Pondy Time

As usual gyes gathered up at the adda for bikechat and thinkin where now, its sat night. ideas came out for a movie n mid night drag watch or a small night ride or go home to cozy bed etc etc... santhosh very exited for pondychery ride for the next day. but me wanted to leave now and spend more time there. with just me and santhosh thinkin of different stratejic approaches to pondechery. Me tooo wanted to do a pondy ride after reciveing the very good feed back form sanjay,keerthi and PraveenS bout the roads and would be nice to drive at night. Then ashwin and vicky were in and the ride was on. Me very skeptical still with a bad cold and night journey with it, but the temptation of the ride was too strong. Raghu was in too with just phone call and santhosh decided to leave the next morning after catching some sleep. 8:30 Family Mart was the meeting point for spontaneous trip. went home smuggled out some bike spares and cloths in bahana of a night out at friends place :D. 9 Pm all 4 gathered and started chatting. well don we have ride now, wat r we waiting for??? Then we started towards krishnagiri and planed to have dinner sumwhere near hosure. negotiating the dusty horrible traffice we pass hosure in search of a hotel of dhabha. me stopped on way to wrap towel around ma face (n helmet over it) to not worsen the cold i had. the open highways were chilly too. some forty KMs to k'giri we find the Forest dhaba and first pit stop for dinner. was already 10.20 pm. ordered some roties and curry for dinner. Aswin gets a cal dat his dear one has caught malaria and hospitalised. Ashwin has to go back now after the dinner. some loss of exitement with the remaining chaps. ashwin encouragin us to carry on. vicky saying "am ready for any thing, carry on or go back" same with raghu. me too kinda wanted to go back cos of my bad cold gettin badder. but decided we will decide a decision at k'giri. 11.30 time we leave with ashwin heading back to banglore. have a nice 40 km rip to k'giri still in two minds about to go or not. reach k'giri at 12 am cross the toll gate and put our thinking caps on. spent 15 mins looking at each other as wat to do. finally vicky said "lets go" so did raghu then me. OK the ride was on now.

had to take right for thiruvanamalai(err...tuff to rmbr the name :D). instead went into k'giri town and after some route enquiry headed in the right direction. me exited bout the good roads ahead. i was asked to lead. gladly took it cos din wanna feel sleepy following a tail lamp. but KMs pass and roads was filled with potholes and patches. was goin on and on and were in doubts whether we are goin through the correct route. but had parse strehes of good road but surprising deviaitons at place. at one place theres a deviation after a good strech which appeared suddently and i jam the breaks. both wheels lock and keep goin and instead of stopping cos of gravel. stopped short of 6 feet from the wall. well that took out what ever little sleep i had. based on the feed back i had pictured wide roads with very good reflectors. but where is dat. fruastration was growing cribbing bout the decision for carrying on. getting blinded and disorianted by on comming trucks. riding mostly on the center of the road and giving way when the opp vehicle was coming close. but the roads improved a bit with the center white line reflecting well and had reflectors on the center of the road in turns. had many sudden turns which needed quick leaning. cos we were doin speeds of 70-80. at one tank bund there were reflecters on the side wall and also on the center of the road but no road by the wall. the side wall reflectors were mis leading and had to frantically lean to stay on the road. giving goose bumps. but inna way was fun too. we reach thiruvanamalai at 2.20 am doin a 100 km non stop. stroll the empty streats a bit searching for a tea shop. found one so take a break for tea, coffee. 200 hundred kms on the odo 100 more to hit pondy. the temp was geting warmer aproaching the coast. being the any time rider arun is, called him up inviting for the ride with santhosh whose leaving in 3 hours. hehe. but he was haunted by sleep.

2.40 am and we start for pondy. But this was a gem of a road. smooth tarmak and no pothols or deviations. the center white line and the reflectors doin good job and could see the road ahead for quite a good distance. This increased our speeds. could even max out on some straight streach. with surprising curves placed here and there. now actually started having fun. pass some towns. some cops there who were checkin lookin in awe at each of us looking left and right, cos were were at 90's no way he could stop us. not dat we din want to but by the time we saw them we almost passed them. hehe. and the fun continues. now this can be called a rip session.

