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Lovely.. the log sounds beautiful... Eager to see more pix... Rivalry makes me curious
Great going guys..!!

Day 1

Behind Every Great Ride There Is A Great Plan!

If only the riders knew what the plan was!
We spent the major part of the week before the trip deciding and re-deciding where to go and even after finalizing the destination, asking for opinions and changing the plans yet again. Some people wanted an overnight trip, some people wanted to go far, some more wanted to do a one day trip so on so forth... We were finally able to make up our minds 2 days before the ride and three people were 100% sure and one day before the ride two other people came in. So there were five of us ready for a 2 day trip (or so I thought). Beruoist aka Biru was to meet us at Chikhaldara on Sunday morning and we would continue the ride with him. That was the plan and looked good on paper as most plans do.

The night before the ride was a Friday plus the next day was Rakhi so I was sure that we wouldn't leave at 6 the next day. Sure enough, the departing time was to be 8 in the morning and we ended up leaving at 9 because of, of course, some unforeseen cirumstances


Waiting for the others


The riders


Gentlemen! Start Your Engines!

The day of the ride, Siddharth (henceforth called Sid) and I met up for breakfast and joined the others at Nagar road where the ride would commence. It wasn't early morning plus it was a weekend so the traffic was heavier than normal. More the traffic and pedestrians and by-standers, more the number of gawks and stares and drag race provocations because of all the riding gear... Being used to it, we covered the 15 or so kms from the breakfast point to Nagar road. After briefing Nachiket (the new guy) about various rules and hand signs and group riding formations, etc we fired up our engines and started the ride...

The initial 20kms were spent in dodging city traffic and trying to get as far away from it as quickly as possible. I'd prepared for a lot of rainy riding so I was wearing 3 layers of clothing which, in traffic, didn't exactly keep me cool . Cursing the weather for its lack of precipitation, I carried on at the tail of the group keeping an eye on Nachiket who was in the middle. Krishna (henceforth called Krish) being the navigator was leading, Sudhir was riding second to lead and Sid was in front of me. We managed to make it out of the city quickly and I soon had my highway smile on which pretty much looks like this:

We were cruising along at 90, keeping around that speed so that Nachiket would get used to his bike's dynamics at those speeds and also because the traffic was still thinning out and we'd encounter an intersection every now and then. About 40kms into the ride Sudhir complained of a wobble coming from his front wheel. We pulled over and after some inspection concluded that the tire was not fitted properly. There was a puncture repair shop in sight so we stopped there and couldn't think of anything but checking the tire's air pressure. The guy there filled it up to 30psi which didn't really solve the problem but there wasn't anything else to be done either... There was a restaurant there so everyone decided to eat some more breakfast.


Working on the Apache's tire

After a 20 minute break, we started riding towards Ahmednagar again. The highways were pretty smooth with well marked lanes and proper banking and relatively well behaved traffic. We stopped for an early lunch at a restaurant which seemed to be popular with tourists.


Lunch at The Smile Stone




From left to right: Nachiket, Krishna, Sudhir, Siddharth and me (one of the very few pics with me in the frame)

There were many cuisines and we wasted about 10 minutes deciding what to eat. After a half an hour break and some curious and jealous looks from car/bus people, we hit the highway again. We had no difficulty maintaining 90-100 on the speedo and it was textbook highway cruising till slightly before Ahmednagar ~ 100kms. When you're approaching a city its pretty evident because of the exponential increase in two-wheeler traffic. Bad roads and obscenely undisciplined traffic forced us to slow down to stop and go speeds and we decided to follow the local bikes and went off road on the left side of the "road".

While riding in the city, my tachometer rarely goes above 4k rpm but while on biking trips, its the other way round so that I have a healthy dosage of torque whenever required. One fellow on a R15 came up from behind us just as I was overtaking a truck. There wasn't anything rash or provoking about it but because of the high rpms the R15 guy (who didn't have a helmet of course) got offended I suppose and decided to race with the group. Upon spotting the Ninja his fervor only increased and he started maneuvering in and out of traffic like a cat with its tail on fire. We were carrying along at a merry pace, as fast as the traffic allowed and soon took a right turn onto a highway leaving him with an ego boost - How he must have boasted to his friends about beating a Ninja .

