Sunday, May 25, 1997

Day 20: Udupi – Mangalore

This is a jump in the day numbering, as I have eliminated the two days I relaxed in Udupi as Krishnan and Shyam went to Mysore, Belur & Halebeedu.

They returned today morning at 5:30. We left Udupi after lunch. After three full days without cycling, we were rejuvenated. Even my cycle had stopped its routine creaking. I left Udupi with a light heart and a heavy bag – stuffed with laddoos, chips, sweets and jam – a whopping 1kg jar of it!

The Udupi-Mangalore stretch was 60km long, and a well-laid highway. We made really good speed, stopping by KREC Suratkal (40km) for water and a look around.

Just after Suratkal is New Mangalore, a port city. At this point, the highway became four laned and incredibly smooth. We zipped along to reach Mangalore, just as darkness enveloped the large city.

After an OK dinner, we went and parked at the police station at Pandeshwara, among some really inquisitive and helpful policemen. The excellent highway was responsible for our record-breaking session in the evening. However, one has to be careful on the Kundapura-Mangalore stretch. There is a lot of heavy traffic and all of it travels at high speed. A few times, I had near misses when trucks or buses passed me by a couple of inches. Definitely not a stretch to be done at night.

After a good bath in the police station complex, we spread our carrimats and slept, at the base of a general statue of a policeman.

Estimate of distance covered today: 60km

1 comment:

Anonymous said...

Is OK an acronym or just means "ok" as in theek hain types. That said, GKR's seem to have disappeared from the scene. Is GKR only found in Maharashtra ? Cheers - Vikram