True bike ride to Pondicherry

Puducherry and Mamalapuram

About Pondicherry:

 

Pondicherry also called as pondy/puducerry (new village in tamil ) was the french colony for almost 300yrs. Puducherry got its indepence by 1954 and is now remained as the union territory, the influence of french culture can still be seen in puducherry. 

The coastal city of Pondicherry is famous for its serene beaches, French War Memorials , Puducherry Museum, Auroville Ashram, Shri Aurobindo Ashram, Promenade, Chunnambar Resort, Old Light house and few other tourist spots.

About Mahablipuram :

Mahabalipuram is another coastal reagion which is also called mamalapuram. Mamalapuram is the historical centre, whos architectural structures dates back to 7th and 8th centuries. Mamalapuram is famous for its 9 monolithic temples which is spread accross the town. 

Places to be visited : Arunas penance, Balancing Rock(krishnas butter), old light house, pacha rathas, sea shore temple, mahishasura mardini cave, trimuti cave, and few beaches. 

Best time to visit Puducherry and Mamalapuram : 

As Puducherry and Mamalapuram are coastal region it would be humid through out the year, the best time to visit would be in the winter(November-February) when the max and min temperature would be 28-20 centigrade.

How far from Bangalore :

Pondicherry is 320km from Bangalore  (Suggested route Bangalore->Krishangiri->Thiruvanamalai->Pondy)

Mamlapuram is 350km from Bangalore (Suggested Route Bangalore -> Krishangiri ->Vellore-> Kanchipuram -> Chengalpattu -> Mamalapuram)

How it went :

In one sentence : Pondicherry the awesomeness of driving experience.
The total distance covered in 3 days was 916km. It all with started the flopped plan to Goa, as many didn't agree and few of my colleagues were off to there hometown, so it's only me and Rajaneesh left out at the last, Rajaneesh is good follower :-)  so I love traveling with him as I will never be asked/questioned anything about the destination.  

At AH45

Well getting into drive let's split it on basis of number of days

Day 1 : It was 15th of August, we agreed upon to start from Silk board at 6am, and I was at meeting point right on time, to add to Rajaneesh confusion when I called him up to check where he is, he answered saying he just started from home, he though that we were supposed to start from home by 6am, I couldn't say much to him and asked him to come asap, by 6.30 am he was at Silk board. We did some stretches and started our bikes, we decided that we will stop at hosur for tea break, hosur is around 30km from Silk board, since we took the overpass we couldn't stop at hosur for tea.

Kamat @ Hosur

Since we missed the first pitstop we though of taking break at krishnagiri, but before we reach krishnagiri we saw a kamat restaurant nearby, and we took the first break and had idly and vada in the hotel. In mean time Rajaneesh filled up his bike with fuel for 300 bucks and this is the only amount he had for the trip start up ;-)  no comments on him as this was/is expected.

The next stop was krishnagiri and as per what I had seen in the map this is place where we had to take deviation. We asked the localities for direction as the construction of bridge made more confusion, we found the deviation of the thiruvanamallai road, this is were the fun begins :-P I had seen in the blog theloapers.blogspot.in that they had mentioned the road is in bad condition, but my viewpoint was different and expected better road than what was actually written in the blog. As we entered the road first shock was its a single road, till now  we ridding on super duper NH for 100km, now it's like a road of century old, I was more scared when I remebered that the road condition is worse for another 120km, my heart stopped beating for a moment thinking about how we can cover 120 km in this kind of road.

Thiruvanamali Road

The road was full of patch and potholes and more over its a very rough surface, we rode the bike for another 10km and stopped near a temple, I saw Rajaneesh face and I could see his pain in his eyes :-) you know where the actual pain is :-P . We picked this road because one of our colleague called Magesh told it's not bad but drivable, now both of were cursing on magesh, anyways we thought we will drive another 50km and take rest, the next point stop point was uttangarai, Magesh had told that the dosa of this place is very nice, but we had no mood of having one as we knew the road the condition ahead. We stopped at uttangarai as I found a atm to draw more cash, still this bugger had no intention of taking money even though he was running with 0 rs, I didn't care we started again, the next stop was Chengam which was around 30km, we stopped in the middle and took rest for a while under the tree and then stared again, but this time we didn't stop at chenagm, we thought we will make till thiruvanamallai which was another 30km and take rest there, with lot of effort we reached thiruvanamallai. We stopped near a juice center and had some soft drinks and chocolates, this time Rajaneesh finally withdrew amount I thought he will not ar all withdrew till pondy.