Just out of Nagar we saw a board which read 'ghat aarambh' - ghat begins. I got all excited and got ready for nice twisty roads! We negotiated the first turn which was barely even there, I was waiting for the next curve when I spotted a speeding ST bus going the other way in the distance. Speeding ST buses are not a rare sight. ST buses driving around and overtaking recklessly are also not a rare sight. But this particular ST bus - the driver was either drunk or half asleep. I was to the extreme left of my lane, not wanting to take chances with a speeding ST bus. Now as this bus is coming towards me, I notice that the axles aren't aligned properly and this gives the bus a drifting type stance, very disorientating for me. It was coming in at a weird angle and on top of that, the bus started drifting into my lane! Imagine a 5000kg red demon at 90kmph coming head on ! I myself was at around 80 and when this bus passed me, it was, literally, a hair's breadth away! I lost my breath because of the wind blast and I'm sure if I'd loaded my bike with saddle bags, I'd have been lying on the road the next instant... All the safety gear in the world can't protect you from a head on crash. Luckily, nothing happened, I was able to shrug it off and continue riding.

The ghat continued and I saw no curves. At one point there was a pothole covering the width of the road so we had to slow down to first gear speeds. Next I saw a bike in a ditch with 20 people around the scene. And the next sight was a board which read 'ghat samaapt' - ghat ends. I was like ! Who the hell would call that a ghat??

But my thirst for the twisties was quenched soon enough when the roads became super smooth and well marked and properly banked. The view at the start of this ghat was irresistible so we stopped and took a few photos.





Krishna started leading after this small break and I didn't want to miss out on the action so I followed close behind him. Sudhir would have been able to keep up had it not been for his wobbling front. So it was the Ninja and 220 attacking the curves at break neck speeds ! There's something about ghat roads that gives me more inner peace than even highways... I completely lose myself and find a level of concentration that I never knew I had! Only and earthquake would make me budge when I'm negotiating a ghat... Maybe its the track guy inside me . So we went through the curves, hair pins, me scraping the ridiculous center stand a couple of times, Krishna fishtailing into a curve. It was all like a well choreographed dance, perfectly executed with no hiccups - well except one. And a very classic one at that. We encountered a curve that kept decreasing in radius - really classic place to crash. But we both were looking far enough into the corner to realize what was happening so no harm done. The others, I later learned, had a scare at that point.

We didn't encounter many vehicles on the way down so I was all ready to go back up but time limits didn't allow it so we carried on after marveling about the roads.

We soon reached a junction and after asking for directions a couple of times we were on our way to Shevgaon which ended up taking more time because of the more-pothole-than-road syndrome.



Riding Through Village Highways

The next phase of the journey was characterized by squeaking shockers and there were many patches where I'd have had the time of my life if I had a dirt bike . This was the traditional more-pothole-than-road syndrome... Every tourer at some point in his/her life has to suffer from this abnormality. In fact, on some routes, this abnormality is the normal order. We arrived at a junction where we had the choice of two roads leading to Shevgaon. One was a a highway but much longer and the other passed through a series of villages. Apparently, the group hadn't had enough of potholed roads so after confirming from a local (who said the road ahead is 'ek number!' - first class) we continued through the 'potty' roads .

This was just the beginning of a number of times we'd hear 'aage ka road badhiya highway hai!' - the road ahead is a great highway! - and end up with abrupt bad patches, diversions and, of course, potholes. To put it simply, we learnt the village definition of a highway. I'm not complaining here, just stating the difference in perspective most of us have from villagers. So we continued down this AWESOME road and after a while, I swear I could hear strange squeaking noises coming from the front of my bike! The road seemed never ending and every now and then we'd almost come to a stand still when two trucks would try to overtake eachother and fail miserably. I have no idea how the Ninja didn't scrape its fairing!

After an unknown number of kms of this type of riding we came across a smooth patch and decided to halt for a few minutes. We drank some water and had a little entertainment at our disposal - Trucks and cars coming in from the opposite direction weren't doing less than 70. We'd stopped just outside the bad patch so almost every vehicle bounced around like a ping pong ball as it hit the bad part of the road. The locals knew better and slowed down but the truckers and tourists won't even bother slowing down even after we signaled for them to do so. So we had a merry time listening and looking at the bashing the vehicles got.

