MadDog
Pack Dog
I started hatching a plan to do this ride some time back when a business trip to India became a distinct possibility. I have always wanted to ride a Classic motorcycle over a longer distance and I have also always wanted to travel across the western coast of India, What better way than to combine both into one trip.
The bikes turned out to be a relatively simple task thanks to a helpful chap named Andy at indiabikes.com. with his help we were able to select the bikes of our choice along with the extras required such as steel luggage racks and helmets etc, allowing me to travel really lightly.
We hired a Royal Enfield Bullet 350 classic for me and a Honda CBR 250R for my colleague. The Bullett has a full cast iron pannier frame and made carrying the luggage really simple too.
The costs were also pretty reasonable with the bike rental ending up around R2500 for the week and the refundable deposit being around R4000. The deposit was required upfront and payment for the bikes was made upon collection or delivery as it happened.
I did not get that many photos along the route, which I regret tremendously but as it turns out time and distance are not as relative in India as they are here leaving us pressed for time to make it to our destination in time.
but I digress, let me start at the beginning and I'll cover the individual costs etc. as I go along.
We arrived in Mumbai at 11:30 local time on Friday the 23rd March and were instantly aware of the hustle bustle of the City. On the approach we could see that there was still an insane amount of traffic on the roads and much to our horror that the Airport (and the hotel) were a very long way from the city outskirts we had to reach by bike in the morning. Our hotel sent a Prius to collect us from the Airport and although the hotel was very close to the airport (less than a km) it still took almost an hour to get there. The hotel itself, the Hyatt Regency was superb, the service was excellent and the rooms were fantastic but we did feel a little cheated out of the experience as it was very westernized. It also turned out to be horribly expensive at over 4 grand ZAR per night
We had an early 7am breakfast of Omlette and fruit juice and prepared to meet the young lad from Indiabikes.com who had delivered the bikes the previous evening to the hotel. We immediately hit our 1st snag when he had neglected to deliver the helmets we had ordered online when placing our bookings. This was however quickly rectified and he disappeared off only to arrive 15 mins later with 2 decidedly used XL full face helmets. After some hurried negotiations with him he agreed to escort us to the outskirts of the city where we could purchase new helmets for 800 Rupees each (about R100)
Starting the Enfield felt like the start of an Adventure into the unknown. it was delivered very low on fuel and with a flat battery. I had to figure out the decompression system which luckily was quite simple and kick the old beast into life. When it fired I had flashbacks of load shedding days and I am now more convinced than ever that my generator runs on a Recycled Enfield motor
The escort turned out to be him riding shotgun on one of the bikes whilst pointing and waving frantically and suffering multiple cardiac events due to our seemingly cowboy riding style. Allow me to explain for a moment...
Almost everyone on India rides a motorcycle of some sort with most of these being locally made 125 or 180cc Bajaj and Chinese models so speed is not really a big thing there. our own 2 bikes being a 350 and 250 had seemingly super bike capabilities in comparison and our far superior riding ability due to better training resulted in us whizzing along at an insane 80kmph while the locals putted around at 40kmph. Simply standing around and watching the locals ride showed us that they don't seem to have any real biking skills but rather just see their bikes like the chinese see bicycles, just a means of transport and not a sport.
So, back to where I was... Mumbai traffic is chaos, admittedly, but it must be said that the roads are very wide and we both found it very easy to maneuver around in the traffic. With the help of our frantic pillion we were shown a very efficient route out of the city to the spot where we could buy our own helmets. The new ones were not much better and it seems that every head in India is XL in size as we could not find any helmets in any other size. Since helmets are now compulsory across India we had no choice but to buy what we could get and get on our way. We still had 350kms to travel and it was already nearing 9am. When we set off again we actually had some time to take in the scenery whilst riding and for the 1st time we both felt like we were in a foreign country. This was probably reinforced by an Elephant walking along the side of the main road in the Ctiy outskirts with its trunk neatly perched on top of a local man's head.
Our 1st big pleasant surprise was when we got to the 1st toll gate to discover that bikes have a special bypass lane on the left of the toll gates and just breeze through without any toll. There were many small towns along the route we chose, almost every 5kms there was civilization and traffic to deal with. this reduced speeds to below 40kmph and it started to dawn on us that things were going to take a lot longer to get done around here.
