Rolling Thunder’s 12th anniversary was held near Bagalkot at Kanthi Resorts. We missed meeting the pack at the start point having slept through the alarm. Luckily I had a backup plan in place. My alarm which was meant to be the get out of home alarm! We got ready as quickly as we could and headed towards the first regroup point which was also breakfast point about 100 km from home. Once we caught up we rode with the pack most of the way. We fell behind in places when we stopped to make pictures (like the one above) and caught up at regular intervals.

This being a longish weekend we also saw some other groups heading out on the highway. This was also the first time I got to see the KTM in the flesh… impressive little machine. Capable of speeds 1.5 times the speed of the bullet, Adrian, Sanjay and Vijay made sure we realised that when the buzzed me and made 100kmph feel like I was standing still. Here is a page of with 9 photos of the KTM Duke 390, that I am talking about.

I was hoping to enter Davangere to eat the ‘world famous’ Davangere Benne Dose, but the only reason I had to enter it was to get to a mechanic to fix a screw that had fallen off my Sol helmet. That was the only ‘mechanical’ that I would have for the trip.

The roads were long stretches that looked like the photo below. But, I was glad to be on another highway than the regular Hosur Road/ Mysore Road stretch, which was done to death for the RTMC / MBMC Anniversaries.

We had lunch at a highway dhaba and I managed to catch a few winks. Later after crossing Hubli, the road got more interesting; an unmarked two lane. But, for the sheer number of speed breaker humps on this route, it’s a nice road. We pretty much rode this solo till Haren joined us.The skies were just amazing with textured clouds keeping the sharp sun out of our eyes mostly.

We soon reached Kanthi Resorts, almost missing the RTMC 12A banner on the highway and overshooting, our home for the next three days. Our room was just opposite the parking, so we could see as motorcycles came and went. There were about 60 motorcycles at the time. All Royal Enfields, but for 3 KTM 390s and a solitary Kawasaki Ninja 650. Once we checked in and got our stash from the boys at the sign-up desk, we headed off towards the rooms.

http://instagram.com/p/fZsZgeM9Ri/

The place is massive, (I will be doing a write up about it in a separate post), but let me just say that even the bathrooms are bigger than an average home in Mumbai. The place had a nice swimming pool and small water park with slides and the sort. We spent some time there and then headed off the party area, till late in the night.

The next morning, I woke up early to try and see if I could get some nice shots of anything. Bagalkot is quite barren and arid. And, its also quite flat. So, I spent sometime taking pictures of the KTM Duke 390 and Ninja in the morning light and catching coffee with who ever was up. What was planned for the morning was a group ride through the town of Bagalkot, flagged off by the DC and SP of Bagalkot themselves. Hehe, should be fun, we usually do not do these rally-through-town type of rides. Here’s most of the group just before the flag off.

Soon, all the people started waking up and finishing breakfast and all the motorcycles were lined up in front of the restaurant area. Speaking the previous night, Vishu had offered his new model Thunderbird 500 for the ride next morning. I took him up on that offer and exchanged motorcycles with him. We were also joined by the riders from the local clubs and we did a quick-ish run through the town.

Here are some of the pictures from that short ride by Kavitha.

RTMC 12A – Town Rally 😉

 

There were events planned by the organisers to keep everyone occupied and entertained, but I was a little short on sleep and made the best of the AC in the room for the afternoon. Much later, after the customary time in the pool, we headed off for another evening of hard partying and other events (which were still on).

Next morning, though I had decided to ride out by 0530, we got going only by 0730ish. Breakfast we decided to have on the way and kept riding. Srivatsallan started off at around the same time as us, caught up with us about 50kms out of Bagalkot just as we rejoined after refueling, went on to reach Chennai the same day. About 930kms in a little over 14 hours. Given that over 90% of that route is on 4 lane roads, hats off to stay awake on the mind numbing road.

As we exited Hubli, we saw the group of the usual suspects from RTMC – Haren, Conrad, Sandeep, Swagata, Saravana and Vinaya on the road side.  Saravana had been hit by puncture and were in the process of getting that fixed. Their breakfast stop was about 10kms ahead and we decided to stop there and grab a bite. Conrad had already ridden ahead and we joined him. As the rest came in, we decided to keep riding since our pace would be lesser with the photo stops.

A puncture for Conrad caused us to miss him completely, since he was on the opposite side of the road! This meant that we would continue riding by ourselves till lunch time, which was outside Chitradurga. We made multiple stops at lovely places like the picture below, and tried calling both Haren and Conrad. But, they both weren’t hooked into their phones and were happily enjoying the scenery!

We all had lunch at a Dhaba and that was the last we saw of most of the riders. But, for the hu-flung-dung couple, who seemed to be having a chat on the highway.

I stopped for photos and Chai and just as the sun set, we reached Bangalore and home.

60 odd motorcycles is all we had for this event, but that made it a more personal event. A special mention to Venkatachalam, the sole rider from Madras Bulls, who rode out all the way. Thanks to all the people involved in making this a memorable event.