Bike Trip - Kodachadri

A bit about our destination first - exerpt taken from wikipedia - Kodachadri is a mountain peak (altitude - 1343 m above sea level) in the Western Ghats in South India (Karnataka State). The name is a corruption of the Sanskrit word "Kutakachalam." In local Kannada language, it is also called Kodashi Parvatha. Kodachadri forms a picturesque background to the famous temple of Mookambika in Kollur. Situated in the middle of the Mookambika National Park,it is home to several endemic and endangered species of flora and fauna. The rain forests loom in a perpetual layer of mist around the peak. Around peak, shola forest is also there. This peak is where 'Shankaracharya' did meditation. You will find an ancient Sarvajna Peetha, (built out of rock) of Sri Shankaracharya at the top. It is also an excellent locale for Trekkers and backpackers.it is approx 420+ Kms from bangalore



After our last trip (me and Arun) lot of our colleagues showed interest in joining a week end ride , we dutifully sent invites to all of them for this ride.
As usual none of them showed at last moment! We stick to the plan and started on another saturday morning 6 AM.We had our breakfast at CCD tumkur and reached nagar , stopped at the nagara fort enroute to take few snaps and pushed off to kodachadri. Little ahead of Nagara there is a right turn you need to take to reach kodachadri Direction board in english is present). If you are going by car you need to stay in Kollur and jeeps are available to take you to Kodachadri. The route is pretty rough especially in rains but bikes and jeep can make it. It was raining till the day before we reached and the muddy road was pretty challenging to negotiate. I had to ask my friend to start trek as riding with pillion was becomming me increasingly frustrating , once he started walking along the mountains I zoomed up and it was a straight go for me. I thoroughly enjoyed the challenge of riding this hill, it was pretty fun. I stopped at a junction where the trek route joined and started waiting for Arun to join. Mean while Arun got chased by a wild bull and lost his path.it was getting darker and suddenly mist sorrounded every where , few mins I waited patiently and then started calling my friend name, no response !!!.
3 jeeps passed by none of them bothered to stop and check out , I started walking in the trek route completely filled in fog shouting my friends name , once i reached a peak i got a response back feeling relieved started to figure out where he was , due to fog he couldn't see me. i notice him and started giving him directions finally he made it after 10 - 15 mins







it is already dark and we have 3 more kms to go! somehow managed to reach the top and checked out the IB bunglow , they refused accomodation. we checked with petty shops near temple and they had arranged a room for us to stay. had nice food and bought some chakli , the room has no electricity. we walked a bit in the trek route and crashed to bed (or matres!) to catch some sleep







Next morning we started trekking to sankaracharya temple , beautiful and calm place . We had a nice little chat with poojari there , nice man. Bought some honey there (pretty tasty btw) came down had nice breakfast (wheat upma ). we paid 150 for stay and 2 course food for both of us , man should i say that is cheap!
we started our descend. we reached kollur around noon , had bath , food and dharshan and back to bangalore

Ride: Avenger 180
Kms: close to 900 ( i reset my trip meter near neelamagala in day 1 , it was 866 when i reached bangalore)
Route taken: Bangalore - kadur - birur - hosanagara - nagar - kodachadri - kollur - sidhapura - theerthahalli - shimoga - bangalore
Date : Sep 27 - 28 , 2008

Bike Trip - Kemmanagundi

After a week long in office why would anybody want to wake up at 3 in saturday! that too in the nice cozy weather of bangalore morning and ready to hit the road for next 8+ hrs.Well you know it is hard to explain! . I was planning to do a long weekend bike trip and finally decided to try chikmagalur. Managed to lure one of my friend (pillion) in to the plan!.

we are supposed to start at 4 on saturday ,I woke up at 3 had nice bath in hot water and suddenly it started raining out side. I love riding in rain but not in the morning! I kept calling my friend but he seems too busy sleeping, Finally we managed to start at 6:30.

we headed straight to kemmangudi via tumkur - kadur - birur. It was a monotonous ride till birur but once we crossed it Mother Nature embraced us with the sheer beauty and wilderness of the green mountains. The ride suddenly became enjoyable making the 300+ kms ride fatigue fading away quickly.we reached kemmangudi around 1'o clock. A bit about Kemmannagundi here: Kemmannagundi also called Krishna Rajendra Hill Station is a beautifull Hill station situated in western ghats a hamlet of Tigada village is 35 km south of Tarikere, 32 km south-west of Birur, 48 km north of Chikmagalur and on the Baba-Budan range with an elevation of 1,434 metre and 252 km north-west of Bangalore. you can learn more about this place here- http://www.onlinechikmagalur.com/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=12&Itemid=27#hillstation We didn't pre booked our accomodation in the only resort available here (run by Horticulture department) the staff asked us to come back around 5 p.m to check the availability We had our lunch in the nearby canteen (can't call this a restaurant!) it was a simple meal but the fresh vegetables added an extra taste which you normally don't find in urban cooking!



