Blog # 4 : MUKUTMANIPUR- The Road trip

They say "Reckless ones ride bikes,Decents drive a car".We say "The Four wheels move the body, The Two wheels move our soul". This time we have one reckless Professor(they can't be..),Two reckless Engineers(Well, engineers are actually..) and two reckless Doctors!!( They are becoming such and fast as per media). Saumya,Shounak,Shubhankar,Me and Subhadip along with their respective wives Shrabani,Smita,Manali,Smritikana and R15v1!

Its been 5 months that we had our last bike trip and after aborting the idea to do a trip to Gopalpur beach,Odisha, we finally setteled for Mukutmanipur,Bankura. Shounak and Smita gelled up well with us considering it was their first encounter with our group.They are nice couples and we also had our funtime with them.

To reach Mukutmanipur there are 2routes from Kolkata.The first one is through Durgapur(NH2) and the second one through Medinipur and Bishnupur.As we were to start from Kolaghat we took the second one.

So on the fine morning of 22nd January,2017 we were all geared up covering every nook and corners of our body in layers as we dared to beat the winter morning.You might confuse us with the Talibans for that matter.This time also Subhadip,the ace biker was given the honour to be our Pilot rider.The ride till Kharagpur was smooth along the NH6. There is a 4way Xing before Kharagpur and we turned right from here toward Medinipur and Bankura.The Road from here is bilane and we became extra cautious now.We reached Medinipur by about 8.15am and now we are due for our breakfast and had 'Luchi,Ghugni,Cha' and few snaps also. From Medinipur riding along the smooth roads through the dense forest of Salboni is a biker's delight.We were forced to halt again in a short span of time to take pictures and selfies.

After satisfying our photographer spirit we started again and after that we rode and rode and rode all along until a thud sound caught our attention. It was a rough bumpy patch ahead of a railway level crossing near Chandrakona town.There was a steep bumper and Shubhankar faced this unfortunate moment when he got panicstricken and locked his front wheel and fall over from his bike.He got straight up and showing that nothing has happened actually.But his wife Manali probably doing her first bike trip was visibly worried and little terrified. We halted there for 10 mins,checked for any damage to man and machine! and was fortunate that nothing significant had happened except for minor scratches and abrasions.I was literally more cautious from there and was riding within speed limits only to hear from Shounak that I am lagging behind too much.Anyway we passed Bishnupur around 11am and halted for tea break at a place called Onda. From here we were unsure of the route and asked locals about it. Google Map helped here and its a must now a days in such kind of trips.

Shubhankar has made this his habit of speeding up at wrong times so whenever we have some reasons to stop we always find him to overshoot us.He doesnt bother look at his viewing mirror or hear our shout to stop. One such place was Dhaldanga more,from where we had to take left towards khatra and mukutmanipur,But the hero Shubhankar took the straightway and almost entered the Bankura town. For those who are going via this route this is important junction where one has to take left towards Khatra and not straight towards Bankura.

The road towards mukutmanipur from here is also a riders delight.The Straight and undulating stretch of road would inspire you to pump every revs and power out of your engine and you cant help pressing the throttle hard.We more than made up for the slow pace after the accident and reached Khatra by about 12.30 pm.Mukutmanipur is 9 km from Khatra town.The road from here is very well maintained with some very interesting corners to take.Reaching Mukutmanipur we found the place was little crowded as people were coming in loads for picnic.The good thing is the bikes are allowed to go along the beautiful stretch of road over the dam.This stretch itself is about 15 kms and beautiful view of the vast reservoir will add to the experience of a very good ride.It was time to give a break and take some snaps.

The Odometer was telling that we are 245 km from kolaghat and my fuel indicator showing low reserve.We spent about 45 mins there and decided to come back to Khatra to satisfy the hunger of us and also our bikes. The fuel station(or Gas station as they call it) would be in Khatra only.We refuelled and had our Lunch(very much needed) in one 'Dhrubatara restaurant'.The lunch was good more so tasty because we were by now reeling with hunger.

Now its time to go to our hotel. We had booked 3rooms in 'Charulata resort' of Panchapally group.Its located atop a small hillock or hilltop in a place called Barughutu about 5 km away from the dam.The location is very good and from the top of the resort one can experience the beautiful sunset ashore the reservoir.

The rooms were way better than we expected and the resort itself is a good place to spend the leisure time.Tired of biking for more that 7 hours we preferred to stay in the resort and shunned the idea of going to places like deer park and local temples.Instead we observed the beautiful sunset.

We spent the night with lots of wisdom!! and joy ,had chicken pakora and coffee as evening snacks and fried rice and chilly chicken as dinner. Shubhankar and Manali,the newly married couple were left to enjoy in one of the room as our compassionate hearts considered their situation because they are yet to have their official honeymoon! Rest 7 of us managed to share two rooms and none of us were complaining:)

The next morning one interesting incident happened. Saumya discoverd that two rogue dogs were munching more than playing with one leather shoe in front of our cottage. He along with others disregarded this happening but we found later that the shoe belongs to one Shounak Das. Had it not been the Woodlands leather,I wonder Shounak  would have to leave the resort with bare foot.Shounak was literally not amused with this event and was very furious. 

We planned to go to 'Jhilimili forest' this morning which is 45 kms from here.But the late rise of Shounak and the 'doggy event' made us late.We departed the resort by 9 am and took the road to Jhilimili.This road is also fantastic to ride through green dense forest.However late as we are,we didnt go to Jhilimili,rather went to 'Sutan forest' instead.The way to sutan forest will give you the feel of riding up the hill round and round through rocky forest road and it was quite an experience.

We came back,again had our breakfast in Khatra in one roadside dhaba with tasty 'Luchi,ghugni,torkari,omlette,cha'.

At about 11.30 am we left there for our return trip.This time it was lot easy as the road by now was well known to us.On our return back we did halt at the place where Shubhankar had the crash and observed 1min of silence mourning his fall!

It will not do justice if I dont mention this in the blog.After having lunch in Medinipur we were pretty eager to come back home.The sadness that the trip is going to end also overcast our mind. We channelised that sorrow into some biking enthusiasm. As soon as we hit NH6 again,we shed out all our inhibitions and tried to free ourselves as the bird frees itself in the sky.We unleased upto the last decimals of horse power from our machines and for a stretch of 20 mins all 5 bikes were clocking at or above 110kmph and literally was racing with each other.Mine being only a 150 cc,tried my best but soon realised that I am taking it too much racing with the big brothers.Better sense prevailed at last.

We reached Kolaghat by 4.45 pm covering the last 80 kms in 1hour.

Shounak and Smita had to return to Kolkata so we bid them goodbye there and the short yet energetic bike trip thus ends.Leaving some pics.