Gingee Fort

It had become necessity for him as he was running out of petrol by then and we stopped at filling station and was happy as the petrol price here was quite less compared to our state, we roamed around the streets of thiruvanamallai as there were some block beacuse of independence day celebration because of the redirected route we could see the mammoth structure of the thiruvanamalai temple.

Thidivaram-Pondy

I had initially planned to see temple but because of time constraint we couldn't make it, now the road was pretty much better. The next stop was at Gingee, which was another 40km I didn't  plan to visit gingee fort but when we passed near the place we saw lot of KA registered vehicle parked nearby and we thought of giving a shot, so we parked our bike near fort entrance, by then Rajaneesh found one of his friend who had come with his family to spend time in pondy we all had a general conversation, by now we were getting late and we dropped the plan of the hill/fort, and we started towards pondy, it was still 80km away and it almost 1.30pm by then, so we wanted to wrap up early, as our lunch plan was supposed to be at pondy. We reached tindivaram and missed the route of pondy and traveled extra 5km, later we came to know that we had to take deviation long before, we missed because of the wrong board at the flyover ,somehow made to the bypass road of tindivaram and pondy.

Paradise Beach

Believe me guys this is one of the best road I have seen so far, the road was equivalent to airport runway, I couldn't resist anymore because of the pathetic drive I had so far, I throttled my accelerator to the max , and I could reach 121kmph which is my max till now, and in no time we were in pondy. It was 2.30pm when we entered pondy, it was slightly drizzling we didn't care much and started to search lodge, after roaming here and there for 15min

Marine Drive

we found a budget room which was pretty decent for 900rs, we checked into the lodge and got refreshed,it was 3.30pm by then, we went to nearby hotel had nice lunch, we came back to room and slept for an hour. We planned to cover two places for that day. First we went to boat house from where we went to Paradise beach in ferry boat. This beach was really good, it was clean and we played  for 3half an hour or so and and then we came back to our parking spot, and had a cup of tea, by then it was almost 6am, we reached room and asked the lodge owner for other places to see around, he suggested marine drive which is beach walk path of 2km stretch. We were there before the night falls, we took some snaps and walked around the drive and returned back to room after getting lost in the street of pondy and slept early as we had to get up early morning.

Day 2 :
It was 5.30am in the morning and we had planned to see the sunrise, so we were up on time and took my bike to pondy beach, it was the perfect time when we had been there, I took the morning coffee and walked toward the marine drive.

Marine Drive

The sun had just began raising, it was the picture perfect sunrise that I had ever seen, it was a beautiful view. We were there around the marine drive for quite a long time , we went to our room and had bath and by 9am both us were ready. We had breakfast and asked the lodge owner few information about auroville opening time, he told it will open by 9.30am, so we at auroville by 9.30am, this was on the way to Mahabalipuram and left deviation from the ECR around 8km inside, we didn't find the place much interesting, most of the people around are all foreigners we heard that if we take pre booking to visit mata mandir we will get chance to sit inside the center of the  pyramid

Mata Mandir

mandir which is supposed to be great for some physics reason, and this is what was told by Magesh, but again this time also it was a fruitless result. The pre-booking should be done two days in advance, anyway we went toward the mata mandir which was 1km by walk, we were carrying our huge baggage and walking 1km turned to be very difficult, somehow made till mata mandir, had a nice view of the unique construction, took some snaps and returned back to the main arena. Spent some time eating ice cream and by 11am we started towards mahabalipuram.

ECR

This ECR is across the sea coast and you would love this drive. It was the awesome view to the right of our road, the beach was all along the road, and traffic was also less. We maintained the decent pace of 70-80kmph and stopped in between twice for break, in between we had a nearby call from the government buses whos driving think he is driving a rocket, after driving for while we reached mahabalipuram by 12.30am and again the search began for lodge. We found a room for 600rs and this was not as good as previous one, but it dint matter for th bachelor's, we refreshed and went out for lunch had a good north thali lunch and came back to room, we heard that all the temples/monuments will be opened after 4pm,

Balancing Rock

we had 3hr of gap we watched TV for while in room and slept for couple of hours, it was 4am by then, so we thought of exploring mahabalipuram, there were around 6 spots which need to be visited that day and all went smoothly,

Rainbow view from light house

the old light house was the best one, when we went upto the tip of the light house,it started raining heavily after that we saw some marvelous dual rainbow one above the other it was spectacular view, took some snaps and when it stopped raining we came down and visited pacha ratha and sea shore temple all these temples can be visited with only one ticket given at any counters, we visited different places and had some nice time, it was 6pm by then, and we had to return back to room, once returned back it was still sunny outside, so we decide to go to beach, this time we changed to beach cloth and spent considerable amount of time playing in beach, then we returned back to room,

My Bike @ Mamalapuram Beach

I was like since we came so long from Bangalore why not to take a bike picture with background as beach, but Rajaneesh didn't seems to be interested, I was keen in it so took my bike and came to beach with lots of struggle to take bike on sea sand, took some snaps in the low lighting's, then returned back it was 7.30pm by then we both went to hotel for dinner finished off and come back to room spent some time in front of tv by 9.30 we had to be off to bed , as we had to travel long distance the next Morning.  The initial plan was to go by the same route as we came, but both of us were scared to go in that road to hell, so I googled for the route and found that via Chennai would be a better route (via chengalpattu), by 10pm we hit the bed.

