Bus Shadow regions

Bus shadow regions: describes arterial roads that are not served by public transport

e.g. HAL airport to Old Madras Road in Bangalore.

I coined this word out of sheer frustration. I live on the HAL Airport road which is fairly well serviced by BMTC. My office is on the way to Old Madras road. Everyday there are a large number of folks who travel from the airport road to Old Madras road via Suranjan Das Road. However BMTC does not serve this route. Share autos make a killing and office goers crowd the street with their cars usually with single occupancy. God I hope BMTC adds buses on this route.

I am sometimes frustrated by Bangalore's public transport system. The whole system seems to be based on buses plying long routes with interconnects few and far between. As long you are travelling on one of these routes, you can find a bus in 15-20 mins. However if you need to travel two routes to get to your destination, you are in for trouble. The interconnects are more distant than the destination or you need to walk a fair distance get from a stop on one route to another.

Sometimes I dream for a hubs and spokes public transport system in Bangalore. Minibuses could run to/from any area to the nearest hub and the large buses could ferry folks between hubs. Add a multi-storey parking or a cycle rental at each hub and BMTC could have a significant revenue stream. I can keep on dreaming I guess.

TFNTen: The summary post

In December 2010, I rode on the Tour of the Nilgiris along with 100 other cyclists. It was an amazing experience and a completely different way to experience nature. Below is a journal of my experiences during the tour.

• TFNTen Day 1: The longest ride yet
• TFNTen Day 2: A ride in three parts
• TFN day 3: Bandipur to Ooty
• TFNTen Day 4: Nature Walk in Ooty
• TFNTen Day 5: The two puncture day
• TFNTen Day 6: Short ride in Kerala
• TFNTen Day 7: Day of the scary downhill
• TFNTen Day 8: The last day of the tour

I should thank my colleague Pramod for all the encouragement and effort he spent in getting me to the starting line of the tour. Without his support, I would have dropped out and completely missed on this great experience.

TFNTen Day 7: Day of the scary downhill

Read the rest of the posts on TFN here

Day 7 was definitely the scariest day of the tour for me. The route of the day was supposed to be a simple one with a descent at the beginning and a climb at the end and rolling terrain in between. This was a long ~120 km ride. The ride till SS1 was good. There was shade all through. The route was heavily populated unlike the routes on the other days. This presented an interesting problem for cyclists who hydrate frequently on the ride.:-)

SS1 for the day set in the middle of beautiful tea gardens. I was looking forward to the downhill section after SS1 and hoping that it would compensate for the time on climb at the end of the day.

From TFN_day_7

In the pre-ride briefing, we were told that the downhill section had loose gravel on it. I was mentally prepared to go slow but I was not skilled enough for the section. I was gathering more speed even with my brakes working hard. Deepak and Navin were waving madly at me to get off the bike. They were signalling me even before I had entered the section. I did figure out the urgency in their gestures until later. My wheels started skidding on the gravel as I was frantically slamming the brakes(Completely wrong technique). I was prepared for a fall but somehow I got of my saddle, managed to get both my feet down and stop the bike. I had one bruise where the pedal hit my ankle but otherwise I was sound. The location was amazing to look at. The valley was green and I could hear the sounds of a waterfall close by but the drop from the road to the valley was terrifying. On the other side of the road there was a gutter and the rocky face of the hill. Not quite comforting to fall on that side either.The road itself was too steep for my skill. I decided to walk for a little while before attempting to ride again.

From TFN_day_7

From TFN_day_7

From TFN_day_7

I made another attempt to ride a little further down. This time I narrowly averted crashing into the lady riding in front of me and fell into the gutter instead. I totally dismissed the thought of riding further down this stretch and started walking my bike. A little while later, I met a group of fellow riders at a chai stop and celebrated survival with a cup of lemon tea.

