more confident.

Practice session did come in May, during our Ride to mangalore to calicut and to bangalore This time we had more riders, i had the pleasure of riding with excellent riders like karthik ayyar and balaji, the fun we had in this ride was simply too much :P This ride made me laugh so much in those 4 days! all thanks to Santosh, the legendary iron butt pillion of balaji! This was my first ride with a large group where i was just out of the learner phase and thanks to sachin's guidance, again while returning for calicut to waynad, i could take up the learning lessons and i got a hang of taking on twisties.
Balaji and karthik ayyar got added to our permanent list of riders after this ride :P
Also, two large hearted Xbhpians Sujay and Zahin from mangalore became our very good friends, they really saved our ass in mangalore, when we were stranded with out getting a room to stay. Their large heartedness humbled us.

Then came the monsoon season, the dreaded season for me. Am yet to start to get the hang of riding in rains. Soon plans were afoot for a ride in october, We had a new rider this time, it was Professor Nanjundappa Nisarga of Christ college! Must say, this ride was one of the most memorable rides for me! Professor's down to earth attitude coupled with balaji's company made me enjoy the ride. Also, i cannot forget the two xbhpians who joined in for this ride, two guys whom i had never ridden with or known earlier, but they turned out to be the most decent riders i have ever come across! Venu and Chetan were excellent on road and off road too, they mingled very well among the group, Professor was the common bonding element i guess!:P
Also got introduced to balaji's pillion Nandeesh, who was santosh's replacement from earlier ride and he was no less in ticking our funny bones!
Jogfalls was misty, the foggy road through honnavar was unforgettable. The ride through back breaking Honnavar to Gokarna stretch was unforgettable! Gokarna's laid back atmosphere was a treat, also big time treat was booze sessions with fish side dishes and professor for company! I missed out on Yana, it was just too much for me, while balaji, venu and chetan went through the ordeal, on our part, prof, me and manas enjoyed the leisure ride back through scenic haveri route and then the rip fest from chitradurga.
Sachin was sorely missed in this ride, he couldn't make it due to office issues, but later, even he regretted for not joining us. No problem, there's always next time.

Ah, the month of october seemed to be raining rides :P
Just 2 weeks after i returned from Gokarna ride, i was to attend wedding of my close colleague all hopes of going with office people got ditched after all my colleagues pulled out of the proposed cage ride. Now it was back to my trusty zma, i was in two minds whether to do this solo ride or go by bus (Yikes!) Thats when my close friend Girish joined in. Now girish was no stranger to rides with me, after all i started my touring with him as pillion during my first loong ride This time though, i had my cramster saddlebags, so my pillion need not worry about being the cramster :P
Also this was to be Girish's last ride with me as a bachelor, he's getting hitched in April 2008. So, we set off towards shimoga and surprisingly, we covered lot of distance in shorttime including breaks.
The ride was a beauty, My 40K done Zma took the abuse, she managed to go through the punishment of hauling me and fully loaded saddle bags with 80kg pillion pretty well. My colleague's place which is 60kms from sagar was heavenly, we thoroughly enjoyed the stay there, soaking in nature, early morning life in a village etc. Attended the wedding, Came back riding through the night! NH4 at night was so sleepy! Thoroughly enjoyed this ride, after this ride, my respect for my trusty zma went up, Am truly amazed at this bike's capacity to endure punishment! Good going girl :)

The month of november was time for annual meet of Bikenomads
Plans were afoot in community about finalising a place for the annual meet this year, Last year's meet was in Goa
Voting was done and most favoured Hampi and Goa. So it was decided as hampi for this year.
Along with Sachin, i volunteered for managing the logistics. It was one heck a exercise! right from making google sheets of riders with their complete details to the number of rooms to be booked in hotel etc. The ride was memorable and all the excel sheets were worth the pain :P
Met members from mumbai/pune/hyd and it was gala time there. I was for the first time leading the pack of riders from bangalore, i had the pleasure of meeting and riding with few wonderful people like Aditya bhelke, Lovejoshi, Ashishchamoli, Gaurav and many more.

Apart from the above mentioned long rides, i also did few chota rides over weekends. Those were
Ride to bheemeshwari with bull gang of dada jsr, Kam and boodie

Kam's send off ride
Bangy guys rode up to say bye bye to kam bhai, who was shifting to Noida :(

Rangantitu ride
Memorable ride to rangantitu bird santuary, Met and rode with Venkatsir for the first time and had loads of discussions with him regarding biking scene in india.

Ride to Himavad Gopalswamy Betta
With sachin, it was a well deserved ride after a looong time indeed!

