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Taj Mahal – The Epitome of Love. |
Madhya Pradesh – The Heart of India. |
Just added the main page of the trip log, for the ride to Taj Mahal and Madhya Pradesh done in Nov 2010. Check out the trip log here.
Its a work in progress and I hope to finish things in next couple of days.
My first decent rainy ride in more than 2 years, turned out to be a really good and satisfying in the end. Though I have ridden to Mumbai in the very first rains of the season, it was more of a high speed run on near perfect piece of tarmac.
In search of a decent resort in or around Mulshi, for a family outing next weekend, I decided to visit there on a motorcycle.
By the time I got kitted for the ride it was lunch time, though the normal routeto Mulshi is via Chandni Chowk – Pirangut – Paud, I have been on that stretch so many times that today I was just not feeling like riding on the very same stretch. So, I head out in opposite direction on NH4. After filling more than enough fuel for the ride at Shell pump (a rare thing for me, I often land up filling lesser fuel than needed for the ride and then searching for one later) I headed towards Lonavala. After having covered some 10 odd km’s, I got bored of the tarmac and got onto a road through villages and headed towards Pavana dam.
It was a bumpy, slow ride all the way with lush green scenery all around me. Though it was bone dry in Pune, as soon as I got on this road rain god welcomes me with heavy showers. All my plans of stopping to capture greenery were put on hold, thanks to rain.
Enjoying every water filled pothole, occasional good section of tarmac and gravel, I reach the dam. Disappointed to see it not yet fully filled. A small stop and I was heading towards Paud. Just as I started to climb, the beautiful view of Tung fort made me get off the road for some offroading on slush + green grass stretches.
The ride till Paud was kinda monotonous with no rains and no great view that would made me stand up on brakes. Road conditions deteriorated soon after Paud and I was already in no mood to repeat the Paud – Mulshi stretch on my way back.
After finishing the inspection of all the probably resorts, I was feeling hungry so pulled over for a pit stop around 3:15. Missal Pav it would be for the near empty stomach. While having food I decided to head towards Lonavala. It was almost 4pm and with bike’s chain a bit loose for my comfort and rear sprocket having a bit of play (may be rubber bushing/bearing gone), there was a distinct possibility of getting stranded in a jungle. All part and parcel of adventure on two wheels, I said and got on the bike and headed towards Tamhini.
The road was bit better than before but the non-stop rain was giving very little chance to bring out the camera. Just after crossing Tamhini village, I got off the road and got on the offroad section towards Amby Valley. After a decent stretch initially, consisting of broken tarmac and some gravel I got on a stretch that was mostly a layer of stones, almost till the end. With rain, jungle and hardly any civilization, I wasn’t complaining much about the road surface. After all I didn’t want to go berserk on near perfect tarmac.
It was disappointing to see not too many sections of road under water, not enough water streams or over flowing rivers, as I encountered during my last ride on this section.
Before it got anywhere close to dark I was on the tarmac section near Amby valley, twisties at its best. It was tempting me to push like crazy in search of scraping my knees against tarmac. Alas, if wishes were horses I would have been on a 223bhp machine and not a 223cc machine. In no time I was riding in thick fog, with near zero visibility, so all plans of pressing that “red” button were put to rest. Though the pace was really slow, still it was fun. After all I was still out of city limits with not much traffic to deal with.
Soon the dream run came to an end, as I approached Bushi Dam. With no fog and rain around, I switched from fun mode to reach home mode. After a initial struggle to pass the long queue of cars, I somehow managed to come out on NH4. The traffic is diverted and I came out just next to the turn for Rajmachi. It was very very tempting to take the turn but with clock well past 6, it was just too late for my comfort. So, it was time to slot into top gear and finally press the “red” button to head home before it gets dark. In the end, just managed to park my bike in garage before it was pitch dark to end a much needed and entertaining ride.
When: 8th Auguest 2009
Route: Pune – Pavana Dam – Paud – Mulshi – Tamhini – Kundalika – Amby Valley – Lonavala – Pune.