Both bikes were very frugal on fuel and the Enfield was getting around 300kms to a tank without hitting reserve. I never did check the tank size but I would estimate it at around 15L with 5L of that being reserve. My top speed was 105kmph but at that speed sustained for more than a few minutes the LandRover in the Enfield showed through and oil started seeping from almost everywhere. a drop in speed of 10kmph and she ran like a dream all day.
Our next big surprise was the heat, at one stage it was a little over 50dec c. on a mountain pass. The tar was melting and the heat would hit you like waves. we found ourselves stopping every few kms just to get some water. Water was in plentiful supply but as it turns out very tricky to ask for as we did not know the Hindi word for water. Most often we could point to the bottles in the fridges but other times we had to resort to the age old internationally recognized "Pepsi" and were rewarded with exactly that
The roads were not in terrible shape and actually far better than many of the old Transkei roads we have here. the only exception is their approach to road building. We never did manage to figure out their system but roads appear to be built and maintained by each village along the route. this results in a few kms of pristine road before and after each town with vast sections of destroyed and unmaintained roads in-between. roads would suddenly transition from freeways to gravel to sand with no warning or signage but that only gave us the opportunity to test our Meerkat poses. That resulted in some very strange looks indeed, it seems not many GS's pass by this way
It took us a full 10 hours in the saddle to get to our 1st stop in Ganpati Pule just as darkness was descending and the route from Ratnagiri to Ganpati Pule was some of the most scenic I have ever ridden. Beautiful coastline with amazing villages nestled in the mangroves and under the trees. The roads were very narrow and bumpy in this area but the people were all so friendly and the food, oh boy the food is something that I'll leave to describe in a whole section
In Ganpati Pule we found the most incredible little beach resort that cost us 400 Rupees per person for the night. The room was air-conditioned and well maintained. it even had modern toilets, the kind we are used to but more on that later.
We took a stroll on the beach and had a swim in the official Indian ocean, much to the amusement of the locals who seemed to shy away from the water. we found out why a little leader when we had to scrub bits of crude oil from our bodies in the shower. There was crude floating in the ocean in big hard lumps. Where it washed up onto the shore it melted in the sand and congealed on the bottoms of your feet or shoes. This sis not ruin the experience for us though and the water was so refreshing and soothing on our now very sore backsides.
Dinner was an almost erotic experience. the food there is nothing like local indian cuisine. the flavors have incredible depth and not everything is a curry or hot but everything is spicy. They take such a pride in their cooking and it shines through. Every meal we ate was beyond amazing and for a non vegetarian I would happily convert if I lived there. They can prepare vegetables like nothing I have ever experienced. We had 2 simple rules to keep ourselves from getting the infamous Deli Belly. 1. Stay away from tap water. 2. Don't eat unpeeled fruits and don't touch washed salads. These 2 simple things kept us from any ill effects and the food itself takes care of cleansing your system, sometimes at very high speeds indeed
Eating in India is different to what we are used to, especially in the rural areas. There are no westernized restaurants and the eating houses have fixed eating times. This means that if you pitch up at a eating house at say 10am for a snack you're pretty unlikely to be served or even let into the premises. Most places serve breakfast from 7am to 9am, lunch from 12pm to 3pm and dinner from 7pm till 11pm. Outside of these times you will definitely struggle to find food unless you are in a major city.
Something to note on the food is the variety of spices. Each little town has their own secret mix of herbs and spices, resulting in vastly different flavors of food between each town. the variations seem to be infinite. Each food type is easily identifiable but very different in flavor profile as you travel. Goa where we spent our 1st night and the 1st few hours of day 2 is renowned for its seafood and it did not disappoint
We left Ganpati Pule at 5am the next morning while it was still dark. within 10 minutes we realized why no one else travels at this hour. The fog was so thick it ran down our visors like soup and we could not see where the roads went as there were no street lights anywhere. Our pace dropped to almost walking pace and I had 1 close call on a hairpin I could not see when I took to the gravel on the outside and found that the old enfield handles gravel like a lilo handles an oil slick. We kept going as we had a long ride ahead. when the sun finally made its appearance to start burning off the fog we were sopping wet and no more than 10kms from where we started. From this point we knew we needed to pick up the pace and I used the GPS to take us to the nearest national highway so we could make the push to Panaji and Old Goa 200kms away.
