Here is the travel diary of the bike trip me & Amit finished this month between May-June'08. It was an extraordinary experience. Photographs
| Day | Time | Place | Altitude (Casio) | To / Remarks | Bike Km |
| Day 0 | 20:00 | Howrah | Train to Banaras | ||
| Day 1 | 11:00 | Banaras | Checked in at Hotel | ||
| 15:00 | Temp : 35 degrees. Visited various temples | ||||
| 18:00 | Boat ride with Hajaari Majhi alias Kallu. Ganga Aarti darshan. |
| Day 2 | 04:50 | Wake up | |||
| 06:00 | Kashi vishwanath Darshan | ||||
| 09:10 | Train to Lucknow | ||||
| 16:00 | Lucknow |
| Day 3 | 05:00 | Wakeup | |||
| 06:40 | Chandrika devi darshan | ||||
| 09:00 | back to town | ||||
| 20:00 | Railway station. Packing bike off to Chandigarh for 1000/- . The concerned person is not around, and we need to drain off all the petrol. Bike's mile meter is showing 15447kms. | 15447 | |||
| 22:30 | Sweaty & tired... but finally on board the same train... |
| Day 4 | 11:00 | Chandigarh | 415m | 1 hr late, but there finally. Getting the bike, loading our 40Kgs of luggage & off we go. But the bike sputters off. No petrol u see! Get 325ml for 30/- from a mechanic, but it is so impure the bike makes all kinds of noise. Amit is getting tense. This is just the beginning and bike already problematic, he is thinking... He just wants to escape Chandigarh, but in a while petrol dries off again, this time very close to petrol pump. I get 5ltrs in a can... and off we go. Now no problems, bike is back to its cool self. | |
| 13:15 | Ropar / Roopnagar | 355m | Lunch somewhere near Ropar, the trip is on!! but Amit's hiking pole is lost somewhere... We went back a few kilometers to search, but in vain... he will be missing it all through the trip & sing songs of longing... :D | ||
| 14:15 | Off on the road again... | ||||
| 17:00 | Tea... | ||||
| 21:15 | Dinner... | ||||
| 22:30 | Mandi | 775m | it is late... We had decided not to drive in the night, and yet the road has been good & we were advised to go ahead and halt the night at Mandi. |
| Day 5 | 10:30 | Had a nice sleep. Got up late. Check out & head for Riwalsar. | |||
| 12:00 | Riwalsar | 1315m | Checked in at K.D. Gompha | ||
| 13:00 | Temperature : 27.5 degrees |
| Day 6 | 07:00 | Tea/pratha & an army haircut! | |||
| 09:15 | off to Mandi | ||||
| 10:02 | Mandi | 775m | Breakfast & petrol tank top up | 15696 | |
| 11:10 | Off on the road again... to bhuntur... | 15720 | |||
| 14:43 | Bhuntur | 1100m | Tea... | 15783 | |
| 16:00 | Kasol | 1515m | Parked bike @20/- per day for 9 days. |
Reporting to YHAI base camp at Kasol for Sarpass'08 trek. Group SP-24 : Day 7 to Day 14.
| Day 15 | 06:00 | Kullu | rest day... |
| Day 16 | 07:00 | Kullu | Wakeup.. packup... | ||
| 10:30 | Checkout | ||||
| 11:00 | breakfast | ||||
| 11:25 | On the way to Bijli Mahadev | ||||
| 12:15 | Dharat | Trek starts at Dharat. Distance to cover 2km+ | |||
| 14:15 | Bijli Mahadev | 2380m | well, a tiring climb.. no one would be believe we just completed Sarpass!! | ||
| 14:50 | returning back... | ||||
| 15:30 | Dharat | pick up our bike... | |||
| 16:30 | Kullu | lunch... | |||
| 18:00 | kinda late to start for Manali... but the road is good... | ||||
| 19:45 | Manali | it is too crowded for our comforts! Peak tourist season... we decide to move to Vashist | |||
| 20:30 | Vashist | Checked into hotel... |
| Day 17 | 08:00 | hot bath at sulphur spring. | |||
| 11:30 | To Manali for sight seeing... tank topup | 15958 | |||
| 18:00 | Bike servicing at Vashist |
| Day 18 | 08:00 | D-day! kinda late... checked out & start bike to find a broken Kick spring!! aahhhh... | |||
| 09:30 | mechanic takes his own sweet time waking up! Repair is done... and then the bike kind of slide while turning & the font brake lever is broken!!! ummmm... wo bhi change hua... so we finally get to start at 9:30am... in between we have our tea & biscuits... | ||||
| 11:10 | Mirhi Dam | 3165m | breakfast at last! | ||
| Rohtang La | 3850m | ||||
| Koksar | 3075m | ||||
| Sisu | 2965m | ||||
| 17:00 | Gondhla | 3160m | Got the broken carrier of the bike welded. Tea... | ||
| 17:50 | start out again. No more welding shop before Leh | ||||
| 18:15 | Tandi | 2855m | Tank topup... heard that the working hours here are erratic! | 16074 | |
| 18:40 | Keylong | 3050m | night halt... |
| Day 19 | Keylong | Another rest day... | 16084 |
| Day 20 | 07:30 | start for Sarchu | |||
| 08:40 | Jispa | 3160m | |||
| 08:55 | Darch | 3230m | breakfast... | 16112 | |
| 11:50 | ZingZing Bar | 3900m | start of ZingZing bar... | 16139 | |
| 12:43 | Baracha La | 4695m | 16160 | ||
| 13:00 | Bharatpur | 4510m | maggie... | 16166 | |
| KillingSalai | 4400m | 16179 | |||
| 15:00 | Sarchu | 4145m | Lunch & rest. Night halt. | 16193 |
| Day 21 | 07:30 | Start out for Leh... | |||
| 09:35 | Nakee La | 4720m | 16239 | ||
| 09:55 | Risky Nala | Tea break at Risky nala alias Whisky Nala alias Brandy nala. We did not know, but this place is prone to flash floods.. and many a vehicles have been washed away!! | 16244 | ||
| 10:30 | LachulungLa | 4850m | 16251 | ||
| 12:00 | Pang | 4290m | 16275 | ||
| 15:35 | Tanglang La | 5150m | Sri Krishna temple | 16341 | |
| 17:30 | Rhumtse | 4070m | |||
| Upshe | 3385m | a late lunch... | 16404 | ||
| 20:15 | Leh | 3430m | finally some stability! Our home for the next 4 days... | 16455 |
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