I've had only 3 hours of sleep but am already late by an hour as per plan. Where am i going? I ’am going to meet my parents in Trissur. Oh don't leave the blog...read on, its a bike trip to Trissur. My bro Rubert, co-rider of this trip, is ready already and now am guilty of sleeping a little extra than him.
Its 4:30 in the morning now and I’m setting up the saddle bag on the bike as the engine is warming up. All set time to roll. Rubert and I had agreed to meet up near the petrol bunk at BTM. Gave a call to Rubert that am starting and started off. The feeling of leaving on another trip is awesome. GOD! What a feeling. Waved off hand to Wife and left our building.
At the BTM petrol bunk now, watch showing 5:10 AM. Met Rubert and started off the ride. We took the Hosur – Salem - Coimbatore route. This is the quickest route so we decided on this one on fear of rains in Kerala. Yeah, it rains heavily there. The Forecasts predicted rains from all the way from Coimbatore to Trissur. But we are praying it shouldn't. Faith on God.
There are few more riders on the road today going various destinations. From pulsars to CBRs bullets, all dressed up for the ride... its Bikers Day out on the highway today.
It’s time for coffee. Rubert had brought a liter of black coffee! What an idea sir ji. The coffee was reeeallly refreshing. Kudos to Roobs! After cleaning our helmet visors off all the bugs that died on the visor, we started rolling. Rollin’ rollin’ rollin’...keep rollin’ rollin’ rollin’.
We've now reached the outskirts of Salem and its only 7:50AM. Yeah, we were keeping up with time well. It’s time for breakfast. Our requirement is a drive-in restaurant, may be a ride-in restaurant. So we settled on a road side hotel where the lorry drivers stop by. We had a few parotas and omelets and resumed back the ride.
A week before the ride we were brainstorming on the route. One of the dream routes is to go through Guddalur. But because of the weather forecasts predicting rain and also that we might be in the forest area late in the day, there is even more chance of getting caught in the rain. And by that time we would also be in the Mudumalai and Bandipur reserved forest area. Hence we compromised on the scenic route and took the quicker route.
The salem-Coimbatore route is little dry. Because of the highway road widening all the trees on the sides are chopped off. So there isn’t much to take pictures of. Soon we were on the bridge that was over the Bhavani River. There was good amount of water flowing in it, because of the rains, probably. The Sun wasn’t out all day. We took some pictures over here, Gulped some black coffee, and energy bars and then the throttle is wide open again.
Pulsar 220 is a good bike to enjoy on. The power is good and usable. I love the roar it makes when the throttle is wide open. I’m even thinking of installing the K&N air filter that would directly fit on the pulsar's stock air box. But it costs RS 2.6k. The Bajaj's air filter element is just under RS 100. I wish the visor on the bike is a little taller so that it would help block some wind off me. This would make the p220 a good Sports Tourer.
It’s 11:20 AM now and 50 km to reach Coimbatore. Now Rubert finds that his front brake's bite isn’t right. May be the pads worn out? We decided to enter Coimbatore city and get the disk brake pads. We got the pads a Bajaj dealer and then Rubert suggested we make a visit to our old neighborhood Meena Estate, Coimbatore as it is nearby. So we headed there. The house where we stayed was empty but it pretty much remained the same as it was about 10 years ago. We were in high school back then.
We met few of our old neighbors. They were surprised to see us. After some chit chat with them and exchanged phone numbers, gulped some coffee, ate some energy bars and we were back on the saddle again.
Its 1:00 PM now, we are at the Kerala border. The roads are bad because of the heavy rains. Though the sky is overcast with black clouds, there isn’t any rain yet. Praise the Lord. Am having a rain pant in my saddle bag, but i don’t want to wear it now. I want to simply believe that God answered my prayer and that rain would not come. 100 odd km to reach Trissur.
We are near Palakkad now. This is the longest leg of our ride today. The road is full of trucks and cars piled up on either side of the road and the pace is just 10km/hr. At times the traffic grinds to a halt. Praise the Lord we are on two wheels. We still have gaps to squeeze through. Now the Kerala's trademark humidity kicks in. It’s sweating like taking a shower. Its cloudy and dark, but there isn’t a rain. The pace is 5-1km/hr through the gaps. I'm lovin it.
It’s time for a break. Coffee break. Man, the lush green is thick and everywhere here. No wonder Kerala is called God's Own Country(The whole universe is God's own though). After some coffee, lots of water and energy bar - not in any particular order, we rolled on. It’s 2:00 pm and 50 more km to Trissur.
Our parents didn’t know we were coming as we planned to surprise them. We were hoping they are at home when we reach there. In all our breaks Rubert was on his phone. Only later when i checked my Facebook, I realized he has been updating his status throughout the ride! Cool techie.
We have finally entered Trissur officially at 3:00PM IST. Trissur is a small typical Kerala town. It’s called as the Cultural Capital of Kerala. We just reached our parents place. I was knocking on the doors and my Dad opened up the door. For a sec there was a pause and its totally worth it.
There ended our Day1.
Read: Next Day