We arrived at about 11am and met our associate from the Bangalore offices who had ridden 17 hours 2 days prior to meet up with us on his Bajaj chopper. After a quick bite to eat we hit the road again and he routed us over some of the most incredible mountain passes to make our way inland to another national highway. This part of the trip is a blur, we had to push like crazy and spend a whopping 14 hours in the saddle to reach our objective for the day which was 250kms from Bangalore with just a stretch of highway to cover in the morning.
Once again we found really cheap accommodation with Air-conditioning (a must due to the insane boeing sized mosquitoes) I also got to experience a real indian toilet on this leg of the journey at a service station. Picture a crude hole in the floor and a bucket or water, thats it. the business took all of 30 seconds to complete, thanks to the spicy food the night before but the cleanup took substantially longer. Anyone wanting to travel like this, consider taking along some toilet paper....
Once again, an amazing dinner was had and even my sore arse could not keep sleep at bay.
Once again we set off at 5am and this time there was no fog and a double lane freeway to look forward to. We only made one stop for a cup of coffee at about 7:30am and arrived at the outskirts of Bangalore at 10am where we were parted from our escort and the biggest shock of the tip waited for us ahead.
Bangalore traffic is Insane. PERIOD. the city has grown too fast and the infrastructure is desperately trying to catch up. there are over 10 million people in this city designed to house around 2 million. the roads are narrow and 2 lanes means 5 cars fit side by side with mm's to spare on each side. Somehow, through magic, luck and osmosis the system works. The hooting is insane but without any malice or impatience. Cars and bikes blend harmoniously while simultaneously experiencing a near death incident at every intersection. No words can do this place justice. Its like month end saturdays at the local shopping centre but imagine that with only 1 shopping centre to serve a major city.
After an hour of sheer luck and 100000 near misses we made it to our hotel in the centre of the city and parked the bikes without ever intending to touch them again. They were collected by the local representatives from the bike hire company a few days later and ridden back to Mumbai by some local biking enthusiasts.
The hooting system in India takes some getting used to. Unlike our own system, hooters are not offensive but are used as early warning systems for motorists and cyclists. Large vehicles all have signs on them asking drivers to hoot to announce their presence as mirrors don't seem to be used much. Its also not uncommon for vehicles to be in the fast lane of a freeway traveling in the opposite direction to the flow of traffic.
There is also an unspoken rule that he who enters a section of road 1st has right of way, this seems logical until applied to freeway crossings where cyclists cross at walking speed in front of vehicles traveling at 100+ km/h. Speed humps are also not uncommon on these freeways and WILL surprise the hell out of you while traveling at full speed with a fully loaded 300Kg bike loaded with luggage and no suspension to speak of.
I could go on and on about the trip but the basics are all laid out above. The big things to take away are the really low costs of traveling if you don't mind roughing it a little and the incredible food. One other big thing to note is the hospitality of the people. Wherever we went people were extremely friendly and would offer you whatever they had even if it meant that it was all they had. I was truly humbled by this more than anything. Our so called poverty stricken people in S.A. have no idea of true poverty and it was in these places where true ingenuity shone through as well.
I have a few pics to share and will be posting those tomorrow sometime along with the track of our route in Garmin and Google Earth format.
Thank you for reading this little report and I hope that more of you will take the time to experience this really wonderful and diverse country. If you can, then I highly recommend that you take your time and travel 150kms max per day and do it on a bike, preferably an old one
My only luggage for the entire trip. This bag was fantastic and handled the dust and bumps better than I expected.
DryBag
Our little Airbus A340 managed a very respectable speed at 40000 ft, but eish it was cold up there
Fast and Cold
The last hour of the flight to Mumbai, I could already spot the lights of some ships way below us.
Long Way From Home
The Hyatt Regency in Mumbai central. 5 Star luxury
Hyatt Regency Mumbai
The view from my hotel room in the morning before the long ride
Room with a View
Breakfast while we waited for the bikes to be delivered to the hotel. The trusty Garmin had the India Streetmaps loaded and ready to show us the way out of this massive city
Breakfast
The old Royal Enfield arrived with just enough fuel to get it started and a flat battery resulting in some decompression and enthusiastic kicking
Bike Delivery
The bikes turned out to be a relatively simple task thanks to a helpful chap named Andy at indiabikes.com. with his help we were able to select the bikes of our choice along with the extras required such as steel luggage racks and helmets etc, allowing me to travel really lightly.
