Team-BHP > Shifting gears > The Team-BHP Meet Section


View Poll Results: Where do you think we should drive to?
Kumarakom! I love backwaters. 7 29.17%
Vagamon! I love hills and grasslands 10 41.67%
Other! (Please specify) 1 4.17%
I am not coming! I love my bed! 6 25.00%
Voters: 24. You may not vote on this poll

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Old 3rd September 2007, 10:03   #76
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Here is another line-up includes Vrena,kids enjoying,a Photo session,Beautiful_PineValley...








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Old 3rd September 2007, 11:16   #77
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Some more snaps, this time a lineup with Verna too, Kids enjoying, A Photo-session in woods and a Misty Pine Valley.







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Old 3rd September 2007, 11:33   #78
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I would say the drenched part was the best! How else will you get to see people running like make? Some launches were better than the best ones We've seen ever in any SpeedRun.

The views from Vagamon is something out of this world. One would never believe it is India. No wonder it is known as the little Scotland. The roads were great. Some patches were so good that we could've easily done 140kmh+. The drive back in thick fog was exciting. It was a very careful and slow drive because we couldn't see anything further than 2/3 cars' distance.

Hey, Where're the pictures?
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Old 3rd September 2007, 11:33   #79
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Report Part 1

20 adults, 10 kids. 7 cars. And 1 I-don't-know-whether-he's-an-adult-or-a-kid (Xinome/Shabeeth).

I woke up at 5.30AM and SMSd Zak. He was also awake by then (!!!!!). Zak was planning to drive a Wagon R. But he found it misssing in the morning, after he woke up. Apparently it had been claimed by a family member early morning.

I picked up Zak, his wife and 2 kids, and we drove to BTH Sarovaram for breakfast. On the way we picked up xinome (who had arrived for the drive the earlier night) from WhyteFort, the official TBHP hotel.

When we arrived at Sarovaram, we found the rest of the gang waiting for us. The most important TBHP drive-tradition was kept.

We said our hellos and good mornings, and made a beeline for the restaurant. (Most of the gang had already had breakfast.)




Nikki and the Innova gang



Mansidea and the Scorpio gang

We had breakfast with Steeroid and family. No photos, sorry, we were busy having breakfast

After breakfact, we met with the new BHPians (well, we knew most of them already, heh heh). I met VivekJi05 for the first time. He drives a silver Baleno, but brought along a petrol Verna he was test-driving for Indian Express for the drive. His parents were also with him. Is this the first time a BHPian's parents attended a drive?

Nikki had brought his Swift along for Zak and family. He and his family rode in retheshkr's new Innova.

The only 3 bachelors (KPhilip, Xinome and myself) were together in my Palio.

Time to go! Zak in action, getting the drive started:


So off we left for the drive, at about 9.00AM. Steeroid's Safari left first. Then the Innova, the silver Swift (Zak driving), the Verna, the Palio and the Scorpio. We were to meet-up with BijuPaul and family soon,on the way.

End of Part 1.

Last edited by hydrashok : 3rd September 2007 at 11:36.
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Old 3rd September 2007, 11:42   #80
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Enjoyed every bit of it.

Hats off to you Zak. Thanks for organising such a wonderfull DRIVE-MEET which anybody would love to join in. Me and family enjoyed each and every bit of the drive (thanks to nikkibike for that 'extremely spirited - abusive' driving of my 'brand new trucky' all the way to&fro).....now I realise what is a "TEAMBHP DRIVE" like!! Food was homely and delicious.... liesure moments - 'fun filled'- were well spent. Got a bit of time to relax inbetween too. All together AWESOME holiday!

Special thanks to steeroid for sharing that 'rare thing' with few of 'US'. Really... that is something which we get to see/have very rarely. Enjoyed the stuff too. Many thanks again for that.

Got oppertunity to meet kochi teambhp-ians and that itself is obligatory! (Well.... 'xinome' IS now a kochi teambhp-ian, right?)

Thanks for all the supports to a newbie like me guys.... eagerly waiting to see you all during the next meet.

Am yet to study how to post pictures here. I'll post what I've in my mobile cam very soon!

Thanks & Regards to all!
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Old 3rd September 2007, 11:47   #81
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Sorry for pestering you guys (can't edit my posts in this phone). Nice pics and writeup!
Keep it flowing. And also look at how the views are increasing on this thread! Wow! :
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Old 3rd September 2007, 11:49   #82
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aaaaaah!

