Yercaud 2010 - Tri State G2G Trip Log

This time around, I didn't use my camera that much and don't have pictures to decorate the log. If someone is generous enough to give me the permission to use their pictures, I would be happy to have them included in my blog. I promise to offer full credit to the people who give me the permission. Please PM me if you wish to. Thanks in advance.





The fun began at four in the morning. When I reached the Chennai Trade Center, everyone else was already there. I could see Kiran out in one corner fiddling with something. I saw Apar and his brother. There were no other familiar faces. I handed over to Apar's brother, the extra jacket I was carrying for him. Kiran came by waving, and introducing me to a new face who was to handle the cash for the Chennai gang. We gathered around in a circle with a round of introduction. We discussed some basic ride tactics before starting the engines are pushing off from there.

I was leading with Apar closely following by. After about ten minutes, I couldn't see any of them on my rear view mirror. I stopped by and waited for them. Apar came by after a few minutes and told me that there was a stop for some cash. However, we couldn't find the others. We waited by a junction for close to twenty minutes and were getting a little worried. Thats when Kiran called up and said that they'd taken an alternative route and we had to catch up. I had Apar and his brother with me. The three of us were quite fast hoping that we could catch the rest very soon. At some point, I lost Apar and his brother on the rear view mirror. I thought they had stopped by for some fuel and so I moved on.

I had driven for close to an hour, but there still was no sight of the gang. I was worried and got down to check if I had calls. I saw a message from Kiran asking me to meet them at Kanchipuram. When I checked the GPS, I had crossed that place much earlier. I decided to stop at the entrance of Vellore which was just ten minutes from where I was. I parked the Ninja on the corner of the road making sure it wouldn't disturb the traffic. I walked to the tea stall close by to grab some tea and waited for the rest of the gang. They all trickled in, one after the other. Once everyone was there, we moved into the town to have breakfast at Saravana Bhavan.

Quickly after breakfast, we got back on the highway. There were three guys who were in the front accompanying me. Kiran swept as usual ensuring nobody was left behind. We made no stops until Krishnagiri. Being the first to reach, I went into the town to buy some duct tape. I was carrying a video camera this time to experiment with some videography. I made a quick visit to see my brother too. I got calls from the gang asking about each other's whereabouts and I gave them instructions to regroup. I finally got a call from the Bangalore folks telling me that they had reached too. I got back to the Chennai gang and led them on to where the Bangalore folks where.

On the left side of the highway I saw the huge number of bikes parked on the service lane. There were riders clicking pictures, chit chatting all along the stretch. When the twenty bikes from Chennai made an entry, there was a huge noise, cheering from people and whistles too. Riders waved to us welcoming us with all due respect. It was a great feeling to see such a large turnout. I glided through the service lane as if it were a pit lane and finally made a stop somewhere close to the beginning. I saw a lot of unknown faces. I walked to the end where I could see Praful and John. We greeted each other and began to organize the group. We were about 75 bikes then and we needed a strategy to ride through the highway. Praful split the gang into a fast group and a slow group. He put me on with Santa, who had a neat looking Comet.

The group of fast riders assembled in the front waiting for the leader to start. With Santa and me in the front, we slowly started cruising at 60 - 70 kmph after which Santa decided to fall behind. I took the lead and sped up to a 100 kmph. I was being very closely followed by some of the other members in the group. I was quite unsure of what speeds where being followed before we regrouped. It appeared to me as if I was relatively slower and increased the cruising speeds to 110 - 120 kmph. I took overtakes with caution so that the group wouldn't break apart. We decided to stop at A2B, which is a gas station with additional facilities. It took us about thirty minutes to get there. When we stopped and looked back, we had about 10 bikes of the 20 that started in the fast group. I waited on one side of the road while the rest moved on to the gas station to park the bikes and settle down. Minutes later, Praful and Santa showed up with the rest of the gang. It took more time for the others who rode patiently to reach the spot.

