THE VIEW IS ALWAYS WORTH THE CLIMB!!!

This is my first attempt writing a post. This blog has been in existence since quite a few months. Other than pompously displaying my IQ, I haven't done much to add to this blog. So here I start with my first post!!!

I always wanted a bike since my school days but due to many reasons unsaid I had to restrain myself to riding my father's Kinetic (Kinetic Honda DX 1997 model, weighed 100kg, 97cc engine ~7hp). Then in my 12th class I got my mother to promise me a bike in return of my performance in JEE (and this was even before the results were declared or I had appeared for the exams). But as they say "All good things happen in good time". What with all the IC at IIT, the bike ban in the first year, I had to prolong my wish of buying a CT 100 (imagine this is what i wanted to buy back then). To those who are a bit less knowledgeable in the field of Indian Bikes here is the link (What with the craze of Hayabusas, Ninjas, R-1s, bikes like the CT100, BYK are bound to get unnoticed by our generation :P, this is meant to be sarcastic, i wonder if I am reaching the masses :P). Well I was very ideological back then, things are far different today :). P.S: The CT100 is claimed to deliver 101kpl.

So finally just before passing out of IIT-B, and after my placements :), I bought a Royal Enfield TBTS (2009 model, weighs 182 kg, 346cc engine ~20bhp) in February this year. Dont ask me why I chose this bike out of the numerous ones available on the Indian market today, because if you dont get the reason on your own, I dont think I would succeed at making you understand either. Imagine my second but distant choice was the YAMAHA FZ (recently launched), the chickest bike after the BUELL i have seen till date. Hey just to add something interestingly embarassing here, I had never riden a geared bike before in my life and my virgin ride was on Gadgad (thats its name :P) at the age of 22years and 60 days. I was tired of riding it at speeds of under 60-70 kph on the WE highway and the JVLR, so to get a real good feel of its performance I decided to go for a ride to Karnala. Plans were made, maps were printed, the terrain was studied (all bakwaas yaar itni koi jarurat nahi hoti, the local junta on the road is your saarathi and keep your head level on the road without getting too much wind in it, [:P] u will sail thru smoothly on most road trips.)
After much coaxing I got Gaikwad baba to accompany me to Karnala (for the Fort and Birds). On the morning of the 22nd March 2009, I got up early, washed Gadgad sparkling clean. Some birds had blessed it the earlier day in Powai [:P]. Just the night before I had filled the tank full. The fuel added was 7.2 L for the 304 km travelled on the tripmeter. That amounts to a mileage/fuel efficiency of 304/7.2 = 42.22 kpl. Just close to what RE claims 40-42 kpl. I left home at 5:50 am. On the way, I had to pick up Saching from Powai. It was a very chilly morning and being a Sunday there was hardly any traffic. I opened the throttle to cruise at 80 kph on the WE. Thats when I realised why bikers wear jackets (the chilling wind just keeps pricking sharply all over your torso). I reached hostel at 6:10 am. Twenty minutes flat!! Thats an average of 60kph!!! (achievement) [:)]
Saching as usual was unwilling to wake up from his nidra-awastha. But thanks to Saching's enthusiasm we were soon on our way to Karnala at 6:50 am.
Sorry but dont have much to say about my ride from hostel to the first break. It was pretty uneventful, we took the following route: Powai --> LBS Marga --> EE highway --> Airoli bridge --> PWD road to NH4 --> NH4-C --> and finally the blessed NH-17 (i love this road). To the less aware junta its the Bombay-Goa Highway [:P]. At 7:50 am we took a break at a roadside dhaba as i wrote this down. "Had fun ridng the T-Bird. Gadgad is just awesome. Discovered a new characteristic about his personality (will tell about this later). We were cruising at 70-80 kph continuously. Topped at 85 kph. The bike is just 400 km old and is in the run-in period hence the cap on the top speed. I havent really seen such good quality two-lane roads in any other state. Plus thanks to all the truckers that plow this strip, a lot of mullah is generated for the PWDs. I had great respect for the ST drivers until now, and was terrified of the truckers. But this trip I had a completely opposite experience, the ST wallas just wouldnt let me pass by."
At the dhaba, I had brought alongwith me POHE (made by Mammu) for breakfast. Saching had his regular boiled eggs and Chai alongwith the POHE. The Chai was special and cost us Rs.8 each :P. But was worth it after the ride. The highway-side dhabas are always a great fun on road trips and the NH-17 is dotted with some good ones. The constant hum of the cars, trucks and buses passing by is sounding music to my ears right now. The sanctuary and fort are just 4 kms from the dhaba. We took some pics of the bike, answered the questions of some curious onlookers and rode off.







