Re: Riding the GQ - Realizing my dream - more riding less pics

*spoiler alert* I have already read this beautiful travelogue by argee sir on advrider long back.
People who are too eager can check it out.

Re: Riding the GQ - Realizing my dream - more riding less pics

Will try to see how far I can hold

This version will be completely different from Advrider If that is Pepperoni Pizza, this will be Paneer Makhani

Re: Riding the GQ - Realizing my dream - more riding less pics

To understand the reason behind my GQ ride, we'll have to rewind about 4 years precise, 2010 Feb to precise...

Those were my infancy time at xBhp, more or less like few days new at xBhp & that was when a biking veteran @bluevolt, a.k.a Rahul was riding GQ & that sounded to me like WHOOOOOOOAAAAAA!!! I was all super excited & wanted to help him as much as I can (http://www.xbhp.com/talkies/roadtrip...formation.html)

And his route plan (those days) about the places sounded greek & latin to me, considering the fact I'm weak in Geography (and the hard truth is, I'm weak in everything except sleeping).

And Sunny's idea of donating the amount equivalent to your bike's CC sounded great to me. I was eager to help him as much as I can & offered him to bridge between NH4 to NH5 & I indeed helped him. After sending him off towards Nellore from Redhills, I kept thinking about his ride the whole day. Needless to say, I had even couple of disturbed nights thinking about him & his ride.

Along the way a good friend of mine, @jd666 also was giving him route plans as where to ride & as Rahul was posting them (esp the Jaisalmer - Bikaner stretch), I was all hyper excited to visit those places & experience them.

His 'Gift a Dream Ride' to children was gifted to me as 'Ride the GQ'; my dream was also the same as Rahul, with one exception that. I couldn't contribute or give back anything to society, I could only ride the GQ. I hope I'll turn my rides to useful someday, starting atleast with GQ...someday

Re: Riding the GQ - Realizing my dream - more riding less pics

Just finished reading the whole triplog in AVrider. You guys inspire us a lot
Cheers
Mathews

Re: Riding the GQ - Realizing my dream - more riding less pics

Your Rides & Logs are always a pleasure RG! Looking forward to the rest!

Cheers & Ride Safe

Re: Riding the GQ - Realizing my dream - more riding less pics

And one picture that terrorized me that day was this one...


I was wondering, how the heck does one ride all the 1600+ Km? How long does it take to do 1600 Km? What does one feel like to ride 1600 Km? What does he feel after riding so? At that point I couldn't think what does one feel when there's another 4000 more Km to do for next few days!!

But all that left me with was the thoughts, "I should do GQ, I should give back something like Rahul, I should do something like Rahul" I didn't know how to do, I didn't know when I would do, but, I had strong thoughts & determination that I should do GQ.

Re: Riding the GQ - Realizing my dream - more riding less pics

eagerly waiting for more [MENTION=26407]aargee[/MENTION]

Re: Riding the GQ - Realizing my dream - more riding less pics

Feels so very good getting along with very prominent names on the forum on the similar kind of trip.

And this log just gave me reminder to take some time out from work and complete my log on GQ! http://www.xbhp.com/talkies/tourer/2...conquered.html

Great ride, great fun.. Kudos [MENTION=26407]aargee[/MENTION] on the completion.

Re: Riding the GQ - Realizing my dream - more riding less pics

Hey [MENTION=26407]aargee[/MENTION] nice little snippets of stories mate... bring it on... loving it, true those daunting 4 digit numbers... reliving it.

Re: Riding the GQ - Realizing my dream - more riding less pics

Like Dr Kalam says...


I guess that is what drove me to ride

Before getting into pictures & talk more about GQ, there's something more that I have to mention here, otherwise, people here are bound to think the fruits ripe right after the seeds were sown. So my apologies to people who're eagerly awaiting to read the GQ report, it's going to take sometime before I come back to GQ ride...

From Feb 2010 - May 2011 is a little fast forward period where I had riding in my trusted Rx to Yercaud & Munnar

2011 Jun - 2011 Aug - I got the CBR 250R, that helped me to check & increase my endurance level such as, completed the run-in in 2 flat days, did Chennai - Trichy - Chennai in half a day & once I was confident enough I could do about 700-800 Km a day...

2011 Sep - I still don't know why, but, I made a super duper half baked plan without even giving a thought on anything to RJ all the way from Chennai (TLog here - http://www.xbhp.com/talkies/touring-...here-ride.html) If you look at that thread, the first question that I posted was to ask if GQ could be done in 14 days. So people suggested doing something else & that became RJ for no reason. I had been thinking GQ everytime whenever I had holidays, whenever I had a chance. The fever of GQ couldn't be brought down without actually experiencing GQ. I came back from RJ with a boosted confidence to a new & greater level.

From 2011 Nov to 2012 Mar I did several short trips anywhere between 400 to 1700 Km in a span of 1 to 3 days & they also encouraged me a lot that I could do GQ.

So finally in Apr 2011, I was talking to [MENTION=15661]Binoy[/MENTION] & had accidentally mentioned doing GQ & found he & I shared the same interest. I wouldn't say I was fully confident of doing GQ because, doing 1000 Km in a day is completely different from doing 500 Km for 3 days consecutively. And most people would simply say doing 1000 Km in a day is more difficult compared to people who're well experienced on road. I was not really sure how many days would I need to do the 6000 odd Km

So to rescue, I consulted as usual with our HiVayKing about the routes & had planned to complete it in 14 days with 1 day buffer; applied vacation in office for Jun 1st week of 2012 & the fact (today it seems like a joke) is that I had to justify as why I will need 14 days to complete this ride.

Then comes prepping the bike...

Re: Riding the GQ - Realizing my dream - more riding less pics

My week is going to have a good start

Re: Riding the GQ - Realizing my dream - more riding less pics

Once the vacation plan was approved, things got pretty exciting. Next came was luggage! I had a puny 30 liters capacity tailbag from Nelson Rigg & it nearly held my luggage for 10 days
Fancy picture...


How it looked in real - http://www.xbhp.com/talkies/universa...lt-review.html

Somehow, I squeezed in all my things inside the tail bag & sad fact being, I couldn't even tie down the tailbag properly (compared to the super rugged tail bag that I'm having now). Truth is, until I get Viaterra Claw, motorcycle luggage had always been a slight nightmare to me & after that, carrying luggage on motorcycle is never a botheration to me.

On the D-day, 2-Jun-2012...

Woke up early in the morning like 1:30 AM or so; I had similar experience of riding from Chennai to Pune & I know how long does it takes, so plan was to leave by 2:00 AM, but then, plans are proved to be good in papers & eventually when I left it was 2:26 AM or so in the morning.

First break was at Hosur at my trusted IOL fuel station & called up Binoy stating I would be at the entrance of NICE road by 6:30 or so.

Re: Riding the GQ - Realizing my dream - more riding less pics

Waiting !

Sent from my A500s using xBhp Connect mobile app

Re: Riding the GQ - Realizing my dream - more riding less pics

Thread bookmarked...waiting for more details....plz plz plz @aargee bring on the rest...

Re: Riding the GQ - Realizing my dream - more riding less pics

Any upadates?

Sent from my ST23i using xBhp Connect mobile app