Day 3:
This is something very interesting as the last part has some funny moments. 

Morning Breakfast - Kanchipuram

It was by 4.30 I woke up and had bath and alarmed rajjo by 5am,

 

Kanchipuran to AH45

 he got ready by 5.30am and we started packing our bags, we checked out the room by 6am and we hit the chengalpattu road by 6.15am or so, rajjo is a straight road tracer wherever he see straight road he just follows it :P , since I have bad view during night drive I prefered him to go ahead even thought I knew he didn't knew the route, we had to take deviation at some point but this guy didn't take turn at all, I had to chase him for another 1km and boughy him back to right track, we crossed chengalpattu and moved towards kanchipuram took some photos in font of kanchipuram temple.

@ wallahja

We hit the bangalore Chennai highway this road was very good,

Bike @ Garage

we were at 80s and 90s it was almost 9am by then, we stopped for every 50km, and we reached a place called wallahaja were rajjo bike started showing some sickness, and it didn't start after many trial it started again, and we moved towards krishnagiri. We stopped at krishnagiri for tea, it was 12am by then, we thought in another 1.5hr we wpuld be at house, but it didn't happen. Our great Rajaneesh bike didn't start at all, we found a local garage nearby and pushed the vehicle, and the mechanic told the engine has seized because of low oil, in Bangalore the bajaj guy had asked if he need the oil top up, but rajjo was like big NO, now we could see the effect, anyhow he told it will minimum 4hr to repair I was totally out of mood, went out with mechanic for boring the engine  and he asked to come back by 5pm and we said OK, rajjo was like what to do now, I told lunch :-P  we went to a hotel had nice full meals, still three more hour to be passed,

KRP Dam Park

so I thought of going to krishnagiri dam, and we took my bike to the damand I slept in the park for almost two hours after roaming inside park here and there, it was 4.30pm  by then we left the dam and slowly came to the garage which was 10km away,

Krishnagiri Dam

by 5.30 the pulsar was ready, to add to the shock the mechanic told he cannot drive more than 40kmph, it was almost 6pm by then, I told Rajaneesh I can't wait and drive with him at 35kmph as at going to be night and I can't see much, so I let him and started towards Bangalore reached home by 7.30pm and messaged anand( Colleague ) on safe arrival, by 9.30pm I got call from rajjo that he has also reached and he then called up anand and told that both of us reached, this is were the  fun began, I had informed anand that this had scenario had happened, rajjo wanted to hide the failure and told Anand not to spread with other colleagues in office about bike failure , but the secret exploded in office when anand busted the secret in font of everyone, from that day onwards rajjos bike has a unique identity in office ;-) 

Total Trip Distance

Solo ride to Muthathi

 Solo Ride to Muthathi

About Muthathi :

Muthathi is a village which is situated on the bank of the river Kaveri, The area is surrounded by the dense forest and hills, this place has a small temple of Hanuman (Anjaneya) which attracts lots of devotees. 

How far from Bangalore :

Muthathi is 100km away from Bangalore, on the stretch of  SH 209, look for the left deviation point called sathanr around 18km from Kanakpura.

Best Time to Visit Muthathi :

Since this is a river valley, the best time to visit would be during monsoon, or after the monsoon, season, so ideal month to visit would be between July and Dec.

How it went :

Well this is one of the unforgettable ride till now, as I met with an accident rite after reaching Bangalore, this was totally unplanned trip I had done till now. It was Saturday of 23rd June and I was supposed to go for a pooja at my cousin location, but I wasn't interested to go on that day, and stayed back home, but later I really felt bored as there was power cut by 11am, I waited for 15min or so I couldn't wait anymore so took my jacket and bag with a bottle of water started my bike and was heading towards the petrol bunk, meanitime was also deciding on the place to of drive. I finalized the destination as Muthathi as  read in one of the blog that the ride through kollegal forest region is good, this place is around 100km away from Bangalore, it was quite Cloudy and it was perfect for the ride. The traffic was up-to peak and somehow made up till sarakki signal, till you cross the nice junction on kanakpura road you cannot expect the clear road, more over because of the metro construction the traffic was hell.

