Kolli Hills Biking on BTC Anniversary

Initially on BTC 1st Anniversary, planned for visiting Historic place. Later changed to Kolli Hills Biking as it was in my To-Do List & I love Biking.

About Kolli Hills:-
Kolli Hills or Kolli Malai is a small mountain range located in central Tamil Nadu in Namakkal district of India. The mountains are about 1000 to 1300 m in height and cover an area of approximately 280 km. The Kolli Hills has 70 hair pin bends to reach the top of the hills. The region was ruled by Valvil Ori around 200 A.D., who is praised as one of the seven great philanthropists of ancient Tamil Nadu. His valor and marksmanship are sung by several poets, and his exploits are a popular part of folklore.y The Kolli Hills are part of the Eastern Ghats, which is a mountain range that runs mostly parallel to the east coast of South India.

Day 1 - Trip Outline:-
Woke up early, got ready & started towards Electronic City (meeting point). Met Roshni @ Silk board & soon Piyush joined before Electronic City flyover. We all stopped at our meeting point where Akhilesh came. Everyone came one after other. Just gave some guidelines on the route which we take, Stop points & explained biking signals which we need to use.

We are 9 Bikers - 2 Hunks, 2 Royal Enfields, 2 Avengers, 1 Yamaha Sz-R, 1 Fazer, 1 Pulsar & 3 Pillions = 12 Members started to Kolli Hills through Dharmapuri (SH 17) @ 5:30am. Early morning drive is always chilling & make your spirits on toes. Driving through villages, small hills, fields, through fog, patch roads & darkness is making me feel so happy while driving. Reached Rayakottai by 6:50am. Everyones hands are like freezed & so cold. Took short break & had hot coffee, tea.

Now we started towards Dharmapuri which is 51kms & the road is good. Here & there we took few wrong turns as there are no proper sign boards, early morning & we don't know the exact route too. After asking few people on road drove to Dharmapuri by 8am. We had nice Breakfast & continued with Introduction of all.

Once it is done, we started towards Haruru (SH 60A). Drive was pretty good as roads are good & good vegetation on both sides of the road. Nice to watch & drive through the way in cool weather. Checking if everyone are coming through the side mirrors & driving at 80kms/hr speed. Stretch between Haruru & Salem (SH 16) is mind blowing. Trees are covered like entrance door on the roads full greenish layer. We have lot of hills which has thick vegetation too & would be nice place for exploration.

Took one more wrong turn at Salem & drove around 3kms. Got doubt & noticed in Maps that we are in wrong route which is going to Chennai. Turned back & moved towards Rasipuram (AH 43). Re-fuled our bikes in Rasipuram Petrol bunk & stopped at Hotel Shanthi Inn for lunch @ 12:30pm. Had nice south indian meals & started towards Kolli Hills. The villagers are seeing us & kids are waving hands stating bye. Had a pit stop @ base of Kolli Hills to give break for our bikes as we need to drive 70 Hair Pin turns. Explained everyone that, we will go one after other & no overtaking.

Kolli Hills really looks so huge in radius even though the height is not that much & seriously takes 2-3 days to explore the complete hill. We started our bikes & going through each & every hair pin. It was good to drive in such terrain & keeping a track if everyone is coming or not. After crossing 27 turns, we stopped our bikes & had photo session for 45mins.

Group picture with bikes, lot of individual pictures while crossing hair pin turn & 3-4 bikers driving pictures. Everyone wants their own pic on bikes at the turn. Good that, there is no wrong turn in this section. After all the photo sessions are completed, started towards top of Kolli Hills.

Kolli Hills is fully covered with trees - lush green. Reached top of the hill & after little enquiry reached Nallathambi Resort. Everyone went & relaxed sometime in the 13 Bed Dormitory which I have booked already. Everyone got freshup & roamed around on the hill for sometime. In meanwhile, Roshni went out all alone & roamed around 1hr for 30kms & came back. By that time, we tried reaching her number multiple times. Spoke with resort guys & came to know that, we have few places which we can visit - View Point, Waterfalls, Botonical Garden. He told that, police personal will not allow to waterfalls post 3pm. As it is already 4pm, we decided to cover other places. So drove around 2kms for View Point.

It is nice view of Kolli Hills, Villages from this point. Thought of watching Sunset from this point. However, stretch of hill is stopping to view clear sunset. Had lot of photosessions at this place. Few climbed the watch tower & view point block. Had nice fun seeing people climbing them & facing difficultly in getting down. 

Went back to Resort. Few people went for shopping & the rest we sat in children play ground. Had nice fun there too with photos. We had a rapidfire round from Girish to all the girls which was damn funny. Enjoyed to the core. After everyone came back, decided that we need to play some game. Varun said that, MAFIA is wonderful game & no one in our group knows about it. He explained how to play the game. Few are hesitant to place as initially we didn't feel it was good one. Roshni slept off nicely.

