My Big Escapade - Destination Unknown...: Day 167 - Aug 22

Aug22 at EveryTrail

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291 Kms Trip Meter 23778 Kms

Pretty comfortable hotel in Shivmoga and din feel like leaving. Like i have been saying; a traveler has to move on. Got to the Jewel Rock hotel for breakfast and have this amazing set dosa! Stayed in this city in my early school days. Had come to this very hotel with parents many times i am told but i hardly remember. Any way felt good to be there. Get a call from Santoosh that he is already in Hunsur! the lazy me is just having break fast. And also looks like i am too late for calicut today. Decide to skip Agumbe and head down via NH 13 the supposed to be faster and less scenic route. It was a typical pleasant morning like it is in Malnad area. Awesome twisties and sparce traffic and forest ride spotted quite some birds and the red squirrel. Reach Theertahalli and take a left towards Koppa along the NH 13. Make it there with pretty good roads along the NH13. Take the road to Karkala along the NH and it got narrow and small! With NH boards looking they have been there in quite some years. Soon i am to make an entry to enter the barricaded forest area. I am given a entry slip which i am to deposit at the exit of the forest reserve. As i enter i see the board of Kudremukh national park! Have never rode before in this are. It was interesting forest ride where you get to here the quiteness and some small creatures sounds. Roads were worthy of complaining. Get calls santoosh and seemed like he would be early so he would take some time off in coorg at his friends place and rendezvous with me in Kanhangad. Some 20 kms later i was stopped by some machine gun wielding forest guards and was rudely told to open the panniers. Kept the cool and talked casually and they got interested in my travel and some chit chat i was let off with out checking. Well really did not want the panniers to be unloaded as it would take a lot of effort to pack the stuff again. Then all of a sudden the road widened into smooth bright tarmac and wide curves and throttled on. Surprised to see that i was even touching 110 at some curves. Felt like the trees around gave extra oxygen to the bike!! Was more interested now in riding than stopping for pix. Roads in karnataka when good are awesome and when bad are nightmare!

After an enjoyable undulating high speed ride reached Karkala and seemed like i had crossed the mountains and am in relative plains near the coast. I could hardly see any mountains in the route i did today will be out of karnataka soon. Exchange status with santoosh and also update Meghan that would be passing by Mangalore in some time. After some more pleasant riding make it to Mangalore. Meghan and Abhishek come out to meet me for lunch and it was a nice conversation with the young guys sharing enthusiasm and experience. It was time to move on and Meghan joined me for lil distance before we bid farewell. Soon the roads worsened and it also looked like it would rain. But the bad roads gave way to good ones soon and rain was a false alarm. These false alarms take out valuable time due to wearing and removing the rain gear. There is quite some amount of traffic. Take it leisurely and i make it to Bekal fort and the resort was not working there it seems. Just clicked a pic from outside and went out to kanhangad as santoosh would be there any time. Bustand was decided to meet. What timing we both reach the place almost simultaneously. It was already 5.15 and knowing the mad traffic on the nh, going further only would result night riding till calicut. So we decided on calling quits for the day.

Got a nice looking room. Freshened up and we went out for exploring the city. Once i park my bike i have no energy to take it out for spins. So i go pillion with santoosh. We were unsuccessful at find a snack and settled for cake and groundnuts! I din know of a beach at kahhangad town but since we were near the coast there has to be one nearby says santoosh and of we go in search of it. Have to cross the konkan railway track and few kms we hit the coast and boy what a beach it was. Completely isolated though there was habitation all along the coast. It was awesome there. Wished we had gone there earlier. There is beach every where but just that its not designated as a tourist spot. Spent like an hour there chatting catching up with the few months and trying out some photography. Get to room and crash for the day...

Set Dosa for you... and boy was it Slurpy!!