9:02 am: On the way to view some birds. It was our understanding that the caged birds had been released. So we started off the base parking the bike in the wrong spot and starting off on the wrong trail. (I should have understood, who would create a parking lot next to the toilet!!!) We were greeted into the Abhyaaranya by 4 langurs (Grey Langurs, Genus:Semnopithecus) out gathering food early, before the sun would really start to blaze and then it would time to retreat into the shadows. One was sitting on a very low branch close to the ground. But by the time I had steadied myself to take a snap, it ran away upwards into the foliage in the comfort of his other companions. Unfortunately we didn't have a Digicam with us so we had to make amends with the 2.0 Mp cam on my cell, which died midway and refused to click any more snaps (the reason that u will see no pics from the top of the fort [:P]) On the way upwards along the trail a bird with a very sweet call guided us all along the path. we tried to spot it in the dense, but even after gazing for a good couple of minutes, we could spot it only for a few seconds before it took flight. Animals in the wild have an acute sense of awareness!! [:)]







As the trail got steeper we started to gauge the feel of a strenuous trek. The path was a bit old and unused for a while (we realise the reason for this later [:(]), with dried leaves making it difficult to guess at times. The forest became so dense at times that even Saching with his thin frame had a difficult time. From the base we could see that we had to reach a long first plateau, then there was a shorter second plateau and finally the fort. The trek from the base to the first plateau was very steep (it took us exactly one hour and i was panting every 10 mins all along the way). I had enough fun riding the bike and didn't want to climb any more but Saching cheered me upto the first plateau. After that it was a piece of cake. As we rested on the first plateau, we heard some groups coming along a second path. On enquirng we realised that we had come up along the steeper but shorter path and decided to take this one on the way down.
By 11:00 am we were in the fort. We didn't know this earlier but the fort has a genuine history attached to it. I feel now that the Govt. of Maharashtra isn't doing enough to safeguard and protect some of the lesser known but important forts of Maharashtra other than Raigad, Pratapgad, Sinhagad. To share the knowledge, the Killedar of Karnala Fort was none other than the grandfather of Vasudeo Balwant Phadke, "Father of the Armed Struggle for India's Independence", until little after the fall of the Maratha Empire. After spending a good half hour at the top holding back as much of the scenery as we could in our memories, we started our descend to the base. The heat was immense and we had already exhausted 2 litres of water on our way up. Along the way, we met many fellow trekkers, some families, some college buddies, some couples and some married folk with little children, all with the same questions:"How long is it to the top?","Is there any water supply up there?","Is the the view worth the climb?" (one chick asks me) (this one was the funniest, IF YOU KNOW WHAT I MEAN, THE VIEW IS ALWAYS WORTH THE CLIMB [;)])
I was not prepared for what was at the bottom (at the base of the actual trail) there was a proper parking lot for bikes, the cages weren't really empty, we saw parakeets, peahen, peacock, rabbits and some firang duck (most enthued animal there, the rabbits were lazily dozing and didnt seem bothered by the human folk gazing at them.)
Funniest part was from the house with the plate that read "Mukhya Vanarakshak" meaning "Chief Forest Officer", out came a muchhiwaala Maratha and served us two bottles of maaza and local mineral water. So between the two of us, in 3 hours we consumed over 4 litres of H2O, damn the heat!!!
We took off from Karnala at 12:30 pm and with the help of some really nice folk from Panvel and Raigad dist. reached Powai by 2:00 pm.