Banavasi and Unchalli Falls-Uttra Karnataka

I know I know I couldn't come up with a better name for the post. Blame it on lack of creativity (actually I am just plain lazy to think).

I had come across this falls when browsing a automotive forum, one pic and a Facebook message later we(me and by ridding buddy JJ) were all set, err... more like decided to visit this place. We have a rule we don't plan the trip, every time we have planned the trip never materialized . I come home on a holiday , inform him the day before that we are going on a trip. And a lot of resistance from JJ, his parents don't like him riding motorcycles and he has never told them even once. Unlike my parents who no longer make the futile attempts to put some sense into the empty space between my ears. They must have heard the echo after all these ears.

So we decided to ride there, bike was CBR250, I love riding this machine. JJ came home and off we went from Hubli to Tadas cross, I should have topped up with speed petrol, indian brand of high octane fuel. There was none and no petrol bunk till Tadas cross upon enquiry the attendant told that there was one 5 Kms ahead. Despite better judgement of asking a few more people about the availability, I went ahead 10 Kms I am low on fuel and cursing the attendant with my huge vocabulary of colorful words. Finally we hit Tadas. Fill up normal fuel. We head on.

There is a place called Banavasi a temple town deep in westernghats. I wanted to visit it since all my school friends had been to a trip here and as usual I had missed, this was before almost 13 years ago or 14. So past mistakes have to be set right and JJ clueless as usual about my ulterior motives agreed.

I had no idea what to expect at Banavasi and since many visit this place I had some expectations. I don't want to comment if it was worth coming here since it's a historical place and I am not too excited about temples and such.

Here are some of the pics, excuse the quality of the pics. I have excuses for the quality-
All the pics were shot by JJ , even his.
Photography is not allowed here(seriously, that's what the board says) so we have had to shoot in spy cam style.

Ok Ok I am just a pathetic photographer who likes his pics to be taken and too lazy to shoot others. Correction I love shooting as long as its with a gun.

There is no place to leave you footwear. So take care to hide them.

This guy greets you at the entrance.



This one is of the courtyard.



A sthamba(Pillar) at the entrance.



This a stone table made out of a single rock, I'm not sure if it's a single rock. But I will still say so to make my Indian sculptors look great, and they were.





The table is locked in a steel cage so excuse the even worse quality of pics here.


A statue of Nandi, Shiva's ride.



The face of nandi has been sculpted very nicely looks very serene.





A pic from the back yard of the temple.



Another pic, I forgot from where I took this.



I was told the food in Banavasi was very good, but we had reached there pretty early and by the time we were leaving it was only 11.30 am so we skipped it. Hold on let me do a quick google on the cuisine there and may be regret a little. Ok did not find anything but I am sure this place is famous for it's food also.

Initially we had planned to reach Uncahlli via Siddapur, but at Banavasi we were advised to go via Sirsi as the road was good and not isolated like the Siddapur road. It was a good decison as I had a good ride and also got to race with a Suzuki Swift on the ghats there.

I am not able to find the route I took from Sirsi to Unchalli on google maps and don't remember the villages I passed through.

Now some pics to project "I am a biker" image of mine.





This is JJ wondering what am I doing with this lunatic.



Some pics of the falls.






I really enjoyed riding to this place,but if you intend to visit this, do go to Jog which is a mere 50Kms from here. Only regret about Unchalli is it's very difficult to reach the water as the trek is steep and would be very difficult to make it back up.



By the way there was a petrol bunk 5 kms from Tadas cross I did not see it nor did JJ, saw it on the return :)

The brown dog

Those of us who have had dogs growing up will understand how much of profound influence they have on us. And how much we miss them.

They are truly stress busters.



A pic of a dog which visits our home or follows me home whenever it sees me.

We have always had dogs in our house, Mom had a Pomeranian and than we had a cross breed Mudhol which was the most aggressive one we ever had. 2 strays. Buzo a Golden Retriever cross , which we adopted from our neighbors.They had mistreated him and when they left the dog choose to remain behind in our house. He was with us for quite some time, not once did I touch him, he had become very aggressive due to the abuse.

Then we had Johnny as GSD cross, my best dog till now, very intelligent. I have very fond memories of him. Died at the age of 11 few years ago. We never got another dog after that. I did adopt a Golden Retriever, but gave it back as it was too big and did not adjust in our house. I cried when I gave him back, he was with us for only I week.

