For professional reasons, I am not at liberty to reveal what TEMC stands for. Rest assured, it has something to do with my workplace. And yes the last two letters stand for Motorcycle Club. Now it so happened that parking lot discoveries revealed to me that there were quite a few ardent motorcyclists in office. It was only a matter of time before a Whatsapp group was created. Official emails were sent and the first day ride was organised to Yelagiri on August 28th, 2014.
We were a motley bunch with most of us riding Royal Enfield motos and a couple of lads on an Avenger 220 and a Yamaha FZ 150. The plan was to cover the 160 odd kms to Yelagiri in good time and start real early.
Now this ride was a first with folks from my office. My expectations from this ride were so so. There were some inexperienced riders in the group who would need some amount of shepherding. At the same time, four of the riders had done a lot of touring- A moto couple, Vaishali and her hubby Ashutosh, had also done the Leh/ Ladakh circuit. Sabith and Rajeev were experienced riders. I had had my share of rides.
We assembled in front of Total Mall, Koramangala at 5:00 am and most of us showed great discipline and turned up within minutes of each other. The last rider, Sabith, was to join us somewhere near Hosur. We made a cracking start and were at the second rendezvous in no time. Sabith turned up some 10 minutes later and it was surprising to see him sans his riding jacket. Instead he had a yoga mat strapped with a bungee cord on his seat! I still wonder what he had been thinking at that time…
On and off, the group would fall into a two by two ride formation, but it was mostly each man for himself. Ashutosh had the good sense to ride tail and make sure no one was falling behind. Breakfast halt was at Shoolagiri- and many a masala dosa, idlis and vadas were gulped and washed down with steaming filter coffee. We made good time after that and reached the foothills of Yelagiri by 7:30 am.
The real fun started after that, the ride uphill was exhilarating. At that hour, there was no traffic, so you had all the bends to yourself. I could see Sabith, just ahead, scraping his footpegs on every corner. On this ride I had a custom performance exhaust strapped on my bike and this was a good opportunity to test it (more details here- https://yonderbluemountain.wordpress.com/2016/06/26/c5-evolution/). I gunned the throttle and took pole position. I think that was the fastest climb I have ever done in my life. I had no time to count the bends, nor to admire beautiful mountain vistas flashing past me. All I could see was the corner ahead and Sabith in my mirrors, hugging bend after bend. The logic was simple, slow down just before the corner, accelerate through the bend, make sure you time yourself around the corner and keep your eyes glued to a spot at least 50m ahead. Before long, the entire fast bunch was at the top. This was good riding, I told myself.
Yelagiri is best described as a sleepy hill side town, I would go to the lengths of calling it a kasba-something between a town and village. The townsfolk were just rising- a tea stall owner was setting up his pots and pans, when we rolled in. It seemed like a scene from an old western. There you have it, a main street. Townsfolk just starting to go about their business. Shops starting to open, smells of breakfast wafting into the street from a few meagre cafes and schoolchildren being cajoled out of their houses by their frantic moms. Suddenly, there’s a thunderous sound, and a bunch of cowboys ride in on iron horses. We get stares. Some appreciative glances from a few youngsters. A few minutes of drama and we are the centre of it all. But this town is no stranger to visitors. We park and dismount, kill our engines, and the towns people just shrug and go about their business. This is clearly no event for them.
We stand together, sipping coffee when one of us glances at his watch. Its 8:30 am. We applaud each other- wow! We made good time. We are happy. And then it strikes us! This was meant to be a whole day affair! We have made it to our destination too early! What are we supposed to do now? This was surely a first in my history of rides.
Grand plans are charted immediately, some of which promise to be a mini tour around half of South India. We soon remind each other that we have wives, children, uncles, aunts and mouths to feed. Indeed the nation’s economy hangs in balance until our return- not to mention the rest of the office eagerly waiting for us to return to work! We finally decide to survey and explore local flavour. Directions are asked of village folk and we take one of the smaller roads leading out of town.
An old gent tells us of a spot on a hill and we head off in that general direction. A spot of off-roading and a steep climb leads to a hill top parking lot- with views to behold.
Some of us head off for a trek after that. I lose and find my phone on the trail. A lonely goat herd doubles up as a guide/ sneaky murderer in our collective, fertile imagination. A couple of hours later, we decide to head back home. Some photo sessions on the way down and we conclude that this has been a good day out. A short detour to Krishnagiri dam turned out disappointing, but I did manage to take a couple of photos.
With that first ride ending on a happy note, I have one more reason to love my workplace (yeah right!).
yonder blue mountain... 