As nothing much left to do till 5 we decided to pay a visit to Hebbe Falls nearby.
Enroute to hebbe breath taking landscapes covered with all shades of green will welcome you. On the way we noticed cars parked on sideways and only jeeps and
4wd moving ahead with out thinking much we continued ...Due to the continuous rain the muddy path ways (road!) were covered with slush and made our ride challenging, Also the path became narrow with full of gravels and steep incline and decline completely drenched in rain. Avenger did behaved well but it was a tough task for both the machine and man to reach hebbe with out breaking a leg ;). Finally reached hebbe , parked the vehicle . Moved inside the forest to get a darshan of the falls , the falls definitely will take your breath away. Completely hidden in the jungle this is really awesome! Lot of "leeches" around this place so you need to be bit more carefull with them here (their territory) one was romancing me in the neck for quite a while with out me knowing it!!





After spending few hours we started off back to kemmangudi, the dusk came too soon and the mist filled routes made our journey back really Adventurous!.

The guest house staff finally offered us a dormitory accomodation ;(. After the challenging ride to hebbe my friend wanted to celebrate it and didn't want
to stay in dormitory , we decided to start off to chickmagalur , it is already 7 . The localites advised us not to go as the routes are bad and there
will be hardly any visiblity. With the new found courage we decided to ignore them and started off after a gharam chai. We took the viewpoint - datte peeta route (not lingdahalli route) . Soon we were covered with mist and zero visiblity on the roads. Mid jungle and pitch dark , absolutely no traffic and we were riding on high peaks which has no barricade in the sides, you miss one turn and you will be out of coverage area ;) and to add bit more fun it started raining. Arun played some classical instrumental songs from his phone which were apt fit for the situation
enjoying the music we reached a town.before we were relieved,the street dogs started chasing us hearing the bike sound (not one but 10s of them) excellent!! shooted my bike in 90s and quickly moved out. Finally we reached chikmagalur at 9 , checked in a hotel. we ended our first day adventure with couple of beers.





Second day we started at 9 from hotel and headed to mullayanagiri (highest peak in karnataka) , Excellent place. the 20+ kms ride in the mountains was one of
the best rides of the trip (nothing can beat hebbe). trekked / climbed to the top , the temple is currently being renovated. took couple of snaps around.
I wanted to buy some coffee in chikmagalur so we started off at 12 and reached chickmagalur. Bought coffee in MG road , on the way back we decided to visit belur
Excellent roads from chikmagalur to belur. The Hoysala temple in belur is by far the beautiful temple I have ever seen , Amazing architecture and beautiful
stone carvings. Belur's main temple, Lord Chennakeshava, dedicated to Lord Krishna, was built at the instance of King Vishnuvardhana in 1117 AD to celebrate Hoysala war victories. It took over 103 years to complete this temple , the sculptor's skill is revealed in the living carvings.



After spending few hours we headed back to bangalore around 3 , had lunch at hasan. It started raining heavily, we waited for few hours and started off in the rain. Finally reached bangalore around 10, looked like whole bangalore was flooded, complete traffic stall near by majesty. Almost knee depth water riding with high acceleration prevented water entering the engine. we pulled off from the mess successfully and reached home at 10:30. All in all it was a heart throbbing experience and a weekend well spent.

Photos uploaded in http://picasaweb.google.com/isachere/Chikmagalur

Quick Facts:

Rider (me) pillion (Arun)
Total Kms: 650 Kms (round trip)
Mileage: 40 Kms /Lt
1rst Day Route: Bangalore - tumkur - kadur - birur - kemmangudi - hebbe falls - chikmagalur
2nd day: Chikmagalur - Mullayanagiri - chikmagalur - belur - hasan - bangalore

Leh - Ladakh Trip - Day 1

Our Day 1 Destination is Manali - approximately 565 Kms from where we stay! We were getting ready for a early morning start but we realize the taps were empty , no water! Ravi had a stomach upset, it was funny to watch him chasing around the staff for water in early morning :). we started around 6 SM when bunny,nitin and chanderjeet joined us . Thus I started my longest ride in a day.

The early morning breeze and fog covered road was an exciting invitation for cruising but in order to save time we had to push our bikes to their extremes. we stopped at a dhaba in karnal for breakfast, had yummy alu paranthas with makkan (butter) and curd. The Delhi - Manali route involves a 200+ kms ride in ghats which starts just after chandigargh (NH 21).Till chandigargh it was a pure bliss - NH1 (riding this road in night is a different story!).We stopped near by mandi for a late evening lunch. few minutes later we got a call from bunny and learnt chanderjeet bike is broken (this was just begining :)) we went there to check on him. looked like a 2 hr job so myself and bunny decided to keep chanderjeet company while others push off and look for accomodation in manali.