From TFN_day_7

After the break, Namit, Prithish and me decided to walk down the stretch before riding again. The stretch I had though of as a time saver in the morning actually ate up a lot of time. Once we got down from the ghat section, the terrain was only rolling gently. By the time we reached SS2, we figured we had a good chance of completing the days ride. From there on till SS3, it was a grind in the sun. We tried to maintain a decent pace to give us a good chance of finishing the days ride. A short distance after SS3, we entered Karnataka through a national park. This also marked the beginning of the last major climb of the tour. As we kept going, we found another group of riders fixing a flat. We joined up and rode through the park together as it was getting dark. The climb was tough. Coming at the end of a long ride, it felt harder than the Ooty climb. Howevr being a large group helped. The guy from Pegala kept us going and all of the group finished the climb and reached SS4. Prithish and I made one last push to try and beat the clock and avoid getting swept at SS4(My top speed at this point was 9 kmph). We did make it to SS4 before the group but the light was already fading and the organizers stopped the ride there. SS4 was again set in a beautiful location with a lake for the background. I got a few photographs of the riders and the organizers at the lake. We took a ride to the hotel in one of SUV's and called it a day.

From TFN_day_7

From TFN_day_7

TFNTen Day 6: Short ride in Kerala

Read the rest of the posts on TFN here

Day 6 was short 70 km ride around Kalpetta. The original longer route was cut short due to ongoing road repair works. The ride was uneventful. The terrain was mostly flat and occasionally rolling. The Sun came out only near the end of the ride. There were a couple of good memories from the days ride.

One was the best cup of tea I had on the tour. Pramod and I rode together for sometime on this day and stopped for tea at a roadside shack. This was the best tea of all the eight days on the tour. I passed by the same shop on the ride the next day. I realized that when I was too far down the road or I would have definitely stopped there once again.

From TFN_day_6

The other was that the buses of Kerala are to be respected. After the first one passed me, I started getting off the narrow roads or riding in the shoulder everytime I heard a bus approaching.

The best part was that the area surrouding Kalpetta reminded me of my fathers hometown. Coconut trees and paddy fields everywhere. The only thing different was that the terrain here was rolling.

From TFN_day_6

From TFN_day_6

All in all, an easy and refreshing ride midway through the TFN.

TFNTen Day 4: Nature Walk in Ooty

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Day 3 of the tour ended at the YMCA in Ooty. I was already feeling quite happy having finished the ride. The YMCA folks organized a bonfire and carols on the first night of our stay there. The atmosphere and Christmas decorations reminded me of christmas during school days. The YMCA folks followed the carols up with an excellent dinner. Though the rooms were not insulated, our hosts had setup four layers of quilts on the bed. It was good for once to go to sleep without the next days ride on my mind.

Due to the routine on the last three days, I woke up quite early on day 4. Vamsi who sharing the room with had already gone around Ooty once in the morning. We had some time to kill. So we set out again without agenda. We made a full circle around the Ooty Race course and visited the railway station. I was quite excited to visit the location of the train scene in Gitanjali. I got some beautiful photographs on the walk and one photograph of the race course is probably one of my best.

After the breakfast, we set on a nature walk organized by one of our fellow riders Prem. Prem was a Ooty local boy and generated quite a buzz on the TFN mailing list with his tidbits about Ooty. A twenty something group had formed for the nature walk. We rented a couple of mini trucks for transportation and set out for the starting point. The weather was amazing, clear blue skies and a comfortable temperature. Great day for photography as I realized later.

We started walking through the woods towards Dodabetta. We spotted some birds indigenous to Nilgiris and a lemur. Prem's excitement and passion for the Nilgiri's was quite obvious from the way he was showing us stuff. It reminded me of my other friend Sharath who is equally passionate about Bangalore. I also got to meet some of the other riders who I see only at the starting point and the finish line.One of them was Jaggi who was talking of hash run's that they organized along the trail we were walking. One more thing added to my general knowledge. By the time we finished the trail, it was later than we planned for. We decided to return to Ooty instead of going to Dodabetta. We hired a couple of Jeeps and landed up at the Ooty main road.

After the usual shopping for chocolates,tea and eucalyptus oil, Prem and I headed to Higginbothams. I was looking for a map of Ooty which I found but not detailed enough. I set out for the St. Stephens church on walk taking in the sights of the non-tourist portions of Ooty. The church was unfortunately closed. So I started back to YMCA using the map I bought. I had been to Ooty a couple times before but this was the first time I was walking freely through the city. Ooty was very much like any Indian town except for being in a beautiful hilly area. I returned to YMCA, cleaned my bicycle and started preparing for the next days ride.

