Mumbai-Pali -Mumbai

Mumbai-Pali-Mumbai

      After having my Suzuki by my side, it was just a matter of tagging someone along for the first planned long ride, apart from solo Mumbai-Pune-Mumbai which I used to do on a regular basis. My friend, Vinayak, got into the groove of a trip with his new RE and we decided to go on a weekend getaway , Mumbai-Pali

     We planned an overnight trip to his native place, Pali. With the help of Google maps, I came up with route for, which was not unknown to me, yet had an unexplored off-road part in the journey. All set to embark on my first ever so-called bike trip of more than 400 kms, I was excited and set to go.

     Rendezvous at Kalamboli McDonalds – 8am sharp. I got up early, strapped my new gears and started towards this wonderful journey knowing nothing of the thrills and adventure awaiting us ahead.

      With a sigh of joy and eagerness, Me and my Gixxy’s engine revved.

      The sun was rising on my east and cold breeze swept through my open helmet visor, within 45mins I reached the rendezvous point at Kalamboli. This is a common place where most of the bikers meet for weekend rides from where the Mumbai- Pune Highway starts.

      That day too, many bikers had gathered and the place was as usual lively, filled with aspirations and desires. This place has seen many new friendships & bikes!! 😉

      After about 10 mins, the thud…thud… came and stopped centimeters away from me and as usual I greeted him **** ***. Well, that’s how we greet each other every time we meet. Yes, Vinayak reached and we decided to take a sip of tea before we start. All the hustle of the bikers, jokes cracking, and many different engines roaring and testing before each of them set off.

      Having finished with the cutting chai, we took an inspection of our bikes. Firing up the engine and a little throttle gave me chills and a smile like something had been long waiting to be achieved. We started around 945 am and soon crossed Panvel and were on the old Mumbai-Pune highway.

      We crossed many riders, solo and groups, on the highway while heading for our first stop at the Varad Vinayak Temple in Mahad, around 6-10 kms before Khopoli.

      This is one of the Lord Ganesha’s temples of Asthavinayak. We reached there in approx. half an hour. We parked our bikes and walked the rest of the short distance till the temple.

      The spiritual ambience is very soothing to the soul. An unexplained silence amongst the devotees and all the hustle is what peace was. After spending about half an hour, we returned to the parking area, strapped up, and began our journey. It was 12:30 and we decided to take a snack break in Khopoli.

      The restaurant was just on the highway, good for a short break for travelers. We spent an hour eating and resting as we had a long way to go till our destination for the day.

      After a short discussion on which route to proceed, we started with full-swing. We decided to take the old Khandala route which goes through the hills. Following the road, we passed the tiger point and decided to go to Ambey valley city.

      We were racing through the hills, pastures, downhill paths, villages. All passing by, making me apprehend the speed of life and at the same time the very moment of pause, trying to grasp the feelings into one moment.

      The GPS was cut off once we were nearing Ambey Valley. On a lighter note, it was a break from the city life after all. We reached the gates of Ambey valley, took a break chatting with the guards, just to relax and get our legs relaxed.

      The entry to the city has to be booked in advanced, so we turned around back to the Ghusalkhamb junction and that was the time we decided to take route towards Mulshi road. We had saved the maps but lost the GPS.

      After a few pictures of the scenery, we started and soon were passing by small huts and houses. The path ahead was unknown to us.. Initially the road was quite good, but after few kms, all we could see were mud trails of tyres left behind by the cars and bikes.

      After a few kms, the trails disappeared only to be replaced by pieces of rocks, just like a foot of a hill. Trees and branches growing huge on to the trail and nothing but small rocks. The place seemed to be visited rarely by any of the population on automobiles. Such path continued for about 10kms, and this was when we had a second thought about our route and should we be proceeding further?

      After a few minutes of chat, we decided to carry on. The feeling of an unknown destination, time and path was thrilling but at the same time felt like riding in a jungle with lot of uncertainties. If anything went wrong, there was not a single person in sight to reach out to. With a leap of faith, we continued.

      I had a brief view of the map memorized and our probable location on it at that time. All we felt was for our dearest bikes and tyres. It would have been a hell of a time for them.

      We came to a route covered with dense trees and birds chirping. We decided to stop and capture those moments, not that it was advisable, but then more often than not, we fall for the temptations, don’t we? 🙂 . We parked our bikes across the road and strolled nearby only out of curiosity and for a few snaps.

      Soon we heard some murmurs in the remote, and to our relief, there were 2-3 bikers and a car going past us in the opposite direction. Seeing this we grinned, but, the next question was, where would the car go? Which turn did we miss for the exit? Well, may be some veiled exit, but now it was about the Ride ahead.

      We started the ride and continued a long way till we again missed one of the turns and were on to a path were there was no life. There I was, this time smiling, and not worried at all. Hailed my friend with some compassionate words (&$%#) and continued.

      After 2 hours or so, we came across a road construction site and had a sigh of relief. In another half hour, we found an exit to the main road.

      To our relief and joy, it was the Tahmini Ghat on which we were riding. With a sigh of relief we carried on. Almost at dusk we stopped for snacks. A road-side Dhaaba, we parked our bikes and the first thing we did is to check the tyres very carefully again. They were still strong with few scratches of the rocks and a lot of mud and dust.

      After spending an hour at the Dhaaba, and a little chat with the guys over there we memorized few directions and the number of kms for our destination, and we hit the road. The road was thrilling and a pleasure to ride.

      In an hour we reached Pali. Parking the bikes in the village compound, the neighbors gathered to greet us. I went inside and lied down without removing my gears, closed my eyes and a deep breath was all it took to re-ride the entire day again in the single moment. My body felt tired of the travel bumps but I couldn’t stop smiling to myself thinking about the first road trip which was successfully completed one way.

      I freshened up and sat in the balcony to take-in the beauty of the surroundings. The house was at the foot of a small hill, good for trekking too.The rest of the evening was a blast & before we knew, sleep took over us.

      We woke up around 11 in the morning, and headed straight to the Bhalaleshwar temple after freshening up for a pending ritual for Vinayak’s new Bike, Royal Enfield Bullet 350 Classic.

      We left at 3 and took a detour to the Ekvira temple and Karla Caves from khopoli.

      The Ekvira temple is on a hill, where half of the stairs can be covered on bike and cars as a road is almost constructed to reach till there. The rest of the path needs to be ascended along with all the other devotees. We had a tiring day’s climb to reach the top.

      We came downhill by 5 -6 PM in the evening, post which we halted for some snacks nearby.

      It was past dusk, we were done with munching and all set to head home. With headlights flooding the path ahead, in no time we reached Khopoli where we were greeted with traffic and decided to take a re-fueling break.

      In about an hour we reached the Khandeshwar junction where we parted our ways, he left for Kalyan and I headed for Sion. I reached home by 10 PM and gave a sigh of accomplishment of my first planned ride.

      The day ended with a short story telling session with my mother who listened patiently about the journey while I narrated the trip nodding and asking questions. Insatiably, my mind had started to contemplate of my next tour, coming up soon on the blog. 😉

Ride Statistics:-

– Total kms: 474
– Riding hours: 8
 – Route Map