[mobike008]

Prologue

Hyderabad Riders Association of Triumph (HRAT) members have been seeing a frenzy of activity ever since Triumph opened showroom in Hyderabad late January 2014 and after paying them a visit right after they opened their showroom and also just after one test-ride later, I was a proud owner of their legendary motorcycle-Triumph Bonneville.

This kind of ignited the already present but, dormant interest of riding motorcycles for me even though i have been actively riding a motorcycle during my second phase in life after buying my Maroon Marauder ( Classic 500)

http://www.team-bhp.com/forum/motorb...umps-home.html

Since February'14 and after acquiring the Bonnie, I havent looked back and have been riding almost every saturday (prefer this over sunday as home-minister wouldnt allow me squandering my time on 2-wheels on a sunday when iam supposed to spending time at home) except when iam travelling

Story of my new love-Triumph Bonneville is here :-

http://www.team-bhp.com/forum/superb...s-arrowed.html

Anyways, getting back on track, I met most of these gentleman with whom I ride with regularly AFTER buying my Triumph and since then I have realized that these bikes not just provide us immeasurable pleasure but, also helps bonding with like-minded folks with whom you can share your motorcycling joys together

Invariably it so happens that I normally start on the ride proposals every weekend including the long rides and thankfully have been having great participation until now even if some of my ideas have been weird & wacky.

During one of the conversation, i proposed Vizag, Tadoba and Mahabaleshwar and it was almost a unanimous choice for everyone to go to the "Land of the Tigers"....Tadoba and Andhari Tiger Reserve (TATR)

We were lucky to spot the elusive Leopard

[mobike008]

We honed down on destination around first week of October'14 and then started the confirmation count and we had a healthy number of 10 bikes willing to participate for this Oct 24-Oct 26 riding jaunt

Onward route we decided was :-

Hyderabad-Adilabad : 4 Lane Highway (~300kms)
Adilabad-Chandrapur : 2 Lane Highway ( 100kms)
Chandrapur-Tadoba : 2 Lane roads (30kms)

Total : 430kms

Team-BHPian DiptantS was helpful in arranging for our accomodation and safaris and was the primary reason the whole experience turned out to be impeccable as we were not sure about how many people coming for this trip until almost a week ago and people who are familiar of making visits to Tadoba (this was my first trip & enjoyed it thoroughly) know that you have to book the Safari trips online and is usually full couple of months in advance.

There is absolutely no way the forest reserve guards will entertain last minute booking (via. quintessential indian style of sirji, jaane do na....yeh lo paan sau rupaiyee....Sirji, please let us go in..here are 500 bucks)

Dipant was away in nearby Nagpur (his hometown) for his vacation and was constantly in touch to help us with accomodation and for arranging the safaris through a VIP quota. Thanks Dipant !!!

As the day came closer, excitement rose to unimaginable levels and whatsapp group got into high level of activity with pointless queries most of the time which proved the excitement in the air..LOL.

As it usually happens night before, either you dont get enough sleep due to excitement or have an engagement that you cannot skip.

For me, it was the latter as had to attend a diwali party and got back home at 2:00am and had less than 3 hours to catch up on a few winks before we headed out for this ride.

One of the riders who rides the mighty monster (Triumph Explorer 1200) wanted to get his brother join us in their Ford Endeavour along with his brother's friend. This inclusion was actually a huge welcome as the car served as an escort car + luggage carrier.

We all sighed in relief and really looked forward to a stress-free ride sans the luggage

[mobike008]

Oct 24th, 2014

Got up promptly at 5am and as expected saw a few messages of folks dropping out at last minute. Suddenly, the confirmed names dived from 10 bikes to 7 bikes.

7 is an interesting number, there have been many rides that I participated where only 7 bikers were riding. I call this phenomena as the "Magnificient 7"

We met at Runway 9 which is a popular go-kart track on the outskirts of city on Nagpur highway. We assembled at the meeting point, shifted our luggage to Ford Endeavour and tanked up the gas and left that place around 8:00am

Our next planned stop was exactly 100kms at one of our regular and favorite joint for breakfast called "Malgudi" where we all relished a sumptious south indian breakfast and lounged around for an hour before we emabarked our journey little after 10:00am, we enjoyed a beautiful ride on the broad 4 lane highway and some of the scenary is gorgeous with 4 lane winding up every 10-15kms unlike the Bangalore highway which is much more broader, much more straighter and absolutely zero shelter and greenry throughout its entire 600kms stretch.