TFN day 3: Bandipur to Ooty

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Day 3 was the ride I dreaded. A 40 km climb to Ooty. I was not quite sure I could finish the day. The road out of the hotel was a small climb on a mud road. I was already on my lowest gear, struggling up the climb. Some how, I decided to go ahead. May be it was the chance to ride through Bandipur or most likely I did not like being thrown around the sweeper truck all day. In a little while, a group of late starters passed me and asked me to ride along. A little saddle height adjustment with their help and I was riding along feeling better.

From From Right, Raghavendra, me, Vinay and ?. This was right at the start of the ride into Bandipur. There were deer grazing on the other side of the rode unconcerned about the vehicles passing on the road

. The ride through Bandipur was uneventful. The road was good but it was rolling through out. I felt as if I will be worn out before the start of the Ooty climb. I stopped at the first tea stall I could find. This was at Theppekadu from where there were two routes to Ooty. TFN was taking the longer but less steeper road via Gudalur to Ooty. I was glad. The other road via Masinagudi has a lot of hairpin bends and is hard to climb. From Theppekadu, it was a monotonous ride till Gudalur where I first saw what we were attempting. It was daunting but the ride mood had kicked in and I kept going.

From TFN_day_3	From TFN_day_3

From this point on, the scenery was amazing. As we rode up the hills, every turn would bring a new vista. I had good company as I rode. Initially there were Priya and Anand who had this talent to find anything interesting on the way, be it a beautiful view or a bird up in the trees. Later there were Sameer, Supreet and Mayank who were completely enjoying whatever the road had to offer. We stopped at road side shack for lunch of omlettes and chapati's. It felt like I was back in college.

From TFN_day_3	From TFN_day_3

Unlike the earlier two days where I had some intention to complete the ride, I was just riding along and enjoying the scenery on day 3. In addition to the normal water stops, I stopped at whichever road side shop I fancied. At places it was so beautiful that I had to stop. The lake at Pykara was one such place. As I covered the distance, I started believing that I could finish the climb to Ooty. Sameer who was riding with us had done the recce of the route earlier in the month. His information that we had finished most of the climbs by the time we reached Pykara was very motivating. I doped myself with coca-cola and dry fruits and set along to finish the ride. On the way, there was a false alarm where I took one of the villages for Ooty itself. In the end, I reached Ooty around 6.30 PM in the evening. Lots of riders had reached a lot earlier. I was justglad that I finished the climb. Now I could just enjoy the day off and prepare for the rest of the tour.

From TFN_day_3 Supreet, Sameer and Prem at "Chinese" hill	From TFN_day_3 False alarm for Ooty

TFNTen Day 2: A ride in three parts

Read the rest of the posts on TFN here

Day 2 started off well. Though there was some uncertainty over the route for the day, it was settled overnight. The route was now shorter than the initial route and I was happy. The weather was cool and the fields beside the road reminded me of my hometown. Yogesh found a jaggery workshop on the way. We all stopped there and snacked on fresh sugarcane juice and jaggery. SS1 arrived quickly. There were tender coconuts at SS1 alongside the usual snacks. Sun was coming out and I put on some sun screen (a first for me) and started off from SS1.

The roads were good for sometime after SS1. The roads were treelined. There was a beautiful lake we passed.Sadly after this stretch, we had to take a diversion from the highway and the roads were bad from this point. The Sun was out in full force. All I had in my mind was that I wanted to complete the days course. I kept pushing forward not even stopping for photographs. Not too much enjoyment in this strecth.

SS2 came up in its own time. As always, the location was quite good. SS2 was pitched beside a pond under shade. We waited for a little for lunch to arrive from SS3. In the meanwhile, I tasted a weird combination. Peanut butter with Good day biscuits. Different but tasty. Lunch arrived shortly and I set out after refueling.

The roads were quite bad. There was one stretch of gravel that was made me nervous but my cycle got me through it without any issues. All this while, the wisecracks on the road from the marking team provided some relief. These were getting funnier as we went further. I eventually arrived at SS3 quite spent. I was ready to chill out and wait for the sweeper truck. One of the volunteers was so surprised when I asked for peanut butter and biscuits that she took a picture. I guess it was not the flavour of day at SS3.