With rested spines, we carried on along decent roads interspersed with bad patches. Krishna was nice enough to let me ride the Ninja after a while and I noticed two things immediately. First was the rock hard shockers in comparison to my ping-pong 220. Second was the frustrating lack of torque around 4k-5k rpm. I'm used to bouncing around on bumpy roads but on this bike I could feel almost each bump - I liked that, that much feedback is confidence inducing while cornering. The 220 is a torque monster in the Indian biking context so anything below 5k rpm just didn't feel natural on the Ninja. But once past 5k, I could feel the power kicking in. I tested the brakes, the rear brake was rather scary compared to my 220's rather easy going counter part. The front was a different story altogether! A one finger grip was more than enough for any kind of emergency braking! The bike was very flick able and I found myself over steering because of the 220's hard handling characteristics.

Overall, its one of the best bikes I've ever ridden (not like I've ridden many) and even if I had the money for a Hyosung GT650R (which I've ridden for 30 odd kms on a highway), I'd go for a Ninja 250 (Keeping in mind Ninja 650 is a different segment).

So that was the Ninja ride for 20kms or so. Back on my 220, I felt at home and gave the bike a pat for its low end torque . We took another break for water and tea along the way and soon we were on our way towards Jalna.








Goofing around


A Contract To Break Roads

After Paithan the roads got progressively better. We had four laned roads once more but every now and then there was a diversion so the traffic was always on one side of the divider. This road work has been going on for a few years now and there's still some significant work left to be done. The condition of the roads is good and bad at the same time. The good part is that the roads are smooth, like a good NH. The bad part is that there are HUGE potholes cropping out of nowhere. It was almost like a contractor was hired to make the road and another to make the potholes! Hence the heading.

It was near twilight now. We stopped and asked a local for some directions. It was nice of him to let us know that the roads ahead were unsafe because the area was forested and there were lots of animals around.
My crazy mind formed the image of an elephant roadkill . But we didn't encounter any such dangers and the only threat was the road which now had abrupt patches with loads of gravel lying around. Twilight is a hopeless time to ride, or even drive for that matter. The headlights are useless, natural light is fading, concentration becomes difficult, etc etc. It was understood without saying that the Ninja and 220 would lead at night but at this point, both were equally worthless in terms of lighting. After Krishna narrowly missed a few potholes, I decided to move ahead and ride second to lead.

The light kept fading and the roads didn't get any better. I started leading after a while. It was going good for a while and I was switching between low and high beam continuously scanning the road ahead. But I wasn't ready for what the road threw at me and twice that night I out ran my field of vision by riding too fast. Twice I ran into decently sized potholes and twice the bike stayed upright. I was given two chances and luckily neither of the rims suffered any damage. Krishna decided to start leading again and I was more than happy to follow him. After a while it was pretty much as dark as it would get and there was not a moment's rest what with the number of ugly potholes lined up like the bad guys in an Indian movie!

We reached Jalna after a while and it was a relief from the potholed roads. Jalna seemed to be a busy town with lots of vehicles and ST buses and vendors and shops. We passed through the city with the customary non-challant attitudes ignoring the irritated and surprised looks at the sound of the Ninja. Right outside Jalna we asked a trucker a few directions and road conditions. He was a nice chap and told us a lot more than we asked for. Basically he confirmed what I feared. The roads ahead were pretty much the same and worse in places.

We rode on a bit more and after a while pulled over again. Krish as usual had not rested after his night shift on Friday so he got drowsy rather early. By then I'd gotten used to the darkness and the general speed of the group had slowed down. We were taking a water and pee break when three guys on a Splendor pulled over in front of us and started walking towards the group. Within no time we noticed that they were drunk. They asked the usual questions and we answered and then one guy went to the edge of the road to pee. This one was the most drunk and he couldn't even stand straight! He lost his balance and fell into a ditch by the road and didn't emerge for quite a while . His friends went to help him up and advised us to leave. We obliged and this time I led the group as we rode towards Chikhli.



220's Projectors!

I was careful this time and stayed on high beam whenever the road ahead was free of vehicles. As many of you might know, 220's high beam is rather murderous and I am yet to ride a bike produced in India that has a better high beam. As for the low beam projectors, only the CBR and Ninja seem to be better. The headlights on my bike are a great source of pride for me . The high beam proved to be very useful not only in lighting up the way but also in forcing the oncoming vehicles to switch to low beam ! Everytime I saw an idiot coming in on high beams, I'd switch to high beam too and 80% percent of the times I'd get good results . Its encouraging to know that you can scare the hell outta a Tata Sumo with your headlights .