I hit the nice junction in another 30min, took a break and had tea at the nearby stall, I could see the clear road ahead,  so I hit the highway and was at causing speed, those who want to enjoy via mild forest, they should choose this as the route to reach Mysore, but again this route handles big trucks, so be careful as its a single road, but you will enjoy ride via the curvy forest road,

I had seen some blog mentioning about mavathur lake in kanakpura road which is quie good, I wanted a short ride but due to lack of route knowledge and since native people were not that helpful I had no other option and headed towards Muthathi. At kanakpura I stopped nearby a hotel and had lite lunch, Muthathi was around 50km from this place,  and I had to take deviate at around 20km ahead, I was riding and enjoying the view around, and also  was looking at the sign boards for the directions, finally I could see some boards with distance to Muthathi, I reached sathanur where the deviation to Muthathi begins, believe me after zooming from highway this would be the worst road to ride, the road was full of potholes and patches, I could see more people going towards Muthathi. I maintained a descent pace of 40kmph on this road, 

The road got much worse moving ahead, and some part had only gravels which made the ride horrible and after 8km ride from deviation from sathanur I saw a check-post with police around, I got scared as I didn't get my insurance paper nor my original driving license, I thought of returning back home, but I decided that I came all the way 90km from Bangalore and dont want to go with empty feeling, so I thought of paying some fine to the force and going ahead. As expected I was stopped along with 3 more guys who were on another bike, I only had the duplicate license and the police asked for the insurance papers which I didn't carry, neither the guys who were in front of me had one, we all were asked to pay 1000rs, and I had only 300rs in my pocket, the guys on another bike called someone and made the police to talk to person over  phone, I don't know what was the discussion, the police thought I am also with other three guys ahead and let he me go out the check-post to the Kollegala forest region, well the road got much worst and the ghat section begins, after a while I couldn't see the person who had ahead of me met with a accident, he and his friends misjudged the curve on ghat and hit the mountain ahead, nothing was serious they just had scratches in there body and bike.

I stopped and helped them in lifting the bike and we were more careful for the road ahead, another 20min I was at Muthathi, this place had a small temple of lord hanuman, I visited the temple had darshan and moved towards the river the rainly season had just started and there was considerable amount of water in the river by then.

I roamed around the river and had some snack which was being sold nearby clicking some pics I wasn't interested in getting into the water as I dint carry any extra cloth I was at the river side for a while and then decided to leave back. I Reached my bike, and started toward Bangalore, it started raining by then, I couldn't see much with my helmet visor,so slowly I made up till the check-post I had seen before, and stopped there for a while as the rain was intensified, after half an hour of staying back, the rainfall had weakened so I decided to move ahead, after reaching sathanur the rain had completely stopped, again the weather turned to be awesome for ride,

I continued towards Bangalore with a descent pace of speed, I didn't take any break in between till I Reached nice road junction, after reaching the junction I called up one of my friend whom I haven't met from long time, it was evening by then I met  my friend, and was going back, the traffic was hell and I was hit by a van while taking turn, the guy pushed me to an empty drain, and my palm was cut by the sharp stone in the drain, people gathered and helped me get me out of drain :P, I was bleeding in my hand, one guy tied up the hanky and asked me to go to hospital, I took my bike and reached a nearby hospital, I got three stitches in the palm and some bruises were treated which were on shoulder and legs, took rest in the hosiptal for a while it was quite late by then so I took my bike and started towards my source(home) which was almost 7km from hospital, it was painful riding the bike that too with traffic around and I had to use my bandaged hand for braking but there was no other option, finally reached home and had a good left a right scolding from parents :)
The next day I took my bike to service center and got fixed the broken elements of bike.

Namooru Mysore

Namooru Mysore

About Mysore : 

Mysore is the second largest city of Karnataka. It is known the world over for its exotic sandalwood and rich silks.Also known as the City of Palaces, Mysore retains a quaint charm, that never fails to enchant. Mysore District is a popular tourist destination, offering several attractions ranging from the royal splendor of Mysore City and its fabulous Dasara Festival to exquisite temples, pilgrimage centers and scenic spots.
Some of the attractions in mysore are Wax Museum,Railway Museum,St Philomena Church, Mysore Zoo, moolika Bonsai Garden,Karanji Lake, Lalith Mahal, Jagan Mohan Palace, Mysore palace

How far from Bangalore :

Bangalore to Mysore distance by road is about 140 kilometers.The State Highway is quite busy all the time, but yet fast moving, the approximate traveling time is 3 hours.

