Since it was Christmas day in a rather un-Christmas-y place, we decided to shower to the accompaniment of Christmas carols on the iPod. We walked back along the river to the same restaurant where we had lunch yesterday for a breakfast of fruit, muesli, curd, and honey and a cup of coffee. It wasn't my mom's Christmas coffee cake, but it was still pretty good. While we sat, we watched the kingfishers dive into the river for a holiday breakfast of their own and saw monkeys warming themselves in the sun.

After walking back to the guesthouse, we fired up the bikes and rode the eight miles into the nearby town of Hospet and hit the ATM for some much-needed cash. We then resumed our tour of Hampi's ruins with some of the outlying temples.



Our first stop was the Queen's Bath, which was surprisingly elaborately decorated on the inside.





We then rode the short distance to the Royal Center, where we wandered through another set of massive ruins and posed for 30 or 40 more photos.



We got back on the bikes and rode to the Lotus Mahal, which was surrounded by a 25 foot high stone wall punctuated with massive guard towers.



Next to the Lotus Mahal were the gigantic elephant stables that once housed the royal elephants.



After a quick stop at the Underground Temple, we rode to the Vitalla Temple. Even though we were bordering on being “templed out,” this temple was worth the visit.



Located in the courtyard was a massive, stone chariot that used to be mobile despite the fact that the axles and wheels are made out of stone as well. In some places, the carving on the temples was remarkably intact and crisp.



Especially impressive were the sets of slender pillars that were carved out of a single piece of stone. Some of the pillars in the temple are musical and will generate a tone if tapped.

We finished temple touring by around 4:00 pm and decided to head back into Hospet to hit the liquor store (and find out about Re's Christmas present). On our earlier visit to Hospet Re spotted a liquor store next to the motorcycle upholsterer. (One drawback to temple towns in India is that they are almost always vegetarian and “dry.”) While I spoke to the seat upholsterer, Re went next door for some whiskey. The upholsterer said that if we come back tomorrow morning at 10:30, he could redo our seats while we wait. When I asked the price, he said 350 rupees each (7 USD). I opened my mouth to haggle on the price, but when I realized how little it actually was, I quickly shut my mouth.

When we got back to the guesthouse we decided to work on our First Need XL water purifier, since it was getting difficult to pump. We purchased some purified water and used it to backflush the canister. While trying to reassemble the unit, I dropped the canister on the floor from chest height. Crap. The instructions say that if the canister is struck hard, that you need to test it with dye to make sure it still works. The unit comes with a bottle of blue food coloring that we used for the test, but very unfortunately found that our canister was indeed ruined. Fortunately, we are carrying a backup filter, which we installed. Unfortunately, the canisters are only rated for 150 gallons, and that ain't gonna last us very long. After a delicious Christmas dinner of falafel, hummus, and pita, I called my parents on Skype to wish them a Merry Christmas. The we enjoyed a nightcap of Diet Coke and Indian whiskey and called it a night.

46 miles over some amount of time. Re's bike is definitely running better and getting better mileage with the leaner pilot jet. Tomorrow I will need to clean mine and install it.

After another easy morning, we left for Hospet around 10:00 am and arrived at the upholsterer shortly before 10:30. After removing our seats, the upholsterer and I attempted to discuss what we wanted from our new seats. He eventually called for another man from a nearby business who spoke some more English. With his aid, we settled on the seats being approximately two inches thicker and new, black seat covers.



With the design agreed upon, I removed Re's rack and started to look for a welder. When the upholsterer saw the rack, he asked if we needed welding and took us around the corner to a machine shop. He showed the rack to a rather startled looking employee, who said they could weld it for 80 rupees (1.60 USD). I left the rack at the shop and walked back to the upholstery shop.

While Re wandered off to do some shopping, I sat and watched the upholsterer work. He retrieved two pieces of foam from his collection that appeared to be used rear seats from a TVS bike. He motioned for me to test the foam, and it felt very dense. He then glued the foam directly to our stock seats, on top of the existing seat covers.



He shaped the foam with a saw blade and foam files made out of metal cups with nail holes punched in them. After the foam was glued and shaped, he cut out and sewed new covers. Once they were stitched, he installed them over the new foam/old seat combo. This left us with two, very tall, sort of Frankenstein-y seats. In the meantime, the machine shop employee delivered Re's re-welded rack and only charged us 70 rupees for the work. Hopefully, this welding job lasts longer than the previous one. I was pleased to see that they laid some reinforcing beads on the underside of the rack as well. With the help of the upholsterer, I quickly installed the rack and the new seats, and Re and I hopped on to try them out. They are certainly taller, but felt firmer and much more comfortable. We paid the man and headed back to Hampi.