While the entire gang waited at A2B, we gathered together for a round of introduction. We certainly couldn't get to know all, but it was a good start. We tried calling up the Kerala folks and got to know that they were heavily delayed. We spent some time around the gas station chit chatting and then settled down for lunch. We stuck to the standard South Indian meals for everyone, which made the arrangements easier. Kiran took up the hard job of tracking all the orders that were placed and ensuring everyone had their lunch. I spent some time experimenting with the handycam, trying to fix it to the back seat of the Ninja with some bungee cords and duct tape. I was able to successfully mount it, but the seat was too shaky and the video wasn't convincing enough. I quickly finished lunch and got back to my experimentation. This time, I removed my GPS from the mount and taped the camera to it. I used to mount to fix it to the bike. The test video I took was a little shaky, but I was happy with the result. I was now waiting to get to the ghats to get some nice videos.

Before we started, Praful did the organizing again. But this time, we decided that we split the group into three; the hyperfast, the fast and the slow. I had a feeling in the back of my head that hyperfast was a diplomatic term used to refer to a hooligan group and very soon did I get to know I was to lead it. The first group started riding out closely followed by the others. I was leading the entire pack at a fairly fast pace. We passed through the small ghat section before Salem which had a few unexpected speed bumps causing some distortion in the formation. A few couple of bends down the road, I couldn't see the others on my rear view mirror. Very shortly, I could see one of the bikes flashing the light, slowly approaching towards me. It sent a chill down my spine. I wasn't ready to hear any bad news. I parked the bike and looked through the mirror waiting for the tiny object to become bigger.

The rider said that a blue R15 was hit by a dog and the others had stopped by. He assured that the rider was safe, there was no fall and nothing except the fairing was broken. It was a big relief to hear the news. The few of us who had overshot took a u-turn and proceeded back to the spot where the other waited. The R15's right side plastic was broken by the dog that was hit and most importantly, a blue 220 that followed the dog ran over it, and managed not to fall. We patched up the R15 with the duct tape that I had and requested the rider to join the slow group so that the bike wouldn't take much of a beating.

The plan was to regroup before Salem so that I could lead the gang through the city on to the ghats. Do to this small delay, the entire gang had passed us and were up ahead. With 20 odd kms left to Salem, we made our way through the slow riders group to catch up with the rest who were up ahead. I was so sure the slow riders were cursing us for cutting through the formation, but I didn't have a choice but to make it to the leader. We stopped just before the entrance of the ghats to make sure everyone was around. Praful, myself and a couple of others started first to take our positions at some nice corners to click pictures and shoot videos. After a 20 minute wait, the riders zoomed past one after the other. I captured them on the video camera in various angles suitable for editing. When the last rider passed by, we started off from there and met the rest of the gang at the entrance of Yercaud.

We had booked two hotels at Yercaud. One was the primary place of stay, where we could accommodate 50-60 members. The other was Hotel Aishwarya where we could accommodate the rest. Kiran led an initial set of 30 riders to Hotel Aishwarya and came back to lead the rest of us to MM Holiday Inn, where most of the gang was to stay. When all of us had reached the place, Kiran helped allot the rooms so that there would be enough space for the Kerala gang when they would arrive. Folks who stayed in Aishwarya started coming in one by one after having dumped all their luggages in their rooms. Most of the riders chose to roam around the small place of Yercaud to visit view points, while some of us chose to stick in the hotel to keep chatting about bikes. Tea was served in the mean time, which was a treat to the grumbling tummies.

On one side of the hotel, the bonfire was being setup with chairs arranged around it. Music was played, but all of it was from the left over CDs the hotel folks had. We could connect our portable players since we did not have the cable for it. We went around hunting for one, but we couldn't get hold of one, neither could we even buy a decent set of music CDs. Disappointed, we came back and rather chose to turn off the music. People were back by then and the crowd was having fun around the place. Around 9, dinner was ready. Most people were hungry and rushed to the buffet area, while some chose to laze around and have it a little late. By the time all the gala settled, it was close to midnight.

Praful on the other end was constantly in touch with the Kerala guys trying to help coordinate their route to the place. The ten odd riders were already split up due to various reasons including weather, bad roads, etc. Close to Salem, one of the bikes had also given up and they had to troubleshoot it right there. At some point when they knew it wasn't going to work any longer, they chose to store it in a mechanic shop and proceed up hill. We waited for them and finally met them at the entrance of Yercaud. We escorted the riders to the hotel, helped them with the food and facilities. Once they had settled down, we went to our respective rooms and crashed.

