Holi hai!!!!

It’s been a while (more than a year)since I updated this blog. Not that I did not do any rides or did not take any pictures but it was sheer laziness that stopped me from updating my motography blog. I kept updating pictures on my facebook regularly but I was not moving my ass to type the travelogue for those pictures. Since my last post I sold my Honda vtx 1300 cc and bought a Triumph Sprint ST 1050cc. I already did couple of real long rides on them but the post that I am going to write is not a recent one. It happened in 2006 on the Holi day.

We had a holiday on the holi day. It was in the middle of the week so I decided to stay back in pune instead of running to Mumbai like every Friday. Wifey had been to USA on an assignment about a month back. I decided to sleep till afternoon but my colleagues had a different plan on their mind. One of them had bought a new bike about a month back. He was done with his running-in period and wanted to take his bike somewhere. He convinced couple of others too and finally everyone except me wanted to go somewhere. Being a lead of the team I did not want to break the enthu of the team (oh yes, that is one of the rare project where the lead was welcomed in extracurricular activities ;), so I decided to join too.

I suggested them to ride till Mangaon via Mulshi Tamhini and come back. We decided to meet at Chandni chowk in the morning. As usual I was the first person to reach there, but to my surprise everyone gathered within next 10-15 mins. Couple of them came without the helmet. I sent them back to get the helmet. Meanwhile we decided to have the breakfast and play chutkibhar sindoor holi there. After about an hour both of them came back with their helmets and we started our ride.

The ride while going towards tamhini was very good. We passed through the small yet beautiful towns of pirangut and Mulshi. Stopped at a few places to click pictures near the Mulshi lake.
When we reached tamhini ghat, everyone wanted to get their photos clicked in front of the awesome scenery of the ghat. They kept on passing one by one through different sections of the ghat and kept clicking the pictures.

I was feeling hungry so I wanted to go back and have something. We decided to drop Mangaon and head back home from Tamhini itself. Rest of the team was happy clicking pictures so we decided to break into two groups and meet at the restaurant in Paud. So four of us decided to go and reserve the table. Three of them were still not satisfied with the pictures and they decided to join us within 15 mins.
So we came to Paud. The restaurant (forgot the name) was full of colorful people. As the restaurant was full, we decided to wait for the remaining three. We waited for almost an hour but they didn’t come. Unfortunately the cell phone network was not good during those days so we couldn’t contact them. I started fearing for the worst. We had signals in Paud so I asked couple of them to wait there and find out the contact #s for local police and ambulance. I headed back with one of the colleague. I saw a big group gathered near a village between Mulshi and Paud. I was praying that my worst fear should not come true. I stopped and immediately went there. There was one bike standing in broken condition. The headlights were broken and there were some scratches on the bike. I recognized the bike. It was from our group and people were beating the rider. I immediately went there and tried stopping these people from beating him. I think I was the only person that time who knew the local language. Somehow I managed to calm them down.


Apparently they kept clicking pics for a long time. He was riding carefully through the village and kids were throwing the water balloons on him. To avoid getting hit from them he sped up and suddenly one little girl came in front of him. He managed to brake but he still hit her and she fell down. It was just a gentle push and the girl was fine without any scratch. However people saw this happening and gathered around him. They broke his bike and started beating him. That’s when I reached there. Luckily I reached there on time.

I started talking to the mob. Somehow I managed to calm them down. Now they were talking. I was shit scared. Now these people wanted money to treat her. Following was the rough conversation that I had.

One of the villagers (V): We need to take her to the doctor. Give us Rs. 5000 for that.

Me: but she looks fine. She doesn’t even have any scratches.

V: She got hit internally. She is feeling dizzy since the impact.
She looked scared but not dizzy in any way.

Me: In that case lets take her to the doctor together. I will bear all the expenses even if they are over Rs.5000.

V: Why do you want to waste your time on this? Give us the money and go. We will take care of it.

I wasn’t simply ready to give the money. For the matter of the fact that we did not have 5000 on us that time.

Me: No, that’s fine. I will come with you.

