Me, My Machine and the Elements 3.0

If you are really determined to do some thing, the whole universe will work to make that happen for you. Same thing happened to me this time around. I wanted to ride to somewhere far, away from this polluted city. I wanted to ride in the mountains. These wishes were there deep in my mind when my cousin announced that his first born will be baptized in Ooty and that I would be the godfather.

I was both overwhelmed and joyful at this twin prospect. Firstly, I am having the honor of becoming the godfather of the child, at this very young age. I always thought that these duties are for old uncles and definitely not for a twenty something brash youth. Furthermore, I heard my cousin suggesting about a road trip to Ooty. On bikes! What more could a petrol head like me ask for! So I took the two Czech beauties, the dark green and the black Roadkings to the garage to get them ready for the trip.

So there were two bikes and four guys: Ceejoe, the architect, Dintov, the chip wizard, Jamie, the banker, and yours truly, the techie. Contrasting personalities from four different professions, united by one goal and cognate by blood links. We were joined by another cousin of ours, who got the honor of getting packed off at the Mysore Road bus stand to catch a bus to Ooty. And the banker joined us there.

These all happened at around 2 PM on Saturday, some four hours late than the stipulated starting time. All were armed with windcheaters bought cheap from Russell Market except Dintov, who, in true Russian tradition, was covered in a 15 KG monster of a jacket which, I believe, could even resist shelling or an occasional Scud missile.

After the initial traffic in the city, as we moved out into the newly done Bangalore – Mysore highway. We rode like our tails were on fire till KAMAT’s Lokaruchi where we had had a late heavy lunch and set off again to gain some distance before the night sets in. Then we received an early warning of the things to come when we encountered a short burst of rain as we were approaching Mysore. Undeterred, we rode on, taking the bypass in Mysore, which took us to the Ooty road, through its long winded stretch around the city.

The Ooty road from Mysore was in excellent condition except for a few minor potholes which mean we were cruising at nineties till Gundalpet, from where the road conditions resorted to take an ugly turn. It was in this stretch that we encountered the first real problem when the black Roadking hit a pothole the size of a volcano crater and got the rim bent to some extend. We inspected the bike and found that the rear wheel had a wobble and that a couple of spokes were broken free from the rim. Since it was getting late and also due to the fact that we were in the middle of nowhere, we decided to continue the journey.

From there on, the rain had started showing its muscle forcing us to slow down considerably and we reached the check post at the state border by around 8 PM. The people at the check post were not letting us go claiming that two wheelers are not allowed inside the Muthumala Wild Life Sanctuary after 6 PM. After some amount of pleading, coaxing and an exchange of ‘funds’, we were allowed to pass through. I came back to the bike to find that my helmet had fallen off from the seat where I had kept it. The damage became evident when the next time the rain became too harsh and I pulled down the visor to be safe from the vicious raindrops thrashing against the face. I could still feel the raindrops even with the visor down, and a close inspection revealed a hole on the visor, a round one at that!

Soon after that we reached the junction where the road splits into two, one towards Masanagudi and other one towards Ooty. Masanagudi route was supposed to be having better roads and having only half the distance compared to the other. The downside is the threat of elephants and two check posts where we may or may not be allowed to pass. I would have betted that one could pass any check post in this part of the country, provided one does not carry any illegal stuff and does carry the required funds to change the mind of the seemingly unrelenting officials.

The other route through Goodalloor was longer, with bad roads but without any problems about elephants or cops. This information was provided by a friendly Forest Department official that we met at the junction. I voted for the shorter, but risky road while the banker was skeptical about it. Just then a bus came from the shorter route, and the driver informed that they met a couple of elephants on the way. Instantly the architect and Dintov opted for the longer road and we started off right after a bus. All we encountered was an elephant by the roadside, which actually did not scare the riders as only the pillions noticed it.

I still believe that that was a bad decision as we got the worst kind of roads imaginable from Goodalloor. The average speed dropped down to around 20 kmph and the miles dragged on an on through the cracked mountain roads climbing steadily to the hill station that Ooty is. Our plight was not helped by the continuous rain that we had to endure for four hours, drenching us fully, despite of our jackets, with the temperatures dropping to the range of 8 – 10 degrees. And I had the added luxury of having a broken helmet visor to let in all the water that the front opening could allow. Not disheartened, we rode on for another twenty kilometers in one and a half hours until we found a place with a few shops, where we stopped to have tea. Additionally we ate a few omelets to ward off the cold which had seeped right into our souls.