I was too tired to even notice who else was there, sharing my room. I knew one was Praful, but only in the morning did I realize Kiran was there too. By the time I'd woken up, Kiran and Praful were already out. Kiran was busy getting the things ready for breakfast. while Praful I think was out taking pictures. I freshened up quickly and joined the rest of the gang for breakfast. When everyone was done, we grouped together in the parking area in the hotel to click some group pictures. We had a good time ragging Johny bhai as he tried setting up the camera and clicking group shots. Some riders decided to leave right after that since they had to reach their respective destinations sooner than planned. We bid farewell to them and moved to a small open area just beside the hotel.

This was an empty space where we could park all the bikes and take group shots. It took us a good one hour to park all the bikes on either side of the road. We had to make sure that the bikes were safe on the road that was in a slope. Once everything was in place, we spent time posing around in groups and clicking pictures. The Kerala folks had to cover quite a lot of distance that day and decided to leave quickly. Once we were done with the photo shoots, we got back to the hotel and started packing our stuff. Lunch was served in parallel. Kiran, myself and the financial volunteers from the different cities gathered together to do the accounts and settled it to the hotel folks.

A lot of the riders were losing patience since it was well past noon and decided to start by themselves. We had roughly 70 bikes left when we started the return leg. I spent quite some time with the video camera again trying to mount in to my helmet. I used a bungee cord to first strap it tightly and then used duct tape to adjust the angle to the desired level. I left a few minutes earlier so that I could test the setup and also find a sweet spot to start the shoot. I was followed by another rider and we managed to take the wrong route and get lost. We waited for about 20 minutes and later realized that the bikes were obviously not going to come that way. We went all the way back from where we had taken a detour and then took the right path. I was slightly racing down so that I wouldn't miss the ghat section shoot. The rider behind was having a hard time catching up with the Ninja.

We were done with almost 16 of the 20 hair pin bends in the hill. I was slowly losing hope that I would find these guys. Suddenly just before a corner, I saw Kiran and some bikes standing with a black 220. When I stopped, Kiran came by and explained that there was a small fall and that he was trying to fix things. He asked me to proceed and alert the group waiting down, since there was no signal in the place these guys were standing. I chose to send the message with the rider who was with me, and came back to help these guys. The fall had caused the fairing of the bike to shift out of place, but the handlebar and forks were in tact. The front mud flap was scraping with the wheel and the guys broke it apart to let the wheel move freely. After the small tinkering job, Kiran took it out for a spin to ensure that the bike was ridable. When he returned, he nodded signing positivity. He asked the rider of the bike to take his ZMA and rode the broken bike till the downhill. I managed to shoot a small video around the very few curves that were left.

All the others were eagerly waiting for us down there. I saw a sign of relief in some of the faces when they came to know there was nothing major that happened. Kiran and I chose to stay back to take the bike to the mechanic shop to completely remove the mud flap. We asked the rest of the gang to move on to A2B and wait for us there. Back at the mechanic shop, we couldn't remove the nuts since they were too tight. We rather chose to chop them off with a blade to save time. I asked Kiran to lead and offered to follow. I expected him to do somewhere around 60 or 70, but this bugger opened the throttle wide to take it to 120. I was starting to wonder what exactly was wrong with the bike! We entered A2B in no less than 40 minutes, only to find that the rest of the gang had just made it there a few minutes back. We were close to Dharmapuri then. The Bangalore folks had about 130 kms to cover, whereas the Chennai folks had close to 300. We decided not to waste time and quickly gathered the Chennai folks. We bid farewell to the Bangalore gang and got back on the highway.

There were two Chennai groups now. One was us, while the other was the slow group that started an hour before we started from Yercaud. We were planning to meet them at Vellore for dinner. I indicated all the riders that I would be going up and down the line for a few minutes just to grab a video after all the hard work I had put in to mount that camera on to the helmet. I shot a good five minutes and finally parked the bike by the side to find out how the recording had come. I was shocked to see that the shakes caused during the ride had corrupted the current recording as well as the one recorded on the ghats. I was left with the small clippings I had taken the previous day. Well, all I could do was just smile and start riding again. I had a group to catch.