One of my all time fav quotes on dogs and humans is the one by Will Rogers-

"If there are no dogs in Heaven,
then when I die I want to go
where they went." Will Rogers, 1897-1935

Exploring UK.. Uttara Karnataka

My favorite part of our side of Karnataka has always been Uttara Karnataka or UK. My friends from this parts used to introduce themselves as "Hi I am-- I am from UK" confusing the other person.

I enjoy visiting remote villages and jungles for the solitude they offer. During my college days Sathodi Falls near Yellapur was our regular haunt. In the past 2 years I have taken up to explore the tourist places around Hubli particularly around Yellapur/Sirsi and Dandeli.

A friend of mine had been to Shirley falls and had recommended it as it was possible to get into the water and also lack of crowd as not many know of this place. So me and my riding buddy planned to ride to the place. The road from Hubli to yellapur is very good and can be covered very fast. We went there on a CBR 250 and we usually halt for break fast at a hotel next to a Bank on the main road and also enquire for direction. A huge map is painted in the hotel highlighting all the places of interest around UK.

Shirely falls is very near to the highway a little after Yellapur, a small detour has to be taken at a small bus stop, there are no sign boards , just written in red brick " Shirley Falls here" and an arrow mark.

The road is wide enough for bike and small car and the road leads upto a small Areca nut farm. the falls is in the farm. You need to pay 10rs as entry fee.

The trail to the falls is about 500 Mts to the falls. You need to negotiate boulders to reach the falls. We climbed on the boulders and approached to the left side of the falls. One needs to be quite careful as the rocks are quite slippery .

The force of the falls at the time we visited was not too great and could sit direclty under the falls.

There is also a small cavity near the falls inhabited by Bats.

It is better to pack some food. Be care full not to liter the place as dumb idiots have already made a mess of the place with broken beer bottles in the water and all round it.

The body in the well

I was a pretty curious kid, wondering just about everything. There were not many mechanical or electronic goods in the house which had not bore the brunt of my curiosity, a beautiful alarm clock which my mother has still kept and scolds me even now for ruining it. Once the TV went broke and the way my dad looked at me, I thought I was gonna get it that day. Another obsession with me was peeping into wells, I don't know why, but I always thought all the wells had tortoise in them.

There was a place called Mayuri estate a near my house which had a huge brackish water well in the it. It was gated to prevent access to it.And always wanted to have a look. Finally a friend of mine had a house warming ceremony in Mayuri estate and me and my chums went there for the food. The area then was not yet developed and we went exploring and soon we came across the well and to my delight the well was not gated, happily it went in and peeped in, instantly I regretted it there was a body floating in it!!I just saw his bloated hand I distinctly remember he was wearing a white shirt and the something was wrong with his head.I ran scared and told my friends who did not believe nor had the guts to look themselves, another of my crazy friend Prasad agreed to look in and went ahead but he could not see it. He came back saying I was lying. Gathering up all my courage I again went in just to show from the other side of the well with Prasad following me. I saw it again and pointed out to him and I turn back and I see on one and see Prasad running like hell. He ran straight home. I was scared now thinking the police would arrest me and take me to the station. I too ran home, didn't tell my parents knowing that me going near a well would land me in trouble. An uncle had come home and he was going to a near by town and asked me to accompany him I only too happy to escape went with him.
After a good night of sleep I woke up. I was standing near the gate of my house and I saw two police constable standing near a shop, my hear started to beat rapidly I was convinced by now that they were looking for me and I was done for. I had told my sister about the body and I told her about the police. She being the elder and much much smarter then me reminded me that today was a festival and the police were just doing their rounds. I was very happy I was not caught.



A few days later I enquired with my friend whose house warming we had been to about the body. He told that some drunk guy had fallen in and had drowned. I was so relived. This incident took care of my curiosity about wells for quite a few years, needless to say I still love peeping into wells.

Updated -Expansion Chambers

I have been digging deep into forums and scouring the net collecting information on Expansion Chamber manufacturers/tuners in India for my "pipe dream" of owning a stroker. The below is the list of tuners who can build an expansion chamber for you.
The following are the tuners who can get a expansion chamber made for you to your specification, you can get expansion chambers for RX 135/100/Shogun/Shaolin and other bikes.
Numbers are not update.

