Dec 2010 500 k Biking Expedition - South India.

The motive was physical enjoyment and fitness. We wanted to build some excitement in ourselves, inspire ourselves by indulging in endurance sports for vitality & physical fitness and taste some true colors in life. We wanted to see a world that was bigger than us.


The only job of animals were to search for their food, but, us, humans of the 21st century, with a thirst for knowledge - in the midst of need for so much of multi faceted roles and tasks in a day sometimes had to get back to the basics - taste the simplicity of nomadic life so that there could be a balance. We had an exciting plan.


This long bicycle trip had been our minds for over 6 months and the whole brainwave received a form when my mentor Ram Sethu came up and said 'If you had do do something that would inspire you, set up a timeline and make sure you stick to it and finish it off!'.

We were all quite ecstatic. The travel party narrowed down to 2 - 'Jun Kubo' and myself. Kubo, a seasoned biker who'd done 300km stretches in one shot on his bicycle in Au and NZ, with years of practice and a very good carbon frame Omino bicycle was game to join me on this bicycle trip. He was by origin, a Japanese and a sailor with a fishing vessel, too! I on the other hand, apart from running, had a prior experience doing a 210 k long single shot interstate solo biking between Bangalore and Salem.

Biking in Indian roads however needed a lot of preparation for Kubo. His basic questions were -  if the bike courses were on asphalt Road... "If there are no asphalt roads, do I have to go bring a mountain bike?" (MTB's are a little heavier than road bike that have thin tires) What were the other essentials one is got to carry on the bag that we had to have on our backs for during 5 days, etc.


We had this planned 2 months ahead of time and Kubo made a bike case to transport and bring his bicycle with him from Japan. His case with bike now weighed 17 kilos, just about enough for air transport. During holidays, he also encouraged me to ride bikes so that we were psychologically and physically prepared. Before we embarked, Kubo had already done around 400 k as just practice.



Dec 23rd - The first day was going to be 'jet-lag' for the foreign participant so I decided to take it easy. We drove down to Tiruvannamalai in my car with the 2 bicycles kept in the vehicle. I had contacted Mr. Ramesh who owned a Tea shop out there who agreed to help us find accommodation as soon as we reach.

Tiruvannamalai - Annamalaiyar Temple

Tiruvannamalai is a pilgrimage Temple city in the Indian state of Tamil Nadu. We visited the 2000 year old Annamalaiyar Temple located at the foot of Mount Arunachala and amongst one of the great Shiva Temples of Tamil Nadu. We walked 15 k around the hill. This whole place was long been associated with many yogis and siddhars (mystics), and we also visited the 20th century guru Ramana Maharshi, who lived in Mount Arunachala, now a popular spiritual tourism destination.

Mount Arunachala

Dec 24th - We were up at 5 AM the next day morning. The first stop was 130 kilometers away, in Auroville - Pondicherry. We unloaded the bicycles and mounted the front wheel that had been kept dismantled from transportation. It was going to be a big day and we were on our saddles (seats) by 6 AM. We were greeted by all shop owners in the busy wholesale market place where Ramesh had his tea shop. Many were totally thrilled to hear about such a journey on the bicycle.. and seeing a Japanese doing it along-with!

I liked my memory from this cheerful farewell and we entered the state highways that led us to Pondicherry en-route Dindivanam. The fields on either sides of the road were inundated with water and the roads were badly hit by the rain. We rode careful on the good parts of the road, through the morning fog that was clearing fast.


Along the way, we were greeted by several friendly locals who were curious as to the purpose of our passing. Some rode along with us.. and as hours moved by, we soon settled to our bi-cycling rhythm. We were quite often cheered by kids and adults alike, calling for our attention loud, and greeting us as we went past them. In about 45 K, Kubo's bike had a flat tyre. Kubo had 2 spares and we quickly fixed it in about 10 minutes, and back on our ride.


Our destination now stayed 80 K away. We decided to have a quick breakfast. We stopped by in a local hotel for some 'idlis' (rice cakes) and vegetable gravy (coconut chutney and sambar).. before we proceeded to Auroville.

Auroville - Aspiration Guest House

We reached our destination by 2 PM. Auroville (City of Dawn) was in Viluppuram district in the state of Tamil Nadu near Puducherry in South India. It was founded in 1968 by Mirra Alfassa (called "The Mother") and designed by architect Roger Anger. My purpose of reaching Auroville was to see Matrimandir, that had a spiraling ramp leading upwards to an air- conditioned chamber of polished white marble - "A place to find one's consciousness". At its centre was a 70 cm crystal ball in a gold mount that glowed with a single ray of sunlight that was directed on the globe from the top of structure. According to The Mother, this represented "a symbol of future realisation" and the place itself had gave positive perspectives that changed us.


We also chanced to meet Andre - a seasoned biker that evening who had also recently won the Himachal MTB, 2010. Andre invited us to join another team which was biking along the same route as ours, the next day.

Insides of the guest house

Dec 25th - Upon Andre's invitation, we gathered the next day morning 9 AM in their inaugural party. It was fun being amidst bicycle enthusiasts and we learnt that their travel party were a group of BSA enthusiasts who were doing a campaign inaugurating launch of electric bicycles. A very good product for the Indian market, we however learn't that we couldn't go with them since we were on manual bicycles and decided to start of early just as soon as they concluded the meeting, half past 9 AM.
 