Some of us riding in the front were keeping a fast pace and overshot the right turn that we were supposed to take for our next planned stop which was Kuntala waterfalls that comes around 275kms point from home. As its normal with these highways, there is very few breaks in the divider so had to go almost 10kms before taking a U-turn and coming back to the point we had to take detour for Kuntala waterfalls

Enter the small two-lane road and ride for about 15kms will get you to these popular falls. We used this opportunity to shoot some pictures and videos from the car with passenger standing on the foot rail with all of us at really slow speeds, maybe 10kmph or so. We reached the falls and were sorely disappointed because there was low traces of. Hot weather didnt help our mood either so we decided to head out earlier than planned from there

After merging on to main highway, we tanked up and rode for about 50kms when there was a sudden grumbling noises that stopped the bikers in their tracks. They were all terribly hungry..

We stopped at a dhaba just before Adilabad and we had a quintessential dhaba experience of sitting on "Charpayi (Cots)" and ordered the typical and safe items in such places like Tandoori Rotis, Dal, Egg burji and Rice.

By god, this was hands down the best meal of entire trip.

After resting for a bit, westarted again and reached the AP border and with no offense to folks living in Maharastra the roads just dont exist there. And, this is proved right from the 1st kilometer after entering the MH border.

Next phase of the journey was pure hell, we were traversing over roads that seemed like it was made for Mangalgyaan (Mars Orbitor) and while most of us were gingerly weaving through avoiding the bigger potholes or deep cuts in the road. Tiger 800XC and Tiger Explorer 1200 riders gave everyone a wicked grin and were blasting through the bad roads as if they dont exist. Both even copied the Drakar rally style of riding over those hellish roads standing on the foot pegs. And, in their enthusiasm both of them left us way behind and we were supposed to take a right turn after the border within 5kms and the tigers had vanished straight ahead.

Classic example of excitement of the terrain made for their bikes and to add to our woes, there wasnt any network until a good few kms and by the time we followed them and reached the grinning Tiger'ers who had stopped by the roadside, we had already covered atleast 15-20kms of pot holed ridden roads. No point going back.

We decided to continue straight and our journey became slower as we had to ask for routes at plenty of places.

Many wrong routes later, we reached Chandrapur around 6pm and it was dark by then and we were coated with coal ( You see, that entire area is coal country and air is riddled with coal-dust and air is thick and heavy with dust and coal smoke).

Look at my intelligence, I had decided to ride for 1km without helmet as we wanted to stop at a chai tapri for a quick tea-break but, that 1km become almost 10-15kms as we couldnt find one and since the roads
were in horrible conditions we anyways werent riding above 50kmph. This incident left me completely exhausted and face coated with dust and grime

Trivia : Apparently, Chandrapur is the 2nd most polluted city in the world and is a breeding ground for cancer. Someone was mentioning this and not sure how much truth is there to this trivia.

Again, after asking our way and riding through absolutely filthy road conditions with water flowing around we reached the Tadoba gate at around 7:00pm after covering almost 530kms due to those wrong turns.

After signing in our names we were let into the gate and another 15kms of ride through the forest to reach our resort and main entry gate awaited us. Last leg of riding in pitch dark through the forest was quite memorable as I was anticipating a wild animal (mostly a Tiger) to jump out of the thick forests and attack us. Nothing of that sort happened, we reached our resort without any dramatic event and were quickly ushered into our rooms

Out of the 9 people, 6 of us stayed in resort that I booked. Saras Resort in Tadoba where we had 3 AC rooms while the Tiger 1200 owner and his brothers wanted a tent experience so were booked into the Tiger United 21 camp which is a luxurious accomodation a few kms away

We quickly showered changed and went into the garden where the buffet was set up for us and had a hearty meal (though the food was below average) and retired to bed around 11pm

This information is for the general public who wish to go to Tadoba

Morning Safari : 6:30am-10:30am
Evening Safari : 3:00pm-6:00pm

Costs
Rs.2000 for Gypsy
Rs.1000 for Entry
Rs.200 for lens that are > 200mm
Rs.300 for guide

Starting times are when the gates open but, by the time they let you in there is a further wastage of time of 15-30mins

































Breakfast at our regular ride joint "malgudi" was quite nice





Lunch at a small dhaba just before Adilabad was perhaps the best meal of this trip. Simply delectable

[mobike008]

Oct 25th, 2014

We decided to get up early and line up at the entry gate by 6am. We ran into some adminstrative problems of the VIP quota being for only 1 gypsy whereas we wanted 2 gypsies. It took me a good 30 mins to get that sorted out and by the time we started rolling it was almost 7am

It was my first safari and I was thoroughly excited. Weather was simply outstanding. Unlike the previous day when we were riding which was hot and sultry, today was chilly, cold and quite windy and a perfect weather to enjoy a safari

We were in 2 gypsies right behind each other and our moment of tracking the big cat started. We all felt like some jungle experts and folks sitting on either side were covering the vast expanse to see if we can spot something in that wild

Tadoba jungle is simply brilliant. Green, Clean and there was ample availability of fresh oxygen and I was gulping in the fresh air by the bucketful which made me feel energetic and excited to be looking forward to spotting a tiger

Apparently a saying goes that "Whoever visited Tadobad has never returned without spotting a Tiger" Anyone out here who hasnt spotted a tiger during their visit to Tadoba?