Ride to Gaganachukki and K kudi
Ride with old friends santoosh, pradeep and Renu. What a ride! Ride through forest area in K gudi was superb!

So overall, i had a gala time during this year, i hope 2008 too has many rides in store and places to see and ofcourse, lots of people to meet.

BikeNomads Hampi Meet

2007-11-30T18:37:00.004+05:30

Pics of the meet: http://picasaweb.google.com/vaas2000/BikeNomadsHampiMeet

Finally Am starting to pour in to words about the hampi meet which happened exactly 1 week back.
It was an awesome ride to Hampi which saw 40 plus people and 30 plus bikes all riding down from various parts of india and meeting up in hampi.
This was the largest turn out compared to previous Bikenomads annual meets!

It was great to meet legends and members from other cities, email ids which were seen on group were given a face finally!

It all started some 2 weeks prior to the meet and with Vibhu asking for volunteers and coordinators for organising the meet. Since this was hampi and i had previously been there in March 2006 Meet i pitched in for organising things, along with fellow nomad Sachin whose native is Hospet (just 13 kms from hampi)
Then the planning started, city coordinators were appointed for pune, hyderabad, mumbai and bangalore. I was also the coordinator for bangalore. Cut off date was announced for confirming the hotel room booking. That in itself is a long story....

The google sheet started to become very active, with riders confirming, few dropping out, i made an offline excel sheet and started updating the status of riders.
We realised that this time we need to fit in all people in a single hotel, as only then people will have time to interact with each other. The only big hotel near hampi was KSTDC Mayurabhuvaneshwari Hotel in Kamalapur (3 kms from hampi)
Cutoff date for confirming for ride for assured accomodation was announced and till the nth moment, there were changes! Finally the list came up and I booked 11 rooms by calling up hotel, but i was skeptical as the hotel chaps needed advance amount for confirmed booking. Then sachin pitched in, he was in hospet for diwali, he drove down to hotel and rebooked the rooms also paid the advance.

Then the task of grouping Bangalore guys came, i again formed an email chain with ids of guys from bangalore who had confirmed. We were around 10, at the last moment Prabul dropped out as he was to go to USA. Then there were quite some additions/deletions. I was worried as the D day neared, This time neither sachin nor prabul were there to lead the pack and i had to lead. I have always been the sweep guy in all rides or somewhere in middle order, always comfortable following someone, but this time, i had to lead this totally new group of 10 bikes! So viola, there was a CCD meet arranged for collecting the hotel amount from bangy guys and i could finally put faces of the email ids of bangy people. After the interaction, i was confident that most of guys are sensible riders.
But i had never ridden with them, so i had to see how things would go.
Just 1 day prior to ride i came to know that the number of bikes will be 12
Number of people will be 16. That is 4 bikes with pillion out of which 2 would be couple. This was gonna be one heck of ride, i told myself this time i don't have any one to fall back on in case of any problems on the road as i was to lead the group, so i had to be prepared to handle any incidents or fuckups, as my usual ride partners were not riding with me in this ride. But with people like Adityabhelke, Lovejoshi, Gaurav, Chamolibhai and last but not least Renu, i reassured myself that this group doesn't have any juvenile riders and this is gonna be a safe ride.

I left my office early (for the first time before any ride!) as i had pulled in a double shift. Reached home comfortably by 6Pm. Packing things is a huge task for me, i first go through the list of things i need to carry, then categorise it, then pick and choose from the lot, then finally cram things in my cramster saddle bags. This was gonna be my first ride with my own proper camera! Thanks to sachin, i got his KodakZ650 Camera for a good buy from him. By the time i was done with the ordeal of packing, it was 10 Pm! I knew that i shouldn't be wasting time in morning and i should be on road in max half and hour after i wake up, so did my morning rituals at night itself :P and bathed and got ready and slept! sleep i did! like a log!

Day 1 : November 23rd 2007, Friday:

I woke up at 3.45 Am, i was to be in nelamangala crossing (our consolidated meeting point) by 5 Am. So i took my stuff and started mounting the saddle bikes on zma and i was ready to roll by 4.25 Am. My parents did their routine stuff, did a neat pooja for the bike, broke coconut and ran over lemons by 4.35 Am and i was on road.

