The Meeting of the Bulls
Aug 19, 2003
This August 15th was a day that I badly wanted to ride. It was exactly one year since I had gone on my first long ride as a group – with my club The Madras Bulls. We had gone to Coorg last year. Unfortunately this year I was unable to get off from work and had to spend a dreary day at WORK – waiting for the day to end.
The Madras Bulls had decided to ride over to Yercaud for the weekend and I was miserable that I could not join them. Anyway I heard that the Rolling Thunder Motorcycle Club (Bullet club – Bangalore) were riding down to Yelagiri – around 220 kilometres from here and hence decided to join them – I at least would then spend some time with others who share a common passion –the Bullet!
Checked up with the guys and was a little confused on the route they were taking, and anyway decided to join up with them at a place called Gudiyatham, around 160 kilometres from Madras and 40 km from my house in Vellore. Was ideal as I could see my family for a short time and then proceed on the ride.
Sometime in the night, I got a call from Harsh – one of the Madras Bulls that they too had decided to leave Yercaud on 16th morning and reach Yelagiri, as Yercaud seemed a disappointment. Fully enthused with the idea of getting both the clubs together, I tried to get a good nights rest. Unfortunately this was not to be, I had some urgent work that came at around 3 am and managed to finish it all by 5 am. Not wanting to sleep as I would definitely over sleep, I went for a jog and then came back refreshed and left for Vellore at around 8 am.
As I was running in my bike, I did a slow ride with 2 stops along the way and was in Vellore by 11 am. My initial plan was to reach Gudiyatham by 1300 and it looked possible. Unfortunately the Bangalore guys had been delayed and so I left Vellore only at around 1200. Reached Gudiyatham and found a place to eat and gave the bike a wash after it had cooled down and also tightened my tappets a bit as they were real noisy.
After Lunch at around 1430 I decided to head out on the route the Bangalore guys were taking as Yelagiri was no where near Gudiyatham. Rode for a while and finalised the route to be taken after meeting up the guys and finally bumped into them on a small ghat section on the border of Tamil Nadu and Andhra Pradesh.
It was good to see these guys, all Thunder Birds except for Pravin who incidentally rides a 1996 - 500 as I do. Decided to head out straight to Ambur on a National Highway, as the trip would then be faster. Heard from Brijesh of the Madras Bulls that they had reached Yelagiri and were waiting for us.
On the way from Pernambet to Ambur there was a small mishap that was taken care of by the guys and we were at Ambur tanking ourselves with some chicken fried rice and chilly chicken. Let thereafter to Yelagiri and about 4 km from the hills, it started raining. All of us donned what little gear we had and headed out.
The ride up was really good and Karthick and KJ of the Bangalore group and I had a good quick ride and finally managed to find the hotel where the Madras Bulls were staying. There was no place for the others so we managed to get them accommodated in one of the other resorts there.
Had a wash and then we went over to where the Bangalore boys were staying and had a late night of fun with a campfire et al and Karthick pitching his newly purchased tent and then dismantling it up fast as it was raining!
Woke up on the 17th pretty late and eventually managed to get both the clubs to leave around 12:30. Reached Vaniyambadi – had some good biriyani and then bid adieu to the other club as it was time to head out to our homes to look forward to yet another week of fun-filled….ugh...work?
The Madrasi’s did some excellent group riding for about an hour and then stopped for a small break where a few guys tanked up on gas. I was bringing up the rear as I was running in my bike and finally took over just before Vellore as I had intimate knowledge of the roads. Took the guys on an alternate route bypassing the main Vellore - Ranipet highway as it is in a real bad condition.
It was a good 20 km of nice country roads till Wallajah where we met up with the main highway. The entire group was doing some good riding and managed to maintain nice speeds. Stopped a couple of times for breaks and finally reached Poonamalee at around 7 pm where we all went our separate ways.
All in all a rather good ride with no major breakdowns or problems.
Lessons Learnt:
1. Be prepared for the worst weather - always.
2. Go slow on the ghats and enjoy the scenery as well.
3. If in groups - have a contact at base city who will be a point of contact
in case of any problems. (Mobile phones DO NOT ALWAYS WORK!)
4. Take lots of plastic bags.
The Riders:
Madras Bulls
Bips (RE 500), Nish (T-Bird), Ranga (T-Bird), Bijesh (Campus), Harsh (STD 350), Varun (STD 350), Brijesh (A350), Dodo (RE 500)
RTMC (Rolling Thunder Motorcycle Club)
Rocky and Pallavi (T-Bird), Bumboo a.k.a. Karthikeyan (T-Bird), Praveen (RE 500), Sathish (T-Bird), Keerti a.k.a. KJ (T-Bird).
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