A tale of 3000 Kms, 8 days, 3 states and 2 bikes – Day2

Gokarna to Bekal:

“Every day is a new day, and you'll never be able to find happiness if you don't move on”
New day, out of Bangalore, fresh air, cool sea breeze, I was cuddling in the blanket and at around 5 I saw Lohith wake up and get ready. We had plans to visit the beach before we head out on our wonderful journey, but I was wondering why is he up so early! I know it will be pitch dark till 6:15 at least. I wanted to tell him, and I thought I told him.You know sometimes when your body just wants to sleep, it creates those feelings of waking up and doing some stuff that you have in mind, later you wake up to find it was all games played by mind!! This was one of them. I woke up late, got ready by 6:30 to see a disappointed Lohith sitting in the balcony looking outside, cursing himself for loosing sleep.

Now we start walking, walking to watch the sun rise and bestow all the beautiful golden orange colours that he has on the serene nature before transforming into a burning red hot avatar. The walk to the beach was beautiful and I will let the pictures do the talking.
This is what we saw once we stepped out of the room. It was late when we reached in the night so we couldn’t see on how beautifully the farm house has been maintained.


Now this is where I might have found Lohith, with may be couple of broken teeth had he tried to wade into the beach in the pitch dark.


The beautiful path which leads to another marvel of nature, filled up with cashew nut trees filled with flowers. I so want to be in my home town in summers, this place gave me all the memories of how school and college summers were spent, eating cashew fruit, mango, sleeping off in the trees, roam in the wild collecting peacock feathers. It feels like something that heart wishes to do, but the responsibilities force you to be otherwise.



Now once we crossed this path chatting, making fun of each other, and me asking some silly questions which apparently were bugging him, we see this.





Now, we forgot that we were together. I was filled with joy and happiness, I waded off somewhere and Lohith in the opposite direction, may be ( I don’t know). Clicking pics, soaking in the golden rays of sun, smirking at one nice lady who climbed a rock to start her meditation. Who wants meditation when you are in such a place! Found a Kingfisher sitting on a rock, and I wanted a pic of it. The moment I frame the shot, the bird flew off to another place. Now this continued for at least 15 minutes before I could finally manage one pic of the bird.



Few more snaps from the beach,











































Now it was time to leave, we had been on the beach for good 1 and half hours and we had to head on to our next destination. Now I have a problem, I cant start my day without tea. A desperate search resulted in no tea available and we did not want to wait. Headed back and packed our luggage, handed out the keys and went to our bikes to see this!!

Each and every part was red due to the Yana road we had taken, and Gokarna roads were not helping the cause either. Now we had to fill up fuel and hit the ATM for that much needed cash.After waiting for a long time, while Lohith struggled with his tank bag, we moved on only to be amazed by the road we had taken this time. Riding on the mountain, sea on my left, roads that were twisty like a serpents tail, this needed a photo stop. Now photo stops are difficult, remove the helmet, balaclava, gloves, take out the camera and do things in reverse order, but who cares! I am out here to enjoy, take home the memories to cherish (show it my kids someday may be).












































Headed on, it was a small lane, forcefully going through a sea of houses that had their doors right on the edge of the road. This was an awesome feeling twisting and turning, ever so carefully (not to hit any one and get beaten up by crowd) we got out of the lane to see the Gokarna temple. Now on the journey started, another stop at fuel station meant loosing at least 15 mins of time in tying Lohith’s tank bag. Temperature was rising and last thing you want is to become a toast by the end of the day. We stopped for that much needed breakfast soon. Eating to hearts content, we were discussing the plans. I assured Lohith that the roads will be good and we can make up for the lost time.

Headed out into the smooth tarmac, enjoying every minute, Lohith was riding like there was no tomorrow for some reason (May be he wanted to make up for the lost time). We hit the ghat section only to find trucks and cars piled up. It was difficult to stay together in traffic and Lohith overtook a truck and we split up. I like curves, and I started overtaking, carefully and swiftly, I overtook most of the traffic and in the process, left Lohith behind. Now I overtook an Ertiga, and the driver was not amused (How can a bike over take a SUV!). Best part was, driver and the co passengers peeping out of the windows to see what on earth is that . I stopped for Lohith and saw Snehith’s missed call. He was in Udupi and we made plans to meet up for lunch. Finally after waiting for 20 mins, Lohith turned up. Cursing me for leaving him behind, and telling me stories of how a lady ended up hearing Udupi as Monkey.