The excitement was too much, i could feel the butterflies in my stomach, but all that drowned when i saw the truck traffic in yeshwantpur! i was dodging and making way through the trucks for atleast 10 kms and well past jalahalli circle. I had estimated that it would take me 30 mins to reach the meeting point and i was right. I rolled in exactly at 5 am on zma's clock at nelamangala crossing. The weather was too cold, even though i had worn gloves, i could feel the coldness in my fingers. Stopped at the chai shop in junction and waited for other guys to roll in. It was 5.10 Am and still no sign of other guys, i was the only one waiting there, much to the amusement of few truckies who were amused at my riding gear and loaded bike!
Well, another ciggy smoked and finally by 5.20 Am, Chamoli bhai rolled in with his avenger, along with him was gautam sharma and Gaurav All three avenger brothers were there :P After the hi's and hellos, we settled down for another cuppa tea, then at 5.30Am, The Koramangala folks rolled in, Aditya on his P220 with his wife Sapna, Lovejoshi on his Bull "red eye" with his wife Tanya and other stags like nfsnfs aka santosh, Sunil dhummi and otehrs, the crowd was growing!

But still no sign of our great sweep, my good old friend Mr renukumar and his pulsar 180! I got a call from prasanna, he's shot past crossing and is waiting ahead near the toll gate, i tell him to wait there for us, so he can join the brigade when we start. Question was when to start! it was 5.45 Am, all the junta were accounted for except the sweep, i tried calling renu, but he didn't answer, so i decided to wait till 6Am and see if he catches up. Meanwhile the entire junta got talking, i was just standing and observing the entire junta. Wow! i had never imagined that one day, i would get to ride with some many guys, We were a total of 12 bikes and 16 people! and i was the one who knew the route, so i was technically the lead. It was a great honour indeed, but also thoughts of whether i can lead successfully and maintain the composure of the group cropped up, i told myself, what ever happens, happens for good, so let me go with the flow and see.

It was 6.00 Am, still no sign of Mr renu kumar, I call him on his cell and no answer, meanwhile junta start getting impatient, Lovejoshi is frustrated that we all have been made to wait for one guy and looks like he's gonna rain punches on me if i try to talk to him! :P so i keep my distance from the tatoo man!:P Then finally by 6.10 Am, i see our spot come in and stop next to me. I gave him a kick on his butt with my steel toe CAT shoes to show my frustration and collective frustration of the group! Then renu explains his story and turns out cops were checking and blah blah... So after final round of Tea, i brief the guys, Iam gonna lead, you guys stick to your positions as per the sheet (yeah, i had got printout of the details of junta :P) All agree, i see veteran nfsnfs mumbling, i know things aren't going down well with him, he's not used to slow riding :P

Finally! at 6.25 Am We all start the bikes and roll! caravan of 11 bikes to start off with. It was a sight to see! then prasanna joins the brigade from the toll gate ahead and now we are 12 bikes riding in formation in a straight line with me leading the pack, i was just letting this thought in mind when i see someone over take me from left, whoosh! who was that breaking the rules? Well, it was our own nfsnfs! true to his name, he had enough of slow riding and rips ahead! ok, let everyone ride as per their comfort i feel. Then see the numbers in the formation are interchanged in the rear view mirror, i see the avengers are last with few pulsars and me followed by Aditya's P220 and LJ's Redeye. Then after some distance, prasanna goes ahead whoosh! okay so he wants to give nfsnfs some company in fast riding, so I leave the speedsters ahead and lead the remaining 9 bikes.

It's heavenly to ride on wide 4 laned road, early morning with minimal traffic. We gobble up kms and after an hour or so, i give a small pit stop, Then carry on again. We had planned to have breakfast in Kamat near sira, i missed it. I realised that after nfsnfs who had gone ahead of me, tells in sign language while riding parallel to me. So i find the next hotel on the service lane and pull over.

Entire junta decend on the hotel, taking the chaps there by surprise! They have only idly and dosa, fine! anything will do as everyone was damn hungry! We gooble up breakfast and after sutta and teas, we roll on. I decide to stop at Reliance A1 in chitradurga next. So we roll on, we are covering good speeds and tarmac is never ending 4 laned bliss! But all good things come to an end, so did the 4 laned runway! we hit the two laned road just outside chitradurga, i spot the A1 plaza and pullover and wait for junta to regroup. After 10 mins, the entire gang is together and we roll in to A1 plaza at 10.15 Am. We take a relaxed tea sutta break and i brief junta here again.

We decide that prasanna and nfsnfs are comfy riding faster, so they both will go ahead of us, while the remaining lot will follow me. I also warn the junta that NH13, which we are gonna take hence forth towards hampi (150 plus kms) is total opposite of what we had see till then, i tell them that based on sachin's report 2 weeks earlier, the road was a mess, 2 laned potholed road to hell with lots of trucks thrown in. So i tell the junta to be very very cautious and show them the handsignals which i will use to warn the riders while i ride and ask them to follow the same so the riders behind me could get the message. All set, we roll out of A1 plaza by 10.30 AM.