Well, we were lucky but, not as lucky as some folks as we didnt get good opportunity for clicking a picture as they were always in dense foilage and on the move....so best we could do is snap away a few fast shots

More on it in the next post..............


Well Said, It's indeed luck to spot a tiger in such a huge jungle covering a span of 625 Sq.kms



Triumph'ers



Triumph'ers






Baby Elephant







Peacock that scurried away as soon as it saw us



Beautiful landscape of Tadoba





Stork



Is that a Bald Eagle? (300mm zoom and cropped, too much noise eh?)



Hordes of Spotted Deer











Beautiful tar roads cutting across the jungle



Langoor

[mobike008]

Note from Mod : Thread moved from Assembly Line to Travelogues section

Hope you guys like this short story about our weekend motorcycle trip to Tadoba.

Do stay glued as lot many pictures coming up

[harsha.muvva]

The ride sounds interesting and some of the pics are too good

I am having this uncontrollable itch to do long ride especially after my recent absence from riding scene(got busy with work and then fell sick for more than a month) and TADOBA seems perfect destination

Lets catch up on a weekend ride!

Regards,
harsha

[arjun.vanil]

Whoa!!! That must have been one hell of a ride! Insane bikes! The place looks amazing and so do the pics!!

Is that an AGV dreamtime???

[Divya Sharan]

Originally Posted by mobike008

Look at my intelligence, I had decided to ride for 1km without helmet as we wanted to stop at a chai tapri for a quick tea-break but, that 1km become almost 10-15kms as we couldnt find one and since the roads
were in horrible conditions we anyways werent riding above 50kmph. This incident left me completely exhausted and face coated with dust and grime

Completely unacceptable!

Loved the log so far, but for this part. 15 kms on a (super)bike without a helmet?
20 kmph is fast enough!

[mobike008]

Originally Posted by Divya Sharan

Completely unacceptable!

Loved the log so far, but for this part. 15 kms on a (super)bike without a helmet? 20 kmph is fast enough!

Agree with you but, the situation was different. We were supposed to stop for a tea break as per directions of someone who said its in next km but, it turned out it wasnt the case and it was traffic congested small road with lot of dust and grime in the air

Originally Posted by arjun.vanil

Is that an AGV dreamtime???

Indeed. Mine is a AGV Dreamtime Rossi Replica helmet

Originally Posted by harsha.muvva

I am having this uncontrollable itch to do long ride especially after my recent absence from riding scene(got busy with work and then fell sick for more than a month) and TADOBA seems perfect destination

Oh! you have been missing out on plenty of rides and we have been regular on our weekend rides. Next ride, do join up

Group pic in front of the Mohrali gate (Main Entrance) of Tadoba Forest Reserve

Awesome write-up Avi and great pics. You can anytime have a parallel carrier of a writer.
You guys were lucky enough to have spotted a tiger and a leopard. I have been to Kanha national park couple of time but was never lucky enough to spot one in open. Looks like I need to visit Tadoba sometime soon.

How did your bikes performed on the rough roads? Any issues notices during or post ride?

[Haroon]

Wonderful trip log complemented with crisp pictures Avi. Although its always about the ride and not the destination, I guess here you had the best of both.

Thanks for taking us along and Ride Safe.

[Tgo]

Originally Posted by mobike008

Is that a Bald Eagle? (300mm zoom and cropped, too much noise eh?)

Attachment 1304569

That should be a Black Winged Kite if I am correct. You're really lucky to have spotted the Leopard. That's the fun of safaris. people make it such a point to associate a safari's success to spotting the wild cats, that they miss out on so much else.

[Seventhgear]

Thanks for sharing Mobike008.It sure must have been great to be out on the roads with like minded guys on even better bikes.

Would really like to know how the bikes performed on the highway especially the Bonnie.What were the top speeds kept up by you guys and did the bikes have any issues of any kind.Please elaborate.

IMO Chandrapur has yet to get that 'distinction' of the most polluted city but will definitely in the coming years .

P.S. The bird hovering seems to belong to the Falcon species.

[vikash49]

Nice read. Thanks for sharing!

Originally Posted by mobike008

Stork

Attachment 1304568

Is that a Bald Eagle? (300mm zoom and cropped, too much noise eh?)

Attachment 1304569

And btw, first one is a Cattle Eagret and the second one is a Black Winged Kite

[abhinav.s]

Awesome Avi!! Loved the pics and the detailed log as well. Waiting for more pics!