Topic Approved.

looking foroward for the triplog ani,and nice picture there

Finally something from Kolkata guys.Looking forward for the trip log and pictures.

Fourth picture-Is that a dam?

Also the road at the second last picture looks inviting.

Hey Ani,

Beautiful photos and had never heard of this place

Seems like a great place to camp.

East has so much better places to see and be at - damn all this terrorism and naxalites.

Hope you post about more such exotic locations for our "Doordarshan" at least.

Regards,
UD

Very good stuff!

beautiful photos...looking forward for the triplog..

Nice to see the pictures, nice to see people from Bengal touring and sharing, and even more inspiring to see that you guys are doing it on roads which do not necessarily qualify as roads. It would be good to have some details on the trip log.

Thanks for sharing.

Thanks Aryan da,Nabendu da, Mg, 2write, sunny and Ken da.
@mg, yes it is a dam.
@ken da, thank you for those words.And yes, we did a reasonable amount of offroading.
It was 5th november, around 11pm when we decided on a phone conference that we
are going to purulia.Ayodhya hills is a unusual destination,not because of bad road
conditions,but because of maoist activities in that area.It is a disturbed zone.But in
this trip,we wanted to do all kinds of roads, highways,ghat sections, hills and some
offroading too:d.And purulia seemed to be the perfect place.
Three Bikes were:
Bajaj Pulsar 220
HH ZMA
TVS Apache RTR
All black steeds of Indian bike manufacturing companies.
Riders were:
Anirban(xbhp id: A_n_I)
Suvo(xbhp id: suvo_rossi)
Monty(xbhp id: monty_rockstar)
and Somorshee
Monty decided not to ride his unicorn for this trip.We agreed, because its always
better to have one extra rider for these sort of trips.
Serviced our bikes on friday, I bought tubeless tyre puncture kit and some
spares.Suvo was carrying Toolkit, First aid, extra tube and footpump.We decided to
stay in a village farmhouse on ranchi road near purulia town, which i arranged for.
This made the whole trip a better experience.
Day 1:
Could not sleep the whole night coz of excitement.Called Suvo and Monty and went to
Suvo's place around 2.30 am to play with Deco, his black lab:d.Somorshee came
around 3 am.After a little discussion about the route and stops, we decided to start.
packed all the bags properly and loaded them on the bikes.As Monty was going with
Suvo on his ZMA as pillion, me and somorshee carried most of the luggage.
We started for Purulia at exactly 4 am.Suvo was the drag. Passed Kona Expressway in
a ziffy and we were on NH-2,also known as Durgapur Expressway.I prefer night riding,
so was enjoying a lot.The 220cc motor under me performed excelently.I could see
suvo's ZMA struggling in crosswinds a few times, but my 220 was more comfortable
and it was planted on the road.I had a very bitter experience with fog in my last
night ride on NH-6 because I wear glasses,but surprisingly this time it was
manageable.It was the crack of dawn and the highway had less trafic,this made it a
lot better.Maintaining steady 70-80kmph speeds, reached Shaktigar around 5.20 am,
which is 110 kms from kolkata.

Shaktigar

first smoke!

sunrise at shaktigar


Had 2 cups of tea, some biscuits and cigarettes and we were back on NH-2 by 6am.
Next stop was Durgapur.Relaxed there for sometime.


Durgapur

Continued riding again.I decided
to rip a little now, and touched three digit speeds a few times till the place where to
had to take left turn to enter Asansol.entered the town of Asansol around
8.45am.Asansol is 225 kms from kolkata.We were hungry and searched for a
restaurant.Finally found one after 5 minutes.Had Masala Dosas and Hot tea.Stayed
there till 10am.Handed my sony cybershot W80 to Monty as he was the pillion on ZMA.Please excuse the bad pics,most of them are taken while we were riding.Refueled our bikes, and followed the GT road.I was Leading the
group now.Road conditions were not good,but not that bad either.Trafic made it
worse.After 15 more Kays,we took another left turn to enter Disergar Ghat.Crossed
disergar bridge and entered Purulia District.


Disergar Ghat.

The real fun started now.The arrow straight highway was over.We had beautiful curvy
roads infront of us, filled with lots of ups and downs. Road conditions were perfect,
long sweeping curves welcomed us.


the roads!

I was enjoying the most. After sometime, i could see
the Panchet Hill on my right hand side. Crossed some small jungles.These roads had
less trafic, and I was going mad over some curves. The roads and scenary was so
good that for sometime I forgot that this zone is famous for Maoist activities.This
was the most enjoyable experience of the whole day.Crossed Raghunathpur doing
65-70kmph speeds.Roads between Raghunathpur and Purulia were the most exciting.
Took a couple of Butt brakes in between.
some pics:

panchet hill



Somorshee Monthy and Suvo !





