It’s with great respect and appreciation I am writing this blog of our trip to Bilikal Betta. It all started with me discovering the hiwayRebels blogspot during one of my google searches. I was quiet impressed by the blogspot and the places that the Rebels had visited over the past few months. So with approval from Huez (Hubert Godfery) I became a member of hiwayRebels. I had not met any of the rebels before neither had I spoken to any one of them. On Thursday morning I had received the mail from Addy ( a person who is well planned ) from my point he had everything sketched to the last bit about a biking trip. The trip was to start off from Bangalore to Harohalli to Konalludhodi and finally to Bilikal Betta.
There were eight of us Huez the biker, Addy the baddy, Mudit, Captain Suresh, the focused Imtiaz, Hari from Hyderabad, my brother Vinod and myself. So there we where eight rebels on their way to conquer the roads, trek the hills and to define speed. You could call us as the “Fellowship of the Bikes”. With high octane from the exhaust pipe and the wind blowing across the face at 80Kms/Hr we breezed through the road like hot knife on top of butter. Fuelling our bikes and packing some food for our journey we ripped apart the road when disaster struck; my bike got punctured.
Why the puncture shops are always available when there is a puncture is either a mystery or a conspiracy by all the mechanics in India. They are always within a walk able distance from the point of puncture? My bike was punctured the mechanic knew exactly where the puncture could have occurred and within few minutes Huez, myself and Vinod caught with the rest of the rebels for some photo shoots with the bikes. We reached Harohalli @ around half past 5.
Had a cup and tea and rode the bikes to the reach the base of Bilikal Betta. The shear size of the hill gave me the chill and of course the villagers warning us of the wild elephants. With courage in our hearts and torches in our hands we began the climb up the hill. It took us 1 hr and 45 mins to climb the hill. The forest was dark with no well defined path to lead the way we had to make one. Each time we climbed the city lights looked like stars moving away from us like an expanding universe. With celestial stars above us and man made stars below us it was a collage of nature and humans living together.
The Rangaswamy temple was located below a mammoth size boulder. Few yards away from the temple there was this small home for the caretakers of the temple. The temple was undergoing a renovation for the forthcoming Jathre an occasion of joy and celebration for the villagers. The caretakers offered us with food to eat and some shelter. The view from the top of the hill was breathtaking the moon looked reachable and the stars seemed to be closer to us. So we all decided to start a bonfire for some reason there was more smoke and less fire so each of us where getting woods even a tree branch to get some fire going.
After the fire was up we where invited to join the caretakers for dinner. With ragi balls and saltwater on the plates the caretakers served with whatever they had. Oops few fresher’s in the field of eating ragi balls. With our bellys growling any food is good food. We came across an interesting character called Prabusamy. He is a multitalented person with knowledge on Vedas and Cinemas. He was an entertainer he could converse in thamil, kannada and telghu elegantly and even a bit of hindi.
A stroll on top of the hill was exiting the moon seemed to change its position at each point was it because the earth rotated anticlockwise or was it because the moon rotated around the earth? Finally reaching on a logical answer reading the position of the moon few of the rebels hit the sack while few hung around to hear Prabhusamy’s bonfire stories. The night was getting cold and finally I slept at 1 am in the morning. Few rebels got up at 6am to view the sunrise unfortunately the fog had engulfed the entire sky. So with few more photo shots without the sun we bid farewell to the caretakers and to three trekkers (Viswas, Murli and Sandeep) just like us who we met on top of the hill we began our descend down the hill. It took us 1 hr to reach down which was reasonable when compared by the time taken to climb up the hill.
Time to let the tea shop lady know that it’s not 30mins it takes 1hr and 45mins to reach the top (probably she must have been a marathon runner!). So finally we reached at the place where our bikes where parked. Handed over some parking fee and hit the road back home. It was a gr88 journey with g88 people. It was a trip to remember and for me it was the opportunity to become a “HiwayRebel”.
Regards,
Vinay
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