The Himalayas are undoubtedly one of the most spectacular and impressive ranges in the world and home to the highest motor-able road. Period.

Our boys from Bangalore, Adrian, Dinesh, Madhu and Santosh, went riding up in what is obviously our favorite bike now, the Yamaha RD350. All are based in Bangalore and took a month long break from all their other commitments and went off on a very important chore, i.e. spreading some good blue smoke to keep the blue waters of the Pangong lake company. And did they do an excellent job of that or what!! They went up all the way to the Nubra Valley, Khardungla, Pangong Tso and many more such place.

Going a little back, the brat pack was to have at least two more bikes with Sanju and myself joining the above four guys. But due to reasons unmentionable we decided not to go and opted out. The most amazing thing about the whole thing was the fact that they did the whole journey with out a single mechanical failure. The only impediment to the whole tour was a single puncture. That’s amazing and hats off to the guys for preparing the bikes so neatly and nurturing the bikes through the journey whilst having their fun. Just one more thing, dont miss the snaps, there’re about 300 of the best in it.

Ok! I’ll shut up now and let Adrian take over from here. First hand news is always more reliable. 😉

The Himalayan Ride : 27th Jul 2003 – 24th Aug 2003

Riding from Delhi to Manali, pretty amazing road, couldn’t clip as much as we wanted cause it started pouring like hell ,but still managed to ride the bikes at constant 100,the Ceat Secura were amazing in the rain, never felt so confident riding in the rain before. Halted in Chandigarh for sometime, called the people I knew online, one of them being JSR. Was getting delayed in all the drama, had to scoot, scoot we did but got caught in bad rain and fog near Swarghat-decided to call the day off and logged ourselves at a Himachal Pradesh tourism hotel, expensive f**kin’ place, drowned ourselves in rum and some nice food and crashed. Next day start early and boy oh boy what do we see, a crazy road block cause of a landslide, took some snaps of the dudes blowing them apart, the smallest of openings and we 4 took off; the look on all the folks there was priceless. 4 screamin’ RDs. Rode uneventful till we reached Manali, stop enroute near Beas river for some pics and smoke and we reached early evenin.

Booked ourselves into a nice hotel and relaxed for the next couple of days, roamed around Manali getting acclimatised to the conditions before we had to take off further. Manali is an okay place, too much of beggar kinda tourist, reminds a lot of Goa to me. Took of the next day early and it started raining like crazy but we rode on till Jispa. Decided to call it a day here, was very excited the place was getting mind-blowing by the km, jus cudn’t wait for the next day.

Simply mind-blowing, the altitude was going bonkers, the bikes were runnin pretty good, though the power had dropped considerably, but it still moved. Should ask those Russians on bullets he he he, Jus took in the scenery during the whole ride stopping in lots of places taking in the place and of course snaps, I went berserk with the camera, this place was unbelievable, rode till pang and called it a day. Went thru some amazing water crossings, took it nice and easy and we were home, the O’Neal boots were kickass mannn.

The previous night had camped at an amazing parachute camp, had some gr8 food and crashed, the next day was a revelation, most of us had headaches, finally realised we were at 14000 ft, okay time to take it nice and easy, started off slightly late since didn’t feel like riding for quite some time, finally took off and landed at Baralachla pass. Can see some glorious pics, tats Santosh deciding to pee in some beautiful landscape, not to mention Mads and Dins (we called him the old goat, by the way) deciding to blow it out there he he. Finished some climbs and we landed up at Morey plains, man what can I say, another amazing place, some kms of straight road with mind-blowin scenery till we reached Tanglangla pass the second highest pass in the world, took the usual pics and had to f**k off from there as a hale was starting and it looked bad, and then finally signs of civilization again, we had been allocated a place at Karu 25kms before Leh by the army so off we went and parked our sore asses, we had ample time so we jus chilled around in leh for the next couple of days and our next destination was the Pangong Tso lake.

Hung around in leh for sometime, did some showing off out there and did the formalities of buying stuff for family and girlfriends and friends and we were of to Pangong tso, left Leh pretty late as the Dinesh’s back wasn’t feeling good so jus chilled in Leh and left in the late noon and touched changla pass the third highest in the world on our way and reached Tangtse late evenin, the next day was Pangong tso.