Best Time to Visit Mysore : 

Mysore is a place which can be visited anytime, if temperature is the concern then October to February would be the best time as the temperature would range between 20 to 28(Max) centigrade.

How it went : 

Well this would be one of the best ride had so far, not because I loved the ride. It's because someone else who wanted to go for long drive was happy. This time it's the four of us in three bikes, mine, Rajaneesh (doesn't matter where we go this guy just follows :) ) and Sonali who was driving her aviator, yes its a scooter which covered around 350+ km hats off to her interest and capability. 
Well the plan was organized just a day before and it was not to Mysore instead it was till maddur, the plan was only to have breakfast at adigas and return back home, but we did had mysore in mind and we decided we will make dynamic plan based on weather condition.

@ Adigas, Maddur

As agreed the meeting point was at nayandanahalli and time was fixed at 6, Rajaneesh was on time and he called me up I was waiting for other two girls to come near my house to join, since Rajaneesh has already reached the point I started my bike and reached nayandanahalli, had a cup of tea finally these girls came by 6.45am still its not late buy could have started earlier, we didn't wasted much time and asked Sushmita to join one of the bike, as expected she didn't go in Rajaneesh bike as it was dirty :p, all three started the bike and moved along the state highway, the traffic started building up, we just wanted to cross kumbalgodu after the traffic would reduce considerably, these route has numerous numbers of speed breaker and it was killing the most of the time, somehow we managed to move out of the traffic and was ridding towards the destination, there are few stretch before entering ramanagar district which gives mile long straight stretch I could make up to 108kmph in that road even the scooter picked up till 100. We crossed ramanagar district and chanpatna as per the schedule we had planned finally reached maddur adigas by 8am, we ordered the Crispy dosa poori vada and karabath and our tummy was full after the breakfast. Now it the time to make dynamic decision, Sonali stared looking into weather and it gave report of chances of rain, but for us the weather looked great outside, but all of us had interest to continue towards Mysore. We decided that we will go to Mysore, I was tracing behind Sonali 's bike to find out of anything is wrong with vehicle,  so far so good.

View from Chamundi Hills

The route from mandya to mysore is very impressive, very less traffic and the speed breakers drastically reduced, I zoomed to my top sped of 113 kmph which was highest till then in the long stretch, was really happy as I Reached 110 range, and the journey continued we entered the historical city of srirangapatanna, and then the traffic was to pick, now the actually person is in focus, Rajaneesh was a person who belongs to mysore and we were dependent on him for route, all the time we were making fun of him for his route map knowledge as he is kind of 0 scorer in that, but for the city of mysore he was perfect, out first visiting place was chamundi hills.we ascended the hill range easily and reached the temple premise.

In front of Mahishasura

I don't know what was the occasion but the Temple was crowded, so there was no thought of going inside the temple, we just had a far off darshan and circled the temple and moved towards the vehicle, in mean time we were crossing the market, and Sonali bought me a squeaky monkey as a gift, we went to pick up our vehicle, since the scooter had come all the way up to the hill, we had to take the pic of the scooter in front of mahishasura.

The next spot was karanaji Lake which is a kind of time-pass spot it was almost 11o clock and we decided to finish it off by 12pm.

@ Karanji Kere

We took tickets And got chance to see beautiful birds and finally to respect the word Lake we took the boat ride, Sonali was excited to drive the boat but sadly could continue for more than 2min,so it was me and Sushmita who were at the pedal, we had nice boat ride for 20min, we took rest for a while and moved towards finding place to have lunch, on the way we found the domino's and everyone seems to be interested, and ordered pizzas, once done with the domino's Sonali wanted to go for some Bombay sweets to pack up sweet for home, so the search began and Rajaneesh should be awarded to taking to the correct spot, she took good amount of sweets and I became the tasting person, the next point was KRS dam which rajjo was very much interested to go, it was 1 pm by then and as expected it took 30min for drive with a break for fuel stop, we reached KRS by 1.30 and for our bad luck we heard that the bridge get was closed for public ling back, the roar of the gush of water could be heard from kms, whence went near the dam opening the view was spectacular, never seen krs with such a fledge, just went near the grill and stood for less than dew secs, and I was complete drenched and same happened with rajjo, we spent good amount time at KRS and started marching towards our bike, the next point to be seen was balmuri which was 2km from the road of krs, and the road condition was horrible, well coming to balmuri this is the place where many Kannada films were shot and it's a beautiful location where the water ides down the human pass, but since the water flow was very high we could go to the pass by, took few snaps and vacated the place with some snacks.

