The Ultimate Motorbike Trip: Manali - Ladakh

This is supposed to be one of the most challenging and exhilaration biking routes in the world: Delhi-Manali-Sarchu-Leh. My own experience confirms this. The nine days seemed like an overstretched dream that beat all the odds of reality. So many things experienced and learnt. I can go ahead and write a super long trilogy of a blog as someone suggested. But I will keep this extremely brief, going more into those critical moments in our trip… some which gave us a reason to smile for eternity… some which shook our very foundations of will power and faith. At the end of it, I was just happy to come back rugged, tanned, leaner, meaner and alive.

Srinath, Sanjay (Srinath’s bro), Praveen, Prasanna and Srinath’s dad were the others on this trip. We rented a 500cc Bullet, 2 x 350cc Thunderbirds for this trip. Srinath got his own newly bought Thunderbird for this trip.

We got as many “fundaes” on this motorbiking trip as possible before starting. They didn’t even cover 10% of what we experienced. When you set out on a mission, make sure you are thoroughly prepared or you have infinite will power in case you turn out to be a fool. We really turned out to be fools, heavily underprepared for the weather, terrain, food, strain, bike problems etc. But we had the will power to beat all odds.

We planned this trip for 9 days, during the last week of July 2010, on a watertight plan: 3 days onw ard journey, 3 days stay at leh and 3 days return journey, covering around 3000 km in 9 days. A total roadmap to become zombies on paper.

We had to cover Delhi – Manali stretch on day 1, starting at 6am. Srinath’s dad who rode his Thunderbird, met with an accident on the highway immediately after Sonepat. The silencer fell on his leg and burnt his skin and twisted his muscles. Bike was damaged badly. Fortunately we were able to get to a doctor as well as locate an enfield showroom. We lost several hours there. Srinath’s dad took a cab and went back to Delhi to take rest. While we were supposed to reach Chandigarh by 10am, we ultimately reached there by 5pm.

When we started ascending the hills, it was 8pm and still 267km to Manali. The heavy truck traffic killed our coordination. I was riding Srinath’s bike in which the headlight pointed upward due to the accident. In the night, I was able to see all the trees but nothing on the road. With deep valleys on my left and trucks charging at me with heavy beam lights, it was really scary to drive. I should have fallen into the valley a hundred times over, but during moments like these I had to focus on the tail light of the vehicle in front of me and just follow it with all faith no matter how blinding the truck lights from the opposite side were.

We stopped at 10:30 for dinner, covering only 40km in 2.5 hours. Manali was still 220km away. Dinner boosted our morale and the truck traffic ceased by 11:00. We rode till 1:30 in the night with amazing coordination, but did a zombie-ride in the last 1 hour which nearly had us killed. We finally stopped at a cockroach infested motel for the night

We got up at 7am on Day 2 and by the time we got started on road, it was 11:00 am. We knew that the best we could do was reach Manali and just halt there for the night. The ride was pretty peaceful one and we reached Manali by 5pm. There was one incident though. I switched to a different bike on Day 2. There was a 1km tunnel entering which I discovered that my light wasn’t working so I started following the vehicle in front. On a bend the vehicle in front went right but I couldn’t follow it properly, hitting the wall on my left. I kept switching the light button on-off several times hoping it would work but it didn’t. 5 mins in complete darkness with no vehicle in front or back and no fking light in the tunnel, all I could do was honk to save myself from any oncoming vehicle. The lights finally switched on, and it was relief seeing the daylight when I rode outside

We were supposed to reach a place called Sarchu on Day 3. Rohtang pass was really rough and there was a huge traffic jam at one point

On the way, another bike accident and some repairs snatched 2 hours. And while crossing a critical stream at 7pm, my bike fell into the water. It couldn’t start and it was too dark to repair it. Since there was another stream ahead, all of us parked our bikes and with heavy baggages started walking. There was no soul for miles around and it was super cold. There was a light in at some 5km distance which was our only hope and we kept inching towards it in our drained out state in the cold. Fortunately we got a lift from a military truck which was doing its emergency rounds to drop us off at the nearest camp. It was a relief to come back to life from the brink of losing all hope.

The first half of Day 4 was spent on trying to get my bike repaired. That included taking out the water in the carburetor and fixing a puncture. Thanks to bike expert Prasanna and Srinath for the bike fundaes. I learnt so much hands on stuff all there was to learn on the bikes. We reached Sarchu camp that evening and halted for the night.