At Krishnagiri, the road splits towards Chennai, where the gang waited. We took a small 5 minute break and moved on. I was constantly on the watch since riders are prone to getting tired after so much stress. Most riders had got the hang of the others in the gang and the chemistry between them was becoming slowly visible. Apar was leading the gang with Kiran sweeping. Kiran also had a couple of slow riders with him and patiently rode with them to ensure their safety. Just after Ambur, we synced up with the other group that was ahead. Calculating the timings, it was clear that we could catch them at Vellore. Just as planned, they were waiting for us at the entrance of the town. When we regrouped, we chose a hotel on the highway to have dinner. We got a separate A/C hall and we ordered stuff that was ready to save time.

Some riders went into the town to top up while the rest of the gang waited on the highway. We chose to stick together as a group from then on. Our only checkpoint was Kanchipuram before finally parting off just outside Chennai. We stuck to average speeds of 85 kmph that was comfortable to everyone. I was leading the pack and was happy to see the entire group on my rear view mirror most of the time. 80 seemed to be the magic number, since anything more than that, some of them at the end were lost. When we stopped at Kanchipuram, some even complained they were falling asleep. I reassured them I had the same problem too, and so chose to dance to the tunes playing between my ears.

I checked my mobile to find that John had left a message saying that the Bangalore group had reached safe. It took us slightly more than an hour to finally reach the Poonamallee bye pass where we all agreed to finally meet. Kiran was still the patient guy at the end who rode with the slower bikes. When they arrived, we all thanked each other for the wonderful time we had spent in the last couple of days. I left John a message saying that we had all reached safe. One bike after the other, we slowly cleared out the place.

Close to 90 riders, this was the maximum turn out an xBhp G2G has ever had (as on June 23, 2010) and I'm glad I was a part of it.

Praveen, Out of curiosity, A dumb question from me..Hadn't your GPS lead you to correct path down the hill? I am unaware of how the GPS works, that made a way to ask this stupid query...Pardon me..

Good question. But, I didn't have the GPS at that time. When I was experimenting with the camera and the GPS mount, I put it back inside.

Picasa Web Albums - 10362965151704258... - TriState- Ban...#

Nice log Praveen..Sad to know about the videos..was really looking forward to it..

Thanks Arnab..i am honoured..May you get your Classic sooner than expected
And man, I am no Sirjee..am still a junior

i thought of seeing couple of r1s n busas in the g2g but there was not even one in the pics...

Didn't those 2 white ZMR's remind you of busa? They were gorgeous & I'm very much tempted to book one!!!

Thanks ... I will post them soon

Until the pics from DSLRs are posted...

Breakfast


Riders' riding gear


Bikes parked at A2B


Waiting for Chennai Gang


John taking aim


Santa's Comet


Photo Shoot


Karate Kids


Blue R15s (with two screamers)



EDIT: How do I post pictures in their original resolution? Third party image hosting?

Post the pics in Picase or flickr & provide the links here

Nice write up Xinfiii...
Now I will find and replace Ninjaa with Zma and put it in my blog

Nice write up

@xinfii : Nice write up. Wish you could have taken pics instead of trying videos.

Fine

Prolly, For yelagiri/horsley hill ride we can expect you in ZMR

Yeah, +100

@ Hyper

Nice pics

@ Raghav

Still you are searching for cable beloody

My Touring Spirit!!! - What a way to start !!!



The arousal of my touring spirit!!!

It has always been in my back of mind but I never tried it down. Some or the other would hinder in the way and stop it. Used to get relived when I started owning my own and doesn't have to depend on others. Finally I own a Yamaha, it's a 153cc urban legend FZ-16 from Yamaha stable last year. With one of the best looking bike I rejuvenate me from all the personal set-downs and the only things which I had is my bike and me set all alone in the beautiful stretches of ECR and the Bangalore Highway.

Been travelling out with my friends on the caged 4 wheels many times since they doesn't know the pleasure one would get by riding the motorcycles. Tried couple of times to plan a ride with my colleagues to Mahabs and Pondicherry, and went on to do some solo trips - cant say trips, a dash down to Vellore and Gingee. People who knew would call be crazy, yes am crazy about bikes and riding them as frequent as possible. I was that crazy that during my college days I used to ride from tambaram to thiruvanmiyur on his RX135 just as a driver J - just to ride the bike and take bus back to my house in velachery

When I first got my unicorn in 2004, I wanted to some modifications to my bike with now knowledge about them just like the posers. But slowly realized about biking, motorcycles and the riders safety. Later in 2009 I sold of my unicorn and got myself FZ-16. Done many short trips with my friends but it's not easy to make them very skeptical to come always. Was in search of like-minded people and finally landed on Xbhp.com the place where I found not only the like-minded bikers but also people who could give their guidance and support to the budding bikers/tourer like me.