It was getting hot now! the weather was getting too damn hot, iam used to sun, so i enjoyed, i could make out that the rest of junta were really hating to ride in this road at this time of the day! NH13 starts off as a clean road with good tarmac and lots of trucks, hardly after 20 kms, we get samples of potholes, i give the handsignals and never stop till we reach hampi later! The road gets progressively worse as we proceed some 40 kms, the potholes become lunar craters and we have to search for patches of tar to ride on, coupled with the trucks! it was dangerous to overtake a truck too coz you never knew when the truckie would swerve right to avoid a pothole, when you are overtaking him! so i had to watch out the truck's path ahead too and then over take. After an hour or so, the butt aches, the cramps start, all the abuse of riding on potholed road shows up, so i pull over near a tree with lots of shade for a butt break and the junta too pull up. It was a much needed butt break for everyone!

To be Cont'd....

Cage Drive to GS Hills - Bandipur - KRS and a wedding

2007-11-21T20:01:00.002+05:30

Last weekend's ride in a cage to Gopalswamy Betta left me confused and excited.
Confused coz i didn't get the "feel" of the journey like in my bike rides and Excited as we reached Gopalswamy Betta bang on sunrise! It was an awesome view from there. I thoroughly enjoyed the places and my friends company. Only thing i hated was sitting like a couch potato in passenger seat, with my ass strapped to the seat with a seat belt and seeing the whole world through the windscreen "TV"
The frustration increased when i saw 5 Bulleteers on their way towards Mysore, while I was stuck in the cage. Also on the last day while returning at night, i saw a zma and cbz riders on their way back to bangalore. I felt like a smoker with out his fag! :P

My first outing to nature spot with my new addition to my travel kit, Kodak Z650 Camera! Finally i was able to realise my dreams of capturing nature's beauty in my own camera, all thanks to sachin, who generously gave away his cam for a good price to me. Will upload snaps and stuff some time.
The sunrise view and scenic view of Gopalswamy Betta was awesome, on our drive towards bandipur, we spotted peacocks and Deers. Then the customary wedding was attended to and the last day we went to back waters of KRS called Blue lagoon.

Am more exited now about the upcomming BikeNomads meet in Hampi this weekend. This time there are large number of riders and Bangalore leads the list with 11 bikes! Can't wait till friday!

Ride to a Wedding, Jogfalls and NH4

2007-10-21T19:37:00.000+05:30

Well, finally found time to update the ride log of my previous post.

This time, It was a ride with my trusted pillion buddy girish. Target was my colleague Ravindra's wedding in his native in Shimoga Dist, Shikaripur taluk.
So me and giri decided to hit the road on my zma and catch up Jog falls, as in my previous ride just 2 weeks back, i couldn't get a glimpse of jog due to extra ordinary fog! and we decided to ride back via NH4.

The stats:

Ride duration: 13th Oct 07 (Saturday) to 15th Oct 07 (Monday)

Riders: ME!
Pillion: Girish
Bike: My trusty Zma

Total Kms covered: 888.9 Kms

Route taken:
Day1 :Bangalore-tumkur-arsikere-bhadravati-shimoga-sagar-Jogfalls-Sagar-Sorabh-Shikaripur

Day2: Shikaripur- Balligavi-Shikaripur

Day3: Shikaripur-Harihar-Davangere-Chitradurga-Sira-Tumkur-Bangalore

Pics:
Will upload Pics shortly.

Retrospection of the Ride:
This was one heck of a ride! I was thoroughly drained out by the time i reached bangalore! First day's ride was smooth, Thankfully weather gods had mercy on us and it was not foggy or rainy, so we caught a good view of Jogfalls.
Next day the Scenic rural beauty of Fields and agricultural land in my colleague's native village left us speach less! The last day's hellish ride back to bangalore via NH4 was simply mind blowing! I never had to fight my sleep so hard ever in my life! It was pit stop every hour at night and freshening up to stay awake and ride back in NH4. Girish's handicap of not knowing how to ride a bike pushed me to my limits. Managed to reach home with out any incidents and slept like a log for full 14 hours! much to the ire of my boss :P

Last Ride before loosing Bachelorhood

2007-10-12T04:13:00.001+05:30

Don't get me wrong, it ain't my life that's at stake! :P
I was referring to my next ride's pillion's status!

The last time i did a ride with a pillion was in March 2006 to Hampi

After that i realised taking pillion only abuses your bike and accelerates the ageing process of bike. Now iam back to square one, albiet temporarily.
Iam all set to go off on a relatively long ride to shimoga to attend my colleague's wedding but this time with a pillion, my friend girish.

I started my touring life with my first long ride with girish as pillion towards coastal karnataka in jan2006 this will be my last ride with him, with his status as "bachelor" coz he's getting hitched next year!