After the good breakfast and black coffee, the ride on day 3 was smooth and we felt very good on the bicycle. The sun was on full swing by now and I had a big palm hat that protected me from the heat. I kept following Kubo's back tyre and made sure it was under my sight, our heads bent and tailing together, riding on along the East coast. We stopped along the way often to hydrate ourselves with sweet tender coconuts.

Starting at half past 9, we reached Mahabalipuram around 3 PM. The place was serene with some of the oldest and elegant historical temples with Tamil art and exhibits on rocks, many carved on single stones, built during the 7th century BC, some 100 KMS from Auroville, on the East Coast road.


On the way, we stopped for lunch in a local restaurant that served Kubo with delicious 'one sakana' (fish with several needles inside). Kubo relished it.

We found a place to stay and Me being a veggie missed out on much of the fresh sea food that the place had to offer and Kubo had his time with fresh live lobsters. I shopped and got generous with a pair of new clothes, a pendant made out of stone and we got back to bed early.


Dec 26th - The sound of distant winds on the shore was whizzing past our ears, and the next day morning, we were up by 6 AM. We settled for a guide, Mr. Babu who showed us around Mahabalipuram and it took us 1 quick hour. The group of monuments, the nine monolithic temples and most importantly the Five Rathas (monolithic), Arjuna's penance (monolithic) and shore temple (many stones) were all glittering brilliantly under the rising sun, early that morning. Being here made me think about myself and my skull which would have hit the dust, a few decades from now. I felt significant to belong to this world this time, feel alive and part of artists who'd identified themselves and standing out in time to with their art etched for aeons on these huge stones.

We congratulated ourselves on completing half a leg of the trip and now had to proceed to Kanchipuram. Kanchi as they shortly call it, is located some 80 K from Mahabalipuram and there are some very interesting spots on the way to it. One of it is the ancient Shiva temple in a place called 'Tirukkalunkundram' temple atop the Vedagiri hill which is about 160 m high. We learnt, legend had it that there were two eagles who were actually saints who daily made a stop to rest at the temple on their flight between Varanasi (a holy place on the banks of river Ganges in North India) and Rameswaram (a holy Island on the Southern tip of the Indian Sub-continent). The place also had a panoramic view of the rural India beneath that was boasting of its greenery, agriculture, the huge temple of a Goddess below and Her temple pond.

There was a political congregation in Kanchi when we'd arrived on the 26th, a member of Parliament holding his talk and scores of vehicles full of activists in excitement, passing by. Our road was hence unsettling with dust. As we entered Kanchi, we entered the first big Vishnu temple, its magnificent and huge stone walls boosting of its age and grandeur. There were scores of buses parked on its side with pilgrims from neighboring states who'd come to visit. We were however disappointed to note that the place wasn't allowing foreign tourists inside and Kubo had to stay out. Kubo however told me to go in and meanwhile, he had befriended an 89 year old man who showed him a several pillared hall with rich carvings, on the outside of sanctum. The day turned out to be even more eventful when we found a fresh fruit juice shop that gave me what I'd exactly pictured in my mind. The shopkeeper gave us valuable information on accommodation while we quenched ourselves with fresh and sweet pineapple and pomegranate juices. We then settled in our rooms for the night. While I couldn't fathom I was already here and our trip was getting over, it'd been a very long ride from home so far, and so many images from the day flashed in my mind. I thought, 'It'd indeed be a day we'd like to look back and smile, a few years from now!'

Dec 27th - The next day morning at Kanchipuram was very peaceful. We checked out of our room, spiffied ourselves up on our bicycles and got ready to step into the temples before proceeding to Chennai. There were so many gorgeous temples and all of them were almost 3000 to 4000 years old. Just to be around here, watching scores of devotees from across the country come here to just worship and their faith drove me emotional. There was hope, love and peace in the air… and India was teeming with life, and suddenly it seemed, all of us were traveling toward the same goal, our paths in evolution coincided here, in this ancient place.


Way out of Kanchi, I witnessed huge amounts of garbage outside the city. I felt I wanted to fix everything, pick rags from here and my heart cried out loud for cleanliness and to witness all the dirt around was difficult. I thought, 'maybe one day, I'd start cleaning everything up and when my judgement day would have arrived, I'd have absolved something by then!'

This 5th day was the last day on the bike and we still had a 100 k for the finish. After visiting the main Shiva and Vishnu temples, we had a quick breakfast - 'idles' and coffee in the 'Indian Coffee Shop'. We stopped again in 20 k on the way at a place - SriPerumbudur and saw another historically important temple. We had a quick bite at a highway 'coffee shop. As we neared the city, it got hotter and dusty. We were exhausted and it was half past 2 when we finally reached our accommodation. Our hunger seemed little, there was immense satisfaction. We felt extraordinarily high to think we'd made it, about 450 K on the bicycle, every minute of which was absolute providence!


As I hope to inspire myself to do more and more of these long rides on my bicycle, I remember this quote by Prof. Carl Sagan who'd once said -

"If constellations had been named in the 20th century, I suppose we would see bicycles!"

Photos: Jun Kubo
Write Up: Adithya Raghavan