While I had resigned myself to being swept from SS3, Dr. Kumaraswamy arrived. He spent a little while at the SS and started off. I was feeling a bit energetic by this point and tagged along with him. Kumaraswamy was one of the charity riders. He had chanced upon TFN a month or so back and wanted to ride. Since all the rider positions were taken, we opted for being a charity rider and collected donations for one of the charities being supported by RACF. The kids from this charity were waiting to meet him in a village further down the road. I felt great to be riding with this guy.

Unfortunately Dr. Kumaraswamy had a accident a little distance ahead. He was riding ahead of me and hit a speed breaker at the end of a incline. We called the TFN support staff and one of the support trucks reached us quickly. We helped Kumaraswamy into the cabin of the truck and it was on its way to meet the ambulance coming from SS4. Thankfully the injuries were not very serious. They required a couple of stitches in the mouth and Dr. Kumaraswamy was put on a liquid diet for a few days. I was quite surprised to see him riding with us on the all the other days of the tour. Being at the same pace, we rode together quite a lot on the rest of the days. The Dr. was quite a motivation for me on the tour and one of my strongest memories from the tour.

By this time, I had no intention of finishing the day. I was just enjoying the ride and looking at the scenery. One of the guys from the truck rode along with me on Kumaraswamy's bicycle. We just chatted along until the sweeper truck caught up with us and we happily climbed into the truck. As we moved towards Bandipur, I slowly realized how much further I had to ride.

We stayed for the night at Country Club, Bandipur. Their welcome banner called us "Raiders of Tour of Nilgiris". Someone was aware of how hungry the riders are at the end of a day's rider. After dinner, I had a chat with Vishu and Yogesh who were sharing the same cottage. One of the things that I did after looking at all the fun stuff they did on the ride was to stop thinking of completing the ride as the goal for the day. I decided to enjoy the local stuff and indulge in photography and have the maximum fun. I crashed to sleep thinking of the Ooty climb the next day.

TFNTen Day 8: The last day of the tour

Read the rest of the posts on TFN here

I was actually happy that the tour was coming to a close. I woke up early and went for a short walk on the Gonikoppal main road. I was quite suprised to see the utter flop telugu movie Saleem playing there. They must be quite short on movies in Gonikoppal.

The ride started unhurriedly. The distance to be covered was around 80km, short compared to the previous days ride. Before we started, we took photographs of the riders and the organizers together. As we moved away from Gonikoppal, the roads became poorer. I guess the roads are not so well maintained in the national park.

We stopped at a school on the way to take photos of kids. The kids were so excited at seeing us we felt like rock stars. This was definitely the high point of the day.

We hit the only support station for the day around the halfway mark. A little while later, we reached the highway to Mysore. After the rides on the last few days, the route felt positively ugly from this point on. The only motivation from here was finishing the ride and the lunch waiting at the end of it. After a couple of coconut stops, I finished the ride and packed my bicycle for transport to bangalore.

I had a lazy lunch and boarded the bus back to Bangalore. The traffic as we entered Bangalore was in stark contrast to the free roads we had for most of the tour. Me and Prithish managed to hire a omni to transport us and our cycles back home from the dropping point. That concluded the most physical activity I had done in my life so far. A completely different experience, where I switched off from my work for the first time. I plan to go again next time, this better prepared both for the ride and for capturing the scenery along the way.

TFNTen Day 5: The two puncture day

Read the rest of the posts on TFN here

Till this day, I was looking at the TFN as a cycling trip to Ooty and back. I had not looked beyond Ooty on the tour. In my mind, getting to Ooty was the hardest part. Everything else was afterwards was a piece of cake. On this day I found out how wrong I was.

When we woke up, there was a light drizzle. By the time we finished our breakfast, there was a steady rain. The start was delayed by 30 mins waiting for the rain to subside. We were going back from Ooty the same way we made the climb. I was looking forward to the payback. All the gruelling uphills we faced on day 3 would now be a downhill. There were a couple of uphill sections but now I was sure that I can grind through them.

When the ride started, we were forced to ride in groups due to the Ooty traffic. Once we were clear of the town, the groups broke apart based on the pace of the riders. I had reverted to my own photographer self. Frankly, I had gone a little mad at this point. There were a few places where I actually circled back and took photos. One of these stops was the so called "Shooting Point". Amazing scenery. I was glad that I decided to stop at that place. Naturally by the time I did all this, I was the last of the riders.