Sigh, friends grow up so fast! just reminds me that iam getting old too! But marriage is still no brainer for me at this juncture of my life, i still have some gas left in my tank to go on and still have my reserve to burn up before i hit a petrol bunk! lol

Newayz, all said an done, got the bike serviced and readied for the ride and just one more day to go before we embark on our memorable ride!
This ride is dedicated to girish's soon to be lost bachelorhood!

Raid De Sigandur-Jogfalls-Gokarna-NH4

2007-10-04T02:11:00.000+05:30

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

Mangalore-Bekalfort-Calicut-Waynad

2007-05-03T03:57:00.000+05:30

God's own country kerala - this was my third innings there from december and couldn't get enough of the twisty roads there! It all started with sachin and me planning our second innings in waynad as our last ride had to be cut short. Floated around the idea to few guys and Manas confimed, kartik joined in at the last moment along with his friend balaji and his pillion santosh and thus formed the waynad riders.

First the stats: Ride duration: 4 days (28th April 07 (Saturday) to 1st May 07 (Tuesday)
Bikes and Riders: 5 Bikes and 6 Guys.
Me - Silver Zma
Sachin Koppikar - Red Pulsar 150 Dts
iManas Saran - Red Avenger
Kartik Ayyar - Red Bullet Thunderbird
Balaji & Santosh (pillion) - Black Bullet Thunderbird

Total Kms covered: 1228 Kms
Route taken: Day1: Bangalore>Kunigal>Hassan>Sakleshpur>Bantwal>MangaloreDay 2: Mangalore>ThanneerBhaviBeach>Mangalore>Kasargood>Bekalfort>KannurDay3: Kannur>Mahe(pondicherry)>Pakkadbeach>calicut>Kalpetta>KuruvaIsland>KalpettaDay4:Kalpetta>Lakkidi View point>Tushaaragiri Falls>Kalpetta>SultanBathery>Gundlupet>Nanjangud>Mysore>Mandya>MaddurCfday>Bangalore

Retrospection of the ride: This was the best birthday gift to me, I got my riding gear before the ride (new lid, jacket and gloves) and went on this ride the very next day of my birthday.
Most hilarious ride of mine till date, thanks to funny bone tickler santosh and sachin. Did what ever i din't want to do in a ride - Night riding, riding in rain, offroading, offroading in rain, extending saddle time for more than a hour. But at the end of it, it was all worth it! My zma's battery conked off in this ride and had to manage with no horns, kick start (!!) and dim lights for 2 days.

Thanks to sachin's cam, this time too i could get quality pics.
My Pics : http://picasaweb.google.com/vaas2000/MangaloreBekalfortCalicutWaynadRide
Manas: http://picasaweb.google.com/manas.saran/SeaNHillsTourKerela
Kartik: http://picasaweb.google.com/kartik.ayyar/MangaloreCalicutKalpettaRide

Day1: 28th April 2007 Saturday:
All set to go, i was up and ready by 4.45 Am and i got a call from Sachin, it was any biker's worst nightmare (which l lived through once) informs me that he has a flat rear tyre. Now he's tense and has second thoughts about making it to the ride. I ride off to the meeting point (yeshwantpur Metro) and meet all other guys, i inform them about the problem and we all decide that we will wait for him after covering some distance. After informing sachin that we will wait after hassan, we start off towards NH4, Had breakfast in mayura hotel by 8 near channaraayapatna, Sachin was stuggling to get his flat tyre fixed, we decided that it would be better if we visited shravanabelagola and then proceeded to hassan, that way we would have seen an extra place while waiting for Sachin. On reaching the place, manas and me decided to guard the bikes loaded with cramster and tankbags so the remaining guys went off for sight seeing. Manas and me emptied few cigs, few bottles of cool drinks, tried few pics and got bored, by then it was past 11Am and the sun had come out to trouble us, it was getting damn hot, So once the guys returned from the hill climbing, we decided to push off. So we went off towards hassan and past hassan we stopped at a nice big tree, under the shade. It was 12.50 Pm and got update from sachin that he had started off from bangalore at 9.30 Am. So we decided to wait. It was a looong break, took lots of pics, cigs, soft drinks, got detailed introduction done with new riders balaji and Santosh. Finally at around 2 Pm, sachin joined us and after resting for sometime, we decided that it is better to skip belur - charmadi route as we had to reach mangalore by evening and decided to do the usual route of sakleshpur via shiradi ghats. The formation ride started with me being somewhere in the middle most of the times and sachin taking the lead. We hit shiradi ghats, the roads were patched up and very few stretched were totally screwed up, but it was horrible to ride on these roads, then the tarmac changed for better, soon we started enjoying the smooth tarmac and speeds increased.