Seemed like the first 4 days were worth it for all the hardship we had to go through… bike repairs, accidents and terrible roads. Day 5 was the ride of a lifetime. We kept biking and encountered such variety of terrains… dusty plains, green valleys, snow covered mountains, a ride through mountains with a grand canyon type of look, a place looking like the climax location of Indiana Jones’ Last Crusade. Wow! This is what I was alive for. After all the rough terrain, around 100km from Leh started the smooth tar road. By this time, the desire to reach Leh was on a super-high. Couldn’t resist gliding at 100 kmph on the Thunderbird, give hi-fi s to school kids lining up on the road to give me one, greet fellow Enfield bikers with a thumbs-up signal, get a hero’s welcome by people waving at our convoy formation ride on the streets. I had finally reached heaven. Some pics of the ride:

Srinath’s dad flew down to Leh to get our hotel booked and we joined him. We stayed for one day in Leh. Visited magnetic hill (which was just overhyped) and got the bikes repaired.

We planned to return via a different route: Srinagar-Jammu-Delhi since the onward journey was really tough. On Day 7, we started toward Srinagar and the road was really pathetic. At the time of sunset, we were caught in a hill, with steep narrow path full of slush. At the same point we were struggling to get the bikes through thick layers of wet mud, fog engulfed us completely. That was a brilliant “horror-movie” moment. We had to ride really close and tight to not get lost. We couldn’t reach Srinagar that night but we stopped at Sonemarg that day, 80km from Srinagar.

On Day 8, we set toward Srinagar and on the outskirts we were warned of all hell breaking loose with rapid stone throwing. And I like a brave warrior volunteered to lead our 4 bike convoy. We took a pic of us just in case something happened:

As we rode, every face looked hostile. Every person looked like an enemy. I am not being prejudiced when I make this statement. We were sure happy to have come out alive without any harm done on us. At night we reached Udhampur where Prasanna and Srinath’s dad took bus to Delhi. Prasanna was having terrible stomach problem in the previous few days and Srinath’s dad’s leg still heal. The rest 4 of us went to have dinner. After riding rhrough all the dust, we looked like coal mine workers and we were laughing looking at each other. After dinner we continued on the Udhampur – Pathkot highway where we stopped at a hotel at 1:30 in the night.

When we were sleep riding in the middle of the night through highway bypass we spotted a camel in the middle of the road chewing grass at a random place with no civilization for miles around it. It was such a moment where I really couldn’t differentiate between dream and reality. A hardcore “Inception” moment

On Day 9, we had to do a marathon ride to reach Delhi by 7pm since Praveen and Prasanna’s flight was at 8pm. 500km in 10 hours. We stretched our riding like hell through the roads of Punjab and reached Kurukshetra by 3:30pm. Sanjay, who was riding Srinath’s Thunderbird yet again, met with an accident at 100kmph when he was pushed aside by an overspeeding car. Though he didn’t get injured, the vehicles which applied breaks to a screeching halt, sent 2 people flying out of a bike which rammed into one car which did the sudden break in front of them. That was a totally shocking moment. It was God’s grace that he came out alive. But the bike was totally bent and twisted.

Me and Srinath sent Sanjay and Praveen on a bus and arranged for truck to tow the other bikes to Delhi. It was a good decision as Praveen and Prasanna were able to catch flight. After returning the rented bikes to the agency, we returned home by 11:30 to Srinath’s house in Gurgaon. I had lost every bit of water in my body through this ordeal. I managed to catch some sleep and wake up in time to catch my flight next morning. It was such a relief to be back in Bangalore

Caught in the act

This is a very random incident which I had earlier wanted to put on blog.

This happened in Trichy. I was going to my cousin's house and I had just got down from the bus. It was around 10pm and the whole place was totally dark and dead silent. I had to walk 1km on the main road to take the first turn to enter the residential area, which was further 1km inside from the main road. I was sort of sure that I was walking on the right path but couldnt find any living soul to confirm it.

Then, out of nowhere two bikers appeared and stopped in front of a T junction. I was walking toward the T junction which was still around 50m from me. These guys got down from their bikes to take a leak. And now started the fun.