I'd like to add something about truckers here, something like an ode to truckers. To all the bikers out there who have any road sense and good will for others - respect trucks and truck drivers. That truck that you're honking at could easily slam on his brakes or veer into your lane and you'd be dead in an instant and on a secluded highway, no one would even know. I say respect them not just out of fear but also out of genuine appreciation for their patience and the sort of work they do. Riding at night, I've noticed that trucks are the most well behaved yet suffer the most abuse. You have to understand that it is not easy maneuvering such big machines. Stopping them requires a lot of distance so if the driver spots an obstacle, the best option is to drive around it, not wait for the traffic in the adjacent lane to pass! Whenever you flash your lights at an on coming truck at night, the truckers switches to low beam. If you're on high beam, he'll do the same!



When you're riding in a group and are left behind because a truck is overtaking another, don't try to squeeze between both and make your way forward - Be a biker, have and show some patience! Its for your own good. I don't care much for Sumo or Tavera type tourist cars or ST buses but for truckers I have nothing but respect. True they drive rashly sometimes but don't you ride rashly from a trucker's perspective? - Food for thought . . .

Anyhow, getting back to the ride. We carried on along the winding roads and every now and then we'd move to the edge of the road when a vehicle was coming in since the road was one and a half laned. I upped my pace after I got used to the road conditions and kept an eye out for potholes plus the group of 4 behind me. Its a good feeling when you're leading a group of riders through unknown roads. Biking teaches you a lot. Cooperation would be among the top 3 in my list. The other two being respect for other motorists and being friendly with people. So this road continued for a while with a couple of high speed curves and the ups and downs of a number of hills.

At one point when I was leading I noticed some lights on my right side. I didn't look at the RVM thinking it was Sudhir. Just then I spotted a large pothole to the right and immediately signaled for Sudhir to get back behind me. Imagine my surprise when a white Hyundai i10 tries to overtake me and ends driving into this huge pothole! At first it was disbelief as I looked at this car bouncing around throwing dust and debris around! Miraculously the driver didn't lose control and fell in behind me and in front of Sudhir. I gave the car a 'what the hell are you doing??' gesture and carried on. The car slowed down and the rest of the bikes were able to overtake it. We reached Chikhli after a while and stopped for a couple of minutes. That was when the car passed by with stupid awestruck faces on the passengers inside. They were completely dumbfounded at the sight of us and didn't seem to care that they'd almost crashed about 10 minutes ago!

We rode and decided to halt on the way for dinner. There was a well lit restaurant by the side of the road and we decided to halt there for dinner. It was around 10pm by then and save me and Nachiket, everyone looked tired . Dinner was served in no time and it was a rather sumptuous meal. Our waiter was a very polite guy and was very nice to us in a place where I'd expected a lot hostility - Vidarbha. He kept calling us sir and it was very embarrassing since he was middle aged. We requested him not to do so and thanked him for the food. While we were eating, a tourist bus pulled over at the restaurant and there were many awestruck faces when people noticed high-end bikes standing around. After a little chit-chat, they seemed to decide that we were the bikers there and as usual - the curious stares . Its always like we're from another world !! A couple of teenagers took photos of the Ninja. After dinner I spoke with our waiter and learned that he was from Rajasthan - Mr. N.G. Joshi. I'll surely visit the restaurant next time I travel along that route.


Dinner time!!



After a while a couple of policemen came around. They must have been on patrol and we were leaving around the same time. The others explained the purpose of 5 bikes being out on the road at 10 in the night and they were happy to note that we had good safety gear on. I guess to them it meant that we'd ride safe. The plan at the beginning of the day was to ride to Chikhaldara and halt there for the night. But the numerous breaks and awesome village highways had taken their toll on our average speed and so we had to halt at Khamgaon. I led the way once again and after a short ride, we reached Khamgaon and began our search for a hotel...



