280 km for a View

Didn't sleep.

At 5:30 AM, instead of making the sensible decision to go to bed, I put on my riding gear and left for Vathalmalai.

The plan was fairly simple:

Ride 140 km → reach the hills → take some photos → ride 140 km back.

That's it.

No group. No itinerary. No particularly good reason to be doing this while sleep deprived.

The ride

The first few hours were actually pretty uneventful.

Which, for a motorcycle ride, is kind of the point.

Once you're out of Bangalore, the roads start opening up and the ride gets significantly better. Fewer cars, more greenery, and eventually the kind of roads where you stop checking how many kilometres are left.

The S1K probably wasn't the most practical choice for this ride, but I wasn't exactly going to take the sensible bike.

Vathalmalai

The last stretch was easily my favourite part.

The landscape changes pretty quickly as you get higher, and suddenly you're surrounded by hills and greenery instead of the usual highway scenery.

I parked the bike, took the helmet off, walked around for a bit and took some photos.

The funny thing about going somewhere specifically for the view is that once you're actually there, there's not much to do.

So I stood around.

Looked at the view.

Took more photos.

Checked the bike.

Looked at the view again.

Perfect.

280 km later

The ride back was considerably less exciting.

At some point, your brain enters that weird long-ride mode where you're basically operating the motorcycle on autopilot.

You stop thinking about the destination and start thinking about completely irrelevant things.

What should I eat?

How much fuel is left?

Why is that car driving like that?

Should I have taken the other road?

How many kilometres?

Checks.

Still 73 km.

Fantastic.

I eventually got home at 10:05 PM.

280 km in total. Zero sleep. One very questionable decision.

Would I do it again?

Obviously.