Riding to BOBMC RiderMania 2016, the largest congregation of Royal Enfield clubs in India. And, I’m riding solo on my new version of ThunderDuck (opens in a new window).  On the back is a dry-bag and on the tank is a Via Terra tank bag.

The meetup point was at Hebbal,  but since I was late, I had to catch up with the group. Soon, it was pouring like crazy. Almost as early as before getting off the elevated road towards the airport.

Breakfast was somewhere along the way. It was a Kamath that I had last vis item when doing a 200km brevet. But, this place has rundown quite a bit since the last time I had been here.

This was the lineup for breakfast , looking good. And the parking was good enough for everyone, even if an additional group turned up.  It was a good place for those who started late to catchup too.

The rain was beginning to get thick around midday. And dirty. Good that I did not remove the front fender on this. Never expected this heavy a shower of rain during the build phase of the bike. Quite gloomy despite being close to noon.

Ananthpur was our place to refuel and get some respite from the rain. And, being able to pay with a card, priceless. Looking at the short mudguards at the back now, I realise that the dry bag took most of the water (and muck) that came off the road and kept me clean.

The sun finally came out and dried out everything. It was a pretty good riding after that. The smaller wheel without a changed gearing did not spoil the experience. Everything going swimmingly for now.

The sun may have come out briefly but it surely was cold. And, with a fleece burk, I mean balaclava, it was Prashanth who was best equipped. The rest of us had to make do with whatever we had. Ashok’s hands were the worst case of wrinkly fingers.

 

This was the last chai stop that we were all riding together. After this the group started splitting up due to vehicle issues and weather. The rest of the day was pretty much solo for me.

Above was my last stop before we pulled over for the night. Since there was no set destination, any decent place was better than the next. The group had split up a little due to vehicular issues and had Prashi negotiated well to get us accommodation about 50km before Hyderabad. BOBMC RiderMania 2016 was at Nagpur, still 600kms to go.

BOBMC RiderMania 2016 Gallery