13th October 2008, 13:16
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| Team-BHP Support   | 2100kms - To the Desert and Back(Jaisalmer Phalodi Sambhar!) 5 days, 2100kms, through traffic jams crawling at 5kmph to cruising at 150kmph on lonely highways, right to the dunes. What a trip it was! There are hundreds of pics to be processed, as the travelogue progresses.... The Highway Star  Was she a Camel in an older life?  Or Maybe a Sambhar,  Jams, Desert, Road, No Road, Lake bed, Lake, this trip had it all. The motto was simple. If we can see it, we will go there. No matter what it takes, 4H, 4L or just brute speed! Day 1: Best laid plans always go haywire, esp starting times. We always plan to start at 5am, and actually start at 8am. This time therefore we planned to start at 3:30am, and it was 6:25am as we rolled out of apartment gates Till Delhi border at DND it was easy. After that the traffic started thickening. I really wonder where do people go at that unholy hour! 6:30am and traffic. And when there is traffic, there is a Jam, and on the ring road near Hyatt, there was indeed a long jam. Reason? A truck driver had climbed flyover railing and toppled blocking the entire road. So traffic had to go under the flyover, and this usually causes a huge jam. After that it was smooth sailing on the Toll road, but after that whoa. Silly trucks and sillier traffic. Speedo needle would do its 20-40-60-70-20 dance again and again, as trucks dragged with each other blocking all lanes at 40kmph. The sun was high, and traffic was rising, and I thought "Its going to be a nightmare till jaipur. Thankfully shortly after Haryana border, the roads improved, and we could manage high 3 digit speeds. Kishangarh came quickly(surprise), and the real nightmare was waiting at Ajmer. Going to Jodhpur you cannot take NH8A but have to take the older highway. After we tanked up at Ajmer, we came across this railway crossing, and huge truck jams. It was 4pm when we hit Jodhpur, helped in part by the excellent highway after Beawar We started asking for directions for the Jodhpur bypass, and Voila, everybody is telling us something different. It was finally 5 pm when we came across the signboard which said - Jaisalmer 230kms After that it was ripping all the way, with couple of tea breaks, and at 8:30 we were tucked in Shahi palace. A long 14 hours drive, more than 900kms! |
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13th October 2008, 13:31
| #2 |
| Senior - BHPian  Join Date: Jul 2008 Location: Jaipur
Posts: 1,194
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13th October 2008, 13:32
| #3 |
| Senior - BHPian Join Date: Dec 2007 Location: Bangalore
Posts: 4,106
Thanked: 537 Times
| A mammoth of a travelogue in the making! Treating the beast as it is meant to be treated, is it TSK? With so many pictures, I am sure this one is going to be a treate!  |
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13th October 2008, 16:24
| #4 |
| BHPian  Join Date: Nov 2007 Location: Hyderabad
Posts: 276
Thanked: 16 Times
| Good start and The Beast looks great in desert |
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13th October 2008, 17:02
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| Senior - BHPian  | This is gonna be a real good one  Come on Tanveer, you know the policy on Adam Teasing don't you  |
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13th October 2008, 17:26
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| Senior - BHPian | Seem's a yummy travelogue, awaiting the pictures to relish |
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13th October 2008, 18:50
| #7 |
| Senior - BHPian | It appears raining travelogues here in TBHP!! I guess this travelogue will be very interesting to read because Safari is right vehicle to visit Desert. I feel one can expect lot of pictures although right now full travelogue is not yet posted. PS 150kmph even in open lonely highway is scarry for Safari!! according to me, since maximum speed my Innova is allowed to touch is 120kmph. Drive safe and come with more travelogue to cool our eyes. |
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13th October 2008, 21:24
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| Team-BHP Support | I mostly drove around 130kmph. The really high speeds came in short bursts, when I was tempted. These stretches actually don't have any villages, any fields, any animals, any people. Its like twilight zone! Here are some pics from Day 1    Did not stop for pic taking. Aim was to get to Jaisalmer quickly, we had lost a lot of time till Jodhopur, and inside Jodhpur, but the roads after that were quick! After reaching Shahi palace, we checked in. The room was lovely  The View from terrace was mind blowing.  Finally it was time to retire, it would be a long day tomorrow --- END of DAY 1--- |
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14th October 2008, 00:44
| #9 |
| Team-BHP Support  | Damn! I was supposed to be in this travelogue...  |
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14th October 2008, 01:02
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| Senior - BHPian  | |
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14th October 2008, 05:30
| #11 | |
| Team-BHP Support  | Excellent start to a very interesting travelogue. Rajasthan is one of my most favourite places. I have been there twice and plan to go there again next year. But the main problem with Rajasthan is that there are so many places to visit that taking adequate time out of office is difficult. The last pic of the Golden Fort (Sonar Kella) is awesome.. waiting for the rest of the story... Quote:
Last edited by BlackPearl : 14th October 2008 at 05:33. | |
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14th October 2008, 08:29
| #12 |
| Distinguished - BHPian  Join Date: Jul 2007 Location: MUMBAI
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14th October 2008, 10:13
| #13 |
| Senior - BHPian  | |
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14th October 2008, 10:21
| #14 |
| Senior - BHPian  Join Date: Feb 2007 Location: Delhi
Posts: 1,356
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| Looks nice tanveer, keep them coming. |
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14th October 2008, 11:50
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| Team-BHP Support | Quote:
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Rajasthan is indeed an amazing place. Schedules willing, plan to go there in Feb again. The desert is one place you can go to again and again. This was our first desert trip, and inspite of 40 degree daytime temperatures it was a blast! Pics are being processed, and next installment will have the desert SAFARI, literally, and plenty of off road driving. I also did Pokhran Phalodi on Bikaner highway, but took detour through the dirt tracks at Ramdeora, and saw in interior villages. Its all 4x4 Mahindra Jeep territory, ours was the odd one out, with people giving curious looks as to what is this strange white elephant doing there. Even the wildlife and camels which kind of ignores the jeeps, was wondering "Whats this?" Quote:
If you take it into the ocean it would float. Its unstoppable. The jeep drivers told me that sometimes that go up and down the dunes at high speed for thrills. I would not even dare attempt that in the safari or any other softroader. The 2.5 ton weight is not really sand friendly. However the torque in 4L and the LSD make up for it somewhat. If she had more torque in 4H, it would have been easier, but every time I had to stop in sand, I had to engage 4L to extract her. The whole vehicle would start shaking as I left the clutch, and gently tapped the accelerator so no to cause a high speed wheelspin. The wheel would first spin slowly in the sand, with one left wheel, and one right wheel slipping, then LSD would kick in and the other wheel would slowly start rotating, the vehicle used to shake a bit, and like a behemoth climb out. In 4H all you would do is spin the wheels and sink in. but one thing I am not happy about is vegetation hitting the sides. there are minor scratches at a few places. You can call them the battle scars. I think I need to borrow the "Vehicle Camauflage" thingy from Tata, the kind they use when they are testing "secret vehicles". | ||||||
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