Re: Effective use of a long weekend!!!

Travelogue Approved

But where is the travelogue!

Re: Effective use of a long weekend!!!

Thank you for the quick approval buddy!! The travelogue will follow soon.

Re: Effective use of a long weekend!!!

The build up to the ride...

The last year was horrible for me with no rides for the complete. Was busy with personal & professional life as well as family commitments. I went on a multiple trips but all of them were the boring family trips. I was itching to get on the saddle and ride to the hills. Time passed but no plans materialized. Every time a plan was made, it was ruined by some or the other reason. Somehow I managed to plan a ride in November but then the de-monetization drive ruined it. It was a hopeless year without any rides.
I was determined not to repeat the same this year. So eagerly started for my companies holiday list for 2017 on the lookout for an long weekend that I could use. The first weekend was during Holi but it being a festival decided against it. The next extended weekend was April 14 - 16, I was hell bent on making this leave count and satisfy the rider in me with some trip to hills. I started searching where could I go for 3 days and didn't share my plans with any of the freinds. I would have disclosed the plan, destination and dates only a couple of weeks earlier. The reason for doing so was my superstition that whenever I disclose my plans, it never gets executed whether it was studies in childhood or some trip in today's date.

Re: Effective use of a long weekend!!!

So here is the view why we decided to go to Parashar lake

Re: Effective use of a long weekend!!!

As I mentioned, 2016 was a horrible year for me. As soon as the holiday list was out in my organisation, I started looking for opportunity to plan a ride. Skipped the first extended weekend because it was Holi. Was dead sure to make the next one count. Even planning the destination and the co-riders for this ride tricky. I wanted to go to Chopta, the reason being, my freinds found snow in March at Chopta a couple of years back.

I was in the middle of deciding the destination when Ankush started the discussion to go somewhere. Remember, I hadn't disclosed my plans to anyone yet, so I was glad to share my plans with Ankush. He agreed to join. As they say " Like minds think alike " , a couple of weeks before the ride, Shekhar expressed his longing to go on a ride. It was then when I told him about my plans. Co-incidently he had holidays from April 14 - 17. This how Shekhar and Mukul joined the group. We were now 4 people. The last entrant was dramatic one. Fast & furious 8 was to be released the same weekend, the freinds already had plans to watch the movie together. So I had to inform Prashant that we are going on a ride and won't be able to accompany him for the movie. Though not very keen, Prashant too joined us. A few after, we got a bad news of Ankush's grandfather passing away, so he had to draw out of the ride.

There was a change of destination. We decided to go to Parashar lake since Shekhar already had been to Chopta. It didn't matter where we go, for me it had to be hills. So this way the dates and the destination were set.

Re: Effective use of a long weekend!!!

The rides and the riders....

Re: Effective use of a long weekend!!!



upload more pictures

Re: Effective use of a long weekend!!!

Expect some today...

Re: Effective use of a long weekend!!!

We started at about 1:30 AM from GT Karnal bypass. By that time, trucks had started flying on the highways creating a choc-a-bloc traffic for us to clear. We were doing an average speed of around 90kmph. Soon we were ahead of the traffic and were riding hassled free. That's when we took our first break at Panipat toll. There were two reasons for this early break - 1) We were riding so long after a considerable amount of time (almost 1.5 yrs) and 2) I didn't get time to rest after I came back from office.

So we decided to stop wherever needed in may 70-100 Kms . Still we did good to reach Zirakpur McDonald's by around 5:30AM....Not bad eh. This was our breakfast break. A pleasant surprise was waiting for us here. We met Apurv sir, Shekhar's D390's ex-owner. He was heading towards Chandigarh with his family and freinds.

Re: Effective use of a long weekend!!!

Waiting for the rest!

Re: Effective use of a long weekend!!!

I'm sorry for the delay. Got stuck with work. Will try n finish this asap. So here it is.

We started from Zirakpur McD at about 6 am. The sun had just risen and the roads were empty. We were tempted to take the usual road via Shimla but avoided it because of the public warning on social media about bad shape of the road by a biker brother. We decided to take the Mohali route then cross Kiratpur. As I mentioned it was already day and with empty roads we upped our speed. As soon as we hit the hills, all of us got crazy...and by around 1 PM we reached Mandi. Here we decided to take a long lunch break before moving on to our destination Parashar lake.