the century ride...

today was the first century ride (100 km long ride) of the year...glad that it happened so early on, setting the stage for many more encores for the rest of the year...5 of us - myself, 3 from work and farside started off very early in the morning, even before any hues of the sun hitting the eastern sky...the meeting place was not new to me...I've stood there on a few occasions in the past, waiting for friends - either for a photography trip or a trip to one of the Sunday breakfast programs of Aashayein Foundation...there's a tea shop at the crossroads, where I almost regularly used to have tea, while waiting...today, the shop was not even open when I reached there...it was all dark but the road was still lit up by the headlights of trucks and intercity buses...once we started rolling, and left the highway for the inner roads, we were riding in absolute darkness...the edge of the road, potholes or any other objects were not to be seen...coupled with it, the blinding high-beam lights from the trucks coming from the opposite direction...driven mostly by our instincts rather than our senses, we just hoped that the speeding trucks on the road be able to see us from a distance...all these made up for a little mysterious, yet interesting ride...the sky lit up slowly but the sun was in a Sunday mood, stubbornly refusing to leave the comfort of the cloudy blanket...we didn't complain - a hot sunny day was the last thing we wanted today...taking breaks, riding through the jungle road, we reached our destination - Narsapur lake, a little later than planned...the approach road to the Narsapur area and the lake was quite interesting...kids and people watching us anxiously...some smiling, waving and running along with us for some distance...all made up for a pleasant company...there were multiple photo opportunities, which I chose to ignore...today, it was mostly about the riding...the ride back home was a little more difficult than the onward journey, due to lots of ups and the gradual but long inclines...I finished up about 3.5 kms shy of the 100 mark but that's not something that I would lose my sleep over...one of us though, did cross the 100 mark as his home is a little far from the starting point...kudos, Cijoy! congratulations on your first century ride :) raise a toast tonight! :)

thankfully, no pains or sore butts...for a century ride, this was an easy one.

another good thing about the ride was that most of the people were pretty much strangers to each other (though I knew everyone and have ridden with each of them at least once in the past)...that's one thing I like about these trips - getting to meet and interact with new people - that's something that makes these travel excursions even more enriching...though an alternate scenario is also not impossible but I have hardly had any bad experiences...