Biking has always been the one which would free me whenever I had some stress and troubled thoughts in my life. Recent times, it was like me crossing a rough sea, and was finding all possible blocks in whichever way I moved. Was totally stress down and laid low, that's the time when I don't know what to do next so took my bike out and jus rode the way the roads lead. As the ride went on I was getting clearer and clearer, by the time I returned back I was very clear of the problems what lie before and how should I proceed further in clearing them one by one.

One by one I slowly cleared them, some I solved it, some I accepted the way it is and started to live with it so that later point of time I can decide on it, some of it I left them to cool down. That's the time when the touring bug started in me. started to me more active in my biking community by attending G2G's and doing some solo rides. Then there is the MEGA G2G plan came up, which boosted my inner self. Even though I thought of procuring the riding gears for long time, but this is the time I really focused on getting them for sure whatever happens. With some blessing from the ultimate one -yep, it must the god in disguise since when I tried to order the riding gears online, I had the sale coming up for the exact riding gears which I looked for and also my friends were coming down to India on the right time what else is needed for a biker like, I just went ahead and ordered the Riding shoes, pants, Jackets and gloves so that I can be well ready for the first real touring I am going to start.

Preparation for my Soul

Now as the spirit has risen, it got to be well prepared for the coming trips. So started meeting the people for advise and preparation by attending the pre-ride G2G's which tuned not only my riding style also gave my bike the insight of what it has to go through in the coming weekends.

First pre-ride G2G, we meet up at CTC with Kiran, Sriram, Ganesh, Tarun, Deepak, Raghav and rode to vallakottai near sriperumbadur. It was a nice ride and weather was awesome. We discussed a lot about bikes and the upcoming ride. Got lot of insights what too except during a ride and the things to be made sure before the ride. We didn't stop there, we decided on meeting up the next week with more members to much more longer ride. So we had discussions over the place for the weekend all down till Friday and fixed up the place to Amrithi forest near Vellore.

As Usual Sunday morning, set the alarm to 4 am but I woke up only by 5, as I stay in tambaram it would be late for me to reach the meeting point CTC, so message Kiran and Raghav that am running late and will meet them near the savitha Dental college on the highway. By 6 I reached there and joined the group from there. From there we were cruising on the highway with our formation and stopped near kanchipuram for Ram.

Raghav passed a comment that he somehow though it was some guy on a blue Fazer, who was touring on his own. Only when i Pulled up in front of them he realise my motocross pants can actually and in a strange way remind of the Fazer's fairing. LOL

After regrouping we headed to the nearest Petrol Bunk for a Fuel Stop, where a few of us filled up and headed off towards Vellore. It was already 6.30 by then and we had to make up for the lost time, so we decided against breaks and were averaging only about 80. The Lesser experienced riders like me ,amit and surabith stuck to the center of the formation. we had a bad time communicating signals as we had either forgotten or unaware that it needs to be passed on. I was however aware of a few and passed it on to so that it would flow on till the sweeper for the morning ride, Aargee, who was doing a great job and keeping an eye out for newbie's like me. After some seventy odd kays of travel, we met up with Ram(Whizkid_ram) who was there on his Apache 150 and a brand new CROSS helmet. Here we took a couple of seconds to explain to the group to pass on the signals and to stick to the formation. I would say that this is where the fun began. Ten Odd bikes ranging from The new Yammie R-15 to Ye Ol' faithful RX, were maintaining a staggered formation right in the center most lane in one of the most perfect stretch of roads accessible to us! One funny thing I noticed when overtaking a bus was that one of the passengers kept signaling to all of us reminding them that our headlights were on! This was a common scene from there on. We reached Vellore by 9 something and entered the town. We found our way to Hotel Saravana Bhavan for a Scrumptious Breakfast and a light and informal introduction between us. There too were people wondering what we were doing. We had strange questions asked to us.

One such question which raghav got from a cager was, What are you guys from Chennai doing here? When he told him we rode down to Vellore for breakfast and as a kind of a pre-ride meet up, He was confused but politely wished us a safe ride back.