It was a few kilometers later in the hills when the already limping black Roadking’s rear tire gave up on us. It picked up a nail, it turned out later, and we were in the hills at this pitch black night with rain hammering all over us. In the beam of the other Roadking’s headlight, we inspected the bike and found that there was no hope for it to continue. We found a bus shelter in this forsaken place to our surprise and left the bike there after locking it up there. I still do not know what purpose the shelter served in that area where the nearest light that we saw after that was some six kilometers away. Anyway, soon after that we hailed down a truck, on which Dintov and Ceejoe left, leaving behind me and Jaime, to continue with the ride. The next time we met them was in Ooty where they had alighted from the truck when the driver had to sign some waybills at his company office.

Luckily, the truck was going all the way to Coimbatore, and hence our guys could hitch the ride all the way to Coonoor, where we all were headed. Some twenty kilometers down the road, we reached Coonoor and were waiting for the truck when a couple of night patrol cops came to the junction, sending home all the people who were hanging around in the area, since it was late in the night, almost 1 AM. They were at the lordly best in arrogance when they asked us what the hell we were up to at this unholy hour at their home town. I just told him that we came to visit one Major General Sebastian and were waiting for him to come and pick us up. Their superciliousness was wiped off from their faces instantly and they just enquired whether we had called him up. That is when the truck arrived and we were all shivering and waiting for my cousin to come and show us the way. As Murphy’s Law goes, he turned up in a bike only and so my bike was carrying three people up the ruthless climb up to the Wellington Cantonment, some ten kilometers from there. Or maybe, the distance was less, but in the exhaustion and the weight that my bike was pulling made me feel that it was unending.

We reached the house, had a hot dinner and slept off obliviously till morning when we got up in time for the breakfast. Then we faced the daunting task of fetching the abandoned bike and getting it done. We found an Auto Rick driver who could help us with the bike. After the preliminary analysis, we bought a tube, and set off with a tire repairman to the place where we left the bike. The road conditions and the Rick’s generally slow pace made us reach the place in another one hour even though the distance was just twenty kilometers. Within no time we replaced the tube and I volunteered to ride it all the way to Ooty. I set off first with the rest of them in the Rick, trailing behind. In this edition of Me, My Machine and the Elements, the Elements had a slightly upper hand and hence I found myself stranded again after a few kilometers when even the new tube got punctured.

The people in the Rick reached the place soon to see me all dejected and with drooping shoulders. That is when the perseverance of the Rick driver came into play. He insisted that we can carry the bike in his vehicle. We tried to get the bike into the Rick but dropped the idea when we saw that the bike was scrapping against the seat too much. Again after waiting for half an hour for a pick-up truck of some kind, we tried again but the front Foot pegs were posing the hindrance. Again we took the bike out when the idea hit us to remove the foot pegs, but this time the Kick lever came into play, against us. Again we found a workaround and the bike was inside the Rick about three fourth, safely, barring some damage to the Rick’s seat. Supported by a wooden block and a stone, the bike continued its journey to Ooty, with Ceejoe perching on the bike’s seat, so that he could claim that he completed the trip to Ooty on the bike itself.

Another two hours we reached Ooty, where we left the bike with a mechanic who would get the rim replaced and the tire repaired. We left to Coonoor by bus and had a beautiful evening during which we met and chewed the fat with all the relatives and friends who came to attend the function and then slept real well till the next morning.

In the morning we went for a walk in the hillside through winding roads around the gorgeous green carpet of tea plantation. The real grandeur of Ooty is outside the tourist spots, in the sublime quality of life where nature and humanity mingle together very intimately leading to such an unseen coexistence.

By 11 AM, everyone got ready and went to the church to attend the baptism. I attended the ceremony all uptight and with a smile permanently pasted over my face. But I couldn’t help laughing when the child raised a ruckus when water was poured over his head. I can imagine what he must have thought. “Why are these people towering over me and pinching my cheeks and making all sorts of stupid noises? And on the top of that, now they are pouring ice cold water over me, that too in this freezing Ooty!”