Stopped at a curve for ciggy break and took few pics, pushed further ahead and stopped somewhere before uppinangadi for lunch at around 4ish. After hurried lunch, we started off towards mangalore. The nearer we got to mangalore, the traffic became insane! Local buses were being driven like autos by maniacs! taking lefts and rights and not giving way to overtake and most horrible, braking in the middle of the road! These guys were totally insane! Finally we reached mangalore entrance (circle) by 6.30 Pm, Stopped and asked for directions and moved on. We reached city and got confused by the oneways and the traffic. Sachin had the hotel details where we had to crash for the day, turns out that the hotel is deep inside the city and it was already dark. Then i remembered that I had Mangalore Xbhpian zahin's number, i called him to ask about decent hotels there, to our luck, Zahin went out of his way and asked our location and turned up with fellow xbhpian Sujay!.
Then they took the trouble of going around the town to find out about hotel details while we guys waited. They found a hotel and led us all there. We were so grateful to these guys for taking time off and helping us, dumped our stuff in hotel and discussed with zahin about beaches to visit the next day and they suggested thanneerbhaavi beach and they were willing to join us next day at 5 AM! we were so humbled by their help, after dinner at a hotel with zahin, we crashed out at the hotel, what a day!

Day2:29th April 2007 Sunday:
I was up by 4.30 and saw zahin's message, he was already downstairs waiting for us! Then all of us could move on only by 6Am.
On the way Sujay joined us and led us in his zma. We were there at the beach pretty early, parked the bikes in sand and took lots of group pics and line up pics

Then it was time to get in to the beach, all guys jumped in and we had a blast. Sachin and me tried out xbhp and BN poses too!

Later It was time for beach ride! Except two bullets, all three of us, sachin, me and manas got our bikes on to the beach shore and had a blast, i tried burnouts and riding, the sand was not so hard and i had a tough time keeping the bike in line, then while taking a U turn, waves came in and soaked the sand beneath the rear wheel and my zma got stuck in sand! Zahin helped me pull it out and it was back to riding in the beach, Kartik too tried out zma's beach riding capabilities :-) Now it was time to get back our bikes to the road and boy oh boy, was it tough! It was a huge circus to get the bikes back on road, thanks to zahin and sujay, we managed to bring out the bikes in one piece! I surveyed the beach riding damage, entire bike was full of sand, it need a wash real bad, so off we went to a service station and got all our bikes water washed. After breakfast party thrown in by zahin, we reached hotel and were able to move out of mangalore by 1 Pm, not before taking group pics with our hosts zahin and sujay and thanking them for all their help and time, we requested them to give us a chance to play hosts next time they are in bangalore. Discovered that my battery was dead so no more self start! back to hard ways of life! Kickstarting was major pain in the ass, also speedo was not working, i got worried, it turned out to be a loose speedo cable, cable tightened, problem fixed! but not before resetting my trip meter accidentally trying to self start! damn, this was gonna me my first ride with out trip meter pics :( We started off towards kasargood, the roads were crowded for some 20 kms and too many autos and trucks and what nots! It was damn humid and everyone was sweating like a pig! We reached kasargood and decided to go to bekalfort. some 15 kms from kasargood, we were in the fort, guys went in while me and sachin and manas guarded the bikes and lugguage and had our lunch, then we went in to explore the fort, it was a magnificient fort, built along the shore of the sea and offering great views of the coast line. This is the same fort where the song "tuhire" from film "bombay" was shot at. After our photography sessions, we moved out of bekal fort towards kannur at 4 Pm. We got amazing straight roads for a while and then short bursts of twisties, somehow manas went ahead of us and i managed to spot the guys ahead of me and after a quickie ciggy break, moved on and found manas waiting some 30 kms frm kannur. Poor chap had done saddle sore ride of 2 hrs thinking we were ahead of him! Calicut seemed far fetched at 90 change kms from the spot we were on, so we decided to land at kannur for the day. We reached the town by 7pm after horrible night ride and truck traffic, found a very good hotel at very cheap rate and crashed in after dinner, not before another round of laughter session thanks to sachin and santosh.