It was time to hit the road again, and the mercury level was at its peak. Crosswinds were high and it was getting difficult to overtake trucks without being pushed out to the other side of the road by the winds (I almost ended up under a bus due to this). There on I started calculated overtakes.




West coast is blessed with very serene beach lines.For explorers, Bhatkal has many beaches and a light house that is not crowded or hogged by tourists.

We moved on, crossed Bhatkal and after a point we started hitting diversions. Man, 4 lane conversion of the NH was in full swing and the roads had more diversions than the holes in a dosa. Now on it was torture for us. Find a good piece of tarmac, twist the throttle, and wham there's the diversion. Finally managed to reach Udupi and called up Sneh bhai, decided to have food at Sharada and we headed there. It was nice to find shade finally and we waited for Sneh for a good 15 mins. He showed up in his car. Showed all the luggage in his cars boot and entered the hotel. Lohith was in hurry to leave, I frankly had no intentions of leaving (I liked being in the cool AC room) and yeah, I got my favourite curd rice for food. Hotel felt like heaven and the hot roads like hell. Had fun chatting catching up on stuff, and then it was time to leave. Thankfully, Sneh thought how to tie the tank bag to Lohith and we hit the road again.

We were in dilemma when we were leaving. Sneh said the roads are not going to improve till Mangalore, we were not sure if we could reach Bekal as planned or would have to stop in Kasargod. We decided that we will see to it in Kasargod and rode on.

The roads as they were, were tiring and the hot and humid weather was not making it any better for us.
The traffic was crazy once we hit the Mangalore-Kasargod road. There was no common sense among drivers, and mainly the frustration of diversions were coming out in the form of road rage. I was almost hit by an unruly driver in Innova who was driving like mad. Lohith saw this too and he surprisingly said lets stop him!! Never expected that from Lohith. Tailgated the Innova for good amount of time which apparently got him scared and he did a mad dash and got out of sight.

The torture of diversions continued till we reached Bekal and it was 8 by the time we reached there. The roads had gone from ridable to unbearable after we had reached Kasargod. It was getting dark and the dust coupled with high beam wielding oncoming traffic was making the progress slow.

On the way we had stopped for tea, Lohith after ordering tea came out and we were chatting. One guy with whom I had enquired about directions started talking to me and I don’t know what prompted Lohith to reply in broken Tamil I think he thought he was being spoken to and when I replied in fluent Malayalam, Lohith was shocked. (I had not told him I lived in Kerala for 3 years during my schooling).


Reached Bekal, it was very dark and we were tired and very exhausted. Looked for a room, found a very spacious one for 1500 bucks after lot of haggling for price. Could not visit the fort as it was too late. Roamed around for food, ate to hearts content and crashed. We decided to leave early next day as the heat was becoming unbearable and tiring. We had plans to leave early cover good grounds before sun comes out all guns blazing so that we could make some ground without getting fried while praying that the roads get better.

Day 3 log is here

A tale of 3000 Kms, 8 days, 3 states and 2 bikes – Day1

It all started when one of my friends had an idea of going for a long ride for Christmas break. Applied for leave, got it too, but my friend couldn't make it. I was looking for a ride and I absolutely hate sitting at home with nothing to do. Started checking with friends on their availability. Now my friend Lohith had leaves and we decided to ride together and started planning 3 days before the ride on places to cover. We had already plans made of meeting with YRC guys in Valparai and ride back with them to Bangalore. So the plan that we stated working on was

Leave on 23rd : Gokarna

24th, Bekal fort

25th, Kochi,

26th, Pollachi and meet up with YRC group and return to Bangalore on 29th.

Now Lohith informed that he could leave on 22nd, one day earlier than the plan and we decided to include Kanyakumari in the route plan.We thought we were optimistic about the  places we had decided to cover but went on with the plan deciding to modify the routes on the fly depending on the fatigue levels. But we ended up doing more than we planned which is a different story which will be revealed in the later posts. The maps image for places covered is below

Now that the route was finalized, it was time to buy stuff and get the bikes ready and we had very little time, but we managed it somehow. Plan was to meet up at Hebbal junction at 4:15 and leave from there. I reached at 4:10. Lohith who usually is on time was not to be seen. Pinged him and waited. Finally he showed up at 4:45 and apologized for the delay which was due to his new tank bag and  he forgot his wallet at home (It must be age taking toll on him ). We started heading towards Tumkur road and stopped for tea at Tumkur road toll gate. I cant start my day without tea and frequent tea breaks will be a part of the log. This was first long ride for both of us, though I have done it to an extent, for Lohith it was new and I felt that he was a little scared when we stopped for tea. Gave him few suggestions and a pep talk and we headed out on our beautiful journey on the smooth roads.

