Grand Tour 2012, Stage 1, Chennai to Goa

I have been very remiss in blogging about my motorcycle travels recently. I didn't publish a word about Grand Tour 2011, my fourth annual "avoid being in Chennai during the north-east monsoon" bike tour, which started earlier than usual, in late September, escorting a visitor from the USA (hi, Dani !) on a car-and-driver tour of several of the famous temple towns of Tamil Nadu; continued (by solo motorcycle) with the Bangalore-based RTMC (Rolling Thunder Motorcycle Club) Tenth Anniversary meet in Ooty in early October; took me as usual to the Karnataka interior and coast, with a quick side trip to Goa for Royal Enfield's annual Rider Mania in late November; then to the Bulls of Shimoga First Anniversary in December near Kemmangundi; ten days in Kodagu; and back home to Tamil Nadu for New Year's Eve.

Given some encouragement by fellow bikers, who have told me they enjoy reading about my adventures, I have promised to take to the keyboard again, and do a write-up on Grand Tour 2012, which is (obviously) my fifth annual "avoid being in Chennai during the north-east monsoon" bike tour.

I'm not a fast rider. I'm quite content to loaf along at 60 or 70, with an occasional push to 80 or 90 in perfect conditions. Potholes, loose gravel, unmarked speed breakers, stray dogs and cattle, crazy drivers who pass on blind curves -- Indian roads can be full of unexpected hazards. A cow dashed in front of me on NH206 near Sagar. If I had been riding any faster, I might not have been able to avoid hitting it. One of the reasons that I don't really enjoy long group rides is that I'm usually the slowpoke in the crowd. For me, 300 km in a day is plenty. I've done 500 km/day twice, and it's too much. A leisurely pace is much more in my comfort zone. I have no aspirations to join the Iron Butt Club.

Until late October, I wasn't even certain that I would do a bike tour this year. Despite the adage "You don't stop riding when you get old; you get old when you stop riding", I have been telling myself for the last couple of years that there would come a time when I would start feeling that long-distance bike touring is getting a bit much for me. As far as I know, I'm the oldest active rider in any of the south India Bullet clubs. (Cue the Beatles, "Will you still need me, will you still feed me, when I'm 64?")

I even did some research on how to cover much of my planned itinerary by train. (Hey, I'm eligible for the senior citizen discount!)

But just to be ready, I got my bike serviced well in advance, bought a couple of months supply of cat food for the Gang of Four, made sure I had enough funds on hand and in the bank, watched the local and en-route weather forecasts, especially after the early onset of the rains, and decided on a departure date of 31st October. Cyclone Nilam arrived that very day, hitting the Tamil Nadu coast near Mamallapuram, with heavy rains and gale-force winds, so I delayed my departure a couple of days, and left home under sunny skies on 2nd November. Fortunately, Nilam wasn't anywhere near as devastating as Hurricane Sandy was in USA and Canada.

All five of my Bangalore connections were either out of town or unable to host me, so I stopped for the first night at a lodge in Hosur, after a comfortable 300 km ride.

The following itinerary will sound familiar to those who have read my previous travelogues, since I've started three out of five of my annual trips with roughly the same route, although the post-Goa ride is different each year.

From Hosur, I bypassed Bangalore on the NICE Ring Road (finished at last), took the Tumkur highway to NH48, (also finished, at least the section I rode, up to the turnoff for Sri Adichunchanagiri Mutt), spent a couple of nights at the ashram's guest house, and continued on to Shimoga for a three night stop to visit friends. (Thanks, Deepak, Naveen, and Subbu for hosting me!)

A couple of years back I had ridden from Shimoga to the coast via the Gersoppa ghat/ Honavar route, which was in terrible shape, so last year I had gone via Sirsi, which is only 5km longer, and has much better roads. But Kenith in Shimoga told me the Gersoppa route has been repaired, and it's now Sirsi which has the bad riding conditions, so I took his advice and rode via Gersoppa. Well, the road is certainly in better condition than it was a couple of years ago, but has already started to deteriorate, and NH17 up the coast has some perfectly dreadful bits. If you hit any of them at highway speeds, you'd take a nasty spill for sure. To be fair, I did see a road-patching team at work, but I think the potholes still claimed more territory than the repair crew did.

Anyway, I made it safely to Gokarna, and settled into my usual room at Vaibhav Nivas Lodge. But inflation seems to have hit hard; they have upped their rates by 50% from last year, so I looked around a bit for alternatives, and got a very nice room for only Rs 300 at Padma Laxmi Guest House, opposite the temple and much closer to the beach. (Phone 08386-257980 or 098863 35937.) My yoga teacher Ganesh started up his classes after I had been in Gokarna for a week, so I got in some good stretching for a few days before leaving on the next stage of my adventures, to Goa.

A pleasant surprise when crossing into Goa: petrol is nearly Rs 20/litre cheaper than in Karnataka. Usually when I buy petrol, I get Rs 500 at a time. In Tamil Nadu, that gets me 7.0 litres; in Karnataka, 6.6 litres; in Goa, 9.0 litres! And of course beer and booze is cheaper too.

Fortunately, my favourite guest house in Agonda, south Goa, which was fully booked when I called earlier, had a last-minute cancellation, so I spent three pleasant days there before heading north to Vagator for Rider Mania IV, 23-25 November. (link: http://www.royalenfield.com/ridermania )

Stay tuned for further updates!