Pune to Puri - Bike Trip: Day 9

Solapur to Pune

We left Solapur after breakfast and then stopped for a quick cuppa-tea at a Hotel Sairaj. Short-stop later we took one last stop at Bhigwan at "Jyoti Misal" :) before finally heading off for home. We reached Pune by 15:00 hrs.

Eight-and-a-half days and 3,700 (three thousand seven hundred) kilometers later I guess we were ready to go off to sleep and leave the unpacking for the next day!!!

Cheers and Goodbye,
Till the next trip,
Amod and Shantanu

Pune to Puri - Bike Trip: Day 8

Hyderabad to Solapur

As we had decided to slow down our pace, we planned to stop at Solapur before heading to Pune the day after. The trip to Solapur was was also quite uneventful, only thing to mention is that the road has the top-layer chipped off but very easy to pull "zig-zags" on, or you can stick to the extreme left on the road, which is by far the least eroded!!! :)

We also took a halt to snap some pictures of the Naldurg en route to Solapur. The first place we were actually stopped and asked for papers was when we were leaving the Andhra Pradesh border and entering Karnataka (Bidar district). Having all the papers in order helped!!!

The second time we were asked for papers was as we were heading to Amod's uncle's house. The policemen seemed quite energetic to cross rushing traffic to single us out of all the traffic. When asked as to why they had asked us for papers (you know usual chit-chat while enjoying the chagrin on the cops faces), the reason ... get this ... was that we were wearing a helmet and had all the biking gear!!! ROTFL!!!

* In hindsight, the jacket-and-helmet getup might have seen dubious, Solapur being one of the flash-point areas! :(

P.S.
The pictures of the trip have been uploaded at:
http://picasaweb.google.com/shantanu.gadgil/Pune2Puri

Pune to Puri - Bike Trip: Day 7

Vijayawada to Hyderabad

Nothing much happened during our trip from Vijayawada to Hyderabad. The trip to Hyderabad just as horrifying as before ... both of ready to pull our hair out with the oncoming traffic! Aaaargh!!!

We managed to make the outskirts of Hyderabad (Ramoji Film City) by 15:00 hours. Reaching the place where we were going to stay in Secundarabad was a different story altogether. The traffic is something that we can write stories about!!! (Tee hee hee) Being used to "crazy two wheelers" it took about 25 minutes to adjust to the traffic.

The pictures of the trip have been uploaded at:
http://picasaweb.google.com/shantanu.gadgil/Pune2Puri

Pune to Puri - Bike Trip: Day 6

Vishakapatnam to Vijayawada

As we are getting ready to leave, we ask the desk clerk for directions to get back to the NH5 and this is where the reason for the cattle using both sides of the road was answered. He gave us directions to get back to the “double road” ... yes thats what he called it, a “double road” !!!
"Mystery solved", I thought !!!

I cannot stress this enough ... the NH5 is the "bestest" stretch of road we got but please WATCH OUT for the FOUR-LEGGED and the TWO-LEGGED cattle on the road. Even more dangerous is the MECHANISED CATTLE (read TRUCKS) heading down the fast lane!!!

By evening we had reached Vijayawada, taking our return journey at a much slower pace than what we had done before. At Vijayawada, just like Vishakapatnam, we stayed at the APTDC hotels. Two thumbs-up from us for the excellent way the APTDC hotels are maintained. At Vijayawada we even got a complimentary breakfast of "all we want to eat" :) Yay!!!

The pictures of the trip have been uploaded at:
http://picasaweb.google.com/shantanu.gadgil/Pune2Puri

Pune to Puri - Bike Trip: Day 5

We tried to get the sunrise at the Konark beach, but we were out of luck. No sunrise ... just clouds! :( “Not too keen to show us His face”, we guessed and we headed off to the Sun temple.

[rant]
The date with the Sun at his temple was something we had to keep no-matter-what as he had been so gracious with the weather and minimal rain during the past three days!!!
Usually Most of the time, people try to strike deals with their gods; “You do so-and-so for me and then I will do that-and-that”.
The good weather for the past four days had obliged us to keep our date with the Sun god!
[/rant]

Sun temple visit done, we headed for Vishakapatnam ... back to Pipli market and off onto the NH5 to Khordha via Jatani. We stopped at the A1 Plaza at Khordha for grub. Only later did we realize that we should have had a much heavier breakfast at Khordha as we couldn't find any good places till Vishakapatnam, but all that is "hindsight 20/20" :)

The NH5 was by far the best road that we had got. We realized that we had left Orissa and entered Andhra Pradesh only when we noticed the rickshaw and taxi numbers were "AP" instead of "OR".

