Ride the Himalayas
7-10-2019 Day 1 of the "Ride the Himalayas"
Day 1 of ride and we wake up to RAIN! Ugh! Nobody likes to start out on a trip in the rain, that’s just Bad Juju. We all met up at about 7:30 for breakfast then packed and loaded up the truck to head out by 8:30. Around 9 AM there were some group photos of all of us on the bikes. What a crew we had, 4 Aussies and 5 Americans on the trip. Seems like there were more but that worked and it had stopped raining but was a steam bath and we were roasting in our riding gear. Finally, we took off like a herd of cats. The truck with all our gear was last and I think it had spare parts and food and other stuff. Rahul was in a nice SUV with a few others, we had a lead rider, tail rider and mechanic riding along with us.
The Wild bunch from left to right - Paul, Yadav, Amit, Ken, Stephen, Mischa, Evan, Vanna (in front), Rahul, Dave, Gala (in front), Brian (The Professor) and Von
I decided I would bring up the rear and just enjoy the ride and views. We rode through some really knarly combat traffic in some of the towns along the river. Some of the roads were super dusty and passing cars/trucks and whatever else was in the road was quite a new experience for most of us.
We got stuck in numerous traffic jams and at one such section we were on the downhill side on the outside of the road. I unfortunately came up late on the incident but Dave told me what happened to Vanna. "We stopped in that traffic jam and as Vanna put her foot down there was nothing there (that little cliff). It was slow motion watching her slowly fall over. I was trying to grab her bars and put my stand down. I looked away to jump off my bike and turned to see her bike on its side and her trapped by the foot dangling over the embankment! A local tried to pick up the bike but I stopped him because it’s what was holding her. I sat down and reached her hand and pulled her up as they lifted the bike." Not a good start but we were all pretty ok except Vanna's foot/ankle in pain, the bike was fine.
Photo by Ken Freund
One of the most fun things were seeing all
the school children walking to or from school.
The boys and girls all wanted to slap hands or do a high five. I was happy to extend good will and put my
hand out to lightly pat hands. Some kids
really wound up and slapped hard and my hand was stinging through my leather gloves
so I can’t imagine what their bare hand felt like. Only one punk tossed a rock but 99% of the
kids were great! Love to see them smile.
Our fearless tail rider Yadav and one of the most respected
riders, the cameraman Vikas on the back enjoying the curves going up to our
lunch spot.
At
some point in the travel we wound up through very thick forested mountains and
stopped for a short photo shoot near the top and of course it started
pouring. By the time we hit the top of
the pass the rain turned into a frog strangler.
Being part of the last of the bunch we dismounted and found a small shack
the rest of the folks were in. All soaked we sat around while the owner made
some Egg/noodle or other soup in a HUGE pot for us.
That hot soup really hit the spot since it was chilly and raining like
mad. I think the floor was dirt but he
had some genuine PURE plastic chairs for us to sit on. ha, ha, ha Yes I do have the photo but will spare you all from it.
I read the sign behind Stephan and Vanna and it said this Home stay and found it on the map so we had lunch about here.
It wasn’t the cleanest spot but it had a LOT of character and was a fun experience. After we were all done, it was time to go out and get going. The rain had finally subsided and the humidity shot up like a rocket. The clouds were floating around us at this altitude and more photos were taken before we kept on rolling down the road.
Stephen and Vanna up at the top. Check out the large slate pieces of stone as the shingles on the building behind. Wow! I bet that was heavy.
At the end of the first days ride we had to negotiate this hairpin turn down towards the river and the road turned to boulders about the size of oranges and cantaloupes. This would be interesting as I haven’t ridden off road before and since I was about the last in the group, I could see the carnage of bikes littering the dirt road down to the valley floor.
I somehow made it unscathed and worked my way
over to our first night’s campsite. We
were in regular tents; it was hot and a little humid (remember this is mid July). I know it is hard to see but there is a Yellow tent in the middle of the photo at the back side of the curve in the river.
The river was close by and there were pools of water which was like a bath. I think Stephen, Mischa and I jumped in and really enjoyed the refreshing water before dinner. There were some small children (boys and girls) that were walking around and stopped by to see these crazy folks on the motorcycles. Here is a shot of Evan showing the young children the photo he just took of them.
This camp spot was near the
town of Ani on road 305. The closest GPS
points I can find are: 31°24'01.0"N 77°23'01.9"E or 31.400281,
77.383859
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