Today I logged in for the first time on this website and there could be no better way to start with other than writing a travelogue. I waited for 2 weeks to gather thoughts to write about one of the most memorable journeys I recently had. It all started with an idea from one of my office colleagues Rajeev Swami who was planning a 9 day road trip to Munnar to which I and one of my friends from Pune also joined, but, unfortunately it was cancelled as our company had cancelled all leaves for December .
We than thought of rann of kachchh and started planning for a 5 day road trip by taking some leaves around Christmas. This time Rajeev dropped from the plan,so, it was only Varun from Pune(my best friend) and I. Varun owns a 500 cc RE desert storm and I own a RE classic 350 cc.We were planning the trip from 25-29 Dec 14 from Mumbai. We did not do any hotel bookings and any solid planning for the entire trip, everything was planned on the go.
On 24th dec evening, Varun reached Mumbai from Pune(while coming he fell in a ditch near Pen ). Below is the day by day detailed plan.

DAY 1-25 Dec- Thane - Ahmedabad ( 500 KM)

We started at around 7 am. I had done Thane to Daman the previous month, so, I was sure that NH8 is awesome and it would stretch the same way till Ahmedabad. We were enjoying the morning ride when suddenly we were stopped by the worst traffic jam I had ever witnessed in my life on the ghobundar road from bhayandarpada till the NH8 junction, which is a 7 Km stretch. We unwantedly had to go the wrong way, which took us around an hour to touch NH8. Varun fueled up at Kolhi and without wasting much time we were on the road burning some rubber. Our first halt was at hotel Ahura ,Charoti for breakfast. After 45 mins we were again on the road, we did take some small breaks to have water and attend the call of nature. We had around 16 litres of water and astonishingly we had spent only 100 bucks on water for the entire trip.
Our next big stop was near Surat for tea and snacks, we fueled up again near Baroda and were back on road. We had a heavy breakfast and to cover up the time lost in the traffic jam in the morning we skipped our lunch. Until Baroda the road is awesome and you can reach whatever destination as per the plan. After baroda, expressway starts on which motor bikes are not allowed and the other parallel road is undergoing construction which has no lanes and is 2 way, so we had to spend around 3 hours to complete 110 kms to reach Ahmedabad.
As we did not book any hotel, we planned to reach Sarkhej to look for a place to dump.....but fortunately we saw one \"hotel Radhey inn\" the moment we touched the outer ring road in Ahmedabad. Very nice hotel,clean, the room was small and cozy,clean towels and bed sheets,safe parking and all this for just 500 bucks. I would recommend this hotel to those looking for a budget hotel with value for money. We reached this place at around 8, ordered food from a nearby hotel and were off for the day at around 11:30 pm. We planned to start the next day at 6:30.


DAY 2-26 Dec- Ahmedabad -Bhuj- Mandvi( 410 KM)

I asked Varun to complete the morning activities and then wake me up. As planned, he woke up early, did his stuff and woke me up. Sadly the day for me started with loose motions ....I had the same situation 4 days ago and I was sure that its cured and would not return on the trip. But I was wrong and it stayed with me for the entire trip....thanks to the anti loose motion medicines which I was carrying.
We started at 7:30 am and in no time we were on SH7. Trust me this state highway is butter smooth, if you want to enjoy a drive or a ride, this is the road to be on. Best road on the entire trip. We covered almost 200 Km on SH7, saw Tata nano plant , fueled up in between, had lunch, also I took Glucose, electral and isabgol to help me recover.
On the way we saw endless windmill and salt production farms. Took some snaps and started off for Bhuj which we planned to keep as a base. We reached Bhuj at around 3 and spent 2 painful hours in the search of a hotel, which we finally found also, but at around 5 don\'t know what triggered us to drop this plan and hit the road again, this time the destination was Mandvi and time was limited. We wanted to reach Mandvi before sunset. We did reach before sunset, but time was again killed in search of a hotel. We found one guest house which was average, we dumped in no time to reach Mandvi beach at almost dark. Spent sometime there, went to a hotel for dinner and slept early.



