We woke up early on Saturday morning as our excitement to ride all day ahead was more compared to the joy of being in the bed until 9:00 AM. So here we were on the tar at 6:30 AM with high and right spirits filling up our mind.
Waited on the way for a cup of tea where we also got an ST driver (as only those are the ones awake on a Saturday morning besides some crazy fellows) to confirm the Road going to towards Aurangabad. The road was very good, until now we were wondering as to why all the people around India curse the Indian Roads. The roads were smooth and so wide that we could drive almost together side by side.
Before 8:30 we were at Aurangabad. We thought of having ourselves full in “Aum Shiv Ganesh Idli Wada stall”, before focusing ourselves towards our next destination which was Ajanta Caves.
On the way we also saw the Delhi Darwaza, where we did not waste any time to think as to “What was Delhi darwaza doing at Aurangabad” because we were fully aware that Mughals were a crazy bunch of people who could do anything for their wife’s at the cost of the people in the kingdom. We assumed that Delhi Darwaza must have been a result of a wish by a Mughal king’s wife to see the Delhi darwaza (which was obviously at Delhi at that time) and hence to fulfill this wish we see this Delhi darwaza besides HP petrol pump in Aurangabad.
So enough of history and we were looking into the future and eager to see Ajanta caves which we had heard a lot about. We had known that the main attraction were the ancient paintings on the walls which were drawn some many centuries ago. Though we were not any great lovers of art or homo-sapiens with great creative instincts, we thought we should stamp our bike wheels on this area as well.
However, I would say we were quite amused with the monasteries with various different architectures and the care taken to preserve the ancient paintings and monasteries by the Archaeological survey of India. They had special mild focus lamps in the caves to ensure that the paintings are preserved, no camera flashes or any other bright light is allowed inside the caves. We were also surprised to see that even during the 5th century they had the concept of balconies and floors, there was seriously a monastery that had a first floor.
Our creative heads were so much engrossed in the caves that we forgot about that time until we realized at the end that it was 2:30 PM. We came to the MTDC restaurant and had our lunch and until 4:00 PM we were still at Ajanta Caves.
Now we had to rethink on our plan to go to Lonark. Asked a policeman there who told us that Lonark was only 80 Kms from Ajanta caves which meant we would take to reach there just 1.5 hours. We were excited that everything was going as per our plan and we were looking forward for Lonark. We had to go Via Buldhana from where we would get a road to Lonark. We reached Buldhana and it was only then that we realized Lonark was still 164 Kms from Buldhana. Terrible…..We blamed everybody we possibly could and especially the policeman. I was still of the opinion that we go to Lonark, however Deepak controlled me and my outrageous thoughts. So here we were with already 350 Kms travelled for the day and another 150 Kms remaining until we reach Aurangabad. And mind you the time was 5:30 in the evening.
Enough for this moment. I will mention about the darkest night we had in our lifetime in the next part though we learnt a lot from that night. Next part coming soon.
Saturday, June 26, 2010
Thursday, June 10, 2010
Biking to Mr Aurangzeb's city - Part1
Somebody has rightly said "Four wheels move just the body while two wheels move the soul!!". Similar sort of experience is what I got when I visited aurangabad on Unicorn on 5th and 6th of June.
Most of the trips are fun when they are absolutely unplanned. You just decide just in a split of seconds, surf through the internet for a couple of minutes to know the route and then the whole world is yours, just ride until the road takes you to the destination.
The best thing about biking is that you are a free bird with no barriers besides the traffic rules you need to follow. It brings in you the excitement, the pleasure of simply riding along the road enjoying the wind, sun and the fragrance. I read a quote recently saying you do the best communication when you are on the bike alone. That is absolutely true. You communicate to the fellow driver the fear of a danger you expect, you warn him with signals, you give a stern look asking him to come by quickly or also you signal to him with a sweet expression if you come across by a sweet girl along the road.
I pinged Deepak (another bike enthusiast) on Friday Morning whether we should try and explore a place this weekend. We had a lot of places in mind like Nashik, Bhandardara, Satara, Sinhgad etc etc. Finally surfing through the internet we zeroed down to Mr. Aurangzeb's city Aurangabad and get a feel of the powerful Mughals who ruled most of India. I have always believed that though Mughals are considered for most of the wrong things that happened to India, they also should be given the credit for the most flourishing culture and art they have provided us.
So we left the same evening and decided to stay at Ahmednagar and take over the route to Aurangabad the following morning so that we do not end up travelling a lot on a single day. The road from Pune to Aurangabad is a National Highway and i thanked the road ways for the first time in my life for constructing such an convenient highway. Otherwise the road ways are always thanked for the wrong things. We reached ahmednagar at around 9:30 and slept soon after a days work and 2 hours of riding. So in short no exciting experiences during the first part of the game and the most exciting things besides some mighty bitter experiences were to follow which we were unaware of until this time.
Read on in the next part the best learning experience we had on this trip. The next part of the blog to follow soon.
Most of the trips are fun when they are absolutely unplanned. You just decide just in a split of seconds, surf through the internet for a couple of minutes to know the route and then the whole world is yours, just ride until the road takes you to the destination.
The best thing about biking is that you are a free bird with no barriers besides the traffic rules you need to follow. It brings in you the excitement, the pleasure of simply riding along the road enjoying the wind, sun and the fragrance. I read a quote recently saying you do the best communication when you are on the bike alone. That is absolutely true. You communicate to the fellow driver the fear of a danger you expect, you warn him with signals, you give a stern look asking him to come by quickly or also you signal to him with a sweet expression if you come across by a sweet girl along the road.
I pinged Deepak (another bike enthusiast) on Friday Morning whether we should try and explore a place this weekend. We had a lot of places in mind like Nashik, Bhandardara, Satara, Sinhgad etc etc. Finally surfing through the internet we zeroed down to Mr. Aurangzeb's city Aurangabad and get a feel of the powerful Mughals who ruled most of India. I have always believed that though Mughals are considered for most of the wrong things that happened to India, they also should be given the credit for the most flourishing culture and art they have provided us.
So we left the same evening and decided to stay at Ahmednagar and take over the route to Aurangabad the following morning so that we do not end up travelling a lot on a single day. The road from Pune to Aurangabad is a National Highway and i thanked the road ways for the first time in my life for constructing such an convenient highway. Otherwise the road ways are always thanked for the wrong things. We reached ahmednagar at around 9:30 and slept soon after a days work and 2 hours of riding. So in short no exciting experiences during the first part of the game and the most exciting things besides some mighty bitter experiences were to follow which we were unaware of until this time.
Read on in the next part the best learning experience we had on this trip. The next part of the blog to follow soon.
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