Wooooah... thatz great startup 'hyderabad ashok'! Keep flowing! Will upload my part tonight!
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Old 3rd September 2007, 12:00   #83
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Report Part 2

The drive really gathered up steam soon and we were zipping down the excellent highway (really good road for a change) at a very fair clip.

We met up with BijuPaul in his White Swift LDi soon.

In my Palio, Xinome was keeping KPhilip and me well entertained with his uhhh.. ximonisms (can't call them by any other name).

Xinome warming up his xinomism engine.


Xinome hanging-on to dear life (I don't have seatbelts in the back, and I was doing good speeds on the curvy roads).


xinome providing Kphilip and me with full fledged In-Car Entertainment. We were in splits all the way to the resport, thanks only to xinome.


The mountain roads begin... (Zak driving the Swift, ahead of us).


A nice mini-waterfall on the way.


We stop for a breather, and for everybody to catch-up at Saddam bridge, Bridge from Baghdad City.


Cars lined up at the bridge

...


TBHPIans milling about. That's BijuPaul in the blue shirt. Vivek in the striped T shirt. Vivek's Dad looking at Zak and Vivek. Steeroid and Xinome behind BijuPaul.


The view from Saddam Bridge


Once we were all set, we crossed the bridge and got onto the serious(ly bad) roads.

Vivek driving the Verna


A warning from the PWD Executive Engineer about the roads. It says, "The Road is in Danger". Yeah, sure! So what's new?


To be continued...
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Old 3rd September 2007, 12:01   #84
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Atlast....!

So the reports started flowing! Nice detailed bit by bit report hydra! Post as much as pictures too...

@Zak... no excuse to you.... post the snaps and report as soon as possible.

I'll add up some snaps afternoon!
cheers!
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Old 3rd September 2007, 12:10   #85
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Report Part 3

The drive continues...

The view:


Some of us stopped on the way for a few snaps. Zak looking at the drop. Whooooa!


What we stopped to look at, and photograph:


Another bit of view from where we stopped:


Another opportunity to snap the cars


Zak and Mansidea talking ICE (Mansidea is in the Scorpio). Mansidea's friend is standing near Zak.


Nikki's Swift


A view of a section of the road we'd driven:

...


Scorpio Family: Mansidea, wife and son.


We continued on, towards "The Smokey Mountain" View.

To be continued...
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Old 3rd September 2007, 12:15   #86
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Oh! I don't have any pics. I wasn't carrying my cam yesterday.
Those who had a camera, that is Nikki, MansIdea, BijuPaul, VivekJi05 and Hydra (on behalf of Kphilip) are posting pics. lease: excuse me da!
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Old 3rd September 2007, 12:21   #87
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Oh! I don't have any pics. I wasn't carrying my cam yesterday.
Those who had a camera, that is Nikki, MansIdea, BijuPaul, VivekJi05 and Hydra (on behalf of Kphilip) are posting pics. lease: excuse me da!
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Old 3rd September 2007, 12:26   #88
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Report Part 4

Cars lined up at the place where we get the best view of the "Smokey Mountain":

...


KPhilip with a bit of the Smokey Mountain behind him:


TBHPians moving around at the view-point:

...


Once we had enjoyed the view, we moved one, higher up the mountain, towards the resort.

Steer & family, and the three of us stopped for a bit on the way for some tea. There, Steer showed us something special:

...(Now is that a work of art or what????)


After that we moved on, and found the rest of the gang taking a breather [Well... to be frank, they were waiting for us ]
We also pulled over to take some snaps.

...

...


After a few minutes, we drove on:

...


And soon we reached the Summer Sand Resort:

...


All the cars parked:


Mansidea, Nikkibike, Duboy and Steer, with Steer's Special Surprise


Duboy


A view of the resort:


To be continued...
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Old 3rd September 2007, 12:58   #89
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Report Part 5

After spending a few minutes in the resort, and after we ordered food, some of us decided to take a walk in the Valley of Pines behind the resort.


KPhilip feeling the pinch of bachelorhood -- Feeling bad a certain someone isn't with him . Xinome looks on:


Reconciled to "aloneness" for the time being:


Hydra giving his legs a break:


Hydra and Kphilip taking a break from Xinome


Xinome (self-portrait, as you can guess):


When I looked up...