GOD, DOCTOR, POLICE, VILLAGERS & MAFIA

We played 1 round & finally 11 people joined the next round. Seriously, the game was so funny that everyone started arguing - You are Mafia, He is Mafia, shouting, arguing & defending. It became so interesting that, we played for more than 2hrs till 9pm. Had our dinner - Veg & Non-veg stomach full. Went out for night walk 2kms enjoying the chillness. Returned back to room & everyone slept off.

Day 2:-
As decided previous night, we need to get up early, get ready, packup, vacate the resort, go to waterfalls & return back to Bgl. Everyone woke up & got ready. Shreyas, Varun, Sudesh & Akhilesh went to Waterfalls by 6am as they want to take bath. Rest of us started at 7am towards Waterfalls which is 12kms. Again we drove through 18 hair pin turns to reach. Here we need to get down from 1008 steps to reach base of waterfalls. Most of our group went into the water, took bath & enjoyed for 40mins. I saw half rainbow beside the waterfalls which is not expected.

Now the task infront of most of them - 1008 steps to be climbed. After 3-5 breaks, everyone reached parking area. Relaxed for sometime, had lemon soda, maggi & refreshed themselves. We decided our return journey, stop points for breakfast, lunch & petrol filling. Everyone packed their bags, wore riding gear & started our return journey. So, driving back through the Hair pin turns again.

Roshni is our BTC 1st Female Biker. When I saw her registration with Yamaha Sz-R as Biker, immediately went to google & checked which bike is it. Only 1 thing came into my mind >> 150cc bike - 600km can she drive, Is it safe ? All my questions are answered after seeing her riding for 2 days. In my personal experience, she is 1st Female Biker I met & her driving was VROOOOOOOOOOOOOMMMMMM - Dhoom 4 seriously. Very good driving skills, Brave & Daring too. Thanks for joining BTC & being part of our Biking event.

Among all the bikers - Roshni & Shreyas are back of me only.  Whenever I slow down, they used to overtake me & stand as leaders driving at 80kms/hr speed. By now, they got their names - Left & Right Hand of Leader - Chaitanya (LOL). We stopped at 27th Hair pin turn, relaxed sometime, took few pictures & started back to base. We stopped at base, had breakfast - Dosa & Parota. As per our plan, we started driving on National Highway to Salem. It was sunny day & sultry too.

Driving on the highway is good. However, sitting in same posture is so boring. Drove through Salem & stopped for 5 mins. We decided to stop @ Dharmapuri for Lunch. So started our biking driving towards Dharmapuri. Found Veg restaurant before Dharmapuri & parked our vehicles to fill our stomaches.

After having food, had tea in Dharmapuri & drove back to Bangalore. Section from Hosur - Bangalore is not good as construction of flyovers is going on. Rest of the ride is fine. We reached our meeting point by 5:40pm - 20mins prior as per our scheduled timing.

Highlights of Trip:-
* Driving through Chilled weather with sun covered with clouds till 1pm
* Road from Dharmapuri - Haruru - Salem >> Driving within nature with trees surrounded
* 212 Hair Pin Turns (To & Fro)
* MAFIA Game, Fun we had in Playground & Rapidfire round
* Waterfalls
* Our 12 members team (9 Bikers & 3 Pillions)

Places to visit on Kolli Hills:-
* Waterfalls (Allowed from 6am - 3pm only)
* View Point
* Rose Garden
* Botonical Garden
* Boating

Route:-
Bgl 2 Kolli Hills: Bgl - Hosur - Rayakottai - Dharmapuri - Haruru - Salem - Rasipuram - Kolli 
Kolli Hills 2 Bgl: Kolli - Rasipuram - Samel - Dharmapuri - Hosur - Bgl

Stop Points:-
Onwards: Breakfast @ Dharmapuri, Lunch @ Rasipuram (Hotel Shanthi Inn)
Return: Breakfast @ Kolli Hills Base / Rasipuram, Lunch @ Salem / Dharmapuri
Petrol Filling: we have lot of petrol bunks through out the way & even on top of Kolli Hills too.

Problems you might face:-
* Language problem: As everyone speaks Tamil there, it would be difficult to communicate.
* Extra Luggage: Don't carry extra luggage

Thanks Giving:-
* Thanks to all participants for wonderful biking trip with lot of memories.
* Thanks to Akhilesh for selecting To & Fro routes & helping me out in travel.
* Thanks to all Photographers - Varun, Girish, Piyush & Shreyas for taking pictures.
* Special Thanks to Shubha & Sonali for taking lot of pictures while we are driving.
* Thanks to Sun on Day for 1 for hiding behind the clouds & making trip so cool

See you all soon in future biking events. Over & Out

Written By       : Chaitanya Kumar Adusumilli
Organized By   : Chaitanya Kumar Adusumilli 
Date of event   : 4th & 5th Jan'14
Members Count: 12
Place              : Rasipuram