The mechanic was doing his bit of learning in chanderjeet bike and some how put his bike together after a good 2 hrs. we were losing day light and as you know it becomes increasingly difficult and challenging to ride in ghats after night (fun!).we started our bikes and headed for manali, soon bunny and me started speeding as we wanted to cover as much distance possible in daylight.



It started raining when we reached the infamous tunnel, we met couple of guys on our way who told us the river was broken and flooded!! and apparently these guys fell on their way and returning back, they strongly advised us not to go ahead! we realized both of them were drunk and not heeding to their words we moved ahead.luckily we didn't witness any such incidents and able to reach manali around 8:30 p.m. The place we stayed had a nice little eatery where you can lay back and watch movie. I picked up a beer and some sandwitches and soon crashed for a early bed.

Leh - Ladakh - One step close to World's Roof

Imagine a 140 kms length lake at 15000 ft altitude , A night sky with full of stars and there we are are 6 bikers out in the biting sub zero degree cold allowing ourselves to melt in the beauty of God's great craftmanship!. This is a place that needs to be exprienced. It is a gruelling trip through unforgiven roads, one slip and you have a good chance to meet your fore fathers in Heaven! but Nothing detered us in exploring this un sung beauty!

Early last year there was a sudden rush in my mind to do a bike trip to Kardungla aka K-Top as bikers say! I haven't taken my 2 year old indian cruiser on any serious trip till then. Once it dawned in my mind that it is a definite go! I started preparing my self with long week end bike trips to wayanad / kemmangundi etc. Actually to get my butt used to long trips he he! K-Top is considered a Biker's dream in India, it is claimed as the highest motorable pass in the world (18380 ft!). Just to give a comparison manali lies at 6398 ft and its average elevation is 8612 ft

There are two routes to reach K-Top 1) Easy one - Srinagar - Kargil - ladakh 2) Tough one - Manali - Sarchu - leh - ladakh. The second route is open only during end May till November 1rst week.This route is considered toughest as you need to cross atleast 6 high mountain passes (I lost count :) ) upwards of 13000 ft starting from Rohtang La (13051 ft) ride through freezing streams, broken bridges and what not!. btw La means pass in ladakh.

There are couple of options available to reach there 1) Air - You can take the flight from delhi and reach ladakh in no time and no fun! 2) Bus - I understand there is a bus service available from Manali by HPTDC operated during june to october i guess 3) Bike - Nothing beats this for the obvious facts

* Possible shooting stones can bring you to the edge on seat thrill :)
* You can stop/eat/drink/ pee where ever and when ever you want
* branch out from the roads and take a nap watching the mystic beauty of the hills around
* The possiblity of your bike letting you down and you getting knocked out with depleted oxygen (remember high altitude) keeps you humming your prayers and brings you one step closer to Almighty!
*For the sheer thrill of riding your bike in those curvy roads and getting lost in this mystic beauty


After convincing my bosses that if I don't do this trip I will die heart broken in my eighties! and my delivery will not be impacted in anyway during my absence I got a 10 days leave! I booked my bike through gati (3500 INR) to delhi. Sync'd my trip plan with other bikers and reached delhi by Air. On reaching delhi I learnt my bike was delivered to Gati godown in Okhla enroute there i picked up two litres of petrol. Finished all formalities in gati and after checking my bike which had no injuries started on the first kick!.Excellent packing done by Gati - I strongly recommend them!. It took me more than 30 minutes to figure the way out from this industrial town! by then I got a call from MG and Vivek and we all met near connaught place and later joined ravi in Bajaj pro biking center. After a brief Intro we started discussing our day zero stay in delhi and decided it is better to look some thing around NH1. After few minutes ride (or dragging!) through the hustle bustle of delhi crowd we settled in a tourist resort on NH1.

Bharat darshan

Last 2 years it become almost a custom to have a long family vacation around christmas , this year we planned to do a north india trip as my mum wished to do a round trip around delhi. Plan was to cover Delhi - Agra - Ajmer - Manali and back to bangalore in 10 days. Myself , mum and my friend vinay all started on 29 Dec in bangalore rajdhani.

We packed couple of Kalki books (Alai Osai , ponniyin selvan) and jack welch winning and few warm clothes. little we realize our warm clothes doesn't have any chance before dhilli ka cold. Rajdhani used to serve good food earlier now a days there is a significant let down in that aspect , even hygine needs a little improvement. I wrote my comments in the feedback form , I am optimistic that irctc will do something about this.