Pine "noodles" according to xinome (of course). He was getting a littlehungry.:


Zak's son and wife. Other BHP-folks in the background:


Zak, playing tug-of-war with his son:


After some time, most people (intelligently) turned back. Zak, BijuPaul, Kphilip, Xinome and I were drawn by the beauty of the pine forest. We just had to go down (the 30 degree slope, I think) and enjoy it more.


And we did enjoy going further into the forest too. Look at what we found:


Some Shaadi.com snaps (Zak is excused):

...

...


Xinome, KPhilip, Nikki, And Zak's son. As you can see, the need for the use an umbrella was slowly being felt. But hey, we're guys. A little drizzle is not going to stop us having fun, is it?


And then it happened. It started to rain. It started slow, but soon it was raining cats and dogs. I would go even so far as saying it was raining elephants and whales. We were soaked to our jockeys in no time. Zak's son had a small umbrella and so he survived somewhat. Please also keep in mind, that to beat the rain, we had no cover. We had to run (well, wheeze) up the 30 degree slope for a while to reach the resort.

Xinome had the toughest time. He took about 10 minutes to power down his engine after running up all that way. His air filter was shot and he was gapsing seriously for quite a while before his engine timing went back to normal idle. I have no snaps of this state we were in, as we had secured our cams and mobiles in BijuPaul's camera bag.

We bachelors were then acquainted with one the (IMHO few) advantages of being married. NikkiBike had also gotten soaked, but his wife made sure he was all dry in a few minutes (he had a Hydro-something jacket on soon). BijuPaul's wife squeezed the water off his shirt in no time.

Zak valiantly braved the state-of-being-soaked with us. We were soon looking for a room to dry off. After a bit of some serious haggling and some really serious arm-twisting by Zak, of the manager, we were give 3 rooms we had to pay for. (1 room for drying off for us guys, and other rooms for the ladies and children to relax).

I will not reveal here the less-than-friendly thoughts that were expressed by us about the manager, or the discussions we had amongst us about his sexual preferences or the colourful descriptions of his parentage that were mentioned.

Soon, we had another first-of-it's-kind acivity for TBHP. A TBHP towel meet.


A love-letter left for the management of the resort, on the misted bathroom mirror, by an incensed young man. Going by his state of mind, I think he might have used his middle-finger to write this:


There are a few (side-splittingly funny) videos of how we tried to dry-out our clothes, in the room. Xinome will be posting them soon.

To be continued...

Last edited by hydrashok : 3rd September 2007 at 13:08.
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Old 3rd September 2007, 13:29   #90
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Report Part 6.

We're still wet.

An important finding that Xinome made: (The only part of his jeans that remained dry).


In a while, we managed to get an electric iron from the resort and started ironing our clothes dry. And we got them wearably dry.

It was past 4.00PM now, and we hadn't had our lunch yet. What lunch had been ordered, had been polished off by the rest of the gang. So Zak ordered some more

We sat down for lunch.

...

...


Lunch was actually good, and all of us (except Xinome) managed to fill ourselves.

A somewhat thick fog had settled around the resort and it was time for us to go. We paid the resort, and had a quick photoshoot of the cars. BijuPaul has posted an excellent pic of the lineup earlier.

A group snap of everyone (except Vivek and parents who left early to meet some relatives) is posted at the end of this post.

The excitement the day was all to much for Xinome (he's not smoking in the snap):


We started the drive back without any delay:


The fog wore off after we were mostly down the mountain. We stopped on the way for tea, where Vivek joined us again.


Sombody had apparently heard of me and had decided to name a hotel after my nick here:


Zak making sure everybody got tea:


We left after tea and drove mostly continuously till BijuPaul had to break off the convoy. Kphilip, xinome and I went to kphilip's place to copy the snaps off his camera (90% the snaps I've posted are from kphilip's camera). Xinome kpet wavering between giong back to TVM the same day and staying-on and in the end, decided to stay back for the night. We went to the official TBHP hotel, checked him out and drove to Zaks' place. I dropped Xinome and Kphilip there and got back home a bit after 10.00PM.

I had one of the most enjoyable days of my life. As kphilip posted, the day seemed like many enjoyable days. I repeat my earlier post (#65) thanking all of you great friends.

Xinome is a great fun guy! He took all our ribbing like a real sport. Three cheers to you.

Thanks to kphilip for the photos I've posted here.

I'm already looking forward to the next drive!

Last photo -- a group photo.


Please keep posting photos, folks!

End of report.

Last edited by hydrashok : 3rd September 2007 at 13:36.
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