Prologue

It all started 3 months back when two of us (me and Saquib) were chatting over our late night coffee destination (CCD, Narasapura) about going somewhere far from Bangalore. And, this time the plan was to push our bikes to a 15 days plan and explore a state, if possible. Probable destinations that came to our mind was Rajasthan, Maharashtra or Gujarat. Argument started over coffee and the first two destinations got canceled (Rajasthan being too far for us to ride along from Bangalore and Maharashtra looks best during monsoon) and we were left with Gujarat. This was something which each one of us wanted to do, especially visit the Rann of Kutch and I very well knew that this time we are going there for sure as the planning started in full swing.

Although it was initially me and Saquib who kicked off with the planning and research off, we decided to pull in some close pals of ours who might be interested for this long roadtrip of ours. We decided to start for the trip on 31st January, 2014 (Saturday) and come back to Bangalore by 11th February, 2014 (Wednesday). So, here goes the group below:

1. Saquib - his steed - R15 v2.0.
2. Ashish - his chosen steed - Karizma ZMR.
3. Sunil - his steed - Pulsar 200 NS
4. Tapabrata - his steed - CBR 250 R
5. My good friend, Eshwari. Incidentally, her plan was to visit Gujarat with her parents around the same time frame we were looking for to ride,, and when I discussed the plan with her, she was more than happy to extend her leaves and join our gang of riders. She rode the Thunderbird 350 during her presence with the group.
6. Lastly, Me and my steed - Thunderbird 350.

So, all set with the group, and with all the research nearly complete, it was time to publish the plan. It was a bit difficult for some of us to get full 15 days leave from office, but nonetheless, everyone was able to manage at least 11 days. Below was the routemap which we came up with.



A total distance of 5200 Kms came up as per the google maps. It goes without saying that all of us were excited as hell! The days crossed by and our excitement meter was becoming unstable day by day. We were meeting at times, just to check if everything was on track, ran through the route map again and again so that everyone knows the route very well. Unfortunately, few days to the start of the ride, and we face two setbacks.

Setback 1: Sunil learned from his office that he has to be in his office on 31st January (half-day) and it can not be avoided. He hence would only be able to leave from Bangalore in the afternoon and hence would be able to meet us only at Ahmedabad on the 2nd day. We did not have any other option but to agree to this plan because chances were less that our leaves would get extended.

Setback 2: Saquib had a similar situation in his office but he was able to manage the same. However, his brother Sauban had to be operated on 29th of January (minor one though) which was actually postponed by the doctor in the last minute to 31st January. So, in no ways can Saquib start along with us, rather he has to actually postpone his plan to couple to days later and in that case, he will end up doing a solo trip. This came as a big blow to us because he was the person who was the mastermind behind this mega plan and all of us wanted him to be part of our group. With heavy heart, we accepted his decision and carried forward with our plan.

Teaser of what is to come:

I am hereby presenting some of the teaser pictures of our trip across Gujarat. What we experienced was just not a roadtrip, it was much more than that. We met wonderful people all along our way, ready to help at any point of time. It was an experience which no words can express.































Travelogue to start upon approval. I would try to provide as much details of our stay at different places which might help the fellow xbhpians to plan similar kind of trip going forward.