Galibore: Offroading through the forest

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Long divali vacation and nothing was happening. At least a days ride was needed. Sunil struck the plan for a ride to Galibore area along caveri fishing camp from Muttathi to sangam and Santosh invited me over. Cool the weekend was saved from boredom.

5 am @ metro was the meeting point. Start together by 5.15. Din have any idea of the place but wanted to ride any where. Nice early morning ride. After so long cos many prev trips started of in the night and got up late. Stop couple of times for pix. Sunil offered a ride on the comet and i gladly took it. wow my first ride on a comet:) Once started it felt so easy, it never gave the hint of its weight. The feel of power was too good. But unfortunately the mech had spoiled the tuning of the 2 carbs and n i gave it back to the owner soon. He had to go through the whole tuning process in trail and error. After a refreshing ride till kanakpura catch on quick break fast.

Some narrow twisties and offroad forest ride in store says Sunil. wow n i thought it was gonna be a lazy ride!!. Head towards malavalli and take the deviation to Muttati. Now things get bettor, the early morning cool, narrow roads piercing the sea of trees with no other traffic. How did i miss this route all this time? Twisties undulating and often surprising us with sudden curves which almost threw us off the road. Get some straights and santosh wants to try out Christ!! Got his feet on the seat and up on the feet. Just 1 step behind of letting go the handle bar!! may be next time. Din know how KMs passed and with all the sarine beauty around. Get to muttathi only to be sent back to catch our planed trail which we missed. We head back a bit and see an opening goin into the forest but it kinda looked like a natural canal for rain water which was dry now. The path was full of stone and boulders. Enthusiastic santosh made a run for it and just after sunil spotted the hidden road sign pointing the trail. But santosh was off the wrong way and no amount honking reached him. Well it was humaric and we just waited for him to come back. He shows up after some time announcing theres no way ahead :D. How could i let him alone have all the fun. So i too take my bike some distance and back.:D

We get on to the Galibore trail and some serious offroading was on. Interlaced with the thick layers of sand at some places. This trail follows close by the river and not long before we found an bikable path to the river. Awesome place to visit in the morning with nobody else than us. From now on we keep seeing fresh and stale elephant dung!! Explore a bit around make unsuccessful attempt to keep the shoes dry while jumping across a stream. Time to move on. Sunil struggling on sandy patches cos his comet shod fully street tires and one point he was heading straight for a tree as his bike wasn't steering in the sand. But he maneged to get off the path spare the tree :D. With lots of time in hand we were exploring every small and big detour from the path.

Took a steep one and parked our bikes on the edge of the bank under the thick canopy of the forest trees. Some snacks and Sunil wanted to find some birds to shoot and he could find none. Prolly we disturbed them. Then we think of doin some small trek on foot. We leave our bikes and bags there as nobody if at all could see them. Sunil narrates his experience when he had come here previously and camped on a hill nearby for the night and how they were chased in the dark to the village. Freaky!!. That was supposed to a dangerous place with elephants and leopards around. He even brought a big knife along. We think of strategies if an elephant shows up like run zigzag, climb up something. Santosh identifies some trees to climb in case :D. After some distance we spot some monkeys on the canopy so decided to head back to the bikes not wanting them to do monkey business on our bikes with the all the food in the bags attracting them. Hop on the bikes and get up the steep trail up to the main path. Found one more opening with quite some space which would serve for a good camping spot for a large group. It was soothing sitting by the edge of the river under the tree and the sun shine bright on the river.

As the day got heavier Guys wanted some water play but the water there seemed deep so we back tracked a bit till we could find one more accessible path to the river with a stone bank. Now getting there was quite tough goin across many boulders. Bet no other bikes would have gone till there. This was to make sure that the bikes would be visible while we rest. Sunil quite at home at these places and knew where to expect wat and surly he found us a spot where we could get into the water safely. Now here santosh gets to parenting wielding a big stick and makes sure the 2 of us do not stray away from wat he demarcated as a safe area. Literally i mean :)). After some time in the water its lunch time. and we open up our bags and have cakes and idlis etc. So wat else does one want after a tiring ride, bath and food? Yes a nap !! settled under the thick canopy by the bank and Santhosh and Sunil happily dozed off to glory. Just when i was about to sleep i remember Sunil mentioning about leopards and i spring up to save myself from an imaginary leopard pouncing on me :D. Stay awake most of the time playing the self appointed watch. That was some nice quality time spent. Who says good things in life are expensive. But all good things come to end and we had to start back.

We collect ourselves and jump into the task of getting our bikes back up the path. Sunil finding it hard to maneuver his heavy bike with street tires. while mine and santosh's bike shod with michelins button tires feel quite at home and we make it up. We decide to continue on sangam and as the trail improves that way. En route we get to the Kaveri fishing camp. The attendants din even let us to see around the place not wanting to disturb the families in there. Its quite an expensive retreat with 1650 Rupees per person per day. But how different would it be then the place we been ofcourse it would have some comforts extra. Sunil plans to bring his family there. We move on towards sangam. He finally spots a bird and captures it in his cam. He's got a pretty good eye to spot things:) Now the trail improves and i try some speed dash and i even touch 75 kmph on nothing but sand and gravel:D. It was getting uncomfortably hot and made it to sangam. We din even care to check out the place as it would only be crowded. Now we make a bee line to home except for couple of stops for some fluids. At home by 5 pm for a satisfied nap :)

Just 200 kms for on the ride but was one awesome trip with quite many nice places seen at right time. The roaming around under thick canopy of trees was simply amazing. Thanks sunil for making the plan and santosh for inviting me:)