Jul 01st,2007 Ride FSR#8

Hey, Hope this missive finds you all in the pink of health and tickled pink cause this is Legal's last official Ride with FSR. Legal has, luckily for us, decided to head for greener pastures and become more irrititiating than usual. For this he needs 2 years in the US, lucky for us :-). Anyways with this thought in mind I found myself riding towards Big Bazaar on Old Madras Road which was supposed to be the rendezvous for our ride. I was running late and the only person later than me was Screech who was today's trip leader. As we were already running late, we started off without preamble and headed towards the turn off to Mahadevapura on Old Madras Road, pretty soon we were all strung out in a line and riding hard towards the Hope Farm junction from where we continued straight on and stopped as not all of us were present, we were missing Satya and Santiago, we waited for them and called them up and gave them directions on how to reach us. They were at the Hope Farm junction and didn't know which way we had gone. Pretty soon Santiago landed up and soon after Sats turned up pissed and told Screech that since he was the trip leader for the day it was his duty to stop at every turning and make sure everyone had arrived. So chastised, we turned left here and turned into some dirt Roads heading towards the IOC factory, the roads were now purely dirt roads with a few signs of pre-historic tar, the going was rough and everyone slowed down.I was lucky I was riding Screech's CBZ, it was light and nimble and the tyres were in great condition, pretty soon Screech, Mats and I were ahead of the rest and Sats of course the moment he saw the dirt road, a look of glee must have appeared on his face and he took off on the XR strewing up stones and clods of dirt and pretty soon was lost to sight. This is what a dirt road does to Sats, he has no self-control, we continued on and soon we reached another turnoff and lo, Sats was not there we presumed he took off on the straight and narrow, and dispatched Santosh to go and bring him back. Sats came back with a sheepish grin saying that he'd never imagined that the imitation of a road that Sreech was pointing at was the route. So we proceeded further and pretty soon we were raising Cain and a lot of dust through a small village and finally burst out into the open country with the sounds of hens scolding us receding in the background. The country side was lovely as opposed to the road, green fields and forests and soon Screech stopped at a Quarry. It was beautiful, a naturally hewn granite quarry with a spiralling path to the bottom which was filled with green water. There was a herd of sheep at the bottom for their weekly constitutional methinks. It was lovely, there was a mound at the edge of the quarry and pretty soon we were all on it. Taking in the countryside and gulping breaths of fresh air and of course the only eyesore was the IOC factory with it's silios and railway track, but it was a minor glitch. There were some carving on the rock a little away from the Quarry, which looked a good couple of hundred years old, looks like the place was a temple of some sort here in the olden days. We chilled out here for a good half hour, and Rajesh rode his RD into the Quarry to inspire the sheep to get into the water, which the shepards had a tough time doing anyways. Post this welcome break we started riding towards Malur, the roads were really rough in places the road could not even be called a track, it was torturous for the RDs and Bullets because these bikes are pretty heavy and not meant for this kind of dirt roads. After a while the dirt road became a little better and pretty soon we were on the state highway heading towards the village of Lakkur, this was a good stretch of highway and the Bullets and RDs came out of the stupor and started belting, very soon we reached Lakkur and turned right towards ChikkaTirupathi, we reached there soon and pulled up at a small hotel for breakfast. ChikkaTirupathi, is a small dusty temple town which has the Venkateshwara Temple which is the miniature version of it's more famous counterpart. The temple was right across the road and the bikes elicited a lot of interest as usual. After breakfast we decided to hit it towards Sarjapur and then ride the beaten path back towards town, The ride towards Sarjapur was fantastic through the back roads which were lined with greenery and fields, Screech has told us about a Bridge ahead where birding was good, so we kept and eye out and kept on riding and pretty soon we reached the bridge, it was over the river Arkavathy and a small town on the other side, we rode across the bridge and turned right to find a path going down to the river/stream, it was a beautiful spot and we stopped there. Some of the other riders went under the bridge and headed up the path to explore, very soon Mats came back and told us they had found a nice spot downriver. We all got back onto our bikes and rode up there, it was a beautiful spot on the bank of the river under a Shady tree where we parked our bikes and walked across the river on a cement ford which ended before the other bank of the river. We decided to chill here for a while, we parked up the bikes and were soon sprawled under the shade of the tree. The place was peaceful, the flowing river, the shady tree and a 207 Milk Van which was parked on the ford and was being washed. Biking stories were exchanged and jokes flowed with Legal being the butt of them, as usual. I guess Legal got tired of all the leg pulling and decided to go and explore the town with Rajesh, they were soon back with a sack full on chilled ones. Rajesh looked like Santa Claus with the sack on his back, the ale was quaffed and peace reigned supreme except for a guffaw once in while. After an hour or so, we decided to hit it closer to town to get some lunch, Screech promised us a nice place onthe Byonk of a Tyonk(lake in FSR terminology) and we moved on. The Sky was turning dark and it was drizzling lightly when we reached Sarjapur town.Some of the riders filled up gas here and the rest of us regrouped and headed back. The road from Sarjapur to Bangalore is still pretty bad, I remember last year when we had some to Sports Village for a Football match, the roads were still being repaired and in some places we had to ride on the shoulder of the road for over a kilometer. Pretty soon we were all spaced out and riding towards town. We finally reached close to Sarjapur Road - Outer Ring Road and stopped to regroup, and after procuring some much needed supplies we rode towards the Lake, led by Screech. The lake was beautiful but as it was Sunday it was filled with people around it people washing clothes, vehicles, themselves. ...... etc etc. ..... we headed to another side of the lake which was a grove of trees and found a nice clearing with a rain water filled pond for a backdrop. We parked the bikes up and decided that Screech, Mats and I would ride to Marathalli which was around 10+Kms from here to pack lunch. The others sitting around and the party was just starting and we left, we reached Marathalli and packed lunch which comprised mainly or Biryanis and some chicken Kebabs. We headed back with me carrying a full load and the rest strapped onto the back of Mats' bike. When we reached back the party was in full flow and Legal at the helm, he was apparently enjoying himself a little too much("I'm luving it!!" ) We were all pretty hungry by then and started on lunch, which was promptly wolfed down by everyone and after a brief photo session we all headed back towards town, the Eastern Bloc comprising of Self, Sats,Screech,Mats, Darren, Nargis& Santiago and Roy turned towards Outer Ring Road towards Marthalli and the rest...... Legal went towards HSR layout. Legal gave us a all a farewell pat on the helmets before riding off as this would be our last ride together(how untrue was that :-)) ... Anwyays thats how it went, at least the gist of it, I know I've left out a lot of "interesting" stuff .... but that's for us to know and not tell eh? ;-) ...... what say guys??

Well another great ride, albeit the route was a little short of the stipulated 180-200kms, but the dirt roads and the scenery were great and riding with the FSR bunch is always fun......... Take care guys and until next time.... keep on riding.

Cheers,

Suru