To Ananthagiri, first in the series

Hip Hip Hurray! 5 laughs, 4 Hercules Act 110s and one BSA Mach, 2 days, 160kms, from Hyderabad to Ananthagiri (Vikarabad). A hajaar calories, tons of sweat, a little blood. The agonies of the climbs and the Ecstasies of the down hills. The camaraderie, the fun, the thrill, the milestones, the highs and lows. I loved it. We loved it!

Thanks to the Atlanta Foundation for making it possible, by renting us out cycles and thanks to Abhay for being patient with us and wishing us luck for the ride! Thanks to Ranjith Sajja from the Hyderabad Bicycling Club for letting us know about Atlanta Foundation. A hajaar thanks to Raman Garimella for offering to rent us his cycle, and being patient with us. Also, thanks to the parents of all the laughs who trusted in us, and let us go and packed out bags with all the stuff we needed during our ride. Cycling is so much fun and thanks for letting us have so much fun!

Let’s get down to the details, then? I hope you don’t see the devils. We started at around 6:30 am on Sunday, not exactly on schedule but an early start nevertheless. The initial 2-3 hours were killing. I was hoping we’ll do a majority of the distance during this time, but the cold didn’t let us do much. It was one of the coldest mornings of my life, but the ride was enjoyable with the good wide roads, all for us. Amongst all of us, Boja was having the most trouble with the cold. It almost numbed him, and we didn’t let him leave in peace, with all our questions. Also, it took us a little while to realize, we were on better cycles than he was. But once we were close to Chevella, Boja showed his true colors. He rode with so much ease and at such an awesome pace, that he left us panting, a long way behind. The roads on the whole were pretty good in the parts closer to Hyderabad than to Vikarabad. There were a few shady trees all along the route, but on the whole, this part of the state isn’t all that green, as is well known. On the whole we rode pretty leisurely, stopping every now and then. We stopped whenever, even one of us was tired and the stops were pretty long. We were also constantly feeding ourselves with all sorts of foods, from dry fruits to fruits like guavas, bananas and oranges to candies to ice-creams. It would be an understatement to say, it was more like a picnic than a ride.

We reached Vikarabad by around 1:30pm, averaging about 10km an hour (including the breaks), which I think is pretty good. We hogged like pigs, which is surprising given that 1) we were pretty tired and 2) the food was way towards the end of the spiciness spectrum. The waiter treated us well, thanks to our tired faces and locked cycles. We took a long break, after lunch, chatting about all things under the sun, but actually resting our hurting asses. We started off to Ananthagiri at about 3:30pm and reached the top most point in about half an hour.

Then we set about exploring the jungle, on foot. It was a “dry” land with some trees. Not much green, and Boja thought it was not worth exploring it. He sat, waiting for the sunset, while we went out for a stroll, also waiting for the sunset. Ringo was busy repeating, “We are at the cross-roads of our life”, at every crossing in our path. Meanwhile, a group of people came to the sunset view point on their (motor)bikes, and got a few pictures with our bikes and helmets, with Boja’s permission.

We came back in time, to get a good view of the sunset and get some good snaps. We headed back to Ananthagiri, quickly, as it was starting to get chilly and dark, and we didn’t know if we would manage to get a room in Ananthagiri or had to ride back till Vikarabad. We managed to get a room, right next to the temple. The room was big enough for the five of us, and our cycles. But we could get no food near that place. Three of us caught an auto and reached Vikarabad (Aside: the auto had some serious pro-telangana songs playing), in the hope to get some decent vegetarian food, enough to get us going on the next day. But Vikarabad let us down. We searched like crazy, but couldn’t find any place, that we considered, good enough. The town is so full of sweet shops, but we couldn’t find any place to get some dinner! Finally we managed to locate the Telangana mess (yes, I too think it used to be called the Andhra mess ) We got some food packed for all 5 of us, and headed back.

On reaching, Ananthagiri, I had the a sight of my life. There was a power-cut, in the temple town, and I looked up to see a brilliant star-lit sky! It lasted only for a couple of seconds or so, before the power was back, but the view was mind-blowing. Totally!

We had a good night’s sleep, in a cozy room. It wasn’t as cold as I expected. Except for Sunil’s snores, the room was calm and cozy. In the morning, Ringo and I woke up earlier than the others and headed out to a nearby view-point that Damu, told us about, on phone. We mis-judged the location of the view-point and weren’t hoping for a sunrise view, but were pleasantly surprised to find the sun rising, just as we reached the place. We played around with Ritesh’s DSLR for a while and headed back to wake the others up, to get going. Surprisingly, all of us weren’t in as bad shape as we were expecting and we were willing to try riding back. We set out from Ananthagiri and had another surprise in store, when we took a slightly different route back to Vikarabad. We had the biggest down-hill of the ride, and we had a great start to the day’s ride. (Luckily for me, I was on one of the better cycles for this part of the ride. I loved it.) Boja had a small fall in Vikarabad, and hurt his palm slightly. He was travelling very slowly and was distracted by his sweater/jerkin, which caused the fall. Anyway, we had breakfast and started to Hyderabad, in quite good spirits. On the second day, we rode with a purpose, and every one looked more excited and determined to make it back and quickly at that. All of us, were having more fun than on the previous day. I tried to draft behind a few of the vehicles, but they were moving too fast for me. We rode together in a paceline kinda formation, in most parts of the ride. Obviously, we weren’t doing it perfectly for it to make an aerodynamic difference, but it did make a difference to our spirits. We were thoroughly enjoying it! We were singing along and enjoying the ride. Boja had an insight and was wondering if Chaitu style songs are written and composed, while riding cycles.