Distance: 213km’s
Time taken: 6hrs 35min.
It is not that I was very actively updating my blog here, that anyone will notice that I’m away from Internet for sometime.
Still, for those who stay in touch with me via e-mail, IM’s and other mode of communication, please note that I’ll be out of reach for next two weeks. The picture above should give you an indication as to where I can be found, if at all. 🙂
After spending almost entire night @ office, I dumped the idea of hitting bed. Started in dark towards Lavasa to greet Sun a very good morning. Also got a chance to ride my bike into Lavasa township. Picture from a wonderful morning.
View from Lavasa Top, just before Sun was about to come out.
It was not just me but moon also waiting to greet Sun.
First view of the sun as it come out to brighten up the sky.
Watching Sun rise from Lavasa top.
Viewing Sun through leaves of a tree.
Temghar Dam backwaters view from road to Lavasa city.
Standing on the banks of warasgaon dam backwaters.
Warasgaon Dam backwater as viewed from Lavasa City.
Twisties – No matter how much you have them, you always want more.
CBZ Standing at the bottom of Lavasa township. Towards Warasgaon end.
Standing in Lavasa city.
While I was sipping on Tea, I found this young chap making the most of the early morning warm Sun rays.
Click on image to view in bigger size.
It’s a belief that what ever we do at the start of New Year, we will keep doing that for the rest of year. I wanted to ride out on 31st night but then family and friends had some plans so I decided to party instead.
Couple of days later, it was the first weekend of year and I decided, better late than never. So, I head out to some near by places. Saturday ride was sort of warm up and hence it was just 103km trip, a slow one at that (Ride duration: 2hrs 45min).
Lack of interest in riding on straight roads, I decided to head to near by twisties and sure it was fun even at speeds around 50km/hr (yes, I was running in my bike after a new block piston kit).
The route I took was Chandani Chowk – Mutha – Lavasa – Mutha – Pirangut – Paud – Hinjewadi.
Sunday I decided to head towards Mahabaleshwar, while I was cruising on NH4 at yawning speed I realized I’m not carrying my bike’s original RC book (often documents are checked at Panchgani, only of two wheelers, as if we are criminals while people in cages are all saints). So when I saw a familiar turn off NH4, I jammed my brakes (must have put down a few mm’s of rubber on tarmac) and got off the boring highway. This was the road I have taken for the last time in Jun’03 (when we went for Pulsar Yahoo Group’s Annual meet). This is a lesser known (to travelers) road that takes you to Bhor. Yes, I dumped Mahabaleshwar in favour of Bhor and Varandha Ghat.
The nature of road hasn’t changed much once we cross Bhor. Though its pothole free tarmac almost all the way, there is plenty of gravel on both the edges and in center. I love it, you over cook a curve, run wide and either you will go off the road or can go and kiss mother earth.
Since rains have just gone by, water levels are good in the dam en-route.
After a small break for hot bhajis and tea in Varandha ghat I headed towards Mahad. It was closing on 5pm and I knew I’ll have to climb back in dark, on my way back. Having climbed Tamhini in dark few days back on CBZ, I wasn’t too worried of taking the same route again.
Once I reached Mahad, I saw Poladpur (to go towards Mahabaleshwar) some 15km’s away and there was no distance to Mangaon (to go towards Mulshi) given, I guessed that Mangaon can’t be too far away so I headed towards it, after few km’s I realized my mistake as it was still some 30km’s away and the sun has started to go behind hills. By the time I reached Mangaon it was 6:15pm and after filling some fuel (yeah twice I have started the climb to Tamhini with bike about to hit reserve – no way was I going to repeat that mistake).