Balmuri Falls

KRS Dam

It was already 3 by then, and I said we should be leaving to Bangalore by now, so the journey toward Bangalore started, rajjo knew the shortcut which could take us to Sri rangapatna and we reached the highway in a while, it was looking like it's going to rain, we hoped for the best and we were riding towards mandya, we reached maddur adigas by 4.30 and had Snacks at the place,  by this time it was slightly raining anyhow we stared out bikes and moved toward Bangalore, we crossed chanpatna and almost reached Ram nagara the cloud busted the heavy downpour started, we pulled out vehicle nearby temple and took shade for a while until the rainfall reduces, we again started out bikes and we were moving, but this time The rain that stated never ended, after lots of mismatched communication we finally pulled our vehicle side by tree, and our madam Sonali stated vibrating, I gave her my raincoat and jacket, and we decide we will move with rain, myself and Rajaneesh Atleast had riding jacket poor Sushmita didn't even had that, but she adjusts for any situation and I was driving blindly tracing rear view light of vehicle ahead and slightly visibility available as it was raining heavy,  and in between we saw a accident which chocked all of us, and I flopped my speed from 60 to 45 by then,  by around 7 pm we reached the Bangalore outskirts and we stopped at  nayandanahalli to make a disperse plan, myself and Sonali continued in out way, and  I Reached home in another 15min and the rain had stopped completely by this time, after another hour other two girls made to there destination, we had a good experience in driving on heavy rains, overall Mysore trip turned to be Good.

Bike ride to Nandi Hills

Bike Ride To Nandi Hills

About Nandi Hills:

Nandi Hills or Nandidurg or Nandi Betta is an ancient hill fortress of situated in the Chikkaballapur district of Karnataka. This is a group of hills that lies at an average elevation of about 1,478 meters (4,851 feet) above the sea level, the Hills is open to public from 6 AM to 10 PM.

Nandi Hills offers historic and scenic attractions such as Tipu’s Drop, Tipu’s Summer Palace and Fort, Horse Way, Secret Escape Route, Amruth Sarovar Lake, and Brahmashram. It is also famous for its temples such as the Bhoga Nandeeshwara temple, Sri Bhoga Narasimha temple, Sri Ugra Narasimha temple, Sri Yoga Narasimha temple, and Gavi Veerbhadra Swamy temple.

Best time to Visit

Nandi hill is the place which can be visited at any time during the year. It will be cold during winter and cool during summer. There is a resort at the top of the hill which is being run by the Karnataka Tourism which offer you to stay for the night  which would be best to view the morning sunrise.

How far from Bangalore :

Nandi hills is situated at a distance of about 65 km from Bangalore, on the way to Hyderabad National Highway (NH7). This place can be easily reached as it is linked by roads with Bangalore and Chikkaballapur (24 km). 

How it went :

This is only trip wherein maximum number of riders joined the trip , expected as this is the shortest distance trip and one of the best within 100KM.

We started from our workplace at Manyata tech park, as the strength increases the the waiting time increases, I started from home by 4.20am and reached the workplace by 4.45am, and we waitind for the whole team to join, it was by 5.45am   everyone reached the spot and we started toward the destination.

On the way to Nandi

The traffic was very minimum and we reached the Bangalore-Hyderabad Highway in no time, The road till Yelanka went with all patch works as the flyover was under construction, as we crossed the yelanka market, the road turned to be silky smooth and the traffic was clear and all of us accelerated to enjoy the speed on 6 lane road. 

We kept our vision focused to find-out the sign board of deviation  towards nandi, and we are able to make out to the point in a short while.

We stopped at the deviation point for the pitstop and it was quite dark even at 6.00am in the morning, the weather was very much pleasant , and few took few snap and started towards the hill. The stretch of around 10km was not so good, the road condition was better but lots of speed breakers.  Finally we reached the point from the where the actual ride starts, the drive through the ghat of nandi hills, even though the stretch was very less as 8km but still enjoyable, should be careful about the oncoming traffic as its a single road. 

Morning view from Nandi

View from Nandi

As we started ascending we are able to see many vehicle behind us everyone comes to nandi hills basically to enjoy the morning ride. We reached the checkpost by 6.15am, the checkpost was not open yet, in another 5min few police officers opened the gate and allowed bikers to move on after checking the valid documents. 

At around 3km from the hilltop the hair pin curves started with steep range, most of the bikers would enjoy riding these kind of the stretch. We reached the top and parked our bike, few bikers had already reached the top, we took the break and had some snacks, actually snacks was for the monkeys around, they didn't leave us to have any food stuffs :)

We took the entry ticket and entered the entrance of the gate, there was a big route map of the view points located inside the nandi hills range and we followed the maps.

