Our trips are Contagious, are yours worth Catching?
Kudremukh!
I’ve been there half a dozen times already. Its a special place. A contrast from the city i live in. Beautiful, serene and engaging.
Kudremukh is about 110kms from Mangalore and a fantastic destination for a weekend getaway. It was Sunday and we decided to head over to KDM, Kudremukh as we call it.
Abhay was the newest member of the group, a long time friend but he was justing begining to ride bigger distances on his R15. This was his first long ride ever. We also had Sunny’s friend and an enthusiastic member on the day; Sabata was riding pillion with Sunny! It was her first time visiting Kudremukh!
Due to some delays i met Sunny, Sabata and Abhay and requested them to leave at 10am. I finished my work just as thilak called me saying he wanted to join in for the ride.
It was an incredibly hot Sunday, 11th of October 2009, as we left Mangalore at 11.05AM and reached Attur Church at Karkala by 11.50 battling the traffic which had built up by noon. The heat sapped our energies quite a bit. After a short break at the church, we offered our prayers, stopped by the wishing pool and left towards our destination!
Thilak had brought his tri-pod with him and i had my friend Sidharth’s cam and we used it to take quite a few pictures.
We reached the Malaghat check post, received our entry passes, had a short break and resumed our ride. The weather changed with the journey and cooled down to comfortable levels. With a few stops for photography we headed towards to Kudremukh township.
The road leading up to Kudremukh is race-track like. Superb tarmac and a million curves. But the road is dangerous. There are several blind spots and new riders tend to run wide atleast a few times. This is my favorite spot. I’ve ridden here before, and this stretch takes me to cloud 9.
As we reached Kudremukh we decided to head to lunch. The township is beautiful roads heading in almost every direction. Today we headed over to the Kudremukh guest house, and not our usual place; ‘Hotel Ravi’ that we always visit for lunch, behind the forest reserve check post. The guest house is about about 1 kilometer from the entry to the township. The lunch was quick and the food was great! We never expected tasty chicken kebabs so far away from a real city. Dal fry, Rice and Rotis was also on our menu and we relished on the food. But the unexpected part was the bill! We came out with the experience of having eaten at a 3star hotel.
On our way back i decided to try and get a time extention. For those of you who aren’t aware; vehicles passing between the checkposts at Kudremukh National Reserve are not allowed to stop in between, and delay their exit time without a valid reason. For trucks the time limit is ~2 hours. Cars its 1.5hours and bikes just 1 hour. I spoke to the official and told him we need to make a pitstop on our way back. It was 2.45PM when we were at the forest resever office and i got a 35 minute extention. Luckily the officer there recognized me from a recent trip and i came out with our pass. With our official time to leave Kudremukh starting at 3.20, your’s truly decided to take the group for a little off roading.
The bridge before Kudremukh has an amazing valley. It showcases the old Kudremukh Iron Ore factory far away. One can trek all the way up to it. There is a small path next to the bridge leading to the river bed.
The rocky path laden with huge pebble-like stones made it challenging to get down to the rocky river bed. Thilak, Abhay and I made it to the riverbed, while Sunny decided to keep his bike a little higher up the path.
When we reached down Thilak’s bike stopped running. It wouldnt start! The battery was completely dead and the positive cable had snapped off. I asked him to hold the bike and we pushed it down the rocky riverbed. Slotted the bike in second gear and push started it! It worked!
With a time limit on hand and Sunny’s friend having to reach home by 5PM we engaged in a quick photo shoot. The results turned out quite interesting! Thilak and I have vowed to return to this place again for a lot more action, and hopefully bring our own DSLR camera with us.
We left this place and made a quick pitstop at the bridge. Sunny and Sabata proceeded towards the check post and decided to wait for us there. We decided to head to the main straight at Kudremukh valley for some top speed runs. This stretch is long, with a slight but a lengthy decline, mild curves but a good view of the road ahead. This day i almost peaked out my mini-R1. I had hit 143 max before and 142 on the trip but i managed a best of 145kmph on this day. Crouching for over a kilometer, i managed to hit the best speed on my Storm ever! The bike stayed upwards of 140kph multiple times on the stretch with a best of 145kmph. 6 kmph less off redline.
Thilak and Abhay managed their best speeds as well. After a short break here, it was a mad rush to the check post.
Your’s truly was the first to reach the check post and handing over the exit passes. Thilak and Abhay soon joined in. We had a short water break and headed towards Mangalore with just one stop to fuel our bikes at Moodabidri.
We reached the outskirts of the city and had to part our ways. With a small photoshoot at Vamanjoor, we departed on our way.
This was one of the quickest trips to Kudremukh. I’ve made a continuous run to Kudremukh and back in 3 hours flat before but this was fast and my most memorable one. We had a lot of fun, the company was great with some close friends on the day made if for a great destresser after a long work-weekend. This was my 5th trip to Kudremukh this year.
Looking forward to the next one!
Ride Hard & Ride Safe!
P.S. Visit the Flickr Album here to check out all the images in larger resolutions.
