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The sun rose from the west, my college friends decided to go on bike trip to celebrate the holiday season.
Day 1
We were 4 guys with 2 bikes, My discover 135 and a friends CBZ extreme. Since the plan had the word bike in it i was ever ready to go. The route we decided to take was mumbai - mangaon via NH17, and then the state highway to shrivardhan. While returning we planned on riding to diveagar and dighi port from where we would then take a ferry to rajpur and continue riding along the coast on the murud - kashid - alibaug route which runs parallel to the shore rather than taking NH17 back. Like every other night before a long ride, i couldn't get much sleep, before i knew it my alarm reminded me that it was 4:45 am. After hurrying up, i left the house at 5:45 and headed to kurla to meet the rest. It was so cold that i felt my fingers would freeze, but this was nothing compared to the temperature once we crossed the city limits. I was not too sure about the panvel bypass road so we got stuck in traffic at panvel. Somewhere in that traffic we missed the turn to goa and i only realized it when i reached the toll plaza on NH4. Took a U-turn and headed back for NH17. After crossing panvel i saw this really nice curve. I couldn't resist the urge to twist the throttle open and take the curve at 100kmph, while my pillion was scared. As planned i stopped for breakfast at vadkhal naka, some snacks and a nice hot cup of tea and we were ready to continue the ride along NH17 to goregaon phata. I must say the petronas sprinta 4000 oil that i had filled in the day before was performing really well, the engine was smooth upto 90kmph with a heavy weight pillion. NH17 was fun since there was hardly any traffic. we stopped for a butt break 20 km's before goregaon phata and then continued towards harihareshwar. There was another shorter route 10km's before goregaon phata, but i took the longer route since i thought it would be more scenic with more chances for photography.
We now had 50km's of state highway to cover, It was so narrow that only one car could pass at a time. The road was bumpy and uneven. It was so bad that half n hour on that road and the console on my bike became loose and started rattling. The road did have some good patches with some really nice curves and great corners. The road seemed more like a route to a hillstation rather than a route to a beach. It took almost an hour to reach shrivardhan. It was 1:30 and we were getting hungry so we decided to stop for lunch at shrivardhan and then head to harihareshwar for accommodation. Here i asked my friend to switch bikes with me, i was now on the cbz extreme and another friend of mine was riding my discover 135. I was enjoying the way the cbz felt througout its powerband and the silent nature of the engine. After i thought that i had a fair enough idea of the handling of the bike, i started to take it a little faster into the corners. All was going great untill there was this one gentle corner where i was at 80, i applied the brakes to slow down a little but then there was a gravel patch in front so i couldn't brake hard enough, moreover the CBZ's rear brake wasn't upto the mark. I entered the corner with a little excess speed that forced me onto the outer edge of the road. I thought i was safe and could easily pull back into the left lane but then out of nowhere there were 2 huge rocks on the side of the road. Before i knew it the leg guard had hit the rocks, the rear tyre was in the air, i was still holding on to the handle and i could hear the engine revving. Time stood still and i was upside down with the pillion rider on top of me. I was lucky to walk away from that crash with just a minor scratch on the knee, the pillion wasn't even scratched. My friend who was riding my bike had also misjudged that same turn and gone offroad but managed to gain controlo of the bike. The bike had taken most of the impact, leg guard bent into the silencer pipe, brake lever twisted around the leg rest. I had decided from then onwards that i won't switch bikes on unfamiliar roads anymore. This was the first time i crashed a bike in my 4 years of riding experience, It feels bad that i broke that track record. The brake lever was jammed and the bike refused to move, We had to disconnect the rear brake and take the bike 20km's back to a welders shop to get the lever welded, the service center there was not equiped to change the brake lever. Meanwhile, me and my friend (back on my bike now) decided to move on ahead and find a place to stay, the others returned half n hour later after getting the bike fixed. Found a decent place for 850 bucks, later i realized that it didn't even have a washbasin.
There was no cellphone network in that area so we had to go hunting for a PCO to inform the other two who had gone to fix the bike about the location of the place where we got a room. Luckily they had network coverage and we could contact them. After all this delay, it was almost 5pm. We eneterd the room, freshened up and headed for harihareshwar beach. The beach wasn't as good as a i expected it to be, It was over crowded and dirty so we walked ahead to a more empty patch on the beach. We stayed at the beach till sunset and spent some time taking pics. The rest of the night was spent looking for a place to have dinner since the place we were staying didn't serve food.