Exactly then, a tourist van filled with people appeared. The driver seemed lost as the van slowed down when it was approaching us. The van driver didnt spot me so he stopped his van in front of the bikers, with headlights all blazing on them. It took these bikers taking a leak by total surprise that these guys were embarassed but couldnt help it as they were not finished. One of the bikers shouted in tamil "Macha, we have been caught!"

Me, and the whole van roared in laughter. LOLMAO!

Design Inspiration for Tata Nano

A seminal work on unintentional humour

This is a dedication to my cousin Anirudh, who decided to buy the book: Hypnotism For Everybody by Pandit Laksmhi Doss.

I was at my aunt's house this weekend. Enjoying nice temperate climate, it was a perfect setting to read nice books and relax. Getting fed up after trying out 3 random books including a Sidney Sheldon novel, I decided to read the book on hypnosis, just for something different. When I started reading the book, I couldnt help but notice the bad editing, pathetic grammar , citing of random examples and unintentional humor that lay in the narration technique to describe what the author wanted to tell.

The main thing to note is that the author is a tamilian, who has converted his talk in tamil to english word-by-word, and especially reading it with this in mind makes it extra humorous. Further, the humor is like a progressive piece of music with a grand crescendo!

I am replicating exactly the Introduction section of the book, so that you can imagine the stuff in rest of the book.

INTRODUCTION

Hypnotism is a branch of science or may be considered as an art connected with the mind. Among the various branches of education as Physics, Chemistry, Biology, Engineering,Medical, Geology, etc. Hypnotism is also a branch of study. At present times the nature of study and job are different, for example a science graduate is employed in a Bank or firm. (Eh?)

Hence he almost forgets that he has studied in college. But hypnotism is both study and practice. All these branches are about the matter outside the human mind and its functions. But Hypnotism is a subject of study dealing with what is inside the mind (which is in the brain) and what are its powers. (Heh!)

Hypnotism means to influence others to do an act for the benefit of them, by the strong will power of the hypnotist. In the man kind when we analyse, we find that there are certain persons with extra brain power or mental capacity. This can be noticed in all walks of life,whether in educational field or in music or painting or in acting and so on. Several thousands of people gather to hear the speech of a leader. (Hmm...)

This leader is able to impress upon the audience his way of thoughts. This is also a way of Hypnotism.Often the physical personality does not seems to be a major factor for this leadership. There are several people with charismatic physical appearance but they are not able to talk even a few words before a crowd. The essential factor to be a powerful hypnotist is his will power. Hypnotism is concentration the mind,with purity of thought word and deed. (Fair enough)

The dictionary meaning of hypnotism is that the this word comes from hypnosis meaning Greek God of sleep. Hypnosis means a sleep like state of mind in which the mind responds to the external suggestions of the hypnotist and can recover forgotten memories. Hypnoanalysis means analysis of a person's psychological troubles by obtaining informations from him while he is in a state of sleep. (So where is this going?)

Water is flowing through the river But when a dam is constructed across the river water gathers. By some technical means electricity is produced. There is air every where when more air s inflated in a tube and covered by a tyre makes bus, lorry or cycle to go on road. (LOL!)

Even expenditure has to be controlled according to income. A commodity is put under control for equal distribution. People have to be controlled by the Government and a constitution is framed. Now population control is the major issue throughout the world. When all these are controlled man is not aware of the mind control. Mind when it is controlled and directed towards a proper course the powers are many. (LOL-o-LOL!)

Any branch of knowledge can be used for the benefit of the people and society or to destroy everything. Atoms theory was invented. The result is that one nation is afraid of the other about the atom bomb. A typewriter is an essential machine for use the office to type official letters. But when a clerk uses the machine to type a love letter to a co-lady clerk, the defect is not in the typewriter, it is on the part of the man using the typewriter. (ROFL!)

Any power should never be misused. So also Hypnotism. When a hypnotist uses his power to the evil of others it is not worthy and desirable on his part since his thoughts are not pure. (So also Hypnotism... what Tinglish)

Any action against the laws of a nation is a crime. So also a hypnotist should never use his power for selfish motive or for the evil of others. In due course such persons will lose their power and will suffer a miserable fall. Swami Sivananda in writing his commentary in this had observed thus ,'Thought is as much a thing as the yonder piece of stone, having weight,colour and shape and size and form. It is a strong force. It is a force like gravitation or repulsion. Thoughts travel with the velocity which is unimaginable. Thought has much power.It can work wonders. This is supplied through food. Pure food gives pure thoughts. A pure thought is sharper than the edge of a razor (Yoga Sara Upanishad 1936 edition) (Wow... references!)