Reached the town of Purulia Around 12.30pm.Crossed the Town and asked for
directions towards Ranchi road.Entered the Farmhouse on Ranchi road where we were
supposed to stay around 1pm.Bathed in a pool and Had our lunch. Then we were off
to bed.Woke up around 8pm.Did what 3 college stundents are supposed to do when
they are away from home, alone and have some good ol rum at hand.Had our dinner,
and we were awake till 2am, chatting between ourselves and listening to everything,
from pink floyd to skid row till mudvayne,porcupine tree and Killswitch Engage.:d

Pic from the roof of the farmhouse
Route taken : Kolkata-Shaktigar-Durgapur-Asanson-Niamotpur-Disergarh-Raghunathpur-Anara-Purulia
Kms done:
350 kms.

Day 2: The ride to ayodhya hills and more pics coming soon!

This is my first triplog on xbhp.Trying the best I can.

nice stufff dude...

The roads/destination all sound pretty yummy .

the pics are super, but a bit over editted to my taste!!!

nice ride there guyz....

Congrats...
nice trip...the pictures are really nice especially the last one

great going A_N_I,Waiting for the rest and look who all have appreciated thogh it is your first triplog here in xBhp.

Day 2.

Woke up around 8.30am.By 10.45, we were on purulia asking for directions.We wanted to visit ayodhya hills and start for kolkata in the afternoon.
A guy with his blue r15 spotted us on ranchi road and started asking questions.He said he will show us the way.We followed him, but he led us in the
wrong direction.This wasted a good 30mins.After that, we were on Tata Road, going towards Ayodhya.


Tata Road

Crossed Balarampur and took a left turn towards
Baghmundi.Roads were in good shape.Monty again was the pillion and he was clicking pics.We saw ayodhya hills on our right after a couple of kms.







Went
through a small jungle and reached Ayodhya hills.Started riding the awesome twisties. They were in very good shape. Crossed a couple of small falls
on the way.Could'nt stop to click better pics though,as we were advised not to stop anywhere for various reasons.
After a good 8-10kms of riding the twisties, we saw the Hydro Power Project of Ayodhya. The beauty of ayodhya is not similar to other hill
stations.It has this sort of rude and raw aggression embedded in it. What you see is what you get. And this is what I liked about the place. It is not a
popular tourist destination, so we hardly saw any tourists.













The offroading started after this. There was no tarmac after the dam. Added to that, we took a wrong turn and did some 10-12kms of extra
offroading between the jungle roads, filled with inclines . Monty couldnt click pics at this point of time, because then he would have dropped the
cam.Moreover, Suvo was facing problems with doing those roads(or no roads :P) with a pillion.




Suvo and Monty

Rode through these for quite sometime!!


Returned to the point from where we took the wrong turn
and went to the forest bunglow. Took some 40min break there and had some food. Then we decided to take another route while coming down through
Sirkabad.Roads were in pretty bad shape in this route and we were advised not to stop often.Crossed a few villages and some scenic roads.there was a
small river in this side of the hill which is famaous for flash floods.Stopped there for 1min I guess to take some pics.





Monty riding the ZMA

my 220!





Cows slowed us down for a number of times!





220 took everything.




The river.


The Gajaburu peak was beside us now.It is well known to rock-climbers.There was no tarmac now.Did some 15kms of riding through village roads and
fields.I was sweeping the group.While passing through some of the Villages, I heard people saying in bengali " arrey ora maobadi" and " ha maobadi"(yes
they are maoists). What can you expect when you are passing through a maoist area and where people are probably seeing this wierd looking bikes and
helmets/gloves wearing people for the first time, and who are taking pictures! We were afraid of any terrorist activities, and so were the people of
those villages.

Gajaburu peak!

Yes, these are roads!



We didnot stop anywhere, just rushed to Tata Road.Even 70 kmph on the speedo seemed to a welcome change after a long time. Reached
Purulia by 5.45-6pm.

Our original plan was to start for kolkata around 7pm.We wanted to do the other route to kolkata through Bankura-Bishnupur-Arambah in search of
some more curvy roads and for the forest of jaipur. But while having dinner, we were convinced by the local people that the route is not at all safe for
night riding.So decided to start early morning.

Route taken :
Purulia-Balarampur-Baghmundi-Ayodhya hills-Sirkabad-Purulia
Kms Done :
160kms.
please excuse some bad pics, most of them are clicked by whoever was the pillion.