The Hunt Begins

It was almost midnight now. We were happy to see a hotel just as we entered Khamgaon. We went inside to discuss rates and amenities. We were 5 people so the guy there said we'd have to take two rooms and one extra cot- fine with us. He was charging 250 bucks per room and 50 for the extra cot which was a good rate and we were happy with it. But when we asked him to show us the room first he didn't budge and started saying that if we wanted any other hotel we'd have to go deep into the town and that nothing would be free right now etc etc. He was acting too pricey for our liking and of course, something seemed to be amiss so we decided to move on and look for another hotel.

We negotiated the streets of Khamgaon and asked the few pedestrians there were the whereabouts of a hotel. We finally found one which was cheaper and had decent rooms but the parking was completely open and not to our liking plus there were a lot of auto spare parts shops around the area . So we decided to go back to the first hotel we encountered. Once there the guy said that the rates had now gone up. It had hardly been half an hour since the last time and this hotel's happy hour had started! I didn't even bother asking the rates and we decided to look for yet another hotel. This time we found a good deal at about 120 bucks per head. One room with an attached toilet (which was pretty much non-operational) where Krish, Sudhir and Nachiket slept and a normal room where Sid and I slept. The parking was relatively safer so we all slept without worry.


BED!!
It was around 1 by the time we tucked in and though I wasn't tired, I fell into a nice and refreshing slumber. Dreaming bout flying over potholes and dodging fiery trucks on the highways and flying above the clouds on my very own bike!

Awesome write up..It seems i have to write my part of Day 1 and Day 2 separately

Cheers
Biru

I'll incorporate you from day 1.5 onwards

There's lots more! Day 2 and day 3 and a lot more photos!

Keep visiting when you're online!

Really good writeup. Keep up the good work and update before others forget about this ride. :-)

Beautifully written ! And some awesome pics too ! Kudos guys, waiting for more (??).

Take Care & Ride Safe !

Oh so you guys met the nomad uncle beeru somewhere near the destination! Nice!

Good going..

Nice - Keep going

Sorry had to back out as it was for 3 days and didn't want to ride at nights. Also I was right, reaching Chikaldara by 8PM (as per original plan) was not possible...

yup! The process is being executed!

The wait won't be long

He became quite popular with the local crowd there because of his 3lac bike

Impossible by the roads that we took.. The Aurangabad route was much better..

Awesome write-up Vivek... more kind of minute by minute update.. But had a good time reading all of it.

Day 2

A Morning In Khamgaon

What a refreshing morning it was!





Well maybe not for these guys... I was definitely all set and ready to go the moment I woke up - which was two minutes before the 6am alarm, I was that excited ! This was my first overnight trip and it felt great! The village-ish atmosphere and the cool breeze were very refreshing. Everyone was woken up quickly and after the attached bathroom turned out to be useless, the non-attached ones were put to full use with all the brushing and washing faces and quite a few of nature's calls.

Everyone was geared up and ready to go by 7 and after a final pic the enginerswere fired up, warmed up and revved through the empty streets.



We'd noticed a strange odour the previous night and while riding through the town we realized what we'd been smelling - human shit. I counted at least 6 people pooping at the side of the road. Not even some distance away, right there - the edge of the road without a care for the world or keeping their surroundings clean! I was pretty surprised since this wasn't exactly a rural setup. Anyway, we rode on and hit good highways soon. We were cruising at 100 in no time and the brilliant roads and morning time coolness tranformed my face into in no time! There was hardly any traffic and the scenic beauty surrounding us was mind-numbing. There was green till as far as the eye could see! We had to stop for a few photos.





Soon enough we were back on the road and after passing through a couple of villages we halted at one place to have some breakfast.





Breakfast turned out to be pretty tasteless and the crows there seemed to be pretty smart and brave. I didn't dare speak too much since I don't know much Marathi and all the locals there had this perpetual frown on their faces as if that's how they were born. So we gobbled up some necessary food and were on our way towards Akot soon. The roads were good and bad for some time with mostly smooth patches and the bad patches lasted a few meters at most.

At one point I was negotiating a couple of potholes and was swerving hither tither to avoid them. Unknown to me, a local youngster had crept up behind me and was right at my tail. Just as I swerved to avoid a pothole the guy tried overtaking me! I noticed him just in time and ended up cutting short the maneuver and going through the pothole. He didn't try overtaking us again . We carried on along some pretty good roads and passed through a few more villages.

