Kemmangundi --> Serve Chilled FINAL PART

Here is DAY 3...

DAY 3 NOV 1

Today was going to be the last day for our road trip. We were up by around 7:00 after just 5 hours of sleep. We were all a little groggy, but still managed to get up. I was promised that since I was their guest I would be treated to Davangere's special dosa's for breakfast. This inspired me more than anything else to get ready. I was soon all washed and spruced up. We first visited all of Uday's classmates who were in the neighboring hotel. I was introduced to them. They were all enjoying their reunion, and so was I. I hardly felt left out, even though I did not know most of them before today.

Breakfast was supposed to be at a small place, which was the hangout of these guys when hey were studying here in Davangere. It was called something like "kottureshwar". I do not remember the name properly. By now I was hungry and not thinking very straight. We had to wait for a very long time for a table. After we finally got a place, we placed our orders and the waiter was taking too long to get our orders. By this time we realized that it was 10:15 and the wedding was supposed to be at 10:30. We had to leave the place even before our food arrived. I was hoping to come here before we left for Bangalore.

We then raced across the town to the church to attend the wedding. This was the first Christian wedding I was attending. At least the first one where I was paying attention. The last one my friends and me were just making noise and had got thrown out off. Anyway, that is a story for another time. The reason I was paying attention was because I was expecting to see the "now you may kiss the bride" part. Apparently they skip this part in Indian weddings. Anyway learnt a lot about Christian weddings. After the wedding there was a reunion photo session and we guys hurried back to the room, to start packing for our departure to Bangalore. We decided that our lunch would be the Dosas I had missed in the morning.

Murgesh would not be coming back to Bangalore with us. He was going to stay at Davangere as he had taken a few days off from the office. The remaining three started packing and we were awaiting Reddy to join us. We went to get lunch and as my luck would have it the place was closed. I guess I will have to visit Davangere again, to be able to eat those Dosas. We next went on to visit BIET where Uday and his friends had studied. After that was a lunch stop at a dhaba pretty close to the college. Lunch was over nostalgic memories by Uday and Reddy. They told us of all the good and bad times they had experienced during their stay at BIET. It was pretty nice listening to all their exploits and I was getting very envious of Hostel life, as I have always been a day-scholar.

Post-lunch we got onto NH4 and set off towards Bangalore. By now the time was 3:00 pm. Sine this was the last day, we were all eager to get home, and get some well-deserved rest. We had a lot of sleep to catch up on. Also, our butts had started aching by now. Our first stop was after about 70 kms. We stopped for just 5 min, especially to give our sore butts a chance to recuperate. Stretched our legs and moved on and the next stop was somewhere midway between Davangere and Bangalore. We stopped at a Dhaba, which was populated by truck drivers. The truck drivers were pretty amused by our antics. We were all stretching and none of us wanted to have a seat. After a very long break here, we moved on. The problem was that the longer you rested you would want to just keep on sitting. All of us washed our faces and helmets and got back onto our steeds.

The NH4 is a very god road for night riding. Upto now half the road was under construction and so we had to make do with a 2-lane highway. After Sira, it was a 4-lane highway, and a huge divider separated the oncoming traffic. This made sure we did not have to worry about oncoming headlights blinding you. The roads were so good, that even though darkness had set in we were doing speeds in the 80's and 90's. Also, from here started our " I just can't go on" stops. Every 20 or so km one of us would overtake everybody and stop. This was because the rider's butt would not be able to take the torture anymore. The others would curse, but would take the break. Even our butts were sore by now.

After a few such stops we reached Tumkur by 7:40 or so. Getting off the bikes we realized how famished we were. This hotel we stopped at had an unique offering- "half-masala-dosa". This was a first for me. They would give you half a masala dosa, if you thought you would not be able to put the full one away. After our break here, we started off by around 8:10, and the roads after this were just too good. We were all doing very good speeds, as we wanted to reach home as soon as possible. We hit the city and parted ways. I dropped Jaggi and was home by 9:30, before my dad reached home.

I was able to surprise dad by opening the door for him when he came home. He was expecting me to get in late at night. The good roads had ensured that I reached earlier. Had a loong hot bath and a good home-cooked dinner. After dinner it was my turn to narrate my experience. They were happy to see me return safely and we all had a nice talk late into the night. A good sleep was what I needed.

I was so tired from this trip that I took , the next day off and spent all f it sleeping. All the riding and lack of sleep was catching up. In spite of this I was still heady from the trip. This is one trip I am going to remember for a long time. I met my friends the next evening and we all spent a long time discussing my trip. I even inspired them to go on one. All those wonderful memories still fill my thoughts and I am waiting to do this again sometime soon, and hopefully, the company will be as good as this one. I must say that the company I had on this trip was really good. It helped making the whole trip even more enjoyable.

Overall I was very happy with my bike's performance. We had done 800 km in 3 days and I had got an average of 41 kmpl, which is very good considering some of the bad roads we had to traverse. I also enjoyed all those looks my bike got on those highways. However one grouse remains. Everybody's first question has still been-"what's the mileage?” This apart, all those envious looks add to the whole riding experience. So then, Cheers until next time.