A ‘hillarious’ ride up north

CHENNAI: It is a pleasant morning in Chandigarh and the thump from an array of bikes by Royal Enfield makes it a rider’s delight. The team hands us-- over a dozen journalists and biking enthusiasts the safety gears and explains how the course of riding over the next five days would be. What started off as a ride in the mid-30s sultry weather on the busy Kalka-Shimla highway slowly changed to a mildly pleasant ride before we rode into the hilly terrains where the temperature significantly dropped across 10 hours. Riding a Goan Classic 350 on highways is a breeze. While many would wonder about it’s off-roading capabilities, especially in steep hilly terrains staring down at a 1,500-feet valley, the bike’s kerb weight does a lot of wonders when it comes to balancing off road. We realised this by the time we reached our accommodation in challenging conditions in Mashobra.

A lot more surprises await us at the Himalayan Hub, a CSR initiative of the Eicher Group Foundation, where women from local communities have been engaged in providing rooted experiences through traditional cuisines of the Himachal. “We have prepared siddu, Himachali dish that is a steamed bread stuffed with curries. We ferment the wheat flour for over a couple of hours. Chutneys are not only the best accompaniments for dosas and idlis from the south but also for our siddus,” they say with a laugh and hand over tomato chutney. The meal is not complete without laute aka laung lata, a dessert, which is a traditional wheat flour pancake.

We continue riding through the apple farms of the Himachal, where lorries and pickup trucks whisk past us even at the altitude of 7,041 feet where we see the villagers playing a game of archery. A villager welcomes us with garlands with traditional music playing in the background. “We have a two-day archery festival called the Mahasu Jatra festival, which is deeply tied to our belief and culture. We belong to the Pandava clan,” he says with a smile.

The toughest challenge lay ahead in the partially-constructed Kullu Highway as bikes even as mighty as the Himalayan were put to test and one would realise how crucial safety gears are when riding on this highway as Beas river runs by. By now we have almost covered over 500 kilometres and Dham served by a Mandiyali family makes us leave behind a tough day of ride. “We take a couple of days to prepare the ingredients as Dham is made from scratch. Many restaurants claim to serve Dham but a real Dham consists only of vegetarian food,” says Jatin Sharma aka Buland Himalay, a musician from Mandi village. He performs the local music for us and provides us with a perfect finish for the meal. We now ride back to Chandigarh predominantly on the highway but on a Guerilla 450 that cruises past every other vehicle with ease. The ride-research expedition in the Himachal is not only about adrenaline in the middle of landslides and off roads but also provides us with a food for thought.