Well we reached delhi on 31rst morning , alas what a weather . I always believe winter is the best time to visit delhi ( I can't stand delhi summer , my main reason to move out of that city after 3 yrs working there), mum started complaining that she is feeling like an eskimo with all the warm clothes and shoes , she was looking bit funny :). We started to Agra with out any delay (Blue line bus), reached tajmahal around noon. our plan was to continue to ajmer with out any stay in agra so we spent few hours around tajmahal. The first time I visited tajmahal i was bit let down but this time it looked more beautiful.if you are not planning to stay in agra please note you can leave your bags in the cloak room before tajmahal, auto wallahs will try to misguide you saying that you can't take your bags inside.On the way we saw a huge crowd with lots of dove in nest cheering up , auto driver explained that these are all winning birds of a yearly race. the bids go up to 10 lakh rupees!! We then went to Agra fort , rebuilt by Akbar! Amazing architecture. Don't miss this. (No cloak room here)





We then went to Ajmer by train, reached a hotel near by railway station. spent 800 for a day stay later realized i could have got the room for 400!! Morning we went to sufi saint Kwaja Moinudeen dharga (Garib Nawas) offered a small prayer and moved out looking for a church. Luckily we found a auto driver who took us to a church and later dropped at the bus stand to catch bus to pushkar.

(http://www.rajasthantravelguide.com/rajasthan_fair_festivals/pushkar_fair.html) . Once in pushkar you need to walk a 3kms stretch to reach the brahma temple , on the way we visited the lake. It is a amazing site with so many doves sitting on the shore.The entire stretch from bus stand to brahma temple was overflowing with shops, mostly targeting foreign tourists. You get to hear a lot of fusion music here. if you have couple of leave at hand, I recommend spending few days here.

Same day we had to catch our train to delhi , vinay suddenly fell ill in the transit. luckily he was ok in the next morning. we were supposed to catch our next train to kalka then simla toy train from delhi. we reached the station on time , initially we heard a announcement that train is delayed by 4 hrs due to fog we decided to stay in the station. slowly we realized we don't have adequate warm clothing to with stand the cold that is sweeping in the station. it is painful to note that the delhi station (country capital) doesn't even have a decent rest room !!.
Determined to wait we waited another 4 hrs and realized the train got delayed by another 4 hrs. we then decided to drop our plans to simla and thought of going to manali next day from delhi. we looked for auto, the auto drivers asked 100 rs to drop us to the near by hotel (pahar ganj) looking at the fog condition i agreed. people who visited delhi in winter will do what it means to drive in delhi fog , you have zero visibility. auto driver partly stood on the driver seat and looking out he started driving slowly , though it looked bit funny i couldn't thank enough that guy for dropping us safely (In bangalore no one will drop you in that weather condition even if you are ready to pay 500!!)

Next day i went to himachal pradesh tourism center in chanderlok building, janpath to book bus tickets and hotel rooms. spent around 8k for 3 people to and from bus tickets and hotel room. Manali was one of the best places we have visited in the trip , amazing views. it started snowing very next day we landed. where ever you look it was completely White. it looked like whole city is bathed in cream milk. amazing site. we went to solang next day. the cab couldn't climb after palchan , solang was another 3 kms far. mum decided to stay in the cab. me and vinay started walking in that snow filled roads , wow each scenario reminded me ice age movie and Christmas card images. It is really an amazing experience.





After spending two days in manali it is return journey to home. During transit a small fight erupted among we three for kalki books finally we settled for sequential reading. since mum is a fast reader she completed both books in no time, I got to read alai osai, kalki is one of my favorite author. Reading through the book i realized how much my spoken tamil is corrupted these days , it is fantastic to re learn all those vocabulary again. At least to correct my spoken tamil i decided to start all his books from start to finish when i reach bangalore!!

Photos posted here http://picasaweb.google.co.in/isachere/DelhiManali#

New Year Post!

I got inspired from my Dad and started writing a diary when I was in pre teens , I stopped this after couple of years. I came to know so much about my dad through his diary notes than through any interaction we had. Lately I am realizing how I missed recording my important personal events and if someday I had to write a auto biography it is going to be really difficult!.The world will be missing insight to one of the great man lived on earth (he he ) , I could n't live with that thought so I fired my firefox browser downloaded scribefire and here I am. I wanted to mention that last year i started 3 blogs with same notion and all of them survived only couple of posts. This year I am more determined to keep this blog alive at least till end of 2009. I am going start with couple of travelogue about the trips i did in last year. If you happen to stop by and liked any of them please leave your comment , that will tell me I am not talking to empty wall :). Well Happy blogging and wish you all (who happen to read this so far) a very Happy New year!