When a person wants to take up a Doctorate Degree in any subject he has to study well with concentration from the very first standard for a minimum period of twenty years. For getting proficiency in Veena etc one has to study well under a guru. HALF KNOWLEDGE IS DANGEROUS is the proverb. (:D)

Hence by reading one book or by practicing for one month one cannot arrive at the conclusion that he has got super power. Hypnotism is not like vegetable to be got how market by paying money (Hahaha...!). The man who wants to study the art has to read several books on the subject. Having got a full knowledge of subject he has to do regular steady practice, side by side controlling the senses, anger, lust irritability, ego etc. have to be removed from the mind only than his practices will bear fruit.

In concluding this I wish to state that this science deals on the mind, the center of life force, and that any wrong practice or any hasty method may harm the mind. Hence the author does not take any responsibility for any harm of the practioner due to irregular or wrong method or hasty conclusion. (Haha...) The publisher also takes no responsibility on this. (LOL!) But a slow and steady practice with earnestness, noble thoughts one can get surely. (Surely!)

(NOW HERE COMES THE CRESCENDO:)

"That is full -this is full -
From that fullness this fullness has come -
Though this fullness has been taken -
That fullness always remains full"

(Brihad Aranya Upanishad)

(LOL-y-pop!!!)

NICK OF TIME

Miracles happen. This was definitely one.

Me, Maro, Vijay and Tooms were going to attend Ashish's wedding. We had to board a 6:20pm train from Bangalore main railway station, and apart from Tooms all of us arrived by 6:10pm. Tooms had went to buy gifts and started from Indira Nagar at 5:40pm. Saturday evening traffic was starting to peak around this time. He got into an auto and asked him to race like hell to the station. Unfortunately the train was on Platform 2 which meant that he would have to take the overbridge in any case.

I was the only one who saw even the mildest possibility of him making it into the train when he started at Indira Nagar. Others just kept their hopes alive. But the ultimate shock came at 6:10

6:10 Tooms is at Richmond Circle. All of us see no hope of him making it to the train. We go blank. For me to come from Richmond Circle took 15 minutes to the station. This was a clear Mission Impossible.

6:11 I tell Tooms to rush and come, and promise him that we will delay the train.

6:12 We all rush to the engine driver and start dealing. I ask him to delay the train for 2 minutes and he gets whatever amount he wants.

6:15 Engine driver smiles and contemplates about actually taking the deal. He looks around, goes inside to think about it.

6:17 I see a possibility of him taking some cash but then some official enters the engine and I know that very moment that the deal is not gonna happen.

6:18 The engine drives politely refuses in the presence of the other official but I keep talking to keep the hope alive, however bleak it was.

6:19 Tooms is at the signal before the railway station. We hold our ground and I still keep talking to the driver.

6:20 The driver tells me that there is no other go and he cannot delay the train

6:21 The train starts 1 min late. It actually mattered, looking back in retrospect. Tooms reaches the outer gate of the station premises but he doesnt pick up my call because he is running. He dashes to cover 100m to enter the station at Platform 1

6:22 We guys still hold our ground, calm and cool, and watch compartments pass by us one by one. We go blank. Tooms meanwhile enters Platform 1, and through the window of the train standing on Platform 1, watches our train leave on Platform 2! He goes into a mad rush and enters the standing train, gets down across on the tracks, crosses the dividing water pipeline between Platform 1 and Platform 2, puts the gift on one door of S13 in our train which is already picking speed, goes back to the standing train, gets his suitcase and rushes back to put it on door of S12 (which has come in front of him by this time) and manages to get up on board

6:23 While we still wait with bated breaths I get the call: “Machi, I am in, get in already!” And we jump on board.

And the rest of the evening goes really smooth.

EPILOGUE: The engine breaks down sometime after 10pm and eventually our train reaches at 10:00 am instead of 5:40am, 4 hours and 20 minutes late!

VELLORE BIKE TRIP

In the last 5 days, Wednesday (Feb 24) – Monday (March 1), I have slept for only 15 hours. I do not feel sleepy. Rather, I am on an overdrive. Feels like I have lived in an elongated dream which didn’t cease to amaze me everytime I decided to push further and keep the momentum going.

