Interest: Why I Ride...
"Invest in Experience, not in things", this one is truly a great line. In our lives we want to do great things, things which others haven’t done, things which make us different from others. Some choose different careers, some choose different hobbies, some different things like cars, bikes, etc. so that we look and feel different. But in our country, where is there is always a rat race, we have been raised in a way that our priorities are to first accumulate things and if time and energy permits then enjoy them. Well I am no different from the millions. I am 24 years old, I learned riding bike in 19 years.
As I learned to ride and started following different blogs, automobile sites the bug to own a Yamaha urged me. When I was in 3rd year of engineering one friend of mine bought R15 v2. It is then I fell in love with this bike. The optimum use of 150cc which was not found in other bikes, engine refinement, and appearance on the whole all made me feel what love at first sight really means. My dad was a fan of Honda and I somehow managed to convince my dad to buy Yamaha R15 v2.
At that time moto-blogging was blooming in India and started to watch video on YouTube to gain knowledge about places, states and countries and how they travelled on two wheels. I was inspired and eager to travel across India on mu motorcycle. But was it possible? If so…how?? I was clueless where to start and was it safe??
I joined the riding club. There I could find like-minded people. Many people shared their experiences travelling across states and countries, I was shocked to see people in India travelling in motorcycle across states and some people living their life travelling. My first ride along outer ring road in Chennai although started with excitement met with failure, we couldn’t even cover half the distance planned.
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A Journey of a thousand miles begins with a single step
A Coastal Ride
The year 2017 was mixed experience for me. Exactly 5 months after joining Birlasoft, in october’17 along with my friends from riding club we planned to travel along the south Indian coastal region a distance of 3000kms in 4 days. I had mixed feeling of whether it would workout properly or not and had to convince my parents that I will take care of myself after which started along with 3 experienced riders.
The ride started at 3am and starting place was pitch black with drizzling Rain. We reached Pondicherry in 1hr 30mins and halted at Rameshwaram that night covering a distance of 520kms.
On 2nd day we began our ride reaching deserted town at the south-eastern tip of Pamban Island in the state of Tamil Nadu in India i.e. Dhanushkodi. Then we started towards Kanyakumari and reached the southernmost peak of India and had our lunch moved on towards Kerala to reach kovalam. This was the toughest part of the ride as the highway were closed and we had to ride through the village. It was already 6pm and we had to reach kovalam by 10pm. Somehow we managed to reach Kovalam around 12am and halted there for that night covering a distance of 520kms on Day-2 alone.
On 3rd day, waking up to such a beautiful scenery made me feel all the tough roads we faced previous day night was worth it. It was pathetic to see highway roads in Kerala to be so bad. We had our breakfast and started towards Kozhikode, riding through all the beautiful places in Kerala, which made me understand why it is called God’s own country. We reached Kozhikode covering 420kms from Kovalam, spent sometime in the beach, and went to our room.
On 4th day, we started towards Chennai. After all those off-roading, 6-lane Bangalore highway welcoming us were total bliss. We reached Chennai by 11pm through Bandipur forest, Mysore. I was surprised to see my dad waiting in the entrance of my house with aarti. We covered 450kms on last day of our ride and total of 2500kms in 4 days.