Day3:30th April 2007 Monday:All rose early and started off at 6 Am towards calicut, Me and sachin went ahead and took the great deviation towards calicut. We hit a railway crossing and made use of the waiting time with tea and ciggy break, other guys joined in. Then We had to ride through gulli roads (it was a NH!) never seen so many narrow National highways passing right through towns in front of houses and shops! in no time we were in pondicherry! (no no, not the east coast one, this one is Mahe on westcoast!) it was an union territory hardly 30 kms! Then we reached the kappad beach crossing. Balaji and kartik had gone ahead of us, so they had to return back to join us to kappad beach. We found a good beach resort for breakfast. For 150 bucks, had a royal buffet breakfast starting from southindian to north indian to continental stuff! all filled up to the brim and hit the beach for photography sessions. The beach was too good, isolated and virtually free of locals and crowds. Found a Bangalore scorpio with KA board, with it's rear wheel stuck deep in the sand, the guy had tried beach riding and got screwed badly! took lot of innovative pics like reflections from helmet visor and stuff, it was time to move on to kalpetta, waynad - the land of eternal twisties! We started off towards kalpetta, by the time we left, the scorpio was freed by localites from sand. It was boring ride under hot sun till calicut, after tanking up there, we took the deviation towards kalpetta, Twisties started! Last time me and sachin had been there, they were still tarring the twisties, now it was done and the freshly laid tarmac with broad shoulders for cornering welcomed us, we rode on! Everyone seemed hungry for twisties and ateup the curves thrown at them with good speeds, finally we reached our usually pitstop, a shack bang in the middle of a twisty, had lots of liquid intake to prevent dehydration and moved on, more twisties, enjoyed to the core and reached our usual hotel by 1 Pm. What a ride! Everyone was content with the amazing twisties we had gulped down so far, so it was decided that we move out at 3 pm to kuruva island, sort of a jungle island surrounded by river, 50kms from kalpetta as per the maps. So we took off again at 3pm. We went on and on, the roads were good, we had to deviate after 50 kms and found out that kuruva island was another good 20 kms! Narrow ghat section road! our idea of watching sunset at lakkidi view point was no brainer now, So we went on, sachin who was ahead of us got stopped by cops, later all of us reached the spot and cops let go of us telling that we were over speeding! So we decided to stick to 60s, Me and manas rode together and sachin. kartik and balaji went ahead of us and they missed a turn towards the island, so me and manas went off in the right direction, took some good pics in the woods, the road was isolated surrounded by woods, later moved on and the offroading stretch had to start. The damn island was till 4 more kms, it was like a jeep trial full of mud and stones surrounded by greenery, we stopped and waited for the guys, soon we head the bullets and the guys joined us. We did the offroading together, it was a test to the shock absorbers of the bikes and santosh the pillion on bullet was doing all kinds of acrobatic moves to avoid the bumps tranferring to his rear! We finally reached the place and got in after taking the tickets, it was greenery all around and just a walking path, took loads of pics and we knew as we walked towards the island that we had to ride back in dark some 70 kms to our hotel. We reached the river and found a rope tied to a tree on our side of the bank and another tree on the other side of the bank. a guy was standing on a raft made of bamboos and pulling himself and the raft towards us. Soon he reached our shore and we all got in, the moment we all got in, water got in! we had to precariously sit on the raft while the guy pulled himself and the raft using the rope to the other side of the bank, we reached the shore of the island. It was nice to be there secluded place, surrounded by greenery. Soon we hit dead end, there was the river at the end of it. After quicky fag break we decided to head back at it was already 6 pm. On our way back, it started to get cloudy and it started drizzling by the time we reached our bikes and it heaven opened up and started to rain cats and dogs! we took cover near a tree and as we were seeing the offroading muddy stretch soon became a trecherous pool of slushy mud and stones, rains didn't show any sign of slowing down, so we decided to push off in rain as we wanted to get out of the 4 km offroading stretch before darkness setin, so off we went in the rain, it was totally insane thing to do, offroading in rain that too with day light fading away, all our bikes were fishtailing and the rear of the bikes were swinging left to right, it was scary sometimes as it was getting real difficult to maintain the balance, my bike was skidding a lot as the tyres have almost worn out, some how we managed to get out of the ordeal after some 25 mins of hellish ride and we were relieved that we could get out of that stretch in one piece! took a fag break and rain stopped, it was getting dark and now we had to ride in formation coz the same twisties that exited us earlier will be bothersome now on as it had rained and cornering abilities will be goner, so with kartik and balaji leading, me in between (due to weak battery, pathetic headlight and no horns!) manas behind me and sachin tailing, we started the return back journey to hotel, it was 60kms of rain drenched, shivering riding in the dark experience, we maintained steady speeds of 50 - 60 kms (as per the cops earlier!) Sachin would race ahead and inform kartik to speed up or slow down if the formation was not intact, we noticed few trees had fallen down on the road due to the rain and that too at blind turns, it was good that we were doing moderate speeds. We stopped after 1 hour in total darkness in elephant infested area, kartik took group pic of all of us in total darkness and it came amazingly well, especially manas, his jacket's reflective layer shined like light due to the flash and he was looking like 80s disco dancer! After a fag /tea break we moved on, reached sultan bathery, had another break and managed to reach hotel finally after 2.5 hours from the time we started from the island. We all congratulated eachother for amazing discipline through out the night ride. After a quickie dinner, gulped down much required beer and whisky and everyone crashed in their rooms one after another, me, balaji and manas were up late and talking about all things under the sun, balaji gave insight on his experience in jeddah, saudi arabia.

