TFNTen Day 2: A ride in three parts

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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.