A whirlwind tour of South India - Day 7: The last day of the road - trip for me

We had decided that we will wake up as early as we can and be on our way so as to avoid Tirunelvelli morning traffic. We were on our way at 7.00 AM and hence made very good progress. We targeted reaching Bangalore by evening 6.00 PM. Day 7 again just took us on NH-4 all the way to Bangalore. The road is good, traffic is chaotic and one has to be careful of steps formed by various layers of tar/asphalt at points where we change sides. The road is wide and open and initially we covered 120 Kms without taking a break. This actually saw us cover 350 odd Kms by 2.00 PM. We calculated that we had another 200 Kms to go when we came across the first milestone which we could read. (as it was in English and we might have missed some earlier ones. Also since road work is going on, milestones are not in place yet). It read that we had still 300 KMs to Bangalore. I was really pissed off with the map readings that I had. Another 300 Kms was going to take some real pushing on our part.
It started getting dark and there were insects flying all around. Big ones at that. All this while, we had not come across so many insects coming at the bike lights. The funny thing is that when they realize that they are going to crash hard, they come up towards your face to dodge the bike, I had small ones going into my eyes, ears, nose and many splattering on the helmet. At one instant a small insect stuck into my right eye and the eye was on fire. We had to stop for this one. I washed both my eyes with cold water and we continued. Now it was Rohit’s turn. It became really difficult for Rohit since he wears lenses. We stopped again. I can still remember how my eyes felt when that insect got stuck.
Once we had cleaned our eyes again, we continued and to our surprise all insects vanished in some time. Maybe it was because we were coming closer to some city.
We crossed Salem, Hasan encountering all the evening traffic (It was 31st Dec as well) and made slow progress towards Bangalore. We were supposed to stay overnight at one of Rohit’s friends apartment in Bangalore.
We had call him up several times for directions. As we came near, we picked up 2 bottles of champagne and headed to where he lived.
Vishnu is Rohit’s friend when they worked together in their earlier company in Mumbai. Vishnu had apparently shifted to Bangalore and thus had invited us (or rather we had invited ourselves) for the New Year’s party. We listened to all kinds of rock music (I don’t remember as I was in a trance), had some pizza and rum and I was ready to crash.
I wished everybody and went upstairs. The only thing I remember was that it didn’t take me much effort to get into bed. My legs folded involuntarily from under me, knees buckled and I crashed into the bed and slept almost immediately. It was the end of the journey for me. Rohit was planning on staying back in Bangalore to catch up with long lost friends and I wanted to get back as soon as possible because my wife, parents and my 3 year old daughter were waiting impatiently for me to get back. Rohit volunteered to pack my bike off through railway parcel service and I took the next day’s Volvo back to Pune.
Since we covered close to 650 Kms on the last day, its just a blur in the memory for me. We didn't stop at all for taking any snaps. The only thing we had in mind was to rach Bangalore in time for the new year's party.
On my journey to back to Pune, I met another guy from Mumbai (currently working in Bangalore) named Aditya Joshi who himself is an avid biker. We chatted a long time and got to know each other. Apparently he has bought a Yezdi Roadking in Bangalore and restoring it to its full glory. He may have completed his project by now and I am waiting to see his new bike.
After thoughts:
Would I do it again? Hell, yes. No 2 ways about it. But this time, we will plan a bit more and cover the same distance in 12 days instead of the 7 we did it in.
When I and Rohit met each other last week, we contemplated on our next bike trip. It will most probably be to Leh, Ladakh, Kargil. This time, we decided, have more time to spare and look up the country side.
Other thougts that came out while discussing were that we have been real buggers travelling long distances on unknown roads. But thats the thrill isn't it? I loved it. Luckily our bikes were in prime condition and they responded well to our demands. My bike had its first flat tire while I had given it to my mechanic in Pune.
Later Rohit, the useless bugger completed Bangalore to Pune, a distance of close to 881 Kms in a matter of 15 hours on his bike. I didn't believe it first. But he did it. I dont know eher all that energy comes from. Well....he is like that only.
I guess we had our share of good luck and god was watching us all the while. Also the good wishes of friends and family paid off I guess.
Anyways....Thats all folks. That wraps up my 7 day itch (story). Until later!!