The One With the Cold Feet

After the strenuous ride to Krishnagiri we deemed ourselves fit for a multiple day ride. The plan was to ride to Mangalore and return by bus. The route also included a ghat section, about which we were very much excited and nervous. From our earlier rides we observed that a speed of 20kmph is achievable for us. That multiplied with the 10 hrs of riding implied we could cover about 200Kms in a day. Thus, even with the ascents and ghats, the ride to Mangalore spanned over a couple of days seemed a decent and achievable target.

Special thanks to Ram from BBC who helped us a lot while planning the trip. He too wanted to join but couldn't make it because of some official obligations.

We had decided to ride on Friday(10th Feb) and Saturday(11th Feb) thereby allowing ourselves to book some recovery time on Sunday. Plan for the first day was to reach Hassan as early as possible and continue to Sakaleshpur if there is enough light left in the day.

The alarm clock woke me up at about 4:00 AM. I got ready by 04:30 AM and was about to leave the house when I thought of checking my mails. There was some disturbing news in the mail which almost made ponder over the thought of aborting the trip. Although, I realized there wasn't much I could do by sitting at home and decided to carry on with the trip. I knew it would help me relax myself.

I met Jagan near Domlur Bridge at 05:30 AM. This time I was also carrying pannier bags containing our gears amongst other stuff for the 2nd day ride.

We were to reach Nelamangala by 07:00 AM but the roadblock at the circle after Mantri Square messed up our sense of direction. The GPS on Jagan's mobile did help in getting back on track. Then again we missed the turn at Nelamangala pedaled for about 6 Kms towards Tumkur. Our stupidity and absent mindedness paid their toll and we left Kunigal at 11:00 AM, an hour behind the schedule.

There wasn't a decent place for breakfast at Kunigal (our intended breakfast stop) and we didn't want to waste any more time. We had kept ourselves hydrated so a couple of bananas and a packet of ParelG sufficed for breakfast. We also noticed that it isn't prudent to schedule a break for less than or equal to 10 mins. Practically it is not possible at least for us. Buyig water bottles, filling up water bags, streching your muscles, catching your breath etc. takes a little more than 10 mins. 30 mins proved to be optimal.

Except for a small patch in Yeshwantpur (too much traffic and pollution so early in the day) the roads were good and completely worth a bicycle trip. A few ascents and descents along the way but nothing too difficult or too easy. Also, there were a few stretches of long straight monotonous roads which were a bit boring to be honest. Same goes for the patch from Kunigal to Yadiyur. Although, there are a lot of coconut vendors on this patch. We reached our 100 Km mark somewhere near Yadiyur. While savoring the taste of coconut water the vendor suggested a restaurant nearby for lunch. We were on our way there when we saw a hoarding claiming CCD was just 2KMs away. Well, no one said anything and we kept riding until we reached CCD. It was 01:00 PM. After riding for over a 100KMs, any cool drink from this outlet can make wonders to your tired self. After the blunder on the Krishnagiri ride, we had scheduled a 2 hour break in the afternoon to evade the heat. The air cooled CCD insisted us to look no further. The lunch was good. There is only one problem with the afternoon break. You feel sleepy. Not good if you are running on a tight schedule.

We clicked a few snaps here and then continued pedaling after 03:00 PM. A road widening project was going on a little after our stop. This meant no more four lanes and so no more exclusive lane for us. There were times when we had to get down from the road to make way for the giant trucks. Apart from this, the road was pretty good.

The ride through Chinnarayanapattana was embarrassing. I am quite sure that to their eyes we were no less than jokers. There were instances when school kids were pointing fingers at us and laughing. We stopped just after this town. It was about 04:30 PM, we refilled our water sacks and continued riding. Thanks to the Shades, Water Sack, Jersey, Shorts, Shoes and the playlist on my Walkman ;) I was tired but not enough to quit. Sakaleshpur looked like an achievable target and we would have have made it if not for the inability to resist the temptation of entering a CCD 3 KMs down the road.

It was 5:30 PM when we started pedaling again and Hassan was still 28Kms away. The torchlights were already working their way trough the fading light.

I was optimistic and wanted to pedal till Sakaleshpur but Jagan was realistic and wanted to stop at Hassan. A steady climb from Channarayanapattana to Hassan, giant fast moving vehicles with their bright headlights and the dark streets left us with no other choice than to stop at Hassan. Although, it took forever to reach Hassan. Throughout the trip, this was the only patch when I found myself out of breath.

