The Digboi Trip

Expecting to meet some of my schoolmates during the Durga Puja celebrations I spent the last few days in Namrup, the sleepy little town I grew up in. Well not many of my friends live there anymore but it was great to meet the few I could.

Since there are no good places to eat near Namrup we decided to drive down to Digboi in the afternoon today. The five of us started at around noon in Navin's car. I rode my bike till Duliajan and parked it there and hence the photos are from Duliajan onwards.

The road from Duliajan to Digboi is in good shape and there is not much traffic. But it is a bit narrow at places and has a few annoying speed breakers. We drove through some lush green paddy fields and I took all the shots from the moving car. As you can see there in the pics below, autumn has already added some golden shades to the green fields.







After this we crossed the Dihing-Patkai reserve forest. People tell me that it is possible to encounter wild elephants in this section of the road during the evening hours.



Somewhere on the way we passed this Namghar,a place for social gathering used by the Assamese people. The birthday celebrations of Srimanta Sankardeva, a 16th century saint, scholar and religious and social reformer was celebrated throughout Assam yesterday and this gateway was erected as part of these celebrations.



In Digboi, we directly headed to the Centenary Park that was built to celebrate 100 years of successful operation (1901-2001) of the Digboi refinery. This is the oldest refinery in operation in the world today and was the first refinery in India and the third in the world and has survived the two world wars. Here are some pictures from the park. Maybe I will write more on the history of Digboi in a later post.





In the background of the above picture the Digboi refinery can be seen. Here is one more photo of the refinery.



The only creatures that I could see in the park were these.




And here is a picture of the five of us taken in the park. From L to R it is Navin, me, Amarjit, Madhurjya and Bhushan.


And another one taken on the road just outside Digboi.


We tried visiting the Centenary Museum, the main tourist attraction in this town but found out that it is closed on Mondays. Bad luck. Maybe next time.

By the time we left Digboi everyone was super hungry and we decided to drive down to a place called "NH 37" near Doomdooma. Lots of people had given me good reviews about this modern dhaba.

The highway from Digboi to Makum was too good to describe. We touched 120kmph which is not usually possible in most of the roads in Assam. I tried taking a few pics of the evening colors from the moving car.





We also raced with a train (seen in the pic below) and for the first time in my life we beat a train. The road was that awesome! Remember the Dil Chahta Hai scene? This was something like that.


In about one hour we reached "NH 37" from Digboi. The place is located just before the town of Doomdooma on the highway. The food was good and the ambiance and the service was nice. I would recommend the place to anyone who wants to have a decent outside meal in this part of Assam.

After the meal we headed back home feeling guilty as we were already late for the Kati bihu celebrations at home.

All in all a superb trip. Childhood friends, good food, great roads and excellent views makes it a 10 on 10.

Sunset At Burhi Dihing

Finally there was some sunshine today after these 3 days of rain. So I rode out this afternoon hoping to get a good sunset view. Saw this view from the bridge over the Burhi-Dihing River that is around 6 kms from my town.



This place is special for me. When I was around 10 years old, our huge family used to gather at our grandparents' house twice a year. On each such occasion all of us kids used to have a picnic on the sandy banks of this river just near this spot.

Background

I don't remember how or when I came to know about rides to Ladakh. I guess it was one of those magazines or an online blog. The idea of riding a motorcycle to such a picturesque place, surrounded by stunning landscapes instantly attracted me. This must have happened sometime after I left college and before I moved to Pune for my first job.

I knew I wanted to do it and started digging up more information. But I had two obvious hurdles. I didn't know how to ride a motor bike and I had no motor bike.

Moreover, it seemed that most people did Ladakh on a Royal Enfield motorcycle and there sure were lots of advantages to using one of these. Given that these weigh almost 3 times my body weight, I had a hard time convincing myself that I would be able to ride one of these. Most people I discussed this with thought this was a suicidal thing to do and something that I would never be able to pull off. The more they stressed on this, the more I became sure that my first bike would be a royal enfield (RE).

Fortunately I came in touch with the Roadshakers, a Pune based Royal Enfield riding club. Lets just say that they are a bunch of the best riders in this part of the world. Over the next few days I was convinced that the REs are the only sensible option for terrains like Ladakh and that riding and maintaining an RE is not very difficult if you have the right people to guide you.

So I went ahead and got myself a shiny new RE Thunderbird Twinspark and went for my first Roadshakers meet in early November. There was no turning back after that. I had a tough time riding the bike and all hell broke loose when I went for the first few rides with the Roadshakers. I had lots of falls and was always the last guy in every stretch of every ride. These were times when my confidence was completely shaken but the constant encouragement that I got from the other riders somehow kept me going.

Slowly and gradually I became better. I signed up for my first long distance trip in February to Rann of Kutch. After that ride I became comfortable riding on the highways and on sand. It took me few more months of riding with the Roadshakers to become comfortable with stones, slush and the corners.