I had to go to Sanjay’s wedding in Vellore on Thursday and the muhurat was at 9 am. Since I had taken leave on Thursday, I had to double my shift and complete the pending work, which took me 1 am to finish. However, a solo bike trip just went over everyone’s expectations over me. The amount of blows I received was just too much to handle. My boss blasted me for such a crazy trip. Mom pressed the panic button. I managed to convince Dad before he could blast me, fortunately. Coincidentally, my company accountant gave me the "happy” news that my ICICI accident cover policy had been activated for 5L. Wow… this trip was really worth dying for.

The only way I could go to the marriage function was if I do a bike trip starting at 5am, to reach on time for the muhurat. I decided to sleep for 2 hours and wake up at 3 and start getting ready and do a bit of warmup so that I stay active during the ride. Getting my backpack ready with wedding attire, juice, Gatorade and Red Bull, I managed to start from my home at 5am. My roommate Venkat Shastry was generous in giving me his Bajaj Avenger 200cc cruiser, otherwise I would have had to ride my Bajaj Platina on this trip.

This was the first time I was ever riding this bike. Really smooth and fast pickup. Felt like floating on the road. From my home I hit the NH207 in 15 min at 5:15 and headed to Kolar where I would have to take the state highway SH95. After battling the traffic under heavy head-on truck lamps and bad road works, I reached Kolar at 6:30, half an hour more than it should have taken. Sun finally came to my rescue and gave me a boost. SH95 was bad, but the rural scenery was awesome. Managed to catch a “Cow conclave” where buying-selling of cows and bulls took place. From Karnataka, I enetered Andhra at Venkatragirikota and further, crossed to Tamilnadu just before Peranampettu. The crossing from AP to TN was awesome… the plateau ended and I found myself on the top of a big mountain, going down in bends to reach the bottom of the valley. What a scenic beauty it was. I couldn’t stop to take pics because of lack of time and I thought of taking some while on the way back. Once I entered TN, the roads became awesome and I had only 1 hour left to the muhurat. 80 km in 1 hour was what I had to achieve if I wanted to get in time. And I loved the mad rush. I flew past everyone with such ease, I couldn’t believe it. It was starting to get into rush hour with school and college vans starting off in various villages. School children shouted, college kids cheered and whistled, footboarders on bus tried hard sledging me, people flocked around me to show me the way, when I stopped and asked for directions. Wow… thanks for the encouragement guys. Cruisers always command respect.

Ultimately I reached at 8:55. Nice timing. After freshening up and changing, I joined Saikat, Sushyant and gang to wait for the climax. I slept off on the chair and woke up just in time. We didn’t have much to do so we just idled and chatted for a while. These guys had come the previous night and had checked into a hotel, so at 11:30 they went to their hotel to check out and get the baggage. I had my lunch and started back at 12:45 because I decided to come back to Bangalore before sunset.

On the way back, I tried to retrace the route. But at Peranampattu, I headed in the wrong direction and reached Ambur. Since it was on the NH46 – NH7 route to Bangalore, I took it. What a highway it was… smooth and fast. Unfortunately my bike could only top 110kmph. I wish I had got my Enfield Classic 350 by this time so that I could be flying at 130kmph. Highway unfortunately was a boring and ass-numbing affair till Krishnagiri. After having a RedBull and giving my mom a 10 min call of assurance, I resumed journey. The Krishnagiri – Bangalore stretch was the path of ascent from plains to plateau with only 2 lanes. With trucks cramming and competing, the superfast ride was really interesting.

Reaching Silkboard junction, I joined the regular traffic which lacked any grace. Bikes + buses went buzzing like mosquitoes around elephants. Confronting the Bangalore pollution all of a sudden was a tough task. Reached home at 4:00. I crashed for a while and woke up at 6:00pm, and the rest 3 days continued in the same momentum with nightouts on watching movies, karaoke-ing, partying with very close US return college friends, battling fire alarms and hyper-gas leaks, to mention a few. Thanks to Red Bull Inc. And tonight, Monday March the 1st, I am at IIMB playing AOE.

Long live Ashish the bachelor, till he dies.

(from left: Me, Vijay(chair), Maro (back), Ashish and Sunil)