The Mangaon – Vilhe road was almost empty of traffic and in lovely condition. Even though it was dark, it was fun riding in that section filled with twisties. After Vilhe, I decided to stay with couple of cars that were climbing Tamhini but with me not wanting to stress my new engine, mid way thru the ghat one car was too fast for me while the other was too slow, as a result I was left all alone. It was a bit scary and I was remembering only all the scary stories I have heard about this area. Hoping to catch some slow moving vehicle ahead, I kept on riding but I wasn’t that lucky. Once I passed the last dhaba on top of ghat, it was me and my bike all alone. Other than my bike’s headlamp, moon and stars were the only light sources visible. I wanted to stop and click some pictures but wasn’t able to gather enough courage to do so. After riding all alone for some 15min’s I caught up with some traffic as the bad stretch of road has started. Then on it was just a matter of keeping up with them.
Following with vehicles I reached Mulshi lake and what a beautiful view it was, I told myself I’m coming back here in night again, of course not alone :-). As I was feeling hungry, I halted for dinner and then it was a slow cruise till home.
Route: Pune – Bhor – Mahad – Mangaon – Vile – Tamhini – Mulshi – Pune
Distance: 300km’s
Ride Duration: 8hrs 30min
Click on image to view in bigger size.
Today I was out again in night sharpening my panning shots. Lday luck was with me and the very first shot came out almost perfect (to my liking). As I was hand holding the camera, I started with ISO1600 and hence some grain can be seen in the image.
Clicked using Canon 70-200 f/4 L lense on 400D, shot @ ISO 1600, 188mm, f/4 and 1/10sec shutter speed.
Motivated by my effort, I got the tripod out and started to practise on the moving objets. Now, I was able to bring the ISO down to 400 without too much blurr as I was no more hand holding the camera. Following is one of the many clics.
Clicked using Canon 70-200 f/4 L lense on 400D, shot @ ISO400, 145mm f/4 and 1/5sec shutter speed.
While I was out, I also decided to capture the white moon, almost in its full shape.
Clicked using Canon 70-200 f/4 L lense on 400D, shot @ ISO100, 200mm f/8 and 1/125sec shutter speed.
Similar topics
Panning – My Debut shots
Moon’o’graphy
Last night as I was done shooting moon from my house balcony, I looked at the well illuminated empty road, some 100m away from me. Tried to click some shots but due to not using a tripod most of them didn’t came well. In between I clicked a zooming car and thats when I decided to try my hand at Panning. Due to low light condition, I had to use higher ISO and really slow shutter speed and hence shots were having too much noise/not sharp enough.
So today morning I decided to venture out once again and here are some of the shots I managed.
Click on image to view in bigger size.
So how did I clicked them?
I used a slow shutter speed (resulting in larger f-stop/small aperture) and switched between “One Shot” & “AI Servo” (or something like that). Moved the camera along with the moving car/bike. Click and kept moving, when I didn’t moved the camera as I clicked, the object came blurred.
What is Panning?
In simple terms, its about clicking a picture by keeping the moving object in the frame by moving the camera along the object and clicking it at the same time. This will blurr out the background, giving a sense of motion in the image.
For these shots I used my Canon 400D with 70-200 f/4 L lense.
The above image was created by merging the following two images and did some cropping, along with exposure correction.
Similar topics
Lightning – 1
9th April 2008 – It was one of those evenings when skies were looking threatening to destroy everything that will come in their ways. I decided to cash in on this opportunity and put my 400D to capture the lightning coming down from sky every now and then.
Pug-OT, a yahoo group I’m a member of have started a very useful thread TOTW (Technique Of The Week). As you could have guessed now, Slow Sync was the first topic of TOTW. As a beginner with photography, it was a nice learning experience for me.
Slow Sync – A technique in which we fire the flash along with slow shutter speed. One use of it, as shown in the above image, is to increase the illumination of background.
Following are some of the links I read to learn about this technique
Flash Photography Made Simple
In the above image, the top picture is clicked in Full Auto Mode and the bottom picture is clicked in Manual mode. Following are the details.
Top Pic: Auto(1/60sec, f/3.5, 18mm, ISO400, Pattern Metering).
Bottom Pic: M(6sec, f/3.5, 18mm, ISO400, Partial Metering).
Camera: Canon 400D
Lens: 18-55