And so, by May I became hopeful of doing Ladakh this year itself. All I needed was some company. I had ruled out joining the Royal Enfield Himalayan Odyssey as they wont be doing the Srinagar-Leh route. Lots of people from Roadshakers were planning to do the ride this year but my dates did not overlap with them. Also, my intention of doing the ride was a bit different . I wanted to have a good balance between rough riding and leisure. It seemed to me that most of these guys emphasized mainly on the rough riding part. Not many of them really cared about the beauty of the place or in interacting with other travelers or the locals.

After a lot of searching I found that Amol, a fellow Roadshaker, had similar intentions as mine and that his dates were very flexible. And so it was decided that the two of us would ride all by ourselves this year. Luckily everything else fell in place for me. I was quitting my job in mid June and my university applications weren't due till late August. So July was a very good option for me. Amol wasnt sure till the last few days whether he would be able to get leave from work but we started preparations targeting the first week of July.

Preparations included getting the bike ready and purchase of a lot of things including spares, tools and riding gear. Another important aspect was hunting for information on the internet. Luckily Ladakh being a popular riding destination there was a lot of reliable first hand information available. I found the most useful stuff at 60kph and bcm touring. And here is the best travelogue that I came across in this period and this is what inspired me to write down my experiences.

Epic Ride to the Top of the World

"It is good to have an end to journey towards; but it is the journey that matters in the end. " -Unknown

I started this ride with a destination in mind, the city of Leh. Nothing else was fixed; I didn't know which route we would take, what we will face or when we would return. I just wanted to ride and nothing else really mattered.

The ride took us over high mountains and treacherous terrain, into Ladakh, the Land of the Lamas. We experienced it all; the breathtaking landscapes, the beautiful monasteries, the warm people and the colorful festivals of Ladakh. But that is just a small part of it. What follows is an account of the journey to Ladakh and back. A journey that forced us to ride over all kinds of terrain and tested us at every step; rocks, boulders, sand, snow, ice cold water, slush, steep hills, rains, hailstorm, sandstorm, bike failures, mishaps; we had it all. I don't call it Epic for no reason.

Here are a few teaser pics to give you a glimpse of what lies ahead.

Background
The Riders
Day 0: Leaving Pune
Day 1: Delayed in Delhi
Day 2: Monsoon Hits Us
Day 3: Night Riding Continues
Day 4: Indoors in Manali
Day 5: The Wettest Day
Day 6: We leave the rains behind
Day 7: A tough ride
Day 8: Festivities in Leh
Day 9: Lakes Calling
Day 10: My First Puncture
Day 11: The Unplanned Ride
Day 12: The Better Lake
Day 13: Reunion Day
Day 14: On Top of the World
Day 15: The Best Riding Day
Day 16: The Toughest Test
Day 17: Last Day in Leh
Day 18: Another Tough Ride to Kargil
Day 19: Beyond Kashmir
Day 20: To the Holy City
Day 21: Patriotism at its Best
Day 22: Expect the Unexpected
Day 23: Dude, where do we sleep?
Day 24: I know what you did in Rajasthan
Day 25: The Experience Isn't Over Yet
In Retrospect

The Riders

Me aka Biplab: The kid in the group.


Amol aka Model: My original riding partner for this trip. He believes in thoroughly relaxing on his holidays. Needs a good clean room and hot water before he retires for the night. Cares a lot about his bike and never rides rough. He earned his nickname because of his fair skin and his skill at posing for photos. Nothing beats his enthusiasm to click as many pictures of himself at every scenic location that we hit.


Arvind aka Bhaiyya: The natural leader of the group who maintains his cool under all situations. Very eager to drink only local water says he'll fall sick if he has Bisleri. His nickname is because of his roots in UP. Everyone in Amritsar mistook him for a Sardar.


Alex aka Walrus: The guy who is never in a hurry and like me insists on taking a few snaps whenever he sees something interesting. Earned his nickname because of his mustache.


Srikant aka Marathe: No matter who is leading the group he always is in the no 2 spot. His looks reminded me of Vivek Oberoi's character in Company.


Richie aka Saajan: Whenever we hit a smooth patch he is sure to leave us behind. Is generally the fastest to gear up and start the ride. Has used each and every mobile he could lay his hands on to give real time updates to his GF. Walked like Sanjay Dutt from Saajan and hence the nickname.

I thought I understood the exponential function..

When Prof. Albert Bartlett started this lecture with the line "The greatest shortcoming of the human race is our inability to understand the exponential function" I thought to myself "possibly nothing new here...what could be there that I don't know about exponential functions after dealing with it for half a decade now". Turns out I couldn't be more wrong.

Watch this to know what implications an exponential function has on a lot of things including human population, energy consumption and other major issues faced by the human race.



The play list for the entire lecture is here.

Analog Computers of Another Era

Happened to stumble upon this series of videos that explains mechanisms found in mechanical analog computers of the bygone era that were used by the US Navy as fire control computers.