Ladakh DAY 1 – August 04, 2007 Sat
Ladakh 2. DAY 1 – August 04, 2007 SatGurgaon – Delhi [GT Road] – Sonpat – Panipat – Chandigarh – Rupnagar – Kiratpur – Swarghat
I wake Alok and Rini up at 4am. The day begins with a downpour, while we are trying to pack the bags on the bike. It is dark and pours heavily for almost 2 hours. By the end of which we are at the end of our patience and wits and decide to pack the bags anyway and move on. We are completely drenched, the luggage is wet and the packing is badly done due to lack of visibility. By the grace of Murphy, once we start, the rain stops almost by design.
We meet the rest of the team (3 more bikes) at Dhaula Kuan after some more confusion on the meeting place, and proceed towards GT road – filling petrol, taking cash out of ATMs and generally whiling time away for no apparent good reason. A lot of places are flooded and muddy, through which we waddle our way, especially Azadpur Mandi. Occasional drizzles add to the misery. Finally, by around 8:30am, we are out of Delhi city limits.
We stop at a sad-looking tea place, re-adjust our luggage and ourselves and begin the journey.
The road henceforth is good, apart from the very irritating city crossings of Sonpat and Panipat, where Saki almost gives up due to the constant change of gear. We stop at Karnal for breakfast, at Manoj Dhaba -- arguably the best parathas with white butter in the whole wide world. Ride till Ambala is mostly on 4-lane wide roads with lush green fields on both sides and some lovely misty breeze on the face. I do not remember much of this somnambulist ride, for obvious reasons.
After Ambala, though, the road is under construction, and so speed goes down. I negotiate almost 20km of zigzag road and truck traffic, cross the Wockhardt factory, and await the remaining gang by around 1:40pm, when I see that there are messages from Alok saying ‘bike stopped. Need help’. Damn!
We turn around and head back towards Ambala. Apparently there is water in Alok’s fuel tank. We get a local mechanic to repair that. While he tries to get this problem fixed, he also finds out that the accelerator wire needs to be changed, and what we have with us do not fit Alok’s bike. So we spend quite some time trying to find a solution. Finally it is fixed somehow and move on.
We reach Chandigarh by 3pm. A policeman trying to be helpful guides us to a wrong route and so we end up getting inside the city, and spend the next hour or so trying to find a way out. Whoever says Chandigarh is a planned city has never visited it. To add to the misery, Alok gets a challan by the traffic cops for over-speeding. What luck!
We manage to get back on track, on the road to Rupnagar – also called Ropar in local parlance. It is about 5pm now. Some 20km before Ropar we stop at Aman Dhaba, to regroup and more importantly – to have lunch. Baddy and Shrenik are waiting for us. Tim is out of reach.
The road after Rupnagar to Kiratpur is 2-lane, has more curves and goes through a forest area. Once we reach Kiratpur, there is a turning to the right that needs to be taken for Manali. From here on the road gets woefully narrow and bad. You can hardly see the potholes on the road in twilight. We are tired, hungry and dejected.
And then we meet with a huge traffic jam on the way to Swarghat. We almost give up hope.
Then, out of the blue, Alok gets a call from Tim. He has taken some different route and has reached the top of Swarghat, which is just some 2-3 km ahead. He has found a Himachal Pradesh tourism hotel called ‘Hotel Hill Top’. He says he has booked rooms for all of us. We are more than glad to accept his invitation.
We reach Hill Top and see Tim already in his shorts, sitting relaxed in the dining hall, with a beer mug in hand. There is no comparison to the sight and the relief it brings to us.
But the day is not over yet. While we are unpacking for the day, we first find that Alok’s oil gasket has probably given up, since there is smoke from the block and oil dropping from the bottom. We decide to see that in the morning, -- but that does not end there. Alok gets a call from Baddy that he is some 15km down the road from Swarghat – and his bike has got a flat. I mean, come on! There’s got to be an explanation to why the world behaves in this particular way most of the times. If you believe that the world is an extension to myself, and extended organ of my own, I must be a masochist.
Anyway, Alok and I go down on my bike. We find Baddy with some locals, trying to come to a solution. I am too tired, sleep-deprived and crancky to be of any help. So I leave the two of them to figure out their way back, and ride back to the nice room.
Once back though, I feel guilty as hell (did someone mention ‘rat’?), and so order some food for the three of us and await their return - instead of joining the other members of the gang, who are already well-fed, cleaned and behind protective curtains of warm sheets, way beyond the land of dreamless sleep.