The first spot was the kalyani (small pond) and it was filled with the fish, manb and his wife started feeding the fish and few took few snaps. And we encircled the kalyani, the next point was the park way, where they have constructed new viewing arenas.

View Point

 Along the way there were many children's playing activities which could be enjoyed by the small kids. 

After going through all the way we reached the top the of the hill, it was very windy at the top and the view was exciting. 

There was the temple of bhoga  nandeeshwara and many other temples around it, since it was early morning the temple was not opened yet so couldn't make it out to the temple.

Group Pic

We had few food stuff which was packed last night by sonali and sushmita, which we shared among us and we were followed by a dog from long time and it was expecting some food from us so finally shared the remaining food with the dog. We started moving around and we came across the KSTDC hotel, these hotel was not opened yet, but there was a small stall in front of it who was making some hot dosas and omlet, everyone was hungry by then and we ordered one for each. It was crispy and hot and tasted better than what is being served in our cafeteria :)

Once we finished with the morning breakfast and sip of coffee we moved towards the new view platform which government had installed very latest. And the view was magnificent from the view the point.

There were lots of monkeys around and they will

KSTDC Hotel

never make you eat anything around them, we stayed at these place for long time as it was very much breezy at the top and all of us were enjoying the view. 

Then we moved toward the tippu trop, this spot is called the suicide point of nandi hills as there were many cases of suicide which had happened earlier. We spent quite a bit of time over here and Anand , Zeeshan and Sonali started making some actions pics for there social sites to be uploaded. Other people were just enjoying the activity which was going on.

We had spent enough time and since it was quite late for Mehdia as here kids were waiting for her, and we started descending to the entrance gate, we didn't wanted to leave even though it was 10am and we had spent a lot of time, still we managed to click few pics here and there and finally everyone gathered together and left to the main gate. 

View from Tippu Trop

 Everyone reached there bikes and we started toward Bangalore, we had cup of tea at the start of the hill and these is were we missed the route, myself and zeeshan were together and we missed the route and we reached chikballapur town, we asked for the correct route then and diverted towards the bypass road, by this time I was out of fuel and I stopped at the near by petrol bunk, and started slowly towards the highway, by this time zeeshan had left, to my luck there was Traffic patrol by the side of the road who were and they were charging for the excess speed, I just crossed the as I was less speed, suddenly I noticed even zeeshan was caught by the police and I had to stop, since I was native person who could talk in local language and got rid of police by paying 200bucks. Finally by around 11.30 we reached office had nice brunch and left to our home.

Ride to Skandagiri Hills

Ride to Skandagiri Hills

About Skandagiri Hills: 

Skandagiri, also known as Kalavara Durga, is an ancient mountain fortress, it is a hill with the ruins of a fort which dates back to the 18th century. The fort is in a dilapidated condition, and so is the temple situated close to it, but that takes nothing away from the trek to the top of the mountain.

Best time to visit : 

The best time to visit SKandagiri would be November to February it will be very cold during these month, avoid during rainy season as the trekking would become difficult. 

How far from Bangalore :

Skandagiri is located at about 60 km from Bangalore, and a perfect destination for one day outing.

There are two routes to Skandagiri:

From NH 7, turn towards Nandi Hills. At the base of Nandi Hills turn right and proceed to Kalawara village via Muddenahalli (birthplace of Bharath Rathna Sir M Visvesvarayya).

From Chikballapur proceed directly to Kalawara village

Directions:

Follow the Bangalore International Airport, better known as Bellary Road (NH 7). After crossing BIA take the diversion to Chikballapur. You can see the board for Chikballapur on NH 7 easily. Follow the same road for about 7–8 km until you find a Visvesvarayya statue to your Left. Note that this is a small bust and is easy to miss. There is also a small Ganesha temple right next to that left turn.

Take a left at this place and a right turn at the City Municipal Council a little further down. Later this shall directly lead to Papagni Mutt, which is the base of Hill (Source wikipedia)

How it went : 

This was my first bike ride and I was not the person who was riding the bike, it's my college buddy whom I met after a long time. 

We decided two days before that We will make to Skandagiri on Saturday night. Skandagiri is famous for its night trekking, but we heard that because of recent death at Skandagiri because of a snake bite, the trekking might have been closed. We crossed the finger and hoped for good luck. As agreed I came near Hebbal flyover to meet vijay, This guy is a very negligent person when comes to time pickup after 30min later he arrived at the point. It was almost 10.30 pm by then, the fuel gauge of his unicorn was not working, and he told we might need to fill petrol on the way. I agreed and sat behind him. Within 200m we ran out of fuel,  I started yelling at him because for his sense and we were looking for petrol bunk,  I knew that the next bunk would be almost 1km away, we pushed the vehicle to the bunk and filled up the tank it was almost 11 pm, we thought it would be quite early to go to the hill as normally everyone starts the ascend by 2 am, so we thought of going to see BIAL, we slowly paced towards devanahalli and reached airport it was a good view of airport and seeing flights taking off and landing and the loud noise of engines. 