From there we next headed to Amrithi Forest. I had no clue how it would be and heard about it many times and the favorite one of Srini! First it seemed like a normal State highway, filled with enraged bus drivers or cagers. at what appeared like a few hazards thrown around, the numbers started to multiply and hand signals became frequent. At one point of time, a few of them got frustrated and started to point and wave at the side most of the hazards where. It had became a game of judging what was bad and what was worse! But some of the bends were real beauties. It was enchanting to watch 8 odd bikes in the back, corner them in grace at almost perfect and safe distance from each other. I wish we had a photographer stationed at the turns and capture the moment! After finishing the Amrithi Obstacle course, we reached the Amrithi Zoological park. after parking our bikes, we quickly started talking about the ride and realized we had traveled about 10 kms around the road. As a few of us were unsure about plans were briefed again and hand signals were quickly explained. Next in line was formations and Kiran took a brief class for us and gave us a list of quick tips on highway conditions and routes.











While a few us decided to talk about the Lunch a few started to discuss spares. After wrapping up with the talks. I shared the chocolates which I took along for some energy to ride back home. While coming back home we had taken a short route which ended up in small water body to be crossed. everyone was skeptical in corssing but soon we had a local guy riding his bike across the water and soon we followed the same trail and one by one reched the other side.
Rode back with lot of information about the group riding, touring and safety measures to be taken care while riding; which helped me a lot in the upcoming MEGA G2G.








Preparation for 'The Ride'

Got my bike serviced on 15th itself and Planned to take off on 18th to meet up with couple more Chennai gang as small G2G for getting the spares and tools for the ride. Unfortunately, office work came in the last moment and got to be in office on 18th. Asked Aargee to get the basic need - clutch and break cables for my ride and was breaking my head at office eagerly waiting to leave home. Finally, completed my work and left home by 8pm, on the way filled up the tank to full.

The D-Day Ride

By 9 started packing the bags, keeping the necessary things all in one place so that early morning I shouldn't in a tension of looking where it is and went to sleep by 10.30pm. Only to get up by 11 with no sleep, the enthusiasm has crept in long time back so sleep deprived me; but managed to get some sleep for 3 hours and woke up by 2 am. As soon as I woke up I messaged Tarun and amit that I will be there at the pallavaram meeting point by 3 and tried calling them to give a wake-up call confirmed about the meeting point.

Got ready, packed all the required stuff in bag, geared up and went down to the parking place to see my bike ready to ride. Mounted my bag at the back, with a couple of pictures before starting and left home by 3. My security while opening the gate, gave me a look - might be he must be thinking where this crazy guy leaving in middle of night with all those riding gears (weird stuffs in his case).






After initial engine warm-up ride for a kilometer, gradually increased my speed to be on time in pallavaram; Tarun was already there waiting with C5 and soon Surbhit joined us. After few minutes amit too joined and from there we all started to the common meeting point CTC. By the time we reached CTC, Kiran and Ganesh(Aargee) was already waiting for us. We started parking our bikes and following us we had other group of riders reaching CTC and by now we had around 15 bikes. Kiran gave us the XBHP stickers and it was branding time as all were busy sticking the stickers on their bikes. As I was the CFO for the Chennai team started collecting the Trip Fund from all of them and we had the routine checks for the bike papers. After that we had small briefing session, where we had Praveen gave us the instructions, and also we had a small intro section within ourselves.




Praveen signaled for engine on and then on we all started rolling on NH and our next stop was to catch up with Yuvaraj and Manoj who were waiting for us near Savitha Dental college. After re-grouping we left a message to Ram that we are starting so that he could come and wait for us in Kanchipuram. Our next stop was at Kanchipuram which gave most of us the required nature call break and fag-break. After we split into two groups one group doing fast group (100+) and other one slow group (80+). I was in the 80+ group and was leading them till Vellore in the cruising speeds of 85-90. We reached Vellore Saravana Bhavan 10 min ahead of our planned time which was really good even with a 10 min break for photography, butt and fag-break.
























We had a good breakfast which would permit us do the miles to cover with ease. From there we proceed further on our way to meet up with the Bangalore team; we stopped briefly near the junction to know where the bangy gang was waiting for us and based on their information we started moving forward another couple of kays we find our biking brothers waiting at us to keep left. what a gathering man!! We had 44 bikers welcoming us and what a sight to be welcomed like that . Actually we stopped there so that we can try to get introduced but man with a crowd 60+ that wasn't possible on the highway so we started to roll as 2 groups one the fast group(100+) and the slow group(80+).