V: Today is holi. No clinic will be opened. Give us the money and we will take her to the doctor tomorrow.

Me: I don’t have that much of money. Let’s take her to some hospital in Pune that case. There I can pay by the card.

Now they started getting irritated.
V: Give the money and go otherwise we will break all the bikes.

Me: Look whatever has happened has happened. If you want to go to the doctor, I will come with you and pay for the entire treatment. You won’t get anything by breaking our bikes and beating us. If that happens then you won’t be able to treat her. Bla bla bla…

V: Then let’s call police.

Me: Fine. Let’s call police. If police comes, then they will take money from you and me too and still you wont get anything.

V: Give us whatever you have with you and go. Otherwise we will break your bikes.

We all got together. Since the girl was not injured and didn’t really need a treatment, there was no point in calling the police. We would have spent even more there. Also there was no point in getting our bikes broken. One was already broken. We decided to give them money. We gave them some Rs250 and left from there. Luckily there was no damage to the engine of the broken bike. It started and ran without any issue till home.

By the time we reached home it was 4 pm and I was very hungry. I ate lunner (lunch+dinner) together and slept at 5pm. I got up only on the next day to go to office.
Lessons learnt
1. Never ride on a holi day
2. Never argue with the locals
3. Never break the riding group unless it is absolutely necessary.

Bragging about the Fort Bragg ride!!!

My darling motorcycle was angry with me and refused to start. Joy and I explored all possible blogs/forum about Honda VTX 1300 to go to the root cause. Tried all possible solutions like jump start, changing the spark plugs, push start etc etc but no luck. Finally Joy found that the vacuum line from the petcock had fallen off. We put it back and voila, it started again :) I think she was angry because I did not take her for ride during the week, so I decided to take her for a long ride on the weekend.

Joy/Priti and Piyush decided upon a place called, fort bragg around 200 miles from the bay area. We met at Joy's place on Saturday morning. Joy's friends Vaibhav/Pooja made awesome omlette and coffee for the breakfast. Unlike my earlier rides, this ride did not start at 6am so I was quite happy :) Finally we left home around 10:30 am. Vaibhav Pooja and their cute daughter Simi joined us in their car. Joy/Priti were on their honda Goldwing (1800cc), Piyush was on his honda VFR(800cc) and I was on my honda VTX 1300S (1300cc). It was a happy honda family :)

Ride on 101 was quite boring. Actually freeway rides are boring as there is nothing else to do than steering the handlebar. High speeds on freeway used to provide some thrill initially but not anymore. Now I was riding at 90 mph and not feeling anything. Because of the high speed riding, my spark plug compartment cover fell off and by the time I could ask the other riders to stop, we had already covered half a mile. Decided to ride like that.

Soon we ended our journey on 101. Had to take a lots of breaks due to the small capacity of my fuel tank :( I can go only about 150 miles on a full tank :( I was filling after every 70-80 miles as I wasnt sure if I ll find the gas station in ghat sections. We finished lunch and started our journey on twisties of hwy 128. Piyush decided to zoom past us and soon disappeared. We gathered at a point for a photoshoot. Here is the group shot taken. The earlier shot was taken at the same place.

After riding for about 240 miles we reached to the motel in fort bragg and checked in. The place did not appear great to me. Moreover Joy/Priti were not sure if she wanted to stay there, but finally we decided to check in there. The guy put a cross on $65/night and made it $45/night when Priti told him that the guy told $45 on phone when she had called previously:) Well even though there was nothing exciting in that motel, I still managed to find something interesting :) Here is the shot of the side stand of a harley davidson :)

We did go to the glass beach in the evening, but the only glass portion that we could find on the beach was in the form of a beer bottle. After a quick photoshoot we came back for dinner and crashed in our rooms. The rooms were quite comfortable but I still couldnt sleep, thanks to Joy's snoring machine :)

