my cannondale Q5

here we stand

once again we rushed our way through the peak hour traffic to gather at vijay chowk. at around 6:30 PM we kick started our second critical mass ride in delhi. the ride was pleasant, the weather is also i guess great for bike rides. not too hot, not too cold. the total ride was around 13kms. we missed some of the friends who couldn't make to the ride. still i'm sure we will keep on increasing in numbers just that we need to keep our patience.
more importantly what i know is - that this is not the first Critical Mass Ride in delhi nor is this the last one. riders will keep on changing but the ride will keep going on.

a short trip with ups and downs

as a self proclaimed biker the time had come for me to stop doing the talk talk and try do a ride. and specially after last weeks ride with the bikesonroad i realised how slow and unfit i am. my daily rides to office is not sufficient to keep pace with the world. finally this saturday morning i decided to ride on the gurgaon-faridabad highway. i still remember what the road used to be 5-6years back, now we call it a highway it was no more than a village road i would say. anyways now in it's new avtaar it looks tempting to drive or ride and hence i started. the first uphill coming my way shook my spirit a bit but then i decided to make it till teri at any cost. as once you cross teri the road is flat and for me that won't be an issue as going uphill. also i really wanted to have fun on the downhill on my way just after crossing village ghata. all my dreams where shattered once i reached the slope after ghata...

there was a massive traffic jam early in the morning.



people where stuch there i don't know since when some of them where taking u-turns and back to gurgaon. similar thoughts cam in my mind. but yet again the the realisation of being. of being on a bike enlightened me. and i started seeing the gaps betwen the truck & the tavera. between the alto & the indica. between the qualis & baleno. and here was I the smoothly gliding through the unseen passages and in around a minute through with the jam.



by the time i crossed the jam, i started having other plans for the route to be tracked. took a left turn towards aya nagar from teri (instead going straight for faridabad) and pedalled past the village coming my way. though these villages are not more of small rural pockets inbetween the larger cityscape. and very much a part of the texture we see in google earth of delhi and it's neighbourhood. they seamlessly blend into the fabric of our urban landscapes. giving it a nice relief, watch it in google earth looks pretty fine. as i was riding through the narrow lanes of the villages never realised when did i cross the border and enter delhi. nothing to worry it's not one of the problematic borders.



took a short break for a photo session. and again i kept riding via khullar karms to m.g. road.




as about to reach the main road i met bandharv ram the mobile industrialist who goes from place to place on his bike and and repairs those folding beds we get. and once we over use the beds for whatever reason we need bandharv ram to fix it. well thats another story to be touched upon on another occasion.



waving goodbye to bandharv ram i touched the m. g. road and the sensation of maddening traffic could be felt in the air, a deep breath would be filling your lungs with the smoke and dust of the passing traffic. traffic created by the lesser known creatures of the world who work on saturdays (hahaha atleast this weekend i hope i'm not working).

middle of the road one can see the grand construction of delhi metro on it's way to connect gurgaon with the main stream. and on the left side can be seen the leftovers of the once flourishing m.g. road retail sector, which had been demolished or shut down a couple of years back. though some sparks of life can be seen as some shops have re opened and doing business.




as i pedaled towards gurgaon, got used to the traffic. and kept my all time lazy pace. a bit before aya nagar crossing saw this small roadside shrine, which i had otherwise always overlooked. didn't get down just took a couple of shots sitting in my bike and carried on, the woman there was probably expecting some shoot charges and looked a bit dissapointed at my early leave.




in the next few minutes i'm in gurgaon and on my regular commuting area. another short photo session



trying to make my bike well traveled mountain bike. prefered to follow the longer route home with a bit more of uphills, somehow this time it didn't tire me at all and soon i was home downloading the pictures on to my machine. and here i am finally writting down the trail.

trail to bhondsi

this morning around 7 of us did a ride to a nearby village of Bhondsi. We all are from gurgaon and the trail started from sohna road. most of the guys were regulars and seemed to be fit enough except for me. we pedaled upto the village temple next to a pond, where we could see ducks and peacocks. took a short break there. had a photo session. and off we started back did a short detour to take a full round of the pond. the road was excellent for biking. most of it had trees around and almost negligible traffic. on our way back we stopped at a chaiwala after a short dirt road. i had to get down and push my bike through. chai accompanied by matthi and parle glucose biscuits. back on track in while we hit the sohna road and soon we where back home. the entire trail was around 25kms or so.

Bhaskar Naidu

As i was pedalling my way to work. now that i am immune to the staring eyes looking at me and my strida, some of them surprised others finding it just funny. that doesn't concern me any more. as i hit the lonely patch of road taking me towards Qutab Plaza though not so lonely at peak office hours. i could hear a bike (motorbike) approaching me at a very slow pace, i guess the mobike was slowing down very cautiosly as it approached. very much like a stalker. sounds funny now, but it really raised a few questions at that point of time. i could hear the motorbike rolling next to me just a couple of yard behind. surely he must be working hard to keep pace with me. it's not so easy to ride a motorbike at such slow speed as i was riding. finally after a gap of around a half a minute i looked back encouraging him to start riding next to me. finally this man a bit younger than me riding a hero honda broke the ice by saying "hello". well that was it for the next couple of kilometres he kept on riding at the ultra slow pace next to me. asking me all about my bike, the cost, the effort it takes to ride, where i got it from or did i build it myself. normally i prefer my share of peace during my rides. but none the less this guys enquisitiveness i didn't mind. although i guess by now i was more intrigued by motorcyclist trying to keep pace with a biker. after a while he told that he is the tennis coach in DLF Country Club and how happy was he to see someone riding a bike. somewhere being a sportsman for him he could connect to a biker (a biker without a cause). for a while we rode together without further sharing a word. till we came to a point where we had to take different turns. and as he bade goodbye by telling me that he is "bhaskar naidu".

this episode surely made my belief stronger that there are loads of people who look upto bikers, somewhere in their mind they understand the goodness of biking. just that they themself have to choose some other mode of transport. hopefully one day i see Bhaskar Naidu on the road riding his own bike, where i go and bug him with my questions.

easy riding

few things we can remember for great riding experience

EAT before you are HUNGRY.
DRINK before you are THIRSTY.
RELAX before you are TIRED.

my red strida