We reached Chilkur by around 4pm. Ritesh was ahead about 5 mins ahead of me and I was ahead of the others by atleast 10-15 mins. Near the Chilukur Temple road diversion, I was stopped by some kids from Sri Swaminarayan International School. I anyway planned to wait for the others, so I let them. They were excited by the gears and the helmet. First, they asked me for a lift and I was willing to give the smallest of them, a lift. But, the lack of a carrier made it seem like a bad idea, to them. Then, Pratap, the smallest of them (7th class) dared to ask me for a “troll” (read as, trial ride). I gave it to him, and then his friends Vamsi, Dipesh and Manoranjan (9th class) also went for a short ride. All of them were thrilled by the gears. I hope at-least one of them catches the long-distance-ride-bug.

Then, for about half-an-hour, we had this stream of college busses coming in from Chevella, Chilkur and near-by areas. Most of the drivers drove like crazy. It was scary stuff, to be riding along side them. Thankfully, it lasted only for about half-an-hour, most of which, we spent resting, and watching them drive past us. The ride after this was pleasant, with good roads, and not too much traffic until we reached somewhere near Langer House.

The photography jinx didn’t spare me(us) in this trip too. We were taking a picture of Golconda, from a view point on the road, which incidentally happened to be in front of the Artillery Training Center. But the road was quite wide and the training center’s gate was on the opposite side of the road. Ritesh managed to get a few snaps, before the jawaan walked down to us and asked us to leave from that place! The artillery center was nowhere near the photographic beauty of Golconda. I don’t know what the problem was. We were in no mood to even look towards the artillery center. But, even if we clicked a few photos of “their” center, what’s the problem? Is security by obscurity the best way to go?

Sunil executed another of his flukes in style! His front wheel had a puncture, luckily at the fag end of the trip and almost right in front of a cycle repair shop! We had it fixed and rushed to reach back before it gets dark and the traffic goes crazy. But we didn’t do very well. We did get a flavor of the cities crazy traffic!

Just at the end of the ride, we pleasantly came across Abhay (from Atlanta Foundation) What are the odds of that happening! It was an awesome feeling.

We reached my house, tired, but happy and contended! Then we had a ride report party, where this blog post was born.

As expected, we didn’t get to interact a lot with the local crowd. I think we should go around with simpler cycles and lesser gear, to have any kind of meaningful(?) interaction with the local crowd. I think having an additional motivation/theme for the ride would be helpful too, to have a reason to interact with people around. We did get some interesting comments, from the on-lookers, though.

• He: Ekkadiki velthunnaru? (Where are you going?) We: Hyderabad He: Bus lo vellachu ga? (You could go in Buses, right?) We: !@#!@*!@
• “Sooper anna!”
• “Yedaine Competition a? Training nadustonda?” (Is it some competition? Is it a training?)
• A guy selling verusenaga kayalu (chane) stopped Ringo and Ritesh, like a traffic police stops you, to collect challan. He took a full interview of them, starting off by asking if they were from Ohstralia!
• An auto fellow near Moinabad directed Sunil to go towards Vikarabad, said hi later in Vikarabad and was surprised, we rode it till there.
• People always tended to start conversations in Hindi, I wonder why.

It was a fun trip. But, obviously, we didn’t do everything right. We should’ve carried an easy cam also, with us. Handling a pro cam is a bit too much, during the ride. I don’t know about the others, but I did miss the spontaneity and wit of 9, and the captaincy of Voodoo, during the ride. Hoping for better luck with that, the next time around.

Ritesh felt the competitive spirit, or riding along-with-others, kept you going far than you would’ve gone alone. I agree with that totally. More philosophy from Ritesh — “Life is like a cycling trip, full of ups and downs.”

Infact, a few there are ..

There are those who stop and ask,
And the ones who glance and walk.
While others wonder aloud,
A journey but the norm accepted.

The spirit of caravan halts not,
Flesh begging rest out of bounds.
Legs tired, continue unabated,
With the master of will ebbing them on.

The deeds are minor, in the vastness of verse,
More so in the minds, rather than the miles.
Need they say not, constrained they were,
All in the name of a glorious bond.

Awaiting the tide of tides, soul power at helm,
Where all hands on deck, a dream alive.
Yet these are the few who started it all,
The journey of lore in a step small but sure.

“PrajaabheesTam”

People are desperate for Telangana, said a political ‘leader’. They are all unitedly standing up for a united state, said another one. But, neither of them asked me. I’m sure they didn’t, as I really don’t have an opinion in this regard. So, someone is talking for me, taking me for granted, sure that I would never raise my hand and voice to say that this is not my opinion, and not once but on numerous such occasions and on several such issues. They are rigging my vote, like. Why am I, the citizen, not going out there, to make myself audible and say they are wrongly representing me? That too, when I kind of know almost all these so-called “movements” and “revolts” that are hitting the headlines these days are fabricated ones, directed and funded by the ones who would derive great personal benefits through/from those, and carried out by a set of people whose job is to do just that. A genuine movement, from the people, has already turned into a fantasy in a 60-odd year old democracy- the world’s largest?