Day 2 logs coming soon
Day 1
We were 4 guys with 2 bikes, My discover 135 and a friends CBZ extreme. Since the plan had the word bike in it i was ever ready to go. The route we decided to take was mumbai - mangaon via NH17, and then the state highway to shrivardhan. While returning we planned on riding to diveagar and dighi port from where we would then take a ferry to rajpur and continue riding along the coast on the murud - kashid - alibaug route which runs parallel to the shore rather than taking NH17 back. Like every other night before a long ride, i couldn't get much sleep, before i knew it my alarm reminded me that it was 4:45 am. After hurrying up, i left the house at 5:45 and headed to kurla to meet the rest. It was so cold that i felt my fingers would freeze, but this was nothing compared to the temperature once we crossed the city limits. I was not too sure about the panvel bypass road so we got stuck in traffic at panvel. Somewhere in that traffic we missed the turn to goa and i only realized it when i reached the toll plaza on NH4. Took a U-turn and headed back for NH17. After crossing panvel i saw this really nice curve. I couldn't resist the urge to twist the throttle open and take the curve at 100kmph, while my pillion was scared. As planned i stopped for breakfast at vadkhal naka, some snacks and a nice hot cup of tea and we were ready to continue the ride along NH17 to goregaon phata. I must say the petronas sprinta 4000 oil that i had filled in the day before was performing really well, the engine was smooth upto 90kmph with a heavy weight pillion. NH17 was fun since there was hardly any traffic. we stopped for a butt break 20 km's before goregaon phata and then continued towards harihareshwar. There was another shorter route 10km's before goregaon phata, but i took the longer route since i thought it would be more scenic with more chances for photography.
We now had 50km's of state highway to cover, It was so narrow that only one car could pass at a time. The road was bumpy and uneven. It was so bad that half n hour on that road and the console on my bike became loose and started rattling. The road did have some good patches with some really nice curves and great corners. The road seemed more like a route to a hillstation rather than a route to a beach. It took almost an hour to reach shrivardhan. It was 1:30 and we were getting hungry so we decided to stop for lunch at shrivardhan and then head to harihareshwar for accommodation. Here i asked my friend to switch bikes with me, i was now on the cbz extreme and another friend of mine was riding my discover 135. I was enjoying the way the cbz felt througout its powerband and the silent nature of the engine. After i thought that i had a fair enough idea of the handling of the bike, i started to take it a little faster into the corners. All was going great untill there was this one gentle corner where i was at 80, i applied the brakes to slow down a little but then there was a gravel patch in front so i couldn't brake hard enough, moreover the CBZ's rear brake wasn't upto the mark. I entered the corner with a little excess speed that forced me onto the outer edge of the road. I thought i was safe and could easily pull back into the left lane but then out of nowhere there were 2 huge rocks on the side of the road. Before i knew it the leg guard had hit the rocks, the rear tyre was in the air, i was still holding on to the handle and i could hear the engine revving. Time stood still and i was upside down with the pillion rider on top of me. I was lucky to walk away from that crash with just a minor scratch on the knee, the pillion wasn't even scratched. My friend who was riding my bike had also misjudged that same turn and gone offroad but managed to gain controlo of the bike. The bike had taken most of the impact, leg guard bent into the silencer pipe, brake lever twisted around the leg rest. I had decided from then onwards that i won't switch bikes on unfamiliar roads anymore. This was the first time i crashed a bike in my 4 years of riding experience, It feels bad that i broke that track record. The brake lever was jammed and the bike refused to move, We had to disconnect the rear brake and take the bike 20km's back to a welders shop to get the lever welded, the service center there was not equiped to change the brake lever. Meanwhile, me and my friend (back on my bike now) decided to move on ahead and find a place to stay, the others returned half n hour later after getting the bike fixed. Found a decent place for 850 bucks, later i realized that it didn't even have a washbasin.
There was no cellphone network in that area so we had to go hunting for a PCO to inform the other two who had gone to fix the bike about the location of the place where we got a room. Luckily they had network coverage and we could contact them. After all this delay, it was almost 5pm. We eneterd the room, freshened up and headed for harihareshwar beach. The beach wasn't as good as a i expected it to be, It was over crowded and dirty so we walked ahead to a more empty patch on the beach. We stayed at the beach till sunset and spent some time taking pics. The rest of the night was spent looking for a place to have dinner since the place we were staying didn't serve food.
Day 2 logs coming soon
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