Destination: Mahabaleshwar via NH4.
The Trip: Random decision for a ride. Did 600 KMs on a trip lasting 20 hours.
Riders:Anoop 'Dreamer' Agrawal on Machismo 500
Ujjwal 'Wayfarer' Dey on Bullet Electra 4s
Photos: http://picasaweb.google.com/udey11/MidnightMahabaleshwar
All Photos: http://picasaweb.google.com/udey11
Meeting Point: Eternity Mall, Thane, on 8 pm of Saturday
Anoop is known for his NAP rides - No Action Plan.
This is the story of how from wanting to see sunrise at Malshej Ghat, we ended up seeing the sunrise at Mahabaleshwar.
Saturday 2100 hours:
Well it was weekend and I had nowhere to go. Anoop called and suggested a short midnight trip to Malshej Ghat or Lonavala and back in the night. We do such rides just to have a cup of tea in solitude or maybe stay till the scenic sunrise. No one confirmed to come along for this night adventure so it was only Anoop and I at the meeting point - Eternity mall, Thane at 9 PM. XBHP group members were also here for a Dhaaba Hunt ride and it was nice to see familiar faces even though we were taking different roads. At 10 PM we decided to ride; just the 2 of us.
Then Anoop told me that we could go see the sunrise at Mahabaleshwar instead. I was so impressed by that idea that I decided to go for it even though I had only my riding gear on and nothing else. Normally I have my spare parts, first aid kit, water, engine oil and stuff on my Cramster saddlebags for long rides. But this was supposed to have been a short 4 hour trip. Now we were passing through Eastern Express Highway through Vashi bridge towards Panvel.
Traffic was plenty till we hit Panvel and we took the JNPT route to Lonavala. The Lonavala one-way Ghat was the only thing that intimidated me throughout this trip. At the highway to Lonavala, past the Ghat, my helmet visor broke off. I had kept it lifted up to see clearly in the night and the wind was so strong that it broke off. We stopped and unscrewed it to remove the damned visor and took a photo of it resting at the highway to Lonavala. This road and Lonavala itself still had traffic at midnight. We had had light dinner before the Lonavala Ghat.
We kept on the road to Pune, through Kamshet and then to Dehu Road and on to Wai.
We had enough smoke breaks every 50 KMs and the NH4 was beautiful with wide roads and dividers and at night we were able to do 80 KMPH very safely. The Ghats to reach Panchgani and Mahabaleshwar are smooth and easy to do at night and I faced no steep curves or traffic.
We reached Panchgani by 3 AM and we took an offroad ride to Harrison Folly. This place is used for adventure sports of paragliding and such. At 3 AM it was deserted and spooky with the wind blowing hard and no edge of the folly visible by the naked eye. Here the half moon dimmed enough to view hundreds of stars and Anoop pointed out a few constellations. The mountain view at 3 AM was awesome and the stars lit up like a display of Diwali decorations.
Sad thing is that since this was an unplanned trip, I had not brought along my Nikon DSLR and it was too dark for mobile phone photography.
After managing to light a cigarette here in incredible chilling cold windy weather, we moved on to Mahabaleshwar. Both of us in our Cramster Touring Armoured Jackets were shivering in the cold.
We stopped outside a hotel where Anoop knew the staff but it was closed and so were all other hotels.
Anoop went to sleep outside a closed shop and I wandered the deserted market. A temple had morning prayers on now at 4:30 AM and I followed the sound and found a teashop open for business. I had a coffee and went back to find Anoop who had managed to get us a room. We had to contend with seeing a regular sunrise at the horizon and not at any of the famous points.
The room was awful at the price we paid. Rs 350 for 5 hours. The checkout time at all hotels in Mahabaleshwar is 9 AM and hence we were told that we will have to leave latest by 10 AM. We decided that we should sleep for 2 hours so that we can enjoy the ride back on Sunday.
After all, it was riding our Enfields that was our main motivator. Everything else was secondary. And we knew we would need a couple hours sleep to be ready to thunder back to Mumbai on our Bullets.
Sunday 0900 hours:
We freshened up and went for a walk in the market. The coffee at our hotel was awful. Actually I don't think anyone at Mahabaleshwar makes good coffee, LOLz.
The market had wonderful stuff to sell and we didn't have the saddlebags to carry any of it. The place is famous for its strawberry and honey produce. Sadly we left empty handed and refilled petrol at a pump at Mahabaleshwar and visited 2 tourist points. The petrol pumps always seem to refuse credit cards. The Venna lake view was beautiful in the morning and a breakfast of strawberry chocolate ice cream made us feel happier than anything else. Kates point had monkeys eying our Enfields and helmets. We went again to the wonderful Harrison Folly and clicked more pictures.
Monkeys, camels, horses, kids, everyone seemed fresh and cheerful today.
We left Panchgani at 11:30 AM and rode on NH4 to stop for another breakfast, 18 KMs before Dehu Road. Then a non-stop ride (OK a stop for cigarette of course) to Lonavala. The service at Kumar Resort restaurant was awful and we waited 30 minutes for a dosa which was as cold as a stale papad. We moved through the traffic onto Khopoli and here again we got good fast roads.
Anoop lent me his RayBan since I didn't have a visor and this was the only reason I could do good speed in the growing heat and dust of the day.
At JNPT turn my Bullet reached reserve fuel. I had filled my tank in Mumbai and Anoop had filled his tank in Panvel on Saturday. Then we had refuelled a few litres at Mahabaleshwar. It seemed that Anoop's 500cc AVL was giving better mileage than my cast iron 350cc Bullet. I topped my tank here and then we rode non-stop to Mumbai, via Panvel Expressway through CBD to Vashi bridge. At Mumbai we took our last halt on Eastern Express Highway at 5:30 PM for a smoke and said our goodbyes.
I reached home and had a long hot shower and went to sleep at 8 PM to wake up next day at 8 AM totally refreshed and happy I did that crazy spontaneous trip.