Reaching Sira took no time and we stopped for a cup of tea. It was cold, my teeth were chattering and we gladly took the liberty of finding warmth shamelessly in the fire some guy was lighting up . We took a few snaps, mainly of our companions, my CBR and Lohith’s Duke,  who were posing like super models in the nice orange background from the rising sun.





Warmed up, we started our journey towards the city of forts, Chitradurga, reaching which again on the smooth 6 lane roads, looking at the amazing colors worn by the morning sky was a breeze. If you are going on this road, a must take pic is of the wind mills lined up. So did we, a stop to capture these beautiful windmills was mandatory any way .



Now we were deciding on place to have breakfast. Both of us were hungry, and we decided to eat at a place which we find on the way ahead. We found a Kamath restaurant which unfortunately was closed. In the line up of never ending dhabas on the way, we finally found a decent looking place, had out tummy full of idlies and omelets. We had to take a diversion after Ranibennur and we took the state highway towards Sirsi. This was a single lane road with some bad potholed stretches. Even with the bad roads, the ride was amazing getting in and out of forests. Going into shade from burning hot sun who apparently wanted to see us sweat it out to reach our destination, abruptly braking for the pothole that seemed to appear from thin air, soaking in all the beauty nature had to offer, we continued riding only to stop at a beautiful lake.






It was mid noon and we were sweating like crazy and being fully geared up did not help. We continued our journey and stopped for lunch by 2pm. Now Lohith was getting ideas. Ideas of going to Jog falls (Its only 60 kms from here dude), lets go to Yana and stuff like that. May be the heat was acting up on him giving him some ideas . I shot down the idea of Jog as at this point of time, even my bathroom tap can beat the falls in the amount of water competition . I was considering Yana at the back of my mind, but the road condition got me worried on getting late to Gokarna. I said no to both the ideas which made him feel sad I guess.
We headed out back in the scorching heat towards Gokarna. Now on the way I saw the diversion towards Yana. I stopped and asked Lohith if he wants to go see Yana and from the look on his face I could see that the answer was a big yes. With fuel levels low, we had to find a source of petrol within say 120 Kms, but on the way to Yana, I saw a board which said you will reach Gokarna in 70kms if you go straight .  One stone, 2 birds and we trotted happily in the dense forest filled roads, enjoying the peace and pin drop silence which only would be broken by chirping birds. The roads were curvy and we had fun till we reached a point where the roads just disappeared. For the next few kms, it was a motocross circuit and we had fun. The icing on the cake was the cheer from school kids (actually there were like thousands of them on educational trip) when ever they saw us.


We reached the parking spot from where the trek to Yana rocks begin. Now one gentleman showed us a side entry and suggested to take the bikes down  and would we miss an off roading chance? Never, and so we decided to ride it out to the bottom. The roads were full of rocks and in the hoards of walking people, few cheering, few laughing at our madness, we reached a point where Lohith asked me to stop. He felt that the slope was turning steeper and it will be difficult on the way back. I was reluctant to turn back, but we stick together in a group and respect each others thoughts. So we turned back and headed to the gate again.





From here Gokarna was 40Kms and it was around 4:30. So hoping for good roads, we set off. We were greeted by the most amazing roads we had seen after leaving the highway after Ranibennur. I was happy, leaned in into a smooth wide corner and poof, road disappears! Its all gravel and unpaved rocks which I could see as far as my vision goes. I was not happy, it was a ghat section completely unpaved and we had to really concentrate not slip and break our bones in the gravel. After what seemed to be an eternity, some patches of roads appeared and we found ourselves looking at the most amazing view of the day.





From here the roads were good and we made to the base of the hills in good time. Few snaps were clicked, few kids were spoken to and yeah, Lohith was asked not to click his photo by one of the kids in almost a threatening manner





We made to our destination Gokarna by 6:30 and we had to find a place to stay. Since it was vacation time, we had a tough time going from resort to resort and finally ended up finding a place in out 5th attempt. The rooms were good and the price quoted was 1200 which was ok for a sea facing room. Freshened up and found a place to eat. Nothing can beat food and a bottle of chilled beer when it comes to ending a day which was full of action, both on road and off road. It was time to hit bed looking up to a fun filled tomorrow waiting to hit the serene beaches of Gokarna to see the rising sun and head out towards our next destination, Bekal.

Day 2 log is here
Day 3 log is here
Day 4 log is here