What an unproductive day! If only we were not tired enough, we would be quite dejected with the whole state of affairs.
- Shreekant
I wake Alok and Rini up at 4am. The day begins with a downpour, while we are trying to pack the bags on the bike. It is dark and pours heavily for almost 2 hours. By the end of which we are at the end of our patience and wits and decide to pack the bags anyway and move on. We are completely drenched, the luggage is wet and the packing is badly done due to lack of visibility. By the grace of Murphy, once we start, the rain stops almost by design.
We meet the rest of the team (3 more bikes) at Dhaula Kuan after some more confusion on the meeting place, and proceed towards GT road – filling petrol, taking cash out of ATMs and generally whiling time away for no apparent good reason. A lot of places are flooded and muddy, through which we waddle our way, especially Azadpur Mandi. Occasional drizzles add to the misery. Finally, by around 8:30am, we are out of Delhi city limits.
We stop at a sad-looking tea place, re-adjust our luggage and ourselves and begin the journey.
The road henceforth is good, apart from the very irritating city crossings of Sonpat and Panipat, where Saki almost gives up due to the constant change of gear. We stop at Karnal for breakfast, at Manoj Dhaba -- arguably the best parathas with white butter in the whole wide world. Ride till Ambala is mostly on 4-lane wide roads with lush green fields on both sides and some lovely misty breeze on the face. I do not remember much of this somnambulist ride, for obvious reasons.
After Ambala, though, the road is under construction, and so speed goes down. I negotiate almost 20km of zigzag road and truck traffic, cross the Wockhardt factory, and await the remaining gang by around 1:40pm, when I see that there are messages from Alok saying ‘bike stopped. Need help’. Damn!
We turn around and head back towards Ambala. Apparently there is water in Alok’s fuel tank. We get a local mechanic to repair that. While he tries to get this problem fixed, he also finds out that the accelerator wire needs to be changed, and what we have with us do not fit Alok’s bike. So we spend quite some time trying to find a solution. Finally it is fixed somehow and move on.
We reach Chandigarh by 3pm. A policeman trying to be helpful guides us to a wrong route and so we end up getting inside the city, and spend the next hour or so trying to find a way out. Whoever says Chandigarh is a planned city has never visited it. To add to the misery, Alok gets a challan by the traffic cops for over-speeding. What luck!
We manage to get back on track, on the road to Rupnagar – also called Ropar in local parlance. It is about 5pm now. Some 20km before Ropar we stop at Aman Dhaba, to regroup and more importantly – to have lunch. Baddy and Shrenik are waiting for us. Tim is out of reach.
The road after Rupnagar to Kiratpur is 2-lane, has more curves and goes through a forest area. Once we reach Kiratpur, there is a turning to the right that needs to be taken for Manali. From here on the road gets woefully narrow and bad. You can hardly see the potholes on the road in twilight. We are tired, hungry and dejected.
And then we meet with a huge traffic jam on the way to Swarghat. We almost give up hope.
Then, out of the blue, Alok gets a call from Tim. He has taken some different route and has reached the top of Swarghat, which is just some 2-3 km ahead. He has found a Himachal Pradesh tourism hotel called ‘Hotel Hill Top’. He says he has booked rooms for all of us. We are more than glad to accept his invitation.
We reach Hill Top and see Tim already in his shorts, sitting relaxed in the dining hall, with a beer mug in hand. There is no comparison to the sight and the relief it brings to us.
But the day is not over yet. While we are unpacking for the day, we first find that Alok’s oil gasket has probably given up, since there is smoke from the block and oil dropping from the bottom. We decide to see that in the morning, -- but that does not end there. Alok gets a call from Baddy that he is some 15km down the road from Swarghat – and his bike has got a flat. I mean, come on! There’s got to be an explanation to why the world behaves in this particular way most of the times. If you believe that the world is an extension to myself, and extended organ of my own, I must be a masochist.
Anyway, Alok and I go down on my bike. We find Baddy with some locals, trying to come to a solution. I am too tired, sleep-deprived and crancky to be of any help. So I leave the two of them to figure out their way back, and ride back to the nice room.
Once back though, I feel guilty as hell (did someone mention ‘rat’?), and so order some food for the three of us and await their return - instead of joining the other members of the gang, who are already well-fed, cleaned and behind protective curtains of warm sheets, way beyond the land of dreamless sleep.
What an unproductive day! If only we were not tired enough, we would be quite dejected with the whole state of affairs.
- Shreekant
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