We hired a Royal Enfield Bullet 350 classic for me and a Honda CBR 250R for my colleague. The Bullett has a full cast iron pannier frame and made carrying the luggage really simple too.
The costs were also pretty reasonable with the bike rental ending up around R2500 for the week and the refundable deposit being around R4000. The deposit was required upfront and payment for the bikes was made upon collection or delivery as it happened.
I did not get that many photos along the route, which I regret tremendously but as it turns out time and distance are not as relative in India as they are here leaving us pressed for time to make it to our destination in time.
but I digress, let me start at the beginning and I'll cover the individual costs etc. as I go along.
We arrived in Mumbai at 11:30 local time on Friday the 23rd March and were instantly aware of the hustle bustle of the City. On the approach we could see that there was still an insane amount of traffic on the roads and much to our horror that the Airport (and the hotel) were a very long way from the city outskirts we had to reach by bike in the morning. Our hotel sent a Prius to collect us from the Airport and although the hotel was very close to the airport (less than a km) it still took almost an hour to get there. The hotel itself, the Hyatt Regency was superb, the service was excellent and the rooms were fantastic but we did feel a little cheated out of the experience as it was very westernized. It also turned out to be horribly expensive at over 4 grand ZAR per night
We had an early 7am breakfast of Omlette and fruit juice and prepared to meet the young lad from Indiabikes.com who had delivered the bikes the previous evening to the hotel. We immediately hit our 1st snag when he had neglected to deliver the helmets we had ordered online when placing our bookings. This was however quickly rectified and he disappeared off only to arrive 15 mins later with 2 decidedly used XL full face helmets. After some hurried negotiations with him he agreed to escort us to the outskirts of the city where we could purchase new helmets for 800 Rupees each (about R100)
Starting the Enfield felt like the start of an Adventure into the unknown. it was delivered very low on fuel and with a flat battery. I had to figure out the decompression system which luckily was quite simple and kick the old beast into life. When it fired I had flashbacks of load shedding days and I am now more convinced than ever that my generator runs on a Recycled Enfield motor
The escort turned out to be him riding shotgun on one of the bikes whilst pointing and waving frantically and suffering multiple cardiac events due to our seemingly cowboy riding style. Allow me to explain for a moment...
Almost everyone on India rides a motorcycle of some sort with most of these being locally made 125 or 180cc Bajaj and Chinese models so speed is not really a big thing there. our own 2 bikes being a 350 and 250 had seemingly super bike capabilities in comparison and our far superior riding ability due to better training resulted in us whizzing along at an insane 80kmph while the locals putted around at 40kmph. Simply standing around and watching the locals ride showed us that they don't seem to have any real biking skills but rather just see their bikes like the chinese see bicycles, just a means of transport and not a sport.
So, back to where I was... Mumbai traffic is chaos, admittedly, but it must be said that the roads are very wide and we both found it very easy to maneuver around in the traffic. With the help of our frantic pillion we were shown a very efficient route out of the city to the spot where we could buy our own helmets. The new ones were not much better and it seems that every head in India is XL in size as we could not find any helmets in any other size. Since helmets are now compulsory across India we had no choice but to buy what we could get and get on our way. We still had 350kms to travel and it was already nearing 9am. When we set off again we actually had some time to take in the scenery whilst riding and for the 1st time we both felt like we were in a foreign country. This was probably reinforced by an Elephant walking along the side of the main road in the Ctiy outskirts with its trunk neatly perched on top of a local man's head.
Our 1st big pleasant surprise was when we got to the 1st toll gate to discover that bikes have a special bypass lane on the left of the toll gates and just breeze through without any toll. There were many small towns along the route we chose, almost every 5kms there was civilization and traffic to deal with. this reduced speeds to below 40kmph and it started to dawn on us that things were going to take a lot longer to get done around here.