We reached Hassan at about 7:00 PM covering a total distance of 210Kms at an average of 20.5Kmph. We pedaled our way into the city and were greeted by the very much expected awed and ridiculed looks. We stopped at the first decent hotel that we could find. We were a bit skeptical about parking our rides in the regular parking area of the hotel situated in a city fairly unknown to us. The hotel manager agreed to station the rides in the hotel lounge plus he gave us a discount after learning that we had pedaled our way from Bangalore. There was one little disturbing thing though, he asked "Do you want your beds close together or separated?". I mean, what kind of question is that?

Anyways, after a days ride any hotel room would feel luxurious. That accompanied with a hot water bath and delicious dinner made the transition into the sleep state far too swift.

The plan was to start riding at 05:00 AM the next day. Somehow, we missed n number of alarms set at regular intervals of 5 minutes. It was 07:00 AM when I got up. Jagan was still fast asleep. I got ready and tried to wake him up. I checked mail again and this time there was a good news. Wow!! It felt so good. I had finally been accepted somewhere :).

The hotel did provide us with hot water but Jagan had to use cold water while bathing after the ride. It took a toll on him and he had a fever. His knees were also jammed, the idiot didn't stretch even for a bit after the ride. Plus, he was too scared of the ghat section that we were supposed to cover. No other option but to return back to base. We canceled our KSRTC tickets for Mangalore-Bangalore and booked two for Hassan-Bangalore instead.

There was a little brawl with the conductor about carrying cycles as luggage. He was asking Rs.200 .... per cycle. The luggage compartment was all empty. Finally he took me to some station master who stamped two tickets for Rs30 each and gave away Rs10 to the conductor and the driver. I surely would have given him more than Rs10 had he asked nicely and reasonably.

I know this ride did not go as planned but we promised each other that we will finish it soon, before bidding adios!!

The One with the Sanity Check

After a decent gap of a couple of weeks we geared ourselves up for our next challenge. This time our group (I don't know if a group of 2 people counts as a group) had a new member. Kshitij on his Schwinn Sportera. A real energetic guy. Very soon he'll be walking a distance of 100Kms over a couple of days. As you can infer from the previous sentence, like us some screws in his brain also need tightening. Jagan of course, needs no introduction (provided you have read my earlier posts).

An anecdote: Jagan bought the cateye blinker for Rs 850/- when he bought his bike. Kshitij and myself carry the local blinker that costs about Rs. 80/- . His reasoning was that the cateye blinker does quality blinking. Anyways, it so happened that a day before the ride he found out that the batteries of his blinker have drained off and need replacing. Although, the weird 1.5V batteries were no where to be found and he had to buy the local blinker that does not do much of the quality blinking.

The blogs shared on BBC had given us a fair idea about the ride to Krishnagiri. Our plan comprised of two steps:

Step1 : Reach Krishnagiri as early as possible

Step2 : Return back to Bangalore as early as possible.

Simple enough.

Just before the ride began

This time I woke up early and called up Jagan at about 4:45 AM. He picked up the call but from his "enthusiastic" voice I could tell that he was going to get late. Anyways, it was about 6:15AM when the three of us met each other near Sony World, Kormangla.

Kshitij was riding his bike after a long time. Sometimes things go wrong. When he reached Sony World he pointed out that his mudguard was rubbing against his front tire. After a little discussion and paying heed to the experts (Jagan's) suggestion we decide to remove the mudguard and continue with the ride. While removing the mudguard we somehow managed to pull out the small rod that goes through the center of the tire. Fixing it back is apparently not that easy as the tire keeps wobbling if you don't fix it properly. Jagan did try to put his best efforts but to no avail. Jagan wasn't rally in the favor of continuing the ride but agreed to ride until electronic city and then decide whether or not to continue further.

So we started from Sony world at about 6:40 AM. We rode at peaceful pace upto electronic city. (I wanted to take the flyover but was voted out) There Kshitij's rear tire got punctured. We(Jagan) had experience with fixing punctures. But when fixed, the tire formed a weird shape which wasn't concurrent with the rim. Now it was getting risky for kshitij to continue with the ride and Jagan suggested not to. So he decided to ride until the end of electronic city flyover and then return.

After the flyover we exchanged some stuffs from Kshitij that we thought might be useful and then continued further while Kshitij returned. This could have been his first long ride, I could tell he wasn't happy but had no choice.

Jagan : Smiling/Laughing/Wondering :?

From here on, Jagan and I rode at normal pace and we were at hosur in a jiffy. We had our breakfast at Udupi Uphaar. A decent restaurant I'd say. We did get a lot of strange looks but I guess we were prepared for it. We continued with ride after taking a few snaps.