Day4:1st May 2007 Tuesday:Started off early by 5, our schedule for the day was Tushaaragiri falls, some 50 kms from kalpetta via lakkidi view point. Sachin and me went ahead and reached lakkidi view point by half and hour and what a sight it was! Clouds covered the gaps between mountains below and it looked like we were looking at the himalayas! I went click happy, soon other guys joined in and started the photography sessions. The usally crowded view point was virtually deserted that early morning, there were loads of monkeys accompanying us, no humans! took awesome pics of scenery below and it was time for our orkut snaps! Pics of guys taking the twisties with their bikes, So first up was manas, kartik, balaji and me postioned ourselves and santosh was the signalling guy :) We were ready and santosh signalled manas, who made a good entry and exit of the curve and got captured in our cams. Next up was yours truly, this was gonna be my first set of bending pics, so off i went and got signal and came towards the entry, bent the zma and went out of the exit curve, Kartik and sachin couldn't it properly, so there was a second run and this time they got it. Similarly balaji and sachin got their pics taken. Now it was time to move on, Me and sachin informed others that now the roads leading to falls will get narrower and it will be very steep, so with me leading we went down the same twisties that we had done the previous day while coming in to kalpetta, had breakfast near the deviation from NH to get in to tusharagiri waterfall and moved on, the ghat roads were hardly 3 feet wide and were having some 50 degree inclination, zma took on the inclinations with ease and as we began enjoying the mini narrow ghats, we missed a turn and we went ahead, the ghat road ended and i stopped and enquired, we had to turn back so off we came the same steep inclination and sachin took the lead and we landed up in tushaaragiri waterfall. This time too the falls had very less water flowing but consolation was we were first and no tourists had flocked there, so water was clean, it was time to dive in and all guys jumped in except manas, who was chasing a butterfly to get a macro shot (or matrimondial shot? ) finally he managed to get good shots of the butterfly, while the rest of us enjoyed the dip in in water. We moved out and started riding back to hotel, reached hotel around 12 after butt breaks in between, the narrow ghat roads near the falls were just amazing to drive through, kerala has amazing road quality for the kind of terrain and rain fall they get, it's a very good achievement. Had heavy lunch and we could push out of hotel only by 3.30pm. We knew that we had to hit mysore before darkness, else get stuck in single lane NH at night (nightmare!) We did good speeds and made it a point to take a butt break after every 50 kms. We hit bandipur forest stretch, amazingly even this road was tarred this time! It was a pleasure to ride on, as soon as we crossed in to karnataka, a big pothole welcomed us, later the road got better, i saw balaji honking and signalling to me and we stopped to find kartik was no where to be seen, since he was the last guy, we waited, then kartik comes in and says that he saw elephants in the forests and shows up snaps, damn, we were so engrossed on road, we had missed the jumbo herd, so we decided ride real slow through out the bandipur stretch to see if we can sight any animals, to our luck we did, found a car parked on the road side and people looking in to the jungle, we all stopped and right there some 20 feet frm us was a big herd of around 15 elephants, just walking around. We silently observed them for a while and soon the place got crowded, so the jumbos got disturbed and they retreated inside the forest. We moved on with sachin leading the pack and we hit junction at mysore at 6.30 Pm. It was the beginning of four lane mysore - blore road, all guys went beserk and became throttle happy, with me leading the pack, it was such a joy to ride in wide 4 laned slightly curvy road, in no time i saw the srirangapatna board, so slowed down, rest of the guys formed the formation again and we started to ride with usual speeds till there was day light, as darkness set in we rode again in formation with kartik and balaji leading and sachin me and manas tailing. We hit maddur coffee day at 8 pm. Ordered stuff, it was time for maths class from my santosh, he did lot of calculations and told each of us owe X amount to such and such guy and in the end, we all ended up paying all the cash to santosh :) Pushed off from maddur coffee day, again rode in formation, maintaining constant speed of 80 and signalling eachother and others for overtaking, changing lanes etc. We reached Bangalore university campus junction by 10 pm. Had our last fag break together, congratulated each other for a ride successfully completed, did a quick retrospection, bid good byes to eachother and split up, not before initiating planning for our next ride! :)