The zmas latest ride from the urban jungles of Mumbai to through the arid terrain of Gujarat till the Great Indian desert and back.. hop on board with ace lensman Mehul Gohil as he takes you through this very picturesque journey filled with a hot cultural blend of colours, kms and the open road called life!

Wednesday, January 30, 2008






























So here it was, the day to ride to Bikaner on that most most most most most awesome, ossome, .... i i i ijust dont have words for this most exhilarating road in our country. an arrow straight sheet of tarmac, all 300 kms of it( if not) straight till Bikaner! woow. I was all fired up. the dream ride had arrived. and i was enjoying every moment of it.

Had tea at Chowdharyjee's tea stall( muaah!!), some nice hot onion kachoris and we bid adieu to Jaisalmer at 9 and it was hard saying goodbye to this lovely city. turning back, i said i will come back soon, maybe on some better bike or something.. The bikes were running low on fuel and we only had a little less than half a tankful. Keeping both our bike averages in mind, we decided to go ahead without a break and tank up at Pokhran. Once the city limits were crossed, the roads began and so did the romance! The zma was soo loving this. Flat wide open bends, deep curves, roads going up and then straaaaaaaaaight down(yea say it like dat) and straight ahead. we were on our own, the tire grip was flawless, the wind wasnt much and the crammies were nicely settled.. For those 2 hrs till we reached Pokhran the smile on the face didnt seem to vanish and the twinkle in the eyes seemed to outshine the sun. Aaah! Lot of things were going around in the mind, but most of all, i was living my dream, all planning had paid off and here i was riding on my dream road. The belief in myself had truly paid off. Nothing, nothing ever felt soo perfect.

After tanking up at Pokhran, took a small lunch halt at the RTDC motel. Had the famous cutlets and omelettes( one each) as lunch before dashing to Khichan. My bike was now running very low on oil and that made me abort my chance of hitting the 125ks that i had oh so desired of! but nevertheless, i was safely on the road and that as important:)

The humanless sights continued for long n long n long n long, passed by so many sheep in mysterious formations on the road( donno doing what) until we reached the outskirts of Khichan. I had mixed feelings of seeing the migratory birds and it came true. There were none, and we came back empty handed. The only joy was to see school children come swarming around us just to be with our bikes for a precious little moments! that was so endearing. And their joy knew no bounds when we took photos wid em, the smiles in the eyes and the face were something to cherish forever!! dhoom was all over the place. as we left the place they were still running behind us bidding farewell.

The approach roads towards bikaner were real bad, but even though we managed to reach well before sunset. checked in at the RTDC hotel and called it quits for the day..

The bad part of the day was i was running out of space on the D80 and luckily the coolpix came in handy here. Missed taking shots of the long road with the D80, but the 8800 sufficed big time for it.. I took a real long video of the road, plus the usual pix.. did miss the colors i would normally achieve but nevertheless. So to say, I canned it again:)












On the return, we wished to stop at Amar Sagar lake, but that wasnt possible as we were now running out of time. You come across these windmills in that area near Bada baug( also worth giving a skip as nothings there worth seeing) that will catch ur attention. Do stop for pix. They made up for the amarsagar skip..We took some in a jiffy and off we were coz we were alrdy late for Sam. Sammmm, here i come!!

A little rest and we had to dash to Sam sand dunes..Decided to keep one bike behind and go on the zma express. We got a li'l late as the sunset before we reached. Nevertheless, nature had much more in store for us and the colors never ceased to amaze..this incidently, was also our last day in Jaisalmer and i wanted to make the most of it. So had some shots in mind ever since the inception of the dream ride and now come what may, i badly wanted to can those shots...

Ever heard of moonrise?? and seen it all?? nope or yea, i have it here. that was a fantabulous site to behold, as it wasnt expected at all. It was something which would have gone unnoticed! stunning stunning stunning...Heart killing these beautiful sights..


To top it all, theres Jaisalmer fort for you, in all its glory at night, beautifully lit up by the floodlights. Given whichever hotel you are staying( preferably nr the fort), dont give this sight a miss. It was like the cherry on top of the cake. Yummmmmm!!!























Ride to Tanot, or the Indo-Pak border.

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