4.05 am reach pondy again with a 100 km non-stop ride in little less than a hour and half's time. Roared through the empty streets and reached the coast. err... no beach there but road and along the the edge and rocks below being pounded by the waves. pretty humid unlike b'lore. Head near the Gandhi statue. and think of options now. vicky remembering his child hood days when he came there with their parents. thought of resting on some beach instead of lookin for a room. switched bike with raghu's unicorn. now dats called pickup boosted by the k&n filter he had put. pretty smooth and quick response. then realised how messed up my bike's handling diskbreaks are. need to be corrected. turned out to be futile with us roaming here and there some 20 KMs in search of the beach. bit disenchanted cos may be had built up a lot of expectation for the place. Then roamed around the french colony lookin for a place to rest. Swithced bikes back with raghu and surprised to here from him that he felt the pick up is better in mine. hehe. guess it was the vibrations which gave him dat feel. A lady wakin around there led us to a place where we could rest for some time. tellin us bout he place and how kool it is. Then an elderly gently man kinda interogated us for the purpose before letting us in with the words "no smoking and no hullagulla". hehe we assured him dat we were good gyes and would leave by 8 am. well they had two big halls one for men and one for women open far all with no furniture in it but mats. WOkey rest on the mat it is. called up santhosh and he was starting for pondy after some time. catch up with some sleep. vicky wanted to capture some sunrise pix at the beach so woke him up at 5.45, but he hardly could move a mussle and so was raghu. me too crash again.

7:00 am it is when vicky woke us up and we got ready to go. thought of having some french style food went in search of one. well we did for an hour roaming around pondy not to find one open at dat hour. finally ended up having some fancy buns at a coffee shop kinda bekery. the one i had was with the name "dizzy dog"!!! hehe. some lazy coffee and was some 10.00 by then. get out to be welcomed with the humid weather. now wat. decided to leave for bangy by 2 noon. Called up Praveens askin direction for the beach. Headed towards ECR in search of the beach. which we finally found after some 10 kms out side pondy. messaged santhosh to come to ecr on reaching pondy. lug our bikes in the sand till waters edge. ok now wat. thought would play in water but it was too hot and the beach quite steap for our comfort. the heat din even let us sit for a while. saw some part of beach ahead with some some trees. went bak to the road and offroad again towards the beach. but could not spend much time there too. sat for a while in the shade. vicky too dissopointed to take out his cam. comparing the place with some in karnataka after western ghats and as to how good it was. raghu too remebring his good trips in west coast. tought of checking out the famous ECR. too bad ma bike ran in to reserve and could not find any petrol bunk on the way. n ma mobile's battry ran out of power too. spontanious trip not working this time. not enough fuel to burn the ECR road!!. gyes lost enthu to check it out. may be i wud have gone alone but was out of fuel. so now decided head back to pondy and lunch and then bangy. wrong timing, comparison, and too much expectation killed the fun. unlike the rosy picture given by the previous group who started sat morning and had plenty of time to look around at kooler temps of dawn and dusk.

