June 8th, 2022
Woke up at 7:00 a.m. to get ready. Quick shower and then put on most of the riding gear, packed up bags and then headed down for breakfast.
Once done with meal, did a quick internet update and check, then went back to room to move gear down to the bikes. Put the camp bag in the pile that will go on the support truck, then mounted the camera gear bag, rain gear backpack and tank bag on the bike. Next setup the GoPro on the mirror arm and then tried to mount my GoPro 360, but just not going to work the way I had hoped. Will think about it and try another option later.
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| Bike loaded and ready to go. |
Most of us then stood around talking and we also took a big group photo with the bikes, then we were off. Rode out of the hotel and then turned off onto a back road out of Manali, so only had to deal with the heavy city traffic for about 20 minutes (instead of the hour or more the main road took us). This road took us up along the mountains within the forest and wound around and passed through several small villages. I turned on the GoPro for much of that route.
This road was mostly paved, but a few dirt/rock sections and some pavement was in pretty bad shape as well. We mostly stayed in a group and soon started to come back down toward the river at the bottom of the valley. Traffic was still a bit heavy and we had the occasional road congestion delays, but nothing too crazy and we all handled it fine.
Once at the river we joined up with the highway we drove in on the other day. Much of this section was a proper divided highway, so only had to deal with passing slower traffic, but did have the occasional wrong way driver (not uncommon here). A few sections of the route were less developed or under construction still, so those slowed things down some.
The highway sections went fairly quickly as we were able to stay up around 60 mph for most of it. The long 2 mile tunnel we drove through on way up was the last section we rode before turning off the highway. The tunnel was not too much fun - dusty, low visibility and difficult to breathe well, glad to get out of it. Once we turned off we stopped for a brief rest/tea stop and to let all riders regroup as we had spread out some on the highway. We then headed up the narrow road towards Jalori pass which is at 3220m (10564 feet)
This road was nice at first, but as we climbed it became more beat up and had several sections of just dirt/rocks. The biggest issue was the road was barely 1 lane, so dealing with oncoming traffic or trying pass or be passed was tricky. Lots of horn blasting and strategic traffic maneuvers. I did quite a few passes easily, but a few times had to drop into the dirt shoulders which are quite rough.
At one point I was almost past a bus when it just moved over into me and I had to take to the dirt to avoid a collision. Very rough section, so just gunned it and after some crazy bumps and a few bush branch strikes to the body I was past him.
We had several traffic jams that we bikes could just thread through and few fast stops to avoid bike pile ups when someone in a car did something unexpected, but generally was decent traffic on the way up.
This route is where the group started to split apart and eventually I found myself riding alone somewhere near the back of the pack. I just could not keep speed up the hills on the bike, probably due to my weight and the extra gear I had on it. And I also was not interested in flying down the road at Mach 1, I wanted to enjoy what was around me.
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| View along the road up the pass. |
At one point we all ended up back together to wait for a rock slide to be cleared off the road. Apparently several slides had occurred overnight and this was the last one left to clean up. Thankfully I only had to wait about 10 minutes since I was the last to arrive.
Had a few issues getting through the slide area with oncoming traffic though, since I was about 10 seconds behind the last driver they started letting the downward traffic through before I got to the end of the narrow section but was already past the guy controlling it on the upward section. Fun stuff.
I soon was on my own again as everyone else just took off, so I just kept working my way up to the top. Once there we were all stopped for a rest/lunch break. Took a few photos and videos, then had my lunch at a little roadside shack of some local Indian food that was not too bad for street food.
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| View from Jalori Pass |
We then started to head down the other side of the pass. The trip down was much nicer. Far less traffic and great views of the valleys and peaks. I just rode down in 2nd gear and enjoyed the views, mostly on my own again, though would occasionally come upon other riders taking photos, but as I was stopping they were leaving. I eventually was at the very back of the group again, except for the sweeper rider who always stayed behind the last guy and had to sit and wait while we stopped for photos or other things.
Eventually reached the campsite for tonight. Parked the bikes with the trucks on a flat space below the road grade near a creek. Then had to find my way across the creek on the various rocks and up a small hill to the campsite where the tents were mostly setup in an old unused field. (complete with cows roaming around through the camp or nearby.)
We talked a bit with other riders, then most of us stripped down to skivvies and went into the creek to bath and or wash off the days riding dust. This will be our shower in the morning if we choose as well. The water was really cold, so I only waded around to relax my feet, and washed head, face and arms, but was not going to dive in like some did.
After that I grabbed my bag from the truck and got changed into my camp clothes, which was mainly the lightweight pants I brought, light shoes and would leave on the shirt I wore in most cases, or change into the long sleeve shirt I had along if need.
I next organized my tent (I again lucked out and was sleeping by myself) then went around taking a few photos of the area and campsite. I then sorted my bags a bit to change how I was carrying some things for better access while on the bike. Then it was time to do laundry down at the creek, grab a quick snack and then update FB (shockingly one of the team had good cell service and has setup a hot spot so we could connect). I then went into tent to get journal updated before dinner.
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| Anni campsite |
We first had a small appetizer of some kind of soup, not sure what it was, but was really good. Dinner would still be another hour or so away. I went back to tent and zipped the legs back onto my pants (it was still quite warm so had removed them earlier) and borrowed the DEET spray one of the guys had to hopefully stop the buffet I had become from mosquitos and large flies. [Some of the bites would be visible and itching for almost the entire trip.]
I then put my batteries for the cameras onto the charging modules I had brought with me (had 4 of them, two which could be recharged via Solar and one even had a hand crank). I then pulled out my old handheld GPS and got an altitude reading for the campsite (~1650m or 5413 feet). Then went over near the dinner tent and sat around talking with the group.
Dinner was ready a bit later and was okay, nothing too fancy. I returned to the tent to take a pain pill as I was starting to have some muscle pains and grabbed my jacket as the temperature dropped with the sun, though was still in the mid 60s (~18 C).
Had the tent all ready for the night except the sleeping bag which was just dropped off along with the sleeping mat, so would get that ready right before I went to bed.
Not sure what time we are leaving in the morning, but hopefully it will not be too early.
Will probably just spend rest of the night with the group talking, not much else to do out here in the middle of nowhere, so unless something really cool happens, will end this here so I can spend some time with the others before heading to bed, hopefully around 10:00 p.m.
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| Ride Route (135km/84 miles) |
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