Part 2 — Flag off! and the first flat!
This is a part of a series of blog posts about our bike trip to Kashmir from Kerala. The travelogue is split into several blogs. You can find the intro and the link to all blogs here
Day 1 (15/04/2017)
Kochi — Mysore
Distance: 400km
ODO: 400km
We were flagged off by friends and family by around 8:30 am. It was a slow day, we met some more friends along the route who came to see us off. The destination for day 1 was Mysore. One of our batchmates and a passionate rider Imran worked there. We were to crash at his place that night. We took the route through Nilambur, Bandipur, Gundalpet to Mysore. We got curious looks from people from the start itself. When we stopped at a signal, some people asked if we were heading to Ooty. It was amazing to watch the expressions on their face when we said Kashmir! The second question most of them had was that if we were in the Army. We took some rest and laid down at a bus stop sometime after lunch. We knew we were going a bit slow, but we thought we had enough time. We encountered the first problem right on the first day of the trip. We reached Thorappalli Check post to enter Mudumalai Tiger Reserve just after 7 pm. We were stopped by the officials. Bikes were only allowed to pass through till 7 pm. I started thinking about options to spend the night there, I remembered passing through a small village a few KMs back and I thought there might be some lodge back there. We could stay there and if we wake up a bit early and pass through the check post as early as possible, we should be able to still keep up with our plan. Right when I was wandering in such thought, Sree came up to me and said, “OK then, we’ll set up our tent here right?”. He turned the problem to an opportunity to camp at the edge of a forest. I could not speak for a second. When I digested what he was saying, I said, “Man, this is the edge of a forest, we cannot sleep here unprotected, it’s written right there that its a place where Elephants and even tigers have been sighted”. He did not seem to take it in completely. He took some photos of the boardings of the check post and went up to the officer and asked if it was OK to set up the tent beside their office. The officer was a bit confused for a second hearing this weird request. Even though he rejected the request, he allowed us to pass through if we promised that we would stick with a bigger vehicle. We were all the more happy to hear that, and we passed through.
Through the reserve, we saw a few herds of deer, bison and elephant. The family of elephants were actually right beside the road. It was a thrilling experience. We reached Imran’s place at about 10 pm and together went out for dinner and crashed.
My parents visited her parents and talked everything out and decided to get us married.
Day 2 (16/04/2017)
Mysore — Montebennur
Distance: 411km
ODO: 811km
Got freshened up in the morning, hugged Imran a goodbye and with his wishes, set off for our second day. According to the itinerary, we were to reach Hubli by the end of the day. We stopped at a few places for rest and lunch. After about 200km through comparatively, small roads and villages we entered the AH47. From there we were cruising at triple digits. When took a rest stop to stretch and relax for some time, local people started to gather around and ask questions like the price of the bike and where we were heading. We found people to be curious about us.
We kept cruising and at one point, we were fined for overspeeding. Although we never saw any signs for any speed limits, we could not win the argument with the police officer and ended up paying the fine. When we were about a 100km from Hubballi I run over a nasty crack on the road. Even though I jumped up and down for a few moments, I quickly gained the control back and kept going. A few KMs later, a car came up to me on the right and a guy opened the window and screamed at me “Hey, your friend’s tyre got punctured and is stuck”. We knew we would face a tyre puncture somewhere during the trip, but not in our wildest dream we thought it was going to be the second day of the trip. I pulled up soon after and called him. I said I’ll look for a puncture shop nearby and then come to him. Since we had our locations shared, I checked where he was and he was a couple of KMs behind me. I took the service road and to our luck, I saw a puncture workshop right there. I called Sree up and informed him and asked him if he could slowly drive up here.
The mechanic there didn’t know how to take the tyre out on a bike with disk brake. With the help of youtube videos, we finally took the tyre apart and realized that the problem was a lot more serious than we thought. When Sree went over that crack on the road, his rim had bent and some of the spokes had bent and punctured a hole through the tube and made scratches on the tyre. My alloy wheels had saved me there. The tube had too many holes in it to repair it. We had to replace it. So we used the spare tube we had with us. The mechanic told that the bent in the rim was severe and that we had to get it replaced at the next Royal Enfield Service centre. The tyre also has a lot of scratches, so it was best to get it replaced.
When all this had finished, it was already night. We were exhausted and decided to stop for the day. We stopped at a dhaba nearby for dinner and decided to set up our tent near an adjacent petrol pump. We had planned to set up tents at petrol pumps whenever possible because it was safe, and we had access to drinking water and toilet to freshen up in the morning. We asked for permission to the manager and he happily permitted us.
It was our second time setting up the tent. We had done a trial at home before we left. We had our inexperience and combined with that, it was really windy. We had a tough time setting it up. We could not drill the holding post that came with the tent to hold it against the wind because the soil was too hard and dry.
We ended up tying the tent to our bikes and kept our bags inside to stop the tent from flying off! After a hard battle with the tent, we slowly drifted into sleep with the lullaby of cars and trucks cruising through the highway.
Day 3 (17/04/2017)
Montebennur — Belgaum
Distance: 230km
ODO: 1041km
Woke up, took a bath at the fuel station’s bathroom. We had a hard time folding back the tent due to strong winds like the night before and our in-experience. Folding up the tent and stuffing it into its bag got us all sweated up. We had to rest for some time before we could start. After the hectic workout, we set off by around 10 am.
The first agenda for the day was to fix Sree’s tyres. There were two available service stations, one at Hubballi and one at Dharwad. We opted for the one at Dharwad. It was about 110km away. We had to drive slowly till then to avoid further damaging the tyres. But when we reached the service station, we realized that it was a normal workshop and not a RE authorized service station. They did not have any spare rims for us. We regretted our decision to come to Dharwad instead of Hubballi. Now we had two option. Either go back 30km to Hubballi or go ahead another 80km to Belgaum. Since we did not want to go back, we continued to Belgaum.
When we reached Belgaum, it was already 4 pm. We told them the whole story and that we were on this trip. We wanted it fixed as early as possible so that we can continue with our itinerary. They said they’ll check the condition first. In the meantime, we went for a drive around the city and ate lunch at McD. When we came back, we were informed that the bike will only be ready by the next day morning 11. When I was thinking of where to take a room and started searching for rooms nearby, Sree came and proposed an idea of setting up a tent right outside the service station. I was not a big fan of the idea, because it was better if there was a place to lock our stuff so that we can roam around the city and see some places. However, the RE guys declined our request, and we decided to take a room. We took one in walking distance from the service station. The room rate was 600 and we bargained it down to 400. We dumped all our luggage and went outside.
We went to a Ramakrishna Ashram nearby. The atmosphere there was so relaxing. There were some kids being taught Sanskrit slokas. We roamed around there for around 2 hours. When they started closing down and turning off lights, we got out. On the way back there was a Durga Devi temple managed by the Army. There was a small passage through which the road goes. We wanted to take a photo there, so Sree dropped me off and went to pass through the passage. I got my camera ready and just when I was about to click, an Army officer came shouting at us. He shouted at us saying photography was prohibited there. Meanwhile, another officer came and calmed him down and sent him back. He told us calmly that we were not allowed to take pictures there. So I kept my camera back in my bag. The officer asked us where we were from in a friendly manner. When we said we were from Kerala, He said about his friends from Kerala.
Next, we went to Killa Lake. There was a walkway around the lake, we spend some time there before having dinner and heading back to the lodge.