Dinesh didn’t come as his back was thoroughly f**ked and the route wasn’t pretty either with some crazy water crossings, the locals had advised us to leave early morning to the lake and be back by 11 durin the day as one of the crossings gets real wild with rocks and all shooting down, this was gonna be sumthin so Dinesh decided he wasn’t in a state to ride the bike, so off me Mads and sandy went and reached the water crossin, was feelin like being in some crazy rally, somehow did the trick of one goin ahead ,the rest two acting as support and we pushed thru and reached the lake, man this was simply amazing! u want to see sumthin BLUE, get ur asses out here to see sumthin blue man! So serene and beautiful was this place ,it felt very close to heaven literally, had the most satisfying smoke ever :-)))))))))))))))).finished and back to the base and chilled time for sometime and back we headed to Leh. Reached Leh by even and chill time again. Hung around Leh for some time and next day was Khardungla and Nubra valley.

Next day four of us took of to Khardungla (KL) and Nubra, the climb was pretty easy, gettin checked in the tcp for docs and permits and we were off and finally we were there, khardungla, chilled there for quite some time, prayed at the Khardungla temple and met some German bikers who took the pic of us together, tats unforgettable folks, trust me on that, two of us decided to move on tat was mads and myself, dins and sandy wanted to get back to touch base, we met a army Captain Baljeet Sahni on KL who was pretty amazed by our bikes and volunteered to treat us for lunch at base 15kms down KL, had some amazing food and raved and ranted about Bangalore and the captain was floored, but MORE THAN HIM WE WERE FLOORED JUS IMAGINING AT WHAT CONDITIONS THESE BRAVE MEN ARE FIGHTING FOR WE FOLKS AND HELPING US TO DO SUCH JOURNEIES TIME AND AGAIN,HATS OFF TO THEM…….bid farewell and we had strict instruction to halt at his place on our way back, we moved on and started seein the valley, dudes am very sad at expressing emotions ,took lotta snaps and u folks decide for urself, this place was simplyyyyyyyyyyyy beautiful and mind-blowing, we moved into a guest house in nubra and chilled for the night there, scooted early mornin and took in the beauty of the place,the sand dunes were simply outta the world, took lotta snaps and we were on our way back and suddenly a army truck waved us down and lo behold there was the captain again, he had received orders the previous night to go to the glacier, man LIFES A BITCH ALRIGHT, didn’t have any words to say, spoke for quite a while and bid adieu…….

Came back to touch base and moved onto the Kashmir valley.

The only breakdown happened during this part, my puncture, was goin from Kargil to Drass, it was around 9:00 in the evenin and we were pushing it like crazy and suddenly in a uphill zonkkkkkkkkkk. Pulled the bike aside, sandy was the pro here, during the ride the spare tube had also konked, so we were high and dry, it was 2 in the night ,decided to leave the bike there and climb onto the truck with my luggage and come the next day, but one big goof ,had forgotten my keys in the bike itself he he, luckily for me the next day the bike was wherever I had parked it ,fixed the puncture and had to head back to Drass as the roads aren’t open to Kashmir to civilians after 11:00 in the day, the road opens from 4 to 11:00 durin the day, we landed up at Meenamarg the tcp post at 3:30 early morning in shivering cold, the place looked like a venue for a rally with lots of bikes and cars but a gr8 news was awaiting us no traffic allowed for 14th and 15th cause of Independence day, man what a blast, Dinesh proved a life saver, after some conversations with the senior officers only bikers were allowed to go further, when they opened the gates we 4 took off like hell, living the the rest to take in the 2t but we were stopped again near Zorgilla pass and after the same routine we were off again and kickin up dirt as usual and there it was the land people are still losin their lives for Kashmir, it was phenomenal, from here the road s were tarmac fully and welcome relief for our sore asses, we let it rip and boy did we rip, it was a blast……..

Landed up at a Srinagar at a colonels place a friend of Dinesh, enjoyed their hospitality for two days and finally took the last pic of my camera along with the army men ,its a memorable one for me alright, form then on it was the usual civilisation, wasn’t interested in takin any more pics, its was straight line ridin pissin off all the cars with our antics- keep tailin him till hes reached the end and then jus use the dipper and blow past him,hmmmmmmmmmmm,tat was sweet…….

tats it folks,my patience sucks…….pls do bear for the small writeup.

adios
leppard
Admin:
Well…. that was the report from da man himself. This is surely one trip that everyone has to do, at least once, before he hangs up the helmet for life!