We both found the riding position to be more comfortable and speedbumps to be much less jarring. We were stopped at a police checkpoint on the short ride back to Hampi. This is the first time we've been stopped in our nearly six weeks of riding in India. The officer skeptically asked us if we had “all our papers in order,” and we did. We handed over our Oregon DLs, international driving permits, passports, and insurance documents. The officer looked surprised, and after a cursory glance, gave us our documents back and tried to send us on our way. By this time, several other officers had crowded around and asked us the usual questions about our trip and the bikes, much to the chagrin of the original officer. After five minutes or so, he chased off the other officers and whistled us on our way.

Back at the guesthouse, we cleaned the melted rubber band out of my original pilot jet and wheeled my bike to a vacant lot, where we installed it. Bikes set for tomorrow, we worked on ride reports until dinner. After another delicious dinner at our guesthouse's rooftop restaurant, I posted ride reports at the local internet cafe. Later, we had a late night dessert of cake and whiskey and called it a night.

After a hearty breakfast (since we may not have lunch today) we loaded the bikes and hit the road before 9:00. Our plan for today was to ride to Raichur, which is about halfway to our actual destination of Hyderabad. Raichur is not listed in the guidebook, and a check of Wikitravel last night didn't reveal much information.

Just outside of Hampi, the GPS instructed us to turn down a narrow, country road, and cryptically said “Road to Ferry.” The road eventually dead-ended short of the river at a series of metal bars sticking up from the road. I could see motorbike tracks running in the sand between the metal bars and decided to see where they led. Sure enough, about 500 feet further, the sand road turned into a narrow cement ramp that twisted down to the water's edge. The river here was only about 500 yards wide, and we could see a small boat on the other shore loading passengers and bikes on board. It shortly arrived on our side of the river, and the fare collector asked us if we wished to cross. We said yes, and he informed us that it would be 100 rupees (two bucks) each. I was pretty sure that this was the foreigner price, but I really have wanted our bikes to ride on a small boat some time on this trip, so we agreed. The boat itself was maybe 22 feet long, 5 feet wide, and we had to back our bikes onto the boat.



Two of the crew helped each of us get our bikes safely on board, where we sat on our new seats for the short journey across. A couple minutes later, we were riding the bikes back up a steep concrete ramp to the road. I was happy to be able to cross off one more experience from the list, and Re was happy to have made it safely (thank you, Nandi!).

The ride to Raichur was uneventful and wound through rural countryside for the entire way. The seats were very much better over the occasionally rough pavement and frequent speedbumps. If the ride to Hampi felt like fall, today's ride felt like spring. The weather was still cool, but everywhere, farmers were planting new crops of rice. New rice is a remarkably vivid green, and to me, seems to be the color of fresh. The other good news of the day was that my bike is running the best it has since we left the US. The newly installed jet has made for crisp throttle response and much better fuel mileage. When Re and I were running different jets, she was getting approximately 15 percent better fuel economy than I was, but now I am matching her mileage.

We made it to Raichur by about 1:00 pm and were underwhelmed to say the least. It was a dusty, sprawling town, with the remains of a fort up on a hill. Since we were making good time and Raichur looked like a bust, we decided to press on to Hyderabad, a further 120 miles up the road. We reached the outskirts of Hyderabad around 5:00 pm, and I immediately steered us onto the wrong road. Instead of staying on the Nh 7 into the center of town, I somehow managed to get us onto an elevated highway with few exits and nowhere to turn around. The GPS quickly recalculated our route, and I was glad to see the detour would only add about 4 miles. After 6 miles or so on the elevated road, we exited into the parking lot that is Hyderabad's surface streets during rush hour. We spent about 45 minutes riding the last 4 miles to the hotel and were relieved to finally get off the bikes around 6:00 pm. This has been another marathon day, and both Re and I are mentally fried and physically sore from the trip.

We checked into a big, lovely room and went out walking in search of dinner. We are not staying in the tourist ghetto and one big drawback is a lack of recommended restaurants in the area. About half a mile along the road from the hotel, I spied a young man walking toward us with a McDonald's cup. Re and I have both been jonesing for a beef hamburger (which we will probably never find in India) and were suddenly on the lookout for the golden arches. Sure enough, a few hundred yards up the road, we saw the McDonald's. Of course they have no beef, so I settled for a McSpicy Chicken and Re tried the Chicken Maharaja Mac (think spicy, pink chicken Big Mac). They both tasted good, and in our tired state, we didn't have the interest in looking any further. We went back to the hotel and collapsed into bed.

