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Hi folks,
Recently I went on a ride with friends in the western and southern part of india. here is a trip log of the trip. The format is
[time] [distance in kms] [description].Enzoy !
The Group :navendu – bullet electra 2004 model. ( aka Paunchee )
The bike’s oil was missing when we reached GOA. Its been aptly named as an ‘oil field’ . Nav was prudent enough to take along some extra oil. Smart move man. He was really missing the Aquila on this ride.
[ nav ] ->
Yes the ride was AWSOME.
FYI: The oil was there. Thanks to the presence of arpan who explained where the oil went. Since the bike was parked on side stand whole night it went to “sump” and hence the dip stick was dry.
Confirmed his statement after I came back to pune. After reaching home put the bike on main stand and checked the oil level, half way on the dip stick. Then put the bike on side stand for the whole night. Checked in morning the dip stick was dry.Jas – Pulsar 180 dtsi.
The bike is fast on the straights. My bike was a bit slow also due to the front brake catching … so our frendly drags alwas had jas going ahead. Hey jas … how about one now ? My bike is in tip top condition … before i hand it over to the mechs here in pune. He also enjoyed the beauties in GOA – especially the one in white !!!Pravin and Sheetal (wife) on Fiero .
Sheetal had a few problems on the long bike ride. So, on the way back they decided to take their maruti 800 and head back . Unfortunately they had an accident on the highway. Both are ok.. but their granddad who was also in the car had to be admitted to the hospital.Rajesh on p150.
Nice and steady guy. No heroics on the way. Cool and collected. The two of us trekked to Chapola Fort while the others went back for parasailing. Got some great sunset pics from there.Arpan on p150. (aka Chotu)
Modded bike. Was easily able to keepup with me on straights before i got my bike’s wheel trued and the disk catch removed. He found out on the mangalore ghats why I love my CBZ so much . Amazingly he got a milage of 35 from the first stretch from bangalore to pune… after which he shifted to a sedate 80kmph.. or else we may have broken the speed barrier on the way back to pune. Great guy… kept up with my pushing to reach Pune in 1 day. I guess if the CBZ has better milage – or if he was working – he would have ditched the pulsar and got the CBZ … i could see it in his eyes.Vibhu on CBZ.
The more i write about myself would be less
Ok. ok. no flaming guys. I just went to have a great time and what a great time we had. First the ride to GOA through the longest of the 3 routes we could have taken … no traffic. Cool going. Then the awesome roads to mangalore and to bangalore. And then the back breaking run from bangalore to goa.9th May 2004 : Pune to Goa
6:00 2 at Chandni Chowk. Trip meter was reset at my house. Pravin and Rajesh were already there. After a wait of a few minutes Nav and Doc showed up. Doc is not coming for the ride but has just come to see us off. My Odometer was exactly 7000kms at trip start from home. Looks like its gonna be a good ride.
6:15 start after a brief photo session. Doc has also come. He is gonna give company for part of the way. Nav and doc take the lead . I am the drag.
7:00 33 We reached mulshi where we bid farewell to doc. He wanted us to stop for tea but we had a long way to go so we move off after waving him a farewell.
7:40 72 Stop for tea and breakfast. Lovely ghat roads. The day is just fantastic and all 6 bikes are going in perfect rhythm.
[arpan] nice roads except the patch near mulsi lake..8:25 start off after breakfast.
9:00 107 We have reached Kolad. We stop to try and fix my crashguard.Somehow during the jolting in the ghats, the top bar of the crash guard had cracked !!! We tie it up with insulating tape after putting a rubber piece in between the crack to reduce the rattling noise.
[arpan] hero honda quality eh?10:15 174 Stop at Poladpur for a drink break. Very little traffic on the roads. The road has tree coverage on both sides and the weather though on the hotter side, is much more bearable as we had been warned it would be !
11:20 216 We stop. Pravin’s wife is not feeling well. Arpan and Rajesh stop but jas and Navendu who were ahead don’t see us stop, so I just rip ahead and catch up with them and ask them to turn back. It seems that Pravin’s wife is getting motion sickness due to the ghat roads. We decide to stop for some time and give her some buiscuits to eat and glucose. I also ask her to keep the visor open and let the fresh air come in when they are on the bike.
11:50 We start. Pravin’s wife is feeling better and is game for another stint on the bike.
12:00 Stop for a short break.
12:15 Start.
13:55 325 Stop at Hotel Ekdant for lunch. Nav is falling asleep. Take a few pics of a peahen there. This is where the autofocus of the camera fails as it takes pics of everything in focus except what I want to be in focus !!!