get back to pondy and raghu goes missing. call him up only to know his bike taken a punture and he's gettin it fixed. guess this gyes carry some nails as part of his baggage cos he gettin puncture on every trip. with the unrelenting heat vicky drags me into expensive fancy hotel lured by the AC. while we wait for raghu and santhosh. raghu shows up waving a big nail which he brought along as a suvaneer. hehe. order some omlet and juice. get a call from santhosh that he's in ECR!!!. called him back to pondy to the hotel. This gye did his first solo trip of 350 kms there. only to start back having lunch. poor gye. finally he made it to the hotel around 12.00 and then gyes not willin to move out of the hotel cos the heat. jokes flow and have some nice time. santhosh takes a look at the menu and bursts into laughter and exclaim's "one idli 55 Rs. wat crap" hehehe. yeah some price for the AC. Me willin to venture out and check out the place any way but not the gyes who found the hotel more pleasing. gyes thinkin takin a nap and start by 4!!. me desporately wanted to avoid the mid 100 kms ride in dark. and then the bargaining starts for the time to leave. 1.45 the time we leave the hotel and take some pics on the coastal road. tryin som justice for the trip. 2.30 by the time we reach the room. and the gyes crash like retiring for the day. guess i have a much lowerer comfort level so bid farewell to the gyes and thought would do a solo ride back to blr. filled the fuel. wanted to check wether the gyes are up and went back to the room. to my surprice the they are up and ready to go. well any way was it was 3.45 by the time we started. and 4.15 time we left the city after sum round of fluids.

at least the first 100 Kms were a beauty. started to rip but i stopped to tie the towel around ma face. the cold was still there u see. i see the gyes go ahead. i start and rip bad a few KMs not the find the gyes. tought may be i passed them n waited at a passing town. damn my mobile is completely donw. wat timing. 15 mins i don see any one so headed to the next town so dat i could give a call. crazy rippin session again. beautiful straight roads and curves placed here and there. break to find a std boot by the road. now how could i call, mobiles dead and gye's number's in mobile. called up sanjay as knew his number and got nums of santhos and vicky. though some brain storming it was decided that the gyes were ahead of me and cops checking papers of santhosh. call vikcy and say i am coming. i carry on after some time i find santhosh waving at me. ok where's others?? they went ahead while santhos was stopped by cops. wohav the pack broke into 3 within 10 mins of start. with all this drama we lost quite a lot of day light. me and santhosh stay together from then. but santhosh takin is a bit easy. so i ride to max and wait for him and carry on like dat. pretty good cureves could take it past 90 with quite a lean. 6 by the time we reached thiruvanamalai. some 20 mins of day light left but no good cos, the road was blocked cos of some relegious procession. had we been there a minite of 2 earliar we whould have passed it. this goes on for half an hour. dat was height of fraustration.!!! santhosh makes the best of it by takin some pix. its dark by the time we leave the town. my fears of riding this streach realised. added to dat it started raining. guess vicky and raghu could not wait for us cos of the rain. we stop for santhosh to wrap his bag and there he looses hi gloves. no point waiting so we carry on with me leading. now this was the strech where i felt for the first time, that it do be over soon and din feel like riding. k'giri luring 100 kms ahead. carry on slowly and with only small strech of speedy ride. we take a but break with santhosh feeling tired cos its almost 500 KMs for him in the day and 150 more to go. start again with a lot more trucks blinding us. the deviations turned slushy in the rain.

9 by the time we reach k'giri. call up and update our homes. we decide we go ahead and wait at silk board who ever goes there first. and let the rippin begin. we blow the fraustration of the past couple of hours zip thourhg the 4 lane highway in dar. now kinda racin with terrecan. over take him riding at 110 fully crouched. by the time he caught up with me there were some truck where i zipped between and would go ahead. then came rain again slowing me. this is when the terrecan passed and follow it bright tail lamp. no bettor guide in rain. once we passed the rain i would go ahead. this happened quite a few times. guess he was irritated by so he kinda tried to block my way and had to break hard a bit. damn bugger. but i kept a comfortable distance so was ok. none the less i zipped past him and entered hosure. with lot of traffic and people runnin on the road from no where. i take it easy here and ride at 60-70 till Silk board junction. and wait for santhosh. afer a few minites santhosh shows up saying "strange things are happening to me cant stay will go home see ya later" and left. me too leave for home. not to show the strain in ma face went to a chat center and washed my face and went home by 10.30. after a 650 km trip.

in a way was one good trip. just that was wrong timing. guess needed some day time riding. could have done some things there had ve started sat morning. may be next time.....