We spent considerable amount  of time at the airport took few snaps here and there. Finally by 12 or so we left the place still it was early to leave,  but didn't had another option, so we slowly paced on the nice four Lane road and reached the highway,  we moved towards the dodbbalapur from where vijay know the route to reach Skandagiri, he got quite confused after reaching dodbalapur and for our luck there was one police guy who was having his night duty, we wanted to ask him, but he only stopped us and asked our identity, then we told we wanted to go to Skandagiri, after a bit discussing with him finally he gave us the direction. 

we reached the bottom of the hill and I guess we the first to arrive for the day at around 1.30am, there was a guy who claimed to be a person who looks after the parking, he took 20rs for vehicle parking and guided to the parking spot, and then asked us to go through the pitch dark route. 

I had no idea what Skandagiri is about, vijay had been to this place four times so he had an idea. I thought that this place would be well lighted with route direction and others. To my surprise there was not even a single Street lamp for the road. We didnt even carry any water bottle nor the torch, thanks for this idiotic buddy who is so senseless.Anyways we have come here now we have reach the top,  he told me that the route which we are going to take would be a 8k long, I was quite ok with it, it was half moon day and the was slight lighting which showed the path, we reached the starting point of the hill,  we stared ascending,  after few minutes I was totally drained, and asked him how far, he said we haven't even covered 5%,i was dizzied and sat for few minutes and stared again after taking enough breaks here and there we reached a point from were we could see the small town of chikaballapur, it was glowing with lights and looked magnificent. 

We rested for a while and as we were ascending it was getting colder, luckily I had bought the jacket along with me, the route through the hill was very much confusing and many routes would lead to dead end vijay had better knowledge about the route and I was following him, by 3am both of us were drained after climbing for almost 1.5hr, we thought we will take rest for a while and layer down on the boulder, we didn't knee when we went to sleep, but suddenly I woke up and looked at the time it was 4am we slept for almost 1hr, I worked up vijay and we started again,  from nowhere we started talking about ghost stories now, both were scared we were alone in a remote place and there is no one around even a slight breeze of wind was scary for us by then, somehow the topic changed and we were discussing about college days and we were almost reaching the top.

It was by 5.30 am in the morning we reached the top, it was very much windy and it was too cold, it could be around 7 to 8 degree Celsius, I was totally drained and wanted water, vijay had told me that one every Saturday and Sunday a guy would be at the top with his tent selling water, tea, omlet and Maggie, once reached the tent I asked for water and drank the full bottle of water later came to know that he charged more than the double of mrp, but I thought it fare enough because of the difficulty the guy would have faced to get so many load to the top,  we ordered maggi and shared it. Then after resting was 15min at the tent we moved toward the kind of Fort which was made, by this time another team of around 5 to 6 guys has also made to the top, it was the right time for us the sun has just started raising and view was beautiful but it was not the same later as the loud blocked us to see the sunrise, we were depressed and we moved towards the other sport on the top of Hill. 

Vijay the dare devil started doing some stupid stuff by sitting at the edge of Hill and asked me to take pics, i warned yelled at him and finally started taking pics, by then even I was fascinated being daredevil a d sat tha same spot and asked him to take pics, to look below it was too depth. By this time it was bitty sunny and we were able to see nandi Hill too which was located at the other end, then we went near the temple which was not taken care by any one and many people used to drink at this temple,  we couldn't do anything took few snaps and we decided to leave after a while,

while returning we saw few many people coming and there were girls too, was impressed by there courage and strength as they made to the top, we started descending and we saw many people were ascending the hill by then and few people asked us for the route, when we reached half way the clod was scattered and the view was like we were in heaven above the clouds, 

we spent considerable amount of time taking pics, and the we stated toward the bottom.Vijay was moving very fast I couldn't make to his speed, but we descended much quicker,  we reached the bottom by 7am and took the bike and started towards the home, in between we came across the town of muddenahalli, this is place where Vishweshwaraya was born we stopped there for a while took few pic of the road walls givning the information had a cup of tea at the corner stall and started to home again we were distracted by the route signs there was a route map which showed all the nearby archaeological spots we were tempted to go to Kaivara and koti lingeshwara which was around  70km from the current place we moved in that direction for 5km then we realized we are too much tired of trekking and made a U turn and headed toward Bangalore, reached home in another 1.5hrs had a good nap, woke up by evening.