We reached A2B near Salem for Lunch and the common people who had already having lunch there was awestruck and wondering looking at us who entered there with full riding gears. As all the bikers were settling down in the available tables, some got themselves settled in the shade nearby. As we had a huge gathering, taking orders from each and everyone was tough so we went ahead and ordered veg-meals for most of except for few curd rice and couple of Fried Rice. Once the Lunch was over, we had a small briefing about the ride we are going to take in the hill section and then all were set to ride. We rode for another 20 odd kms and reached the foot hills of yercaud by traversing through the Salem traffic.


















We had a short break for 15 mins then all started to climb uphill in a single-line formation. I was having really fun to ride in the hills for the first time in bike and was more excited and cautious when I was taking each and every hairpin. Was eager to trying my cornering skills but with the luggage on the bike and following a group it wasn't really advisable to do so planned to come down in the morning to try my cornering. We all again re-grouped once we reached top and waited until Kiran and praful went to guide the 30 bikers to Aishwarya Inn. Then the remaining all us went to MM Inn for our stay. We checked into the rooms and the first thing I did was to get rid of the gears and get the feel of air . Slowly one by one parked their bikes unloaded their luggage and went to the rooms. Soon coffee was served and with that we all started discussing about the bikes, some about the places to see there and some on the modifications for their bikes. Kiran, Praveen and Apar shared their Leh experiences. I had bath to be fresh after the ride and took the cam out to capture some shots. Along with few others we all moved to "Pakoda view Point" which was only 2 kms from our stay to get the feel of the Salem city in night and the ghat roads. This is the time when all the SLR cams were in action. They took some amazing shots and am eagerly waiting to see them; hoping the photographers would share them soon


























After that we came down to our stay and by the time, the other gang from the 2nd resort came have gathered in our MM Inn for campfire. All were pulling around john for his trademark dance move but john wasn't ready to show his move. Then all headed to have dinner and we chatted through our dinner and I moved to my room early to sleep so that I can get up early in the morning to go for a ride in the fog.







Got up by 6.45am to see aargee cleaning his bike and praful, john and others already done with the fog capture and leaving to a nearby waterfall. I tried waking up raghav, by that amit and surbhit had got up and was ready to give me company riding to down the hairpin's. soon we had raghav and ram joining us.. Sriram, Tarun, Deepak also wanted to join us so we were waiting for them. they were taking some time to get ready so we (me, amit, surbhit, ram and raghav) moved to View point for some fog view over the mountains and also a personal photography sessions. Soon we were joined by Sriram, Tarun and Deepak. so we had some more photo sessions and moved to the ghat section for the cornering. Deepak wanted have tea, so we stopped near lake and had tea. I finished my black tea early and with surbhit planned to start and reach a hairpin which would be the best place for the cornering. Man with so much excitement, we took a wrong route went towards some more place, as the roads were nice we kept on going and realized late that it was wrong path and tied reaching the others to check whether they followed us or took the correct route. No luck with the phone too.. So we returned back to find Sriram also lost his track and we three started to ride down the hairpins to find them. I kept on going and after sometime I lost both surbhit and Sriram in my RVM's, but the hairpins were so tempting that I kept on riding down all the 20 hairpins by that the other gang amit, Tarun, ram, Deepak, raghav was returning back. They went down to the foot hills and were returning as they didn't see us.
















As already we got a call from kiran informing us that the breakfast is read, we had a quick photo shoot of us taking the corners in one of the hairpins. We had a small hiccup as ram tried to literally do a knee down which resulted in a small fall and amit all time missing his target to take the turn. We quickly wrapped the shoot and headed back to the resort, on the way up we saw few bikes zooming past us down and later when we reached the resort we came to know that the bikes zoomed past us were praful and few other bikers who left early to Bangalore. Even though we had some nice time cornering but we missed the fun part of the entire gang had in the resort while setting up for a group photo in the resort. Later we got our t-shirts and moved to nearby location to take a mega group photo with all our bikes.