There was another speeding local bus at one place and neither would he let us pass nor would he go any faster. He was right in the middle of the road swerving around as he pleased. One by one we overtook him with lights flashing and horns blaring. We stopped for a few photos after a while and this guy overtook us again.



We were riding somewhere after Shegaon and an incident occurred. We were riding behind this jeep which was carrying a few cows and one calf. Now this calf was being most inquisitive, sticking its head out, sniffing around, looking at the traffic and trees. After a few seconds, the calf stuck out its fore legs and jumped out ! This jeep wasn't doing less than 60 and the calf just jumped out! It rolled on the ground a couple of times, Krish, who was leading, narrowly avoided running over it and crashing as a result! Thing was, from my viewpoint, it looked as if the jeep had actually run over the calf and that's why I though it'd rolled on the road a couple of times. The driver was oblivious to what had happened and we had to honk all together to make him stop. The calf was standing right there in the middle of the road and a Scorpio had to swerve to avoid hitting it. The owner came soon and took the calf to edge of the road and looked for injuries.

No harm done, he put the calf back in the jeep and this time tied up the rear with some ropes so there was no space for another escape attempt . We stopped at a petrol station nearby and from this point onwards, everytime we stopped in a village or at a petrol station, people asked us if we were racing and kids asked us to pop wheelies ! We did our best to explain the purpose of the ride but most people, of course, didn't understand why anyone would ride all the way from Pune which 600kms away and secondly, why anyone would spend 3lacs on a bike! So after a little goofing around we carried on towards Akot.

The climate was noticeable humid now because of the many trees around. But surprisingly, it hadn't rained a single time since we started out from Pune, just a couple of small drizzles. Anyhow, we reached Akot and here the roads were covered with mud and slush and the rear tire would fishtail with the slightest throttle input. We were being extremely careful in all our maneuvers and all was going well and I was just getting a hang of riding in all that slush when Sudhir, in his bid to overtake a rickshaw and trying to avoid a scooty at the same time, crashed. That's as bluntly as I can put it. Although it was more of a fall at 5kmph, his right leg got stuck under the bike and he got some bruises right below his shin guard.

The mistake was classic - front brake in slush. The front wheel locked up and his foot didn't get any grip either else he'd have been able to keep the bike upright. So he fell and bruised his leg and as expected the oldies and locals came in and started telling us to ride slower and ride safely and not race and what not. We were off quickly as nothing was wrong with the biker or the bike and rode extra carefully till another petrol station where Sudhir and Krish refueled. A lot of mockery took place at this point .

We were discussing how Sudhir's tagline should be - Why do I not race? - Because I crash at 5kmph ! That's his tagline now and forever and we also did a little something with his alias. It was changed a bit from reverrend to rever**nd. I'm sure you guys are smart enough to figure out what it is. After rubbing in loads of salt into his wounds we decided to carry on. Krish had spoken with Biru by then who'd been waiting for us at Chikhaldara the previous night. He'd stayed over all by himself and was now riding around the place making friends and contacts. By the time we reached Chikhaldara, he was quite popular among the security guards and tapri valas .



A Little Bit Of Plains And Another Ghat

The plan now was to ride to Chikhaldara via Anjangaon (that's what its called ) and Paratwada. The roads weren't bad but weren't good either.

We reached Anjangaon and carried on till Paratwada where we stopped just outside the city for a few photos. Chikhaldara was less than 50kms away now.







We started off again with me leading this time. The roads were good enough for 70-80 with the occasional village with speed breakers and bad patches. The scenery soon changed into a nice open plains and we could see hills in the distance and that could only mean one thing: GHATS !!

The change happened slowly and smoothly and soon we were riding on ghats. These roads were very narrow with hardly enough room for two cars to stand side by side. There were also a lot of sharp twists and turns and completely blind corners and rarely could I shift into third gear! These twisties continued for quite a while and we stopped at a straight patch of road after a while.







We noticed an amazing vantage point in the distance and decided to ride till there and take photos from that point. So we started riding again. I was blasting away at the turns and only Krishna was close behind me. I was so occupied by the twisties that I completely forgot that we had to stop at that point ! When I couldn't see anyone behind me I took a U-turn and met up with the others where they'd stopped. A few more photos resulted.