After Samuel Joy Jose officially became a Christian and after a long session with the snappers, we all went to our host’s house where we had excellent food and a couple of drinks and changed into the riding gear to set off to Bangalore soon. Two of us went in the bike while the other two took a bus to reach Ooty. Now we had to deal with one bizarre dilemma. We couldn’t find the garage where we left the bike!

But after half an hour of search we found the right place and found that even though the mechanic had somehow procured a new rim for us, he hadn’t started working on it since he wanted to show it to us before continuing. So we had to sit and wait till he finished fixing the hub, spokes and the rim and getting the wheel trued to his satisfaction. After that, we found that the edge of the tire was not seated properly in the edge of rim, rendering the wheel a slight wobble. It took another hour for a tire repairer to fix the issue and we set off from the town by around 6 PM with the task of filling the fuel and checking the air in the tires. We went to this place where there was no power, so we had to get it filled with a foot pump, which meant we were not entirely sure about the air pressure of the tires. To make things worse, my bike fell from my hands while taking it out of the centre stand and the right foot peg broke off. This was quickly fixed by taking a steel rod from a junkyard nearby and thrusting it into the open hole which was left behind when I changed my bikes braking system to rod type.

So by around 6.30 we managed to finally leave Ooty and this time, we took the Masanagudi route. The road was excellent with a lot of curves and with a steep slope downhill which was evident from the fact that this route takes u down the same elevation in less than half the distance compared to the earlier one. Except for a scare thrown up by the ailing black Roadking when a bit of the rubber at the coupling between the wheel and the drive burned giving out a sharp smell, the trip downhill went smoothly and we reached Masanagudi village in no time where we stopped to have our cup of tea.

From there it was the haven of elephants, the Muthumala Wildlife Sanctuary. Here again, we passed through the check post with the help of an old man in a car, whom we met at the tea stall. We just followed the car for a few kilometers till another vehicle coming from the opposite side flagged us to stop. They claimed that they encountered a couple of elephants down the road and asked us not to continue further. That’s when an elephant sent out its mighty roar just behind us, just a few meters away from us. I hadn’t switched off my bike, but the other bike was not started and the probability of getting it started in this catch-22 situation was slim, at least according to me. But Ceejoe showed true presence of mind when he got the machine to move by running while on the bike and jerked it into gear to get it started. I would have sworn the other bike had better acceleration on foot than mine which was powered by the 250cc screamer of an engine. We never even dared to slow down below 60 kmph after that incident.

From there on, we rode on smoothly till Gundalpet where we stopped to have another cup of tea and get our bikes’ tire pressures checked. Coming back to the inhabited lands, we rode on without the threat of the ‘Elements’ and the next stop was in front of the elegant Mysore Palace. We took a couple of snaps before getting off fast as the time was getting real late, already after midnight. We planned to have dinner from the first wayside restaurant after Mysore, but there was none that we saw that would fit our taste.

From Mysore we got back into the excellent highway which, when compared to the horror of a road that we rode on during the earlier stages was more line a smooth mirror for us. Then we stopped at the good old Café Coffee Day after Mandya where we had a real late dinner and gave some relief to our straining backs before setting off to the final stretch of our odyssey. When we reached Ramnagaram, the black Roadking pulled out another trick with its headlight going off all of a sudden. We were as unperturbed as ever and just continued by sharing the light of my bike’s headlight and following other vehicles as parasites for their light.

Finally when we reached Kengeri, Bangalore welcomed us with its bright yellow streetlights, which lasted all the way up to our place. Never had we appreciated the BMP’s maintenance of the street lighting before as on this occasion. In fact I had never noticed it.

Finally at 4.30 in the morning we took the last right turning towards Hutchins Road Second Cross from the Wheeler Road and the curtains came down for an eventful and fantastic trip. I had to sleep off immediately as I had to be at my office by at least 10 in the morning.

After completing yet another ride into the countryside and mountains, I started appreciating the ease of city life in another perspective altogether. And here I am writing off the third edition of my scripts, fulfilled to the core and nursing the idea for the next trip. The itch to travel is coming up again, slowly, and I will need another trip shortly to dwindle it temporarily. Another thing that got revealed in the trip was the good nature of humanity in the form of the Rick driver, the guy who helped me fix the foot peg and a lot of others who came out of their way to help us crazy travelers to continue out journey safely and cheerfully.

- Issac Cheriyathu
1 July 2006 – 3 July 2006.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ol2fN0bZCso