Both bikes were very frugal on fuel and the Enfield was getting around 300kms to a tank without hitting reserve. I never did check the tank size but I would estimate it at around 15L with 5L of that being reserve. My top speed was 105kmph but at that speed sustained for more than a few minutes the LandRover in the Enfield showed through and oil started seeping from almost everywhere. a drop in speed of 10kmph and she ran like a dream all day.
Our next big surprise was the heat, at one stage it was a little over 50dec c. on a mountain pass. The tar was melting and the heat would hit you like waves. we found ourselves stopping every few kms just to get some water. Water was in plentiful supply but as it turns out very tricky to ask for as we did not know the Hindi word for water. Most often we could point to the bottles in the fridges but other times we had to resort to the age old internationally recognized "Pepsi" and were rewarded with exactly that
The roads were not in terrible shape and actually far better than many of the old Transkei roads we have here. the only exception is their approach to road building. We never did manage to figure out their system but roads appear to be built and maintained by each village along the route. this results in a few kms of pristine road before and after each town with vast sections of destroyed and unmaintained roads in-between. roads would suddenly transition from freeways to gravel to sand with no warning or signage but that only gave us the opportunity to test our Meerkat poses. That resulted in some very strange looks indeed, it seems not many GS's pass by this way
It took us a full 10 hours in the saddle to get to our 1st stop in Ganpati Pule just as darkness was descending and the route from Ratnagiri to Ganpati Pule was some of the most scenic I have ever ridden. Beautiful coastline with amazing villages nestled in the mangroves and under the trees. The roads were very narrow and bumpy in this area but the people were all so friendly and the food, oh boy the food is something that I'll leave to describe in a whole section
In Ganpati Pule we found the most incredible little beach resort that cost us 400 Rupees per person for the night. The room was air-conditioned and well maintained. it even had modern toilets, the kind we are used to but more on that later.
We took a stroll on the beach and had a swim in the official Indian ocean, much to the amusement of the locals who seemed to shy away from the water. we found out why a little leader when we had to scrub bits of crude oil from our bodies in the shower. There was crude floating in the ocean in big hard lumps. Where it washed up onto the shore it melted in the sand and congealed on the bottoms of your feet or shoes. This sis not ruin the experience for us though and the water was so refreshing and soothing on our now very sore backsides.
Dinner was an almost erotic experience. the food there is nothing like local indian cuisine. the flavors have incredible depth and not everything is a curry or hot but everything is spicy. They take such a pride in their cooking and it shines through. Every meal we ate was beyond amazing and for a non vegetarian I would happily convert if I lived there. They can prepare vegetables like nothing I have ever experienced. We had 2 simple rules to keep ourselves from getting the infamous Deli Belly. 1. Stay away from tap water. 2. Don't eat unpeeled fruits and don't touch washed salads. These 2 simple things kept us from any ill effects and the food itself takes care of cleansing your system, sometimes at very high speeds indeed
Eating in India is different to what we are used to, especially in the rural areas. There are no westernized restaurants and the eating houses have fixed eating times. This means that if you pitch up at a eating house at say 10am for a snack you're pretty unlikely to be served or even let into the premises. Most places serve breakfast from 7am to 9am, lunch from 12pm to 3pm and dinner from 7pm till 11pm. Outside of these times you will definitely struggle to find food unless you are in a major city.
Something to note on the food is the variety of spices. Each little town has their own secret mix of herbs and spices, resulting in vastly different flavors of food between each town. the variations seem to be infinite. Each food type is easily identifiable but very different in flavor profile as you travel. Goa where we spent our 1st night and the 1st few hours of day 2 is renowned for its seafood and it did not disappoint
We left Ganpati Pule at 5am the next morning while it was still dark. within 10 minutes we realized why no one else travels at this hour. The fog was so thick it ran down our visors like soup and we could not see where the roads went as there were no street lights anywhere. Our pace dropped to almost walking pace and I had 1 close call on a hairpin I could not see when I took to the gravel on the outside and found that the old enfield handles gravel like a lilo handles an oil slick. We kept going as we had a long ride ahead. when the sun finally made its appearance to start burning off the fog we were sopping wet and no more than 10kms from where we started. From this point we knew we needed to pick up the pace and I used the GPS to take us to the nearest national highway so we could make the push to Panaji and Old Goa 200kms away.