The ride was seeming like a cakewalk. Which was freaking us out. It only meant that we were riding downhill and return would be most difficult. The blogs on BBC had done a decent job of scaring us already. Given the delayed start, long breaks and effortless pace we were surprised that we reached Krishnagiri before noon. We tried to look for a decent restaurant around but they all had closed doors and we weren't comfortable eating lunch without being able to keep a close watch on our rides. We did find a coconut vendor and gulped down the water from a couple of coconuts each. Later we found a fruit vendor and bought a few bananas and oranges. We refilled our water pouches and decided to have lunch along the way. The constant stare of the people around was really making us(Me) uncomfortable and we didn't even manage to click any snaps.

We started the ride back at about 12:05PM and stopped at a secluded spot on the highway at about 12:30 PM. Had some fruits which tasted gooood. Took a few snaps. 

The sun was up and it was hawt. Plus, there was the added obstacle of steady uphill. Our ride back to bangalore was getting real scary. After a few minutes of discussions/calculations we realized that the easiest way to finish the ride was to man up and climb back on the saddle. Which we did.

The "man up" thought laughed back at us the moment we started riding. Thanks to the water pouches on our backs that we were able to keep ourselves hydrated throughout. In fact we started appreciated every thing that we had bought before coming on this ride. My butts couldn't thank those padded shorts enough and my palms knew that they were alive because of the gloves. The lonely, hawt and steady uphill seemed unending. I so wanted to stop. To add it up my brain started the sanity check on me. I started finding answers to questions like : Who am I? What am I doing here? What exactly am I doing and why? I don't know how but these questions cheered me up. The answer was simple : The person is in fact Insane. I laughed out loud (Thanks to the lonely road nobody else had to witness the insanity :P). I am sure my fellow cyclists on BBC and elsewhere must have had such sanity checks atleast once if not more. I could share the laugh with you, others keep wondering. Anyways, I decided that whatever happens I will finish 20Kms before taking any rest. Which meant I'd have to be on the saddle for atleast an hour and a half. I was about to give up after 12Kms but then a like a beautiful oasis I saw vehicles disappearing at the end of the road. Finally : a downhill.

I pedaled with all my energy and the downhill did not disappoint me. The cool breeze that continued running across my face was so .... peaceful. About 10 minutes after the downhill, my odometer read 100Km (I had to reset it along the way) marking the finish of my 20Kms, I took a snap of it and then stopped near a truck, hiding behind its shade. Jagan took another 20 minutes to show up. 

The only snap of wither of us riding a
bike and he has to look back

I was surprised that he didn't stop before. Later, when asked he said, "How could I ever live with myself knowing you finished that climb in one go and I couldn't". So many funny retorts rushed through my mind when he said that but didn't mouth any of them. As long as it works, let's let it.

We stopped for about half an hour here. We tried to calculate what went wrong. The Sun, the heat and yes, the Lunch?? We were on fruits (2 bananas and an orange). We could recollect seeing a McD joint after Hosur and it was only the thought of a tasty burger that motivated us to pedal forward. 

I have special bonding with McD for so many reasons. It has been the meeting place for most of my dates. Most of my friends prefer Dominoes, Pizza Hut or KFC but I'll choose McD over them anyday. Those soft sinful tasty burgers are just irresistible. It used be one of my most visited place an year ago ;). I started avoiding it later for obvious reasons. The best part is, everytime I take first bite the shape of the burger resembles that of laughing face. Its like the burger is laughing back at me and saying, "Haha!! Got you!!".

Incidentally, McD was just 3Kms down (sorry, up) the road. We filled our stomachs and satiated our thirst (literally and figuratively). Took a few snaps and started riding again. 

The sun was still hot and we were still pedaling uphill but this time we knew what was coming and our stomachs weren't empty. We covered the next 20 Kms in what seemed like a looong time (it was 80 mins as per clock) but we weren't as exhausted as before. Also, many thanks to the awesome playlist (compiled by my special someone). It helped me stay calm and maintain a rhythm. My flatmates had gone to hogenakkal and we crossed paths at this point. The looks on their faces were confusing and usually I'd have pushed for an explanation but needless to say, I was too tired. They left after we took a few snaps. The auto function could have enabled a snap of all of us together but again, I was tired to suggest/explain. They left after that and we rested for some more time.

From here on we had no trouble pedaling. No more scorching heat and not too much of uphill. Throughout the ride a lot of people asked a lot of questions and I answered as innovatively as my weary self allowed.

We had decided to watch the newly released "Chronicle" after finishing the ride. So were moving at faster speed. At about 7:40PM we reached home. Booked the tickets as soon as was possible. Had dinner at the food world in forum and caught the 10PM show at PVR. After which I slumbered into the deepest limbo.