15:00 Start
15:50 374 I have a puncture. I manage to catch up to Chotu and tell him that I gotta stop. He goes ahead to catch up with the other people but can only catch up with Rajesh. The others don’t check that we are not following. Rajesh goes to get a puncture repair chap and Arpan goes to catch up the other guys. Rajesh came back with the puncture guy and we take off the front wheel and off they go to patch it up. It takes around 1/2 hr to get it fixed and 30 bucks. We wait for Rajesh to drop back the puncture chap and we move off again. Jas and Pravin had stopped at a hotel 14kms away from where we had stopped. Its also next to a petrol bunk and we top up and move off.
There was a very old enfield with carvings on the tank and the handlebars. The person really took some efforts to do up the bike !
[arpan] luckily the puncture walla was just 1km away.i had to travel around 15 kms to catch up with the guys.got navendu back.18:20 445 Stop at kinanauli at hotel Anant. This was the place where Pravin had got married and we take a couple of their pics there for posterity. Also down a few cold drinks.
18:55 Start
19:50 497 We reach sawantwadi. Pravin will meet the people going back to pune here. Night riding has started and we are having difficulties. Arpan’s having some real scarry moments and as a drag i see him missing the lines of the curves a lot of times. I make him clean his glasses with water so that visibility is better.
[arpan] my glases wernt clean. plus i was trying to stick to the shoulder of the road,vibhu advised me to stick to the centre of the road just left of the white lines,the going was much smoother then.21:00 We reach the place where we and Pravin split up. He is leaving for his wife’s place in Panjim, while we turn off for Calingut where our hotel is. I call up the hotel for directions.
21:20 We reach Hotel A’canoa in Kalingut where we are to stay for the next 2 nights. We have 2 rooms which would cost us 550 per night ( 250 + 300).
10th May 2004 : Goa
GOA. Let me tell you this 1 day is too less in GOA. By evening we had already decided to come again here… by various ways (cars,bikes,cycles!)
The other thing I want to tell you is that it was not as hot as people had been brainwashing us that it would be ! Though the temperature was around 35 deg mostly, the combination of the cool sea breeze and the amazing greenery of the place did not let us feel the heat.
11th May 2004 : Goa to Mangalore
This is where the group splits up. Chotu and I are to go forwards to Bangalore via Mangalore. The rest are to return back to pune. They have decided on a different and shorter route back . I had contacted a friend of mine who stays in GOA and we had been invited to her house for breakfast.8:00 598 Start
8:15 613 Stop at friends house for breakfast.
9:30 Start. This is the point where we split up, and after saying our byes at the NH17 we go our seperate ways.
9:55 634 We stop to check arpan’s bike. The headlight and the horns are not working . The probable cause is a busted fuse. We check out the fuse box and surely enough the fuse is gone. We need to stop at the next town to find a place where we can get the fuses.
10:20 649 Stop at Margo. We locate a automobile spare shop and get a couple of fuses for arpan’s bike. A couple of cold-drinks and we are off.
[arpan] yeah fuse was fixed,but it went off again after 15km.from then on rode without one.till
kundapur11:53 Stopped at karwar and took a few drinks.
[arpan] the road gets even beter now.
711 We enter Karnataka.12:25 735 Stop for drinks.
12:50 761 We passed through Ankola.
12:55 771 Stopped for pics.We keep passing over a lot of rivers and the scenes were just fantastic. After the first couple of bridges over them, I just had to stop and click a few pics.
13:40 815 We have reached Hotel Kamat at Honavar for lunch. There is a sign board which points to bangalore and mangalore in different directions. We ofcourse are going the way away from bangalore ! The lunch break takes an hour…
15:05 881 Murudeshwar. I had seen the pics of the statues there are the Hotel Kamat, and after a brief talk with Arpan, we decided to head off the road and check out the place. It has got an enormous statue of the Lord Shiva. Amazing !! someone though was stupid enough to erect a light pole right in front of it so as to make taking a good photo impossible . Why are people so stupid.
[arpan] it was really hot here.and lot of crowd on the beach alongside.15:55 881 Arpan signals for a halt. He’s feeling thirsty. The day is getting pretty hot. Its hotter here than it was in GOA.
16:45 915 Kundapur. We stop for a few cold drinks. I make a call to Ashok’s cousin, who has booked a room for us in Mangalore while Arpan fixes his fuse again. The person at the place from which I made the call is really impressed with my leatherman kit. He initially thought it was a nokia phone – but was just amazed to see that it was a tool kit ! We start at 17:30 after a very long break.