Next morning we decided to take a different route back home, but first it was time for some heavy breakfast. We hogged like anything and started back home. The new route was full of twisties. We rode for about 15-20 miles in the shade of tall pine trees. We stopped at a nice place for photoshoot. I checked for my tankbag to takeout the camera but it wasnt there. I had left it at the restaurant. :( Rather than going back on my bike I decided to go on twisty master Piyush's bike. Luckily I found back my camera in the restaurant but we wasted about 40 mins in the process of finding it :(

On our way back Vaibhav/Pooja decided to take the direct route home but we bikers decided to take different route to ride more :) On our way back we stopped at clear lake state park. After clear lake we swapped our bikes for next 60 miles till Napa. I was on 1800cc, Piyush was on 1300 cc and Joy was on 800 cc. We had fun riding each other's bike.

Ride after Napa was quite uneventful. There is nothing boring like riding motorcycle on freeway. Reached home about 8:30 pm.

I am yet to process the photos and dont know when I ll be able to do that as my laptop with photoshop is giving some problems :( Photo credit for these photos goes to Joy and Priti :)

Total distance covered was 525 miles over two days.

Pinnacles pinned down :)

Pinnacles national monument was the venue decided by Joy and Priti. They were planning it on Saturday, but I had my carom practice session on Saturday. They decided to go on Sunday to accommodate me
It was decided to meet at their place at 7 am sharp, that means I needed to leave home at 6:15 am, that means getting up at 5:45 am at least, that means no sleep on weekend in short . I got up at 5:45 and exactly at 6:20 am left the house. I stopped at the gas station to fill up. I was filling up the gas and noticed that the gas tank was dusty. I had not washed her in a month . Suddenly petrol came out of the nozzle and tank. It had over flown at least by 0.5 gallon and washed the tank. It also washed the foot rest and some part of the engine. The nozzle did not stop automatically. Now I was too scared to start the engine. I got hold of a rough cloth and wiped every drop of the petrol. Waited for 10-15 mins to dry it. I was getting late, so decided to start it. I was still sh*t scared to start it. I prepared myself to jump off. Luckily nothing happened and I started cruising @90mph on 880. There was hardly anyone on the freeway. It was feeling like I had rented this freeway for myself for a day

I reached at Joy’s place at 7:15 am. One of their friend was supposed join us along with his family. We headed to his house. This person, Arup is an amazing photographer. For a change there were three people who were interested in photography and can go to any extent to get a good shot . We headed to Pinnacles around 8 am. Joy was leading the way, I was in between and Arup was following us in his van. After around 50 miles we took a break.

When we started again, Joy wanted to switch the bikes. He was kind enough to let me ride is goldwing aka airplane. Initially I was skeptical about its weight(450kgs) and its size, but then thought what the heck and decided to ride it. Mannn!!! it was an amazing experience. This was easily the best vehicle I had ever driven/ridden in past 11 yrs (before that I did not know driving/riding). It has amazing control over curves. It is much easier to ride compared to my 1300CC VTX. In-spite of having 1800CCs it is so silent that you can barely hear it. It has a reverse gear and a CD changer. Here is a beautiful picture of it.


After reaching the park, we had to park our bikes and van at the entrance as the parking near the trails was already full. Then we hiked about 2.5 miles, took lot of pictures. There were three camera enthu people so we stopped at every possible opportunity. I won't bore you by writing what we did there, instead just look at these pictures.






Ride back home was quite uneventful. Rode back home with couple of photoshoot stops. Here is one of the interesting shot on our way back. I know we should have removed our helmets but that's a big PITA. Need to remove the gloves, keep them somewhere, need to unbuckle the helmet, keep it somewhere, remove the skull cap keep it somewhere and while going repeat all that process again. Removing the entire gear just for the couple of shots is next to impossible. Now I know why Joy and Priti had their helmets on in most of the shots of their 30 days coast to coast and back trip :)