The dream of the excellent highway was short-lived though, because as we entered Andhra Pradesh, we got oncoming traffic. YES !!! Oncoming traffic on a “four-lane highway with divider”. Figure that one out!!!

The "cattle on the road" was bad enough in Orissa, but this was something else ... oncoming bicycles, two wheelers and even trucks heading down the wrong side and in the FAST LANE! ACK!!!

We got to see the beautiful "Lake Chilka", but only from far, didn't go up to the lake. Even the small part of the lake that we did manage to see was so beautiful that I am definitely thinking of going to the lake again ... ONLY to the lake, that is! :)

Three near-deaths experiences later; one two wheeler zapping across the highway from left to the other side without any signal, one two-wheeler crossing into our side and heading straight for us down the FAST LANE and one near hit with an overtaking four wheeler, we managed to reach Vishakapatnam!!!

In Vishakapatnam, the entire beach road is quite a beautiful sight, in case you are interested in "being a tourist" :) :)

The pictures of the trip have been uploaded at:
http://picasaweb.google.com/shantanu.gadgil/Pune2Puri

Pune to Puri - Bike Trip: Day 4

Monday the 10th was not starting too well ... "Orissa bandh" was being issued by some party! Wasted a good five hours of our time ... we were cooling off our heels till about 13:00 hours. At least we got to have an amazingly tasty lunch waiting for the road to clear.

Post lunch we were off to Konark and Puri. The NH5 is excellent and no complaints whatsoever. We took the Puri diversion from the highway heading off to Pipli. The road to Konark turns left from inside Pipli market. This turn (as they usually are!) is also quite “miss-able”. The road to Konark is all two lane and quite narrow inside the small villages, so maintaining high peed was not possible.

We halted at Konark to keep our bags in the hotel room, to head off to see the Sun temple and then Puri. That day being "Orissa bandh" meant that the Konark temple was
closed for the day.

The drive to Puri was very memorable ... 40 kms of amazing road ... no lights on the road expect the headlights of our bikes ... hearing the waves crashing on our left and hoping that we don't bang into the cattle that might be sitting in the middle of the road.. :)

The road right up to Puri village is like this, but once you enter Puri village, you know you have reached a typical "devasthan".

The ride back to Konark was not as scary knowing we had made it to our destination in four days and everything had been good so far!

The pictures of the trip have been uploaded at:
http://picasaweb.google.com/shantanu.gadgil/Pune2Puri

Pune to Puri - Bike Trip: Day 3

The next day we had to catch Cuttack; not too far, so we had time to visit the Hirakud dam. An awesome sight, the dam! The slues gates and the gurgling water was an awesome (yes, again) sight!

The Hirakud dam is about 15 kms away from Sambalpur, the road is pretty easy to find from the main road! The booking office for the dam is about one-and-a-half before the dam. Its near a Shiv-temple, quite miss-able. As you approach the dam, you can ask the rickshaw drivers or the tourist drivers for directions.

There is "No Photography" at the dam so we too, did NOT ;) :D take any photographs near the dam!

Note: In Sambalpur we managed to get a Bajaj Service center open on Sunday, which was a very good ting for us, as Amod's bike had a nut missing in the fork (or something ... don't remember the details)

The road to Cuttack was very scenic and we were also taking it easy as we had only about 320 kms to travel. The road story was pretty much same till Cuttack; bad roads near villages, excellent otherwise.

The villages along this road are much farther apart from each other than what we had seen so far. The in-between roads are also quite desolate. We were able to make it to the outskirts of
Cuttack by 16:00 hours.

The roads outside Cuttack are very bad. Entering Cuttack we saw the Mahanadi the second time, one bridge across the river as one-and-a-half kilometers wide ... Whew!!!

The pictures of the trip have been uploaded at:
http://picasaweb.google.com/shantanu.gadgil/Pune2Puri