Done with the photos and eager to get back onto the twisties, we started riding again. The roads got a little worse after a while with patches of gravel here and there. I trusted my instincts and more importantly, my tires, and rode on. Scraping the center stand a few more times (I really need to get ride of it!) and Krish overtook me at one time. The place of the overtake happened to be a viewpoint so it looked like a race - which it wasn't. The people there cheered and egged us on and the rest of the group got similar treatment when they came up a little distance behind us. 2000ft and many a hairpin turns later we were at the top of the ghat. The view was fantastic!







Content with the small break we carried on along the now straighter roads and after a few minutes, we met Biru bhai at 12pm!





Chikhaldara And Semadoh

After 20 minutes or so of chit chat which involved Biru trying to understand how it took us a day and a half to get there we decided to ride to Chikhaldara, eat something and then plan further. So we rode though a few green plateaus with Biru leading the way and we reached Chikhaldara soon enough.





We rode into the town and sat at a tapri where the guy seemed to know Biru well . Biru explained that all he'd done the previous day was wait for us and ride around the town and even a little off roading to get a few good pics. We learned that the hotel rates there were too high to afford and the everything in general was over-priced. So we drank some tea ate some pakodas and after sitting around for a half hour or so decided to ride ahead and look for places to stay in Melghat which was the tiger reserve.

So we started riding out from the town, descending down another narrow road which, this time, was wide enough for just a car and a bike standing next to eachother. There was a lot of gravel strewn around the road and one had to be extra careful on blind corners what with the possibility of a low side because of gravel or falling into a valley because of a car! There were a couple of near misses with cars and I felt my rear tire lose traction because of gravel a few times but a quick counter steer resolved the issue. This carried on until we reached the entrance to Melghat tiger reserve.











The security guards here recognized Biru. After a few resgistration formalities we were on our way again. With road conditions the same as before, Biru, Krish and I were slightly ahead of the other three. We rode another 20 minutes or so and encountered a bridge passing over a stream. It was a beautiful sight.




The navigators










A butterfly on the Ninja

After a some more riding through this narrow ghat we stopped yet again for some more photos! The place was that beautiful !









A Stranger's Generosity

Done with the photo session, we started riding down the ghat. It was not long before we saw a gate to a 'resort' sort of place. It seemed to be a good place to stay for the night. So we halted and Krish went inside to talk with the reception. It turned out that a family had booked the entire area for the weekend and they had in fact, over-booked. They had quite a few extra bunks available and for some reason, this guy was willing to give it to us for the night completely free of cost. Sadly, this isn't reel life and naturally I sensed something amiss. But then this guy was there with his entire family and they all seemed to be a merry lot!

So we decided to take our chances and accepted his offer. Anil Agarwal was his name and boy was he a happy man! He had an imposing aura around him - not the sort of man you want to mess with. At the same time he was very kind and inviting. Suggesting that he was an open man with lots of patience and gratitude but at the same time if you violated his trust... you'd have a bad day, to put it simply . So we put all our bags in the empty room and hung out all our gear. It was nice and cool outside with a tinge of humidity. We chatted a bit with the guy and he told us that lunch would be served by 4.

We thanked him once again and armed with our cameras started shooting the beautiful sights. The entire place was in the middle of the forest with a river running beside it. The greenery of the place was pretty refreshing and so was the thought that we wouldn't have to struggle to find a bed like the previous night.






All the people there were one happy inviting family







Lunch was served after a while and, of course, it was free of cost. We weren't really tired as we hadn't ridden much that day ~ 200kms at most so we could genuinely say that the food was amazing! A very delightful meal complete with dal, veggies, roti, salad. When rice was served I had a dilemma - I'd never eaten rice without a spoon before. Having been brought up in an Army household I was used to the forks and knives and spoons and had never eaten rice with my bare hands. So it was a learning experience with the others telling me how to mix the veggies and the dal and the rice and how to slurp it all up with my fingers. So now I can gladly say I'm ready for a trip to the southern states .

It took me the longest to finish eating which isn't anything new for me - I'm a slow eater. After lunch one of the guy's brothers showed us around a museum. It contained maps and photos of the wildlife around the area. There was a real life full size replica of a Bison aka Gaur there. That animal is nothing short of enormous!! Its easily as big as two normal sized cows! I doubt even a stationary car would survive a head on impact! The car would end up as road kill instead of the bison ! There were a few other replicas of tigers and sambhars and a couple of photos of the flora and a few waterfalls.