[arpan] had to slice open the wiring near the handlebar/tank. and retape some wires. in bangalore,venkat told me this was the 5th case of the same problem in one week that he had come across.18:35 990 Break for rest. My knee is locking up and i need to flex it.
1000 We enter mangalore at exactly the point where my trip meter rolls over.
19:00 1005 We find hotel Manorama where we are to stop for the night.
[arpan] ashok,thanks for the hotel,was a good place.
12th April 2004: Mangalore -> Bangalore7:50 1005 Started from mangalore. We fill petrol.
8:35 At upinnagadi. We have breakfast
9:00 Start.
9:30 1079 Stop for a couple of pics. The last kms are all ghat roads and that is where the CBZ shines over the other bikes. Arpan tried keeping up with me for some time and i see him go off the road onto the shoulder a couple of times. I stop and tell him to chill. I will be going fast but don’t try to follow me.
[arpan] the cbz is way faster then a p150 here..even faster then a 180.10:45 1134 At sakleshpur. Stop here for juices at Akshaya Restaurant – the same hotel which i had stopped on the trip with the Bangalore Bullet club during the Kundapur trip last year around the same time. I reminisense about the ride and tell arpan that the last stretch was where me and abhi had our little race … aah ! that was a great time ! (later when I met abhi in bangalore he was also remembering the trip to kundapur as his best trip ! )
11:05 We leave. Stop at a petrol bunk for arpan to put in some fuel as he has not put in the petrol in Mangalore.
[arpan] i had last filled petrol in goa. got a good mileage…wonder wat went wrng later on in the trip
12:00 1201 Reached Kamat Upchar where we had lunch. The Hassan bypass is as usual very bumpy and the area has the ever present stench of rotten stuff. I was leaving arpan behind on this stretch as it was a bit too bumpy for the p150’s shocks to absorb. The CBZ was as cool as always.
[arpan] my fork seal was damaged in this patch.got it done up in bangalore.
12:55 Leave13:45 1266 We stop for some drinks as I was feeling very sleepy. We have a couple of cold drinks and we move off. I take a few pics of a messa looking bluish in the distance. The place is very inviting for a trek – when the heat is a bit less. It shows 38 deg celcius on my mobiles temperature sensor.
15:00 We enter nelamangala. Huge amount of traffic. A couple of persons on a pulsar are bugging me overtaking me and slowing down. I have to lead arpan into the city so i don’t take their bait. As we reached IISC the chaps stopped at the red light. Arpan was between me and them … so they asked him where we are coming from. Pune was his answer – and I saw the expression in their eyes change from a challenge to respect. After that they did not trouble us more.
[arpan] first impression of bangalore was- what a mess! .but later on traffic was sparse and disciplined.16:00 MG Road. We call up Rahul and go to his office to meet him. In bangalore we will be staying at his house.
16th April 2004
The record run – Bangalore to Pune.well not a record in the actual sense, but a record for both me and arpan.
6:20 000 We start from Rahul’s house.
6:30 MG Road. We tank up. This time too the person filling the oil in my bike spills it over. Deja Vu.
7:20 55 We reach Kamat Upchar. Stop for breakfast consisting of idlis and a new bottle of kinley.
[arpan] these kamats are nice.clean and rite on the highway.service is quick too.7:40 Start
7:55 Stop as soon as we started. I thought that I had forgotten my mobile in Kamat. But as i reached there I checked my other pockets (in my shirt) and found it to be there. Oh Well ! False alarm. We move off again.
9:25 164 At hiriyur. We stop for cold drinks.
9:40 start
11:00 259 At Devanagare we stop for a break. Heavy crosswinds on the way. I had a nice little race with a silver palio and mostly we were doing around 100kmph over the last stretch.
12:18 322 We stop at haveri to put in petrol as I can see my needle is just going below the red mark. My bike will still go another 50-60kms , but with the speeds we are doing I don’t want to take chances. Surprisingly arpan also fills up petrol. He has already gone into reserve !!! his bike gave a milageage of 35 only !!! A p150 with such low milage ???!!!
[arpan] i think my petrol tap was leaking or something.i really dunno wat happend.but i was shocked,so the rest of the day was sticking to 75-80kmph13:00 363 We enter Honavar. I am feeling hugry and the a person points us to Hotel Kamat. However, it is right in the middle of the city and there is no parking for our bikes with the luggage laden on.
13:08 364 Stop at hotel Garden Fresh for lunch near shigaon. On the trip to pune last time we had reached this place in the evening where I had stopped to change my visor as it was very dark. This time we have reached around lunch time. I feel that we can do bangalore pune in 1 day, but Arpan does not want to. After the shock of his bike giving 35kmpl, he does not want to go above 80kmph, and it is difficult to make him think otherwise. I also asked him not to tailgate me – for about the 4th time that day.
