It was a tedious day in office. The Friday evening was not like the normal one. The desire to get rejuvenating power was gradually growing. Not sure, how to make the change, I had my dinner and went on my rooftop. It was cool breeze flowing and I realized that this was what I need. Let this breeze continue with me away from my routine life. The only solution was me and my motorcycle. At night 11 o’clock, I thought of going on a long ride to an unknown place. I called my college friend Abhishek Gupta and by midnight we set on a cruising journey on my Avenger 200 cc machine.
By 12:30 pm we were at the toll gate of Electronics city elevated highway. I felt like paying Rs 20 as the toll charge was a ticket of freedom. Soon we crossed Bangalore city and sailed towards Hosur in neighbouring state Tamil Nadu. Crossing all street lights and highway trucks, it was an enchanting music of passing vehicles and an altogether a different experience. We continued on NH 7 for around 2 hours before we finally crossed all city lights and reached on a road with rocks on both sides. It was a panoramic view in full moonlight. The twinkling stars were like navigators. We continued on this highway, changed the rider and pillow rider position turn by turn and crossed one town after another with breaks for tea on highway dhabas. It was 4:45 in the morning and we reached to the verge of Steel city Salem.
The sun was peeping. The rays have just started touching our faces. The darkness of night and that filled in my heart for my office was slowing fading. We simply stood on the road side for quite some time as if the time stood still. After an hour we found a local fellow who understands Urdu and thus Hindi (Tamil was beyond our scope). He told us that there is a beautiful hill spot just after Salem called Yercaud. Some call it a princess of Hills with most parts still unexplored. It was a symbol that God was with us and has just opened new direction. We thanked that fellow and headed towards Yercaud on state highway, missing NH 7. Just after a ride of 15 min through Salem city we can see the rocky heights heading towards Yercaud. The idea of riding on hilly terrain in rising sun is non parallel and hard to explain. It was like men, machine and let the sun rise. The journey continued and we found our first notice board mentioning that there are 20 hair pin turns in all, making the journey a bit challenging now. Anyways after crossing the first couple of turns we didn’t found ant more difficulty in crossing these hairpins. It took around half an hour to reach to Salem heights hotel, marking an end to hairpin turn journey and Yercaud Lake lay it arms in warm welcome posture. A slight chilling weather was an added advantage. There was only one thing we can now think of...Breakfast! Got a decent south Indian hotel to serve us with warm idlis and sambher. We never liked simple breakfast so much.
After this we continued towards the woods of Yercaud in search of scenic views and peace. The place did not disappoint. It was worth riding the whole night. Pagoda point, Lake view, Sunrise point, water falls to mention a few. By noon we started feeling tired and booked a room in an inn.
The night, unlike Bangalore, was calm and quite cold. Leaving us with no other option but to share our old college memories. My avenger was resting just outside the inn and we were sleeping inside. Next morning, we thanked the inn keeper, paid the dues and left for sightseeing again. Just roamed through this small town hoping that one day we can have our villa somewhere in the woods. By afternoon, we waved goodbye with a heavy heart and headed back towards Bangalore. I noticed, by this time, we have already covered roughly 275 kms.
It was because of one machine Bajaj Avenger 200 cc, that we lived a life bigger than the IT world. To define in one word, its freedom that we loved.
