re: Twinning to the beautiful beaches of Kerala | Ninja 300 & Interceptor 650 Day 5 – Kovalam to Bangalore
We already knew we had a lot to cover on this day. In addition to it, we also wanted to be closer to home as early in the evening as possible since we weren’t particular fond of riding at night. With these thoughts in mind we turned in early the previous night but sleep eluded us the same way sun would, the following morning. After finally falling sleep around midnight we were up by 5, skipped that extra ten-minute sleep that we otherwise crave for (fearing it might turn into an hour). Getting stuck in traffic, especially as soon as the ride starts was something we wanted to avoid as much as possible. So we got ready quick, completed the checkout formalities, lubed the chain on both bikes and mounted our luggage for one last time on this trip.
It was already raining by the time we were up and didn’t seem to stop anytime soon. As neither of us could afford to take leave the next day and this was the plan all along, we decided to start off in what seemed to be just a drizzle then. It would take us a couple of hours before we connected to the beautiful piece of tarmac on NH44 but those two odd hours seemed like an eternity riding in the rain and again moderate traffic, even after starting early in the morning. Combine this with patchy roads and we were pretty much spent by the time we reached the highway. Needless to say, we stopped spotting the first decent hotel there, had our breakfast and filled up both the bikes for what lay ahead.
It was close to 9:30 in the morning by the time we started again and the rain seemed to have taken a break too, although a short one as we would find out soon enough. The roads were good as expected and we were finally able to get to triple digit speeds to start making up for the 90 odd kms we had covered in about two and a half hours. We rode continuously for another 200 kms before the next fuel stop. More mileage on the odo in less time could only mean less fuel in the tank especially for the INT650 with the 13.7L tank. We used this break to also hydrate ourselves, snacked on some biscuits and continued to ride as we had no intention of stopping anytime soon. No sooner had we started, the rain decided to accompany us so that our ride back would be eventful and memorable.
We were too optimistic on our first pitstop and had decided to remove the rain covers especially of our tank bags as it was a pain to take out the mobile or wallet inside it whenever we took a break. So we just made a quick stop to put the covers back on, said ‘to hell with it’ for being completely drenched under our riding gear and continued down the black top. Riding in heavy rains meant we had to exercise some caution so as to not slide into some ditch in the event of something or someone coming in front of us out of the blue (which unfortunately is not all that unusual on our highways). We had covered about 450 kms when the Ninja became thirsty. Surprisingly the wet undies hadn’t dampened either of our spirits so we decided to continue till we would reach Salem or Dharmapuri, whatever would feel best at the time.
We reached Dharmapuri a little after 4 in the evening and decided to take a break while also refueling the INT one last time. Knowing we had only about 150 odd kms to go now until we could find the Kannada signboards, we decided it would be wise to fill up on some carbs as it would take anywhere between two to three hours by the time we could finally rest our asses far away from the saddle of the bikes. Snacked on some burgers and samosas with coffee and started again in half an hour feeling quite happy that we had managed to cover this distance in spite of the rain. The traffic had creeped on to the roads, steadily getting worse with each passing tollbooth.
Finally we had crossed Hosur and reached electronic city where we would part ways, me taking the expressway into the city and my cousin getting on the NICE road. With a final fist bump, we bid adieu to each other as I do to this post. Thank you for reading. Cheers!
Last edited by Juggernaught : 22nd March 2021 at 09:12.
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