[arpan] the thing is if i dont tailgate i am usually far back. anywaz i tried again to keep a distance of 5-6 bike lengths14:05 401 Stop for a leak near the VRL factory. Very windy day.
14:25 We reached the hubli bypass. I have never been here in daylight .. leave aside around midday !!! We are going fast ! Its a very hot day and the area around here has no trees. Its strange that people cut all the trees and then cry ‘foul’ at the governent and god when drought strikes. This area of karnataka keeps coming in the news as ‘drought hit’ area.
14:50 442 Stop at a Hotel at Narayanapur for cold drinks. Chotu is feeling the heat now, and my ears are hurting in my new GPone helmet. Got a call from ‘chimney’ who once again told me to forget getting to pune in 1 day.
15:15 start.
16:10 498 Stop for a sip of water and taking a few pics.
16:20 Start off agian.
17:35 Stopped for chotu to catch up. We are now ahead of belgaum and on the ghats. Going is fast on these curves, and I am going much ahead of chotu.
[arpan] damm cbz is fast
18:35 At kohlapur. Chotu thinks its time to turn in, but i say we can stop when it gets dark.
[arpan] we called up jas…he advised not to carry on. but actually me and vibhu really wanted to go on!19:35 662 Finally dark. We stop at a roadside chai shop for tea and cold drinks at Karad. Pune is around 200kms now and we both decide that we can try it out instead of pitching camp now. 200kms suddenly looks very achieveable.
[arpan] called up nav..he told us to pull over…but we decided to move on!
18:15 Start.22:00 755 We stop for refreshing ourseleves. Night riding is slow and tough. The distance from Kolad to Satara is really bad with a huge number of diversions for the new NH being made and all the trucks and sumos going in high beam. From satara the road is a dream. 4 lanes and smoooth!
There is a milestone here which says Pune 100 and we take pics with that !
[arpan] vibhu called up his cousin and we placed our order for dinner(in pune)00:30 862 Finally home. As soon as we hit the boundaries of Pune (30kms before it) the road becomes pathetically bad. Especially the ghats just before we enter pune are the worst. Why is it that pune , the automobile capital , has the worst roads ?? no answer to that one, but feel great having done the distance in 1 day.
[arpan] if vibhu was staying in bombay i am sure we both wud have carried on till bombay to do 1000km in less then 24 hrs feat. but i was too tired to ride solo(not advisable too) so me put up at his place for the night.left pune at arnd 8am the next day and reached home by 11ish. end to a nice trip.my longest one. did around 2900km.Great to see you back Diablo! Have printed off your story to read and will feedback later.
I have a new job and this has left me little time for the forum at the moment.
Keep riding and posting!!PS Did 823 miles in a day once (23.75 hours) when i was a courier based in Birmingham during 1985 on a Honda CX500.
Excellent read Diablo, excellent log too. How do you carry that big diary when you’re on the bike?
Sounds like a great trip again, albeit a tiring one. Shame about the puncture and the broken crash guard but they could have been worse I guess. Are you planning the next trip yet?
hi folks,
823 miles in 1 day . that is a lot ! how were the roads ? we had all sorts of road.. and 150cc bikes
so i guess we were going real slow compared to you radar ID, there is no big diary that i lug around. This is what I do :
1. Xerox the pages of Loneley Planets “India & Bangladesh road atlas” which is the route i have to follow. These pages go into my jacket pocket. The book goes in my luggage if I need it somewhere else. (PS. If you ever plan on a journey to india, buy this book and come. the atlases you get here are not so accurate as this book).
2. Carry a small notepad . This is used to jot down time and kms and small notes.
3. Carry a digital camera. The pics also have the time information, so you can refer to those as well.
4. Reach back home, type the contents of the notepad onto the computer and fill in stuff from memory.
5. Send the log to friends with whom the journey is done for their feedback , and they will add a few things which you have missed.That’s it !
for linking the pisc i need to host them somewhere. most of the free websites have some access restrictions when you link from some other site.
also ftp is not working from here (bloody chaps in office have disabled ftp ) otherwise i would have uploaded the pics to someplace better.
I’d love to see some shots too as I’m planning a trip to India in 2005. Want to hire some bullets or similar to ride up to the Hims with a few mates.
hi redbullet,
we are planning to go the Leh in the summer of 2005. I’ll kee u in the loop as our plan evolves.
so i guess we were going real slow compared to you radar 
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