DAY 3-27 Dec- Mandvi-Bhuj-Rann of Kachchh-India Bridge-Kala Dungar-hodka village( 290 KM)

We started at 6:30 am from Mandvi as it was going to be a long day, we had to explore many places. In no time we reached bhirandiyara, thanks to the awesome roads, had Jalebi,pakodas and tea, took permits to the white rann and at around 1 pm we were at this beautiful white land. We did not get permission to ride on it as it was swampy underneath. A car tried to do that the previous day and was stuck, they had to pay 20k bucks as damages. We spent some time taking pics and enjoying the one of its kind natural beauty and started off for our next destination.

Our next destination was India bridge which was around 75-80 km from the white rann. We fueled up on the way and reached India bridge in no time. We could not take pictures there as it was military controlled area and photography was prohibited, we spent some time there discussing with people around about the place , there we came to know about this magnetic zone on the way to kala dungar.

We were back on the road to kala dungar, on the way we found a signal board which said \"probable magnetic zone, stay away\", we stopped to check what it is and we were slowly pulled back by the magnetic field. It was simply amazing, we also recorded a video. There was an auto-rickshaw guy who turned off his auto and was going in reverse with a speed of 10-15 kmph against the slope, similar thing happened to a car which stopped to check what we guys were doing. This was one of the best experiences we had.
The way to kal dungar is rough, with steep slopes and turns, also, it\'s a single lane road, but amazingly you can find buses and cars crossing at the same time. At one place a bus was stuck on almost a 45 degree slope , the scene was kind of tough to digest. The bus driver couldn\'t climb and nor go in reverse as there were vehicles everywhere...huh ! but somehow it came down with help of stones under the wheels, thanks to some enthusiasts. We rode straight to dattatreya temple which is at the highest peak of the rann of kachchh region. The view is beautiful, one can see the white land from there.

We then planned to reach bhuj and find a place to stay, alternate plan was to reach khadir bet which was around 300 kms from kala dungar. All this planning was being done at around 5:30-6 pm, did some phone calls to check if it was feasible to start that late for khadir bet and found out that it wasn\'t. I had heard and read about villages near rann of kachchh specialized in handicrafts work, some of these villages provide stay options also. I took out the print which had names of villages, did some study and found a village called Hodka near Bhirandiyara on the way to the rann festival which provides good stay options. We took a u turn straight to this village. We had to do some searching before we reached this beautiful village resort area.

The place was calm and soothing, houses were made of mud, but the facilities inside were like a 4 star hotel(for Varun it was 5star though). We were simply amazed by the whole setup and hospitality. We had dinner at around 9 and went to the open area to enjoy the music played by local guys with sitar etc + bonfire and slept at around 11. We had to pay 3500 for all this for a day and it was worth it. We wanted to start late the next day, so that we can enjoy the stay.


DAY 4-28 Dec- Hodka village-Ahmedabad(400 KM)

We woke up at around 8, did all preps and started off to Ahmedabad at around 10:30 am. As it was a return journey, we took less breaks, fueled up near Halvad, took pictures of rickshaws fitted with Royal Enfield diesel engines called chakkada, made some short ride videos and reached Ahmedabad at around 8:30 pm at the same hotel. Had dinner, got our empty water bottles filled up from the hotel itself(this is how we saved money on water ) and went off to sleep at around 11. The plan for next day was to start early.


DAY 5-29 Dec- Ahmedabad-Thane(500 KM)

We started our journey at around 7:30 am, fed our bikes and ourselves near Baroda and were back on beautiful butter smooth NH8. It was as usual a smooth ride and we reached thane at 6:30 pm without any glitches. One point to mention, on the entire trip, wherever we stopped, we were inquired about the bike most of the time, kitna average deti hai, kya price hai etc etc. We have definitely developed more love and respect for our bullets after this trip and I am sure that we are better and more responsible bikers now.

Gujarat is a beautiful state with rich culture and I salute Modiji for the work that he has done. All the roads that we touched, be it remote or highways, were awesome. I am sure that we would again plan a tour to Gujarat to explore more.

Please do respond with your suggestions and queries.

Thanks........keep riding

Ashish Raghav



Some pics below