First we tried arranging the bikes in a single formation and as the bikes were in n numbers, even the widest lens which we all had was not able to capture the group even with Ravi climbing onto a tree nearby. So as he had climbed the tree we made him to shoot the group in 3 parts and later moved all the bikes to a nearby slope to take the formation. It took us almost an hour to arrange the bikes in a formation in that heat and finally once all were done we had a the grand photo shoot taken by the self-timers. After that the Kerala gang moved since they got to cover up lot of distance to reach their place. Everyone were back to the resort and lunch were served. Me, kiran, Praveen and Ravi (Bangalore CFO) gathered to do the accounts to settle the hotel guys.

Soon all were packing up their bags onto their bikes and were ready to roll back to their respective cities. Everyone started to move and decided to meet up downhill. We all were bid farewell to the chilly mountains and the beautiful twisters and were riding down that's when we saw one of our mate has crashed. We stopped few meters away from the spot later were kiran asked us to move downhill to avoid confusion on the stop as traffic was flowing that time. So we all rode back downhill and waited after the check post for the other to reach us. Soon we had call saying that they have started from the hill and everything if fine except for the bike which had lost its nose. Since it was getting late for all, Praveen and kiran decided to stay back and fix the bike meanwhile asked us to move ahead and wait at A2B.

Everyone started their bikes and proceeded ahead to A2B and this time I was following Apar this time, was superb to follow him with his R15's beat tuning my ears. slowly I let all the fast bikes cross me and was in the tail end on the group. We reached A2B and Apar has received a message by that time from Praveen stating they had started from the mechanic shop. Do some math Apar suggested that it would take another one hour or so for them to reach here so we can have a 10 min break and keep moving since they can catch up with us. Jus been minutes we discussed about this we heard the beats of Ninja slowing down and saw Praveen and Kiran in the fixed pulsar. amazing to see kiran ripping the damaged pulsar in 120+ to reach here.

After a break for refreshments the Chennai gang parted away from Bangalore since we had around 300 kms to cover and it was getting dark. With some group photos and lots of tumbs up, byes and claps we left A2B and headed towards Chennai. we all were doing 100+, when we had some company of a spy ride - which overtook Apar (he was doing 110+) with ease, we all were astonished as the bike looked like a small moped from TVS but not sure which one was it since it was covered fully. We had a small break for 5 min near krishnagiri and then again moved forward to have dinner in vellore. We had fun time in finding the place for parking our bikes and luck enough to find a small a/c hall for our gang. It was fun to see everyone order the dinner form Chola Poori, Parottas and idlies. After dinner few moved to tank up their bikes and others moved ahead few kms ways and waited for them. with kanchipuram in mind as the next stop we ripped in 90+ for the next 70 kms and reached kanchipuram for a short break and also to wait for the slow group to catch up. once they all came we bid farewell to Ram who needs one few kms to reach his home in kanchipuram and headed forwarded with next stop near Savitha dental college.

All were ripping and zigzagging the lorry traffic and that the fate struck and bike hit reserve which was way earlier that I had thought. With time almost 11pm and not sure whether my bike would cope up the another 60 km ride; so I slowed down and asked others to move informing them I would reach the meeting point after filling. I turned back to fill petrol and it took me 4 bunks and some another 10km to find a bunk. Filled up petrol and rode back to join group waiting. Soon we had the slow group reaching and really got to appreciate Kiran here to sweep the slow group which was doing 50+. From here everyone started to part their ways and me, Tarun, Amit and surbhit hit the Chennai-bypass to reach our destination Tambaram. After reaching tambaram I said my byes to others and reached my home by 12.30am with 897kms on my odo.

2 days of fun, riding, biking brotherhood in my mind I went back to sleep after messaging couple of Chennai members that I reached home safe and the entire experience running in my mind.

It was a real pleasure to ride with you all Kiran, Praveen, Amit, Aargee, Sriram, Yuvaraj, Manoj, Raghav, Dev, Deepak, Tarun, Apar, Atul, Ashwin, Vicky, Surbhit, Dev and it was great to meet the Bangalore, Coimbatore and Kerala members. Was able to chat with few and hoping to meet you all in future inter-state G2G's.

Note: Here i got to give credits to Raghav, Sriram and Tarun who had shared their photographs of pre-ride G2G which i have used them in log. thanks Guys.

P.S. Camera battery drained out in the morning itself so have shared the pictures which were good in the collection i have taken. eagerly waiting for the SLR's images in real.

^^ Brilliant!