Nandi Hills - the dio saga

Soon the bikes (yes, mine Honda Dio too!!) were roaring on desrted roads. These early hours only mad soules like us wander on the roads. We started from Jaynagar and we had to hit NH7 somewhere. V suggested one smooth and direct way, but we know it’s better to exhaust all the other options before following him. When it comes to directions, V and A are the last man standings. Then RD came up with his route. Knowing that he has roamed half of Bangalore all his life with so many of his girl-friends, we decided to follow him. He started his usual way and was soon out of sight. So A on poor Honda Dio and me & R on his bike were left wandering on roads of Bangalore. Few calls, some shouting and we all were back in sync.

Fuel tanks were replenished for the journey and all gears throttled for the race of the Day. A was tired and sleepy so I took over the control of Dio. So goes my ultimate tryst with my first long ride that too on a Honda Dio. This bike (yes it is a bike!!) is very good for city traffic but I had never tested it for long drives and today was the stress testing. 60km ride, on a chilly winter morning, tp add tp it a 7km Ghat section. I gave full thrust on the accelerator and the bike started roaring (sound and speed both roaring). It crossed 60 kmph, then 65 and finally 70 kmph mark. That’s it? I gave some more accelerator, that’s when I realized that I had reached the limit, Dio reached maximum of 80 kmph. Bloody why do they drive a speedometer with marking up to 110 when it cant even reach 85 kmph!!!

Anyways, so we were zooming on the road. NH7 is very well built and has really long crossing free stretches for a good riding experience. On the way, there is some construction work going on in patches so sometimes you need to slow down. Else its just one zooming experience. By this time RD had slowed down and now we were three bikes in last place. V with C on fazer had vanished somewhere.

We somehow missed the left turn for Nandi Hill and kept riding on NH7 only. Only when we reached next village that we realized about this mistake. Anyways, we entered the village, asked for the direction and were guided properly. So now we seeing Nandi Hill in our sight still we are going away from it. The view from the way was awesome. There were clouds covering the peaks and it looked like a umbrella covering. Greenery everywhere and this prompted me to switch back to pillion mode. Poor A was again on Dio, that too for the toughest stretch of the trip. I took my camera and started shooting continuously. And here V and C crossed us. Even they had missed the crossing and were lost for a while.

Now we all were in sync and were gearing up for the Ghat Section. I had my doubts about Dio’s ability to take this challenge. Still we continued. The Ghat section is very beautiful. You actually start from a different hill and then cross the path and reach Nandi Hill. The clouds on the hill side result in sudden decrease in temperature and we all were shivering. Camera flash was continuously burning and that was a point of satisfaction for me.

Dio was crawling at all the turns. A said he was riding at slow speed coz he wanted to enjoy each and every turn. Our concern was to reach the top at the earliest before Dio breaks down.
But it didn’t break down. It covered all of 36 turns and reached the top easily. We parked the vehicles and stretched our body. For more than one and half hours we were riding.
Now we had reached the destination and only thing left was to explore it.

continued...

Photos have been uploaded at my flickr page. You can check them here.