The total distance covered home to home was 220 miles. Here is the link to the other photographs of the trip. I will add the photographs as and when I process them :)

http://www.flickr.com/photos/pappupp/sets/72157623611887987/

Life at 150kmph

Got up early on Saturday to cheer for Mumbai Indians. Rajasthan Royal and Kolkata Night Rider match was in progress. I got a ping from Joy about the Goldwinger's meet in next couple of hours. I was in double mind, whether to watch Sachin Tendulkar's batting or go for a ride. Sachin hit Stein for 3 consecutive boundaries and that made my choice more difficult, but Sachin himself made my choice easy by getting out soon :)

Wore my gear and got ready. Wifey was still sleeping, told her that I was going to leave the house for good and she said ok :) Started the motorcycle and zoooomed to the meeting venue. Parked my Honda VTX 1300 cc in between two 1800 cc goldwings. It was looking very tiny.



Joy and Priti were already there. After a brief round of introduction, we headed towards the Mt. Hamilton. The group was full of enthu people. Almost all goldwings were equipped with a CD changer and a GPS. Few of them had radio communicators integrated within the helmets. A lady called Susan had the most colorful goldwing on the planet earth. Here is her photo with her motorcycle. Kiran, now that's what I call a car on two wheels :)



It was an amazing sight to watch 10-12 goldwings crusing at almost 100 mph in staggered formation in a lane. I decided to stay in my limit and followed them at 90-95mph. Cars in our lane were making a way for us. After riding for about 10 miles on freeway, we started riding in mountains. That reminded me my Pune-Mumbai-Goa ride. The twisties were similar to Kashedi and Parshuram ghat. I had a lot of fun taking those turns on my 300+ kg motorcycle.

After about 25-30 miles, our leader stopped. We took a quick photo-break. There were a few horses around. Goldwingers started feeding the horses.



It was a funny sight to see the owners of 120 horsepower feeding 4 horses and 1 horse power was smiling :)

We started again. The road was getting narrower and there was a lot of loose gravel on the road. Everyone was crusing at 25-30 mph now. We rode for 25 more miles in the mountain. It was quite a beautiful sight to watch 10 riders taking turns in a line in front of you. We stopped near a restaurant. It was my first time to answer the nature's call with riding gear on. I unzipped my riding pants and started searchin for you know what;) Then realized that I need to unzip one more layer :)

I was wearing the bikenomads t-shirt (which was very tight for me). This photograph is for you my bikenomad friends :)


Joy and I started early from there to shoot the other bikers. We stopped at a place and clicked the bikers.

After riding for about 65 miles we reached at the top of mt. Hamilton. Clicked a group shot. Joy and I decided to part from the group to do some more photography.

Here are the some more photos from the trip
http://www.flickr.com/photos/pappupp/sets/72157623660591012/


The total ride for me was about 115 miles with over 80 miles in the mountains.

P.S. Even thought the previous post said last post, I decided to add posts related to my rides here, hope you enjoy it :)

Pitaare se!!!!

When I dont have anything to post, I post from my Pitaare se :) These pics are taken @ Bushkill falls, PA :)





Location: Bushkill Falls, PA
Camera: Nikon D80

Grand Canyon Waste!!!

Nope, thats not a typo. Grand Canyon West was a wasted trip. Perhaps this is the one place that I ve seen in USA where you can get cheated in broad daylight and that too officially. First of all the approach road of 14 miles to the canyon has nothing but the stones and sand. The car runs on the road as if it is running on the snow. In fact, we saw a car skidding. Luckily no one was injured. Then the parking lot is 2-3 miles away from the canyon. From there you need to take their bus for which they charge almost $50 per head (just for to and fro 4 miles). This is mandatory. The food is expensive. The helicopter ride (10 mins), boat ride and back will make your pocket lighter by $180. Thankfully it is optional. To go on the skywalk you need another $30. You can not carry your own camera and need to pay extra $20 to have your picture taken by them. In short, one photograph on the skywalk will cost you $100. There are no safety railings at the cliff. You can go till the edge of the cliff. It is too dangerous.
We reached there in the afternoon. The landscape was overexposed. They had native red indian dance show and red indian village nearby. Here are some photographs taken @ Grand Canyon West.