For those up north-Yogesh Lakhani

The FB PageW+K Racing

Shekar Bhojanna of Pacer Yamaha Bangalore

Motokraft
9886723922
#51, 20th Main, Marenahalli, Vijayanagar.

Tectrac Racing

monish_bstreet at yahoo.com
wonderguy15 at gmail.com
Phone Dheeraj- 9035491875 shahid salman- 9538400913 monish- 9035491874

Tectrac racing



Check point service Basvershwar nagar Bangalore-Babu I have the number, but its listed under somebody elses name. Leave a comment for the number


Chamber Jose in Cochin near Kalloor international stadium-Mr Jose aka Chamber Jose - 09846053537




Thirumala Motors JC Nagar-Muthu- They stock chambers built by Muthu

Sashi Chamber Works at siddiya road 2nd cross Urvashi theatre- Edit He has shifted to Siddaiah  Circle


Zen Motors - Bull temple road Bangalore

Hyderabad Gun running tuning
Gun running tuning

The expansion Chambers built by Gun Runners





 

ORM Racing support - http://www.ormracingsupport.com/

This unit is run by Mr Sunil Kumar of Thrissur , he makes the famous ORM Expansion chambers.

OUTRIDERS MOTOR CYCLES,IYYAPPAN MILL COMPOUND,KOKKALAI.(OPP.BARTH PETROLEUM) ,THRISSUR,KERALA. PIN.680021.

Mon- Sat 10:00Am to 5:00Pm - email: ormracing@yahoo.co.in, sunilormracing@yahoo.co.in

Phone Off: +91 0487 2424592 Mob: +91 9847306336 .


Sur Tinkering works -Mysore
Shafi 9980973484
# 3215, Sultan Park Road, Mandi Mohalla, Mysore - 570001, Mysore  

 

 

Yamaha RX series modification

Those of us who used to ride 2 strokes and then had to switch to 4 strokes due to the obvious reason, will always miss them. To sum up my experience with a Bajaj FE scooter and it's maintenance was "No Cam, No chain, No headache!" My dream bike was the shogun, when it was available I did not have the resources to buy it and now I don't have a Shogun to buy, Spares are a major issue.

Even today I see the odd one longingly hoping to own one.

The other bike I wished I owned was a Yamaha Rx series. This series I hope will satisfy my need to have a 2 stroker in my garage. I like to customize almost every thing, either cosmetically or performance or ergonomically. I have been lately collecting pictures of modified Yamaha RX's to get some idea on how I'd like my bike to look.


Over the years I have seen how the mod seen changed. When in my 12th grade, the RX 100 was kitted out with a chrome plated expansion chamber with a belly pan.Some of the expansion chamber were 1 into 1 or 1 into 2, the twin chambers looked very cool. As far as the performance of the chamber is concerned i have no idea as I never rode them. Others also added the "Mag" wheels or Alloy wheels. I've searched quite a bit but been unable to find any pic of this type of mod.



The Rado brand were quite common and also the design in the pic.




In Bangalore the Yamaha's a carriers is welded to the sissy bar added . The belly pan was a lot different than that in the pic, it looked more like that of the RXZ with a radiator cowl.





The sissy bar was chopped off just after the seat and plugged or the sissy bar entirely removed.







On the head light side, a large headlight was added with a grill.
The headlight is lifted in height by using clips.







One more commonm mod was adding a scrambler/off road bike mud gaurd, this gave the bike a bad ass look.





On the seat side, some scrapped off a little foam to make it a little slimmer, In Bangalore adding a Suzuki Samurai seat with a MaX-R 100 tail piece is a common mod.




The sissy bar of the Shogun/Samurai is welded in the place of the original.







The speedometer used on some are of the shogun and some just keep only the speedo and remove the rest.





Using the Yezdi 16inch wheel was and is a very common mod on both Yamaha and Suzuki's , it looks cool also adds good acceleration, at the expense of top speed.



Another mod I have seen in Bangalore is shaving of the fins on the head. It looks nice, and I have no information on the effect of cooling efficiency.











On the handle bars side, we used to use the Fury handle aka short handle, this was quite common and still it. Some use the shogun or the RD wide handle.

A fury Handle, No idea why it was called a fury handle.







Some neatly modded pics off the net.