We arrived at about 11am and met our associate from the Bangalore offices who had ridden 17 hours 2 days prior to meet up with us on his Bajaj chopper. After a quick bite to eat we hit the road again and he routed us over some of the most incredible mountain passes to make our way inland to another national highway. This part of the trip is a blur, we had to push like crazy and spend a whopping 14 hours in the saddle to reach our objective for the day which was 250kms from Bangalore with just a stretch of highway to cover in the morning.
Once again we found really cheap accommodation with Air-conditioning (a must due to the insane boeing sized mosquitoes) I also got to experience a real indian toilet on this leg of the journey at a service station. Picture a crude hole in the floor and a bucket or water, thats it. the business took all of 30 seconds to complete, thanks to the spicy food the night before but the cleanup took substantially longer. Anyone wanting to travel like this, consider taking along some toilet paper....
Once again, an amazing dinner was had and even my sore arse could not keep sleep at bay.
Once again we set off at 5am and this time there was no fog and a double lane freeway to look forward to. We only made one stop for a cup of coffee at about 7:30am and arrived at the outskirts of Bangalore at 10am where we were parted from our escort and the biggest shock of the tip waited for us ahead.
Bangalore traffic is Insane. PERIOD. the city has grown too fast and the infrastructure is desperately trying to catch up. there are over 10 million people in this city designed to house around 2 million. the roads are narrow and 2 lanes means 5 cars fit side by side with mm's to spare on each side. Somehow, through magic, luck and osmosis the system works. The hooting is insane but without any malice or impatience. Cars and bikes blend harmoniously while simultaneously experiencing a near death incident at every intersection. No words can do this place justice. Its like month end saturdays at the local shopping centre but imagine that with only 1 shopping centre to serve a major city.
After an hour of sheer luck and 100000 near misses we made it to our hotel in the centre of the city and parked the bikes without ever intending to touch them again. They were collected by the local representatives from the bike hire company a few days later and ridden back to Mumbai by some local biking enthusiasts.
The hooting system in India takes some getting used to. Unlike our own system, hooters are not offensive but are used as early warning systems for motorists and cyclists. Large vehicles all have signs on them asking drivers to hoot to announce their presence as mirrors don't seem to be used much. Its also not uncommon for vehicles to be in the fast lane of a freeway traveling in the opposite direction to the flow of traffic.
There is also an unspoken rule that he who enters a section of road 1st has right of way, this seems logical until applied to freeway crossings where cyclists cross at walking speed in front of vehicles traveling at 100+ km/h. Speed humps are also not uncommon on these freeways and WILL surprise the hell out of you while traveling at full speed with a fully loaded 300Kg bike loaded with luggage and no suspension to speak of.
I could go on and on about the trip but the basics are all laid out above. The big things to take away are the really low costs of traveling if you don't mind roughing it a little and the incredible food. One other big thing to note is the hospitality of the people. Wherever we went people were extremely friendly and would offer you whatever they had even if it meant that it was all they had. I was truly humbled by this more than anything. Our so called poverty stricken people in S.A. have no idea of true poverty and it was in these places where true ingenuity shone through as well.
I have a few pics to share and will be posting those tomorrow sometime along with the track of our route in Garmin and Google Earth format.
Thank you for reading this little report and I hope that more of you will take the time to experience this really wonderful and diverse country. If you can, then I highly recommend that you take your time and travel 150kms max per day and do it on a bike, preferably an old one
My only luggage for the entire trip. This bag was fantastic and handled the dust and bumps better than I expected.
DryBag
Our little Airbus A340 managed a very respectable speed at 40000 ft, but eish it was cold up there
Fast and Cold
The last hour of the flight to Mumbai, I could already spot the lights of some ships way below us.
Long Way From Home
The Hyatt Regency in Mumbai central. 5 Star luxury
Hyatt Regency Mumbai
The view from my hotel room in the morning before the long ride
Room with a View
Breakfast while we waited for the bikes to be delivered to the hotel. The trusty Garmin had the India Streetmaps loaded and ready to show us the way out of this massive city
Breakfast
The old Royal Enfield arrived with just enough fuel to get it started and a flat battery resulting in some decompression and enthusiastic kicking
Bike Delivery
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