Location: Grand Canyon West, Arizona
Camera: Nikon D80

Murde ki Jaan khatare mein!!!!

Well not trying to make fun of all those dead people with the title but wanted to give some chatpataa one to this post. 

The initial plan was to visit Yosemite early in the morning but couldn't make it due to some reasons. I was too restless and wanted to click something. I pinged Joy and he was ready to accompany me. The initial plan was to have lunch in Annapurna restaurant and head towards SF for some street photography. While driving to SF, Joy suggested to visit Golden Gate Cemetery.  I agreed.

We parked our car and started shooting.  I liked this place (but I m in no hurry to go their permanently :)). I can shoot for hours at this place. There are so many permutations and combinations possible of those headstones to capture in the camera.  You are sure of getting good pictures in any weather. 

Here are some of the snaps that clicked that day.

BTW Chan, here is an life element as per your request. ZINDAA HOO MAIN...;)

Location: Golden Gate Cemetery, San Bruno, CA

Camera: Nikon D80

Berkley Botanical Garden and bird photography

I knew that I was bad at macro photography (not that I am any better now) and wanted to improve my macro photography skills, so when Prakash asked me to join him at Berkley Botanical Garden, I decided to join him. Also I wanted to use the new tripod too :)

I got up at 6:45 am (that too on Sunday) and got ready. We reached the garden at 8:45 am and waited for the garden to open. It opens at 9:00 am. I was feeling sleepy. I wished I could have slept for those 15 mins at home. There are lots of phool paudhe in the garden. They have put a description for each phool paudha. In fact many places just the description was there but no phool paudha:)

It was quite disappointing trip though as there weren't lots of greenary and did not get any photographs the way I wanted them. Here are some of them.

This post was in saved state for a long time. I had been to Stevens Canyon Creek park in Cupertino for capturing a few birds in my lens after that. I did not get a good shot that time. Finally found this jodi on my patio only :)

Location: Berkley Botanical Garden and my patio, CA

Camera: Nikon D80

Pitaare se- Part II

Continuous rains on weekends kept me away from the camera this month. Here are some of from my khajana :) Hoping to click some in the fool's month :) These are some of the pics taken during my first motorcycle trip in USA to halfmoon bay and Baker's beach.



BTW I am quite excited about my $200 tripod. Should be getting it soon :) I must exploit it to recover every penny spent on it :)
Location: Half moon bay, CA
Camera: Nikon D80

The Ghost Town!!!!

A.k.a Bodie.  W.S. Bodie discovered gold here back in 1859. Over the years, Bodie has seen numerous booms...and busts. There were some huge gold strikes here and, at one point, the town had nearly 10,000 residents. By 1882 though, the big strikes were mostly history and the folks began to go elsewhere. Gunshots and stabbing were everyday story. Check out the bullet marks

Today Bodie is one of the largest and best preserved ghost towns in the West. Over 170 buildings remain and what the California Department of Parks and Recreations calls a state of "arrested decay." It is, without a doubt, a photographer's paradise. 

I first saw the photographs of bodie on Prakash's blog (http://passanha.com/home/gallery/Bodie/) when I was in India and I knew I had to capture this in my camera someday.  I bought my SLR after coming to USA and I knew where to use it. It had to be Bodie. Nobody was interested in joining me. I was determined to go alone, but finally my wife, Neha, Sumit and Shivank decided to join me:)  We hired an Impala LT, one of the worst cars ever. It did not even touch 90mph even after standing on the accelerator, But the decision turned out to be a good one when we hit the Bodie road. Actually there was no road at all. In fact in most rural parts of India there are better roads than this one. Had I brought my car here, I would not have forgiven myself for torturing it. BTW checkout the famous Bodie car.

Everybody was tired. We reached here in the afternoon around lunch time to find there is nothing to eat. Everyone was cursing me and I was in no mood to pay attention to them. I was seeing paradise in front of me. I immediately assembled my lenses and here are some of the pictures of the ghost town including a group picture (dont laugh at my shades) :) 

Location: Bodie state historic park

Camera: Nikon D80