Done with the museum we decided to ride to a waterfall nearby. Biru and Siddharth had already left and just as we were leaving it started raining. Raining heavily I mean. It was the sort of rain I'd seen on Nat Geo when the crew goes to some rainforest in South America. We had to sit at the reception and wait for it to subside. It went on for about 15 minutes after which we decided to ride to the waterfall.

It took us about 10 minutes to get there. We parked our bikes under a shed and walked a hundred meters or so towards the waterfall. The rocks were very slippery because of all the moisture around the area so we had to stay away from the edges.






A lot of fury in this waterfall









Evening Timepass

We made our way back after a while and stopped on a bridge just outside our hotel for the night.



We stayed there for quite a while, taking photos, making videos, goofing around in general. We spent an hour and a half there and most of that time was spent in laughing at silly jokes and making weird noises and spotting dragons in the sky, imagining a white dog to be a white tiger and a man in a lungi to be his ring master. Taveras and Sumos were manufactured by Hero Honda and TVS that evening. When bats started flying in the sky, we noted the ones that flew out of formation and shrugged them off as being show offs. At one point a man came to the edge of the river to take a dump. He too was not spared! All in all it was a fun and free evening. Free of stress, free of commitments. The sort of things that you can do 700kms away from home...

We rode up a hill to a tapri for some tea. After tea everyone was testing eachother's bikes. I had a good time testing the Ninja's and CBR's headlights. Sudhir had fun on my 220. His thoughts about the torque - "You can f**k off in any gear!" . Krish took a 50 meter ride on the Avenger aka sofa before finding if too weird to continue.

It was pretty much dark by the time we came back to the hotel. We were again greeted with open arms. The family was having a party in the room we kept our luggage in so we roamed around the grounds. We went to the reception after a while and a nature show was on on the tv. There were 3 other people in the room apart from us and all of them were watching intently. We were kidding around like little kids and Sudhir raised a point that seemed to be extremely funny at the time - "We rode 700kms from Pune over 2 days just to see this silly documentary?". We both couldn't control our laughter and stepped out after a while.

We went back to our rooms and we were handed the keys to another dormitory while the family partied. Biru and I took power naps while the others freshened up. At around 11 we proceeded for dinner. It was again a good meal. I was more comfortable with the rice this time but still took the longest to eat. By 12 we were all in our night clothes. We thanked Mr. Kumar since we'd leave early in the morning and probably wouldn't see him. We hit our bunks soon after and had a good night's sleep once more. Or at least I did - the staff around there decided to play cards with the lights still on while we were trying to sleep .

All in all, it was another great day on the road and the best roads were still to come!

Oh yeah.It was indeed a refreshing morning easing out your stomach in someone else's loo cos yours aint clean. That was me in the red shirt peeking into others rooms for clean loos.

It was scary as hell.The ninja was right behind the tata ace and i was a few inches behind him.The moment it fell i swerved to the left and krishna swerved to the right.A few minutes before the calf jumped out i ve seen krishna waving his hand at the calf and imitating a mating call.I wonder if that s what had instigated the calf indeed.

I was looking for an ATM and I did not even realise when did i start overtaking that rick. But what a silly mistake it was,it brought back memories of my "why do i race" moments from the track

Damn those were one of the most steepest curviest and the most dangerous corners i have seen,if it was not for the bad roads i would have had super fun.But i still did,probably the after effects of the ninja and the 220,people were cheering me up at every corner "GO!GO!GO!"

Our man was running back to pune by the time we caught him.

The 220 was indeed fun,it had the power which goes unnoticed on the ninja on the lower side of 5K rpm.And we had all exchanged bikes and rode on that road together for quite a distance when krishna asked all of us to switch off our headlights and indicators.It was pitch dark and all of a sudden everyone starts screaming ,turn back and zoom off. Damn we were playing like little kids.

You missed the aloo bonda nightmare and the dawn of Inder 2.0 exclusively covered live by sansani.

Hahha! Yeah - that mad scream in the darkness and Nachiket and Sid got scared and all..

The dawn of Inder 2.0 is left for Biru's 'documentary' to explain