May Day Ride 2017
Plan
Three days back was having a normal conversation with my
Hyderabad friend Kiran, during conversation we planned a short ride where we would
catch up in some common place, Gandikota
was zeroed in we planned to meet at 12pm stay there till 4pm and return home by
10pm to their respective home town. As usual other friends dropped out at last
minute that's nothing new to us we still went ahead with our plans and met up.
Thank you Kiran for making it on time.
Ride day
Started at 4am from Bangalore, there were like 300+ bikes
heading to Nandi Hills for sunrise, as usual cops were stopping the bikes at Devanahali
toll booth even when it was raining, have to appreciate their sincerity and commitment
as it was 1st day of the month( ).
We reached Lepakshi around 6am.
Lepakshi, Appx 200mts before reaching the temple towards right side one can spot Shiva's bull
Nandi statue its a granite monolithic sculpture on the main road of Lepashki. Temple opens at 7.30am lucky to have first
darshan for the day of Durga devi and veerabhadra swamy.
Lepakshi(Durga Devi) the name emerges from Ramayana story where
a bird fights Ravana while kidnapping Sita and it gets injured(broken wing) and
falls in that place, Rama gets to know this while crossing the place and blesses
the bird, it's found on the right side of the sanctum
made out of a pillar supporting the temple roof, this is the only lord which doesn't
have gharbagudi and has a mirror placed
on west side so the people can have easy darshan.
Veerabhadra swamy it was built by two brothers Viranna and
Virupanna, facing north side next to the left leg of the lord there is head
which is kept as trophy by the lord and next to it lies the small black stone
called as birth stone.
Temple has many gods spread all over with two big statues of
Ganesha and Shiva and some ruins outside, the other attraction in this temple
is the hanging pillar it's on the left side of the main entrance each pillar and carvings are done in different
shapes some pillars are C shape, square and rectangular.
Gandikota ( The grand Canyon of India) ride was pleasant
till 10.30am as it had rained heavily on the route, there were several trees
uprooted , and small floods on roads we made it at 12pm sharp to Gandikota
where Kiran from Hyderbad too arrived 5min later he too had an long story of is
ride his ride his knee guards were stolen from a hotel where he had parked to
have breakfast, it was my 2nd visit to Gandikota temperature was around 41*c having
a proper sun bathing at view point for an hour, we went to APSTDC for lunch as
there are no hotels around( people visiting this place please carry your own
food ). Long stories over lunch met an rider from Chennai who had come there,
he had done K2K last year he shared is experience and we guided him to nearby
places near Gandikota.
Batrepalli water falls in Kadiri district, it can be seen
from state highway Kadiri pulivendula road while returining, found out from
locals nearby that its dry now due to summer as seen in the picture.
Return reached Bangalore on time by 9:30pm first ride to be completed
on time. Kiran too reached around Hyderbad by 10:30pm.
Riders,
Santhosh Venkataram (Bangalore)
Nandini ( Bangalore)
DRC Kiran ( Hyderabad ).
Bikes
Thunderbird 500
Thunderbird 350