Once I started from "Shooting Point", I was looking forward to the Pykara lake. The lake is at a nice trough in the road and is very scenic. The road to the lake also had a heavily banked turn I was looking to take a good speed. Sadly I realized that I had a puncture in the back tire of my cycle. I walked my cycle to Pykara but could not find any puncture shops. Apparently the closest one was in Naduvattam further down the road. Luckily for me, Dr. Kumaraswamy came by. One of his friends had come down to meet him in Pykara. With their help, I got the punctured tube out somehow and put in a new tube. But I could not get the tyre back on properly. Thankfully the doctor's friend offered to give me a lift to Naduvattam in his car. On the way, we found Jas and the TFN mechanic who were checking the riders brakes before the real downhill starts. The mechanic quickly got my tire back in place and I was ready to go.

The rest of way to Gudalur was a nice downhill. I made a brief stop at SS1 where was I once again part of the rear. From Gudalur, the roads took us through tea gardens. The roads settled into a familiar pattern. A winding climb to the top of a hill. A small section inclined down and then another winding climb. The sun had come out by this time, increasing the effort required. Apart from the good scenery around, the fun on this stretch can from the musical chairs we stragglers(Me, Dr. Kumaraswamy and Shilpa) were playing. All of us were riding at the same average pace. Each would stop for a photograph at a different place and end up being the tail for sometime. This kept happening all the way till SS2.

We had a quick lunch at SS2 and I started off determined to make SS3 atleast before being swept. Accidentally I left one of my water bottles at the SS reducing the weight on my bicycle. This and the lunch gave me a boost. There was a gyan session from Rakesh Nair the previous night where he was talking about pushing oneself on the uphills and enjoying the downhills. I decided to apply his words and I had a lot of fun. I started pedalling harder on the uphills as opposed to going to the lowest gear and plodding upwards. The terrain was also helpful. The downhills were longer than the climbs and the sun had started to set. I made to SS3 earlier than I expected. Now I was dreaming of making SS4 before being swept.

I left SS3 quickly and started pushing myself. The roads on occasion were potholed. I passed a couple of roadies fixing a puncture. I was quite happy that my cycle was holding up well. I was making quite a decent pace when I realized that my front tyre had a puncture. It was getting dark and I decided to wait for the sweeper truck instead of fixing the puncture. When it did arrive, I had a whole truck to myself. Another benefit of bringing up the rear.

By the time we reached the hotel, it was dark. This time though the rooms were great. After a quick shower and dinner, I got around to changing the tube on my front tire. All in all, a good days ride.

Saints by association

I visited a temple on a recent auspicious day and I realized a couple of things. I know only one Sloka(Suklambaradharam) by heart and everytime I recite it I hear it in Ghantasala's voice in my head. Similar is the case with Venkateswara Suprabhatam. The hymn sounds odd in voice other than M. S. Subbalakshmi. Anytime I hear one of these two prayers, the name of the singer pops into my head. I assume there would be many other south indians who associate these two songs with the God and the singer simultaneously. Does that make the two singers Saints like Annamayya in their own right?

Looking back at the world cup final

It is just over month now since India won the cricket world cup. On the day of the victory, I was euphoric. Strangely one month later, the victory does not evoke strong memories in me. I cant figure out why?

The final was good one. Srilanka rebuilt after slow start and set India a hard to get target. Zaheer's first spell was instrumental in keeping the target down. At the halfway mark, I was thinking that India will be deserving winners if they chase this total. India did chase it down after a couple of initial hiccups. Dhoni, Gambhir and Kohli played good innings under the pressure of a world cup final. The Indian victory without Sachin or Sehwag contributing significantly was sort of the younger generation picking up the baton. Then why am I not giving it its due?

May be it's the lack of drama in the chase. May be its the workman like approach with which Dhoni and Gambhir ground the opposition down. May be its the reduced effectiveness of the Srilankan bowling attack. May be its the unhurriedness that Dhoni projected even in the final.

Whatever I may feel, there is no denying that it is a great result. There was planning behind it. There was self belief in the team. There was team work not just individual brilliance. Gary Kirsten completed what Saruav Ganguly started. He built a champion Indian Team. Hopefully the team will improve on that in the next years.