There have been lotsa Leh travelogs this year on BCM. The wise thing for me to do then would be use more pics than words...
23rd August
As described above in the first post, we were six riders. Three from Delhi, the rest from Bangalore and Hyderabad.
Waiting outside my place for Nitinjit on the outer-ring road.
Me, Nitinjit and Chanderjeet (the three punjabi lads!) being from Delhi, decided to meet up at the bypass before 5am. The rest of the gang had already moved ahead last night (20odd km ahead of the bypass) and had to meet us at 5:30am. Ofcourse, by the time three of us reached their hotel, they were still sleeping. A good 30min wasted, back on the road by 6:15am!
Unexpected fog hit us enroute Karnal. Riding speeds came down to 50km/h, though even on open roads, I didnt go beyond 80ish to be with Chanderjeet, who preferred to cruise at 70!
By 8am, we were at the line of dhabas just before the Karnal toll barrier. The plan was discussed over paranthas and chai.
Breakfast stop@Karnal
We were back on the road before 9am. A boring (and fast) ride to Ambala, from where we took a straight to Chandigarh. It was decided to halt every hour for regrouping. Thankfully, the highway to Chandigarh was much better now. By 10am, we were in the heart of CHD, filled up petrol (relatively cheaper here) and carried on to NH21.
The Karnal to Ambala stretch is far better than the Delhi-Karnal one
Railway crossing after Chandigarh. Thats Ravi filling up his tank!
Roads were a mix of good and bad. Private buses were gunning it - keeping 90-95 on the speedo and chasing us for a good time. Though we had to stop soon for a regrouping session once again. The first set of hills had us surprised - lotsa fog which though last for a few km gave us a respite from the heat.
The first set of hills
Everything went on smoothly till we encountered a bad stretch of road. A major landslide had us wasting 30min. At Bilaspur, we got a call from Chanderjeet about his bike's chain coming off! We all rode back, only to find him fixing it by himself. We running well behind schedule and it was decided to halt at the first restaurant for lunch and decide as to what to do.
We made our own version of a ride-in restaurant before Bilaspur
Chanderjeet was the first to leave after lunch to get his bike done up at Bilaspur. We followed him soon. The mechanic seemed to take ages to repair the bike and it was close to 4pm! It was decided that Nitinjit,Ravi and Vivek would go ahead to book a good hotel in Vashisht, while the three of us would ride together once the bike was fixed.
At around the 5pm mark, three of us left ahead of Manali. We still had more than 160km to go! Riding at the 40-45mark, it took us no less than 4.5 hours to get to Vashisht, where thankfully, the other guys had booked a nice hotel. Ample parking, awesome roof top restaurant and cheap rooms.
My bike was carrying the following:
1. Tank bag
2. Saddle bags
3. My luggage in another bag
4. Lotsa books that Chanderjeet got for school kids
5. Me!
565km in 16.5 hours was well, quite frustrating and tiring. Gulping down a beer, I hoped for the best for Day 2!
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