240 miles in nearly 9 hours. New seats are a huge improvement and my bike is running much better and using less fuel.

I enjoy your reports.... I wish you the best rides.....

__________________
3mountainsadventure

After yesterday's hard ride we slept late and finally made our way down to breakfast around 9:00 am. After a delicious Indian buffet breakfast, we dropped our sore buns onto our new seats and eventually found our way to the Salar Jung Museum. Hyderabad is a city of over six million people and apparently they all decided to go for a ride at the same time we did, because this was one of the most fraught three-mile rides we've taken. Once at the museum, we queued up for tickets and discovered that many schools had brought their students to the museum for the day. Though the line wasn't terribly long, each person seemed to be buying somewhere between 60 and 80 tickets for the students and staff. A couple of people tried to cut in line in front of us, but we've been in India long enough now to know that yelling at queue jumpers is the way to handle the situation. We finally got our tickets and went around to the front of the museum to find hundreds of students lined up waiting to go through security and get into the museum. Bummer. The security guards motioned us to the head of the line, and it was our turn to queue jump.

Once we were inside the museum, it was bedlam. We attempted to view some of the exhibits in the first couple of rooms but could not get anywhere near to anything due to the crush of humanity, so instead we went to get coffee and wait for the crowds to die down. Twenty or so minutes later, the crowd had subsided somewhat, and we were able to restart our tour. The museum contains over 35,000 exhibits from all over the world that were collected by a local ruler in the early 1900s. The displays were generally divided into Indian artifacts, Western artifacts, and Eastern artifacts. The galleries we enjoyed the most were those that contained objects and artwork from China and Japan. We've discussed the possibility of visiting China several times, but visiting this museum in central India made up our minds for us- we will go there someday. Several hours later, we reached our USRDA of culture and battled our way back to the hotel.

Originally we had intended to go from the museum to the Chowmahalla Palace but felt too overwhelmed and tired to do so today. On out tour of India so far, we have enjoyed the smaller towns more than the big cities, and Hyderabad may be just too big for us. Back at the hotel, we had a late afternoon snack, and Re worked on blog posts until dinnertime. On our walk to dinner last night, we spotted the restaurant for tonight. After several days in temple towns, we were finally in a place where we could get meat. Kabab Corner had some delicious looking whole chickens in the rotisserie cabinet out front, and for around 6 USD, we got a whole chicken, an order of biryani rice, two naan, and two sodas. After stuffing ourselves silly on delicious food, we headed back towards the hotel and stopped for...more food. We are powerless to resist Bombay sweets, so Re picked a few of the especially good looking ones from the case, and we snacked on them on our walk back to the hotel. While I opted for some post-prandial relaxation, Re was feeling energetic, and after washing out several days of laundry, she decided to wash our Ortlieb bags as well.

6 hard damn miles.

After another slow morning of breakfast and working on ride reports, we walked out into the daylight and to lunch. After lunch, our plan was to ride the five miles to Golconda Fort and the Qutb Shahi Tombs on the eastern side of town, but neither of us really felt like fighting the traffic to see more old things. I think we are getting dangerously close to archeological overload. So we retreated to the relative calm and quiet of our room once again, to work on ride reports/blog posts and plan our further journey northward.

Around 4:00 pm we walked approximately 1.5 miles to a recommended internet cafe, only to find that we needed some sort of an account to use their service. Sigh. So we walked 1.5 miles back to our hotel area and found a tiny, grubby hole in the wall internet cafe with bad monitors and sticky keys. However, the connection was fast and only cost 20 cents an hour. We posted ride reports, blog posts, and some pictures to the Smugmug account before researching the tiger parks north of Jabalpur. Bandhavgarh National Park was going to be our next stop, but in searching for accommodations we found out that everything was booked well through the new year. Well, now what? Discouraged, we headed for dinner and talked about the possibilities over mutton kebabs and chicken biryani. Goat, it's not beef, but at least it's not more chicken! We didn't come to any decision at dinner and decided to sleep on it.

0 miles

But we didn't. Instead, we spent the morning looking at the India and Nepal guidebooks and mapping out the next month or so. One drawback to having no itinerary is that occasionally, we have to pull one out of our asses. Over the past several days, we've begun looking at and discussing traveling to Nepal and Thailand and find ourselves looking more forward to that than to seeing more of India. We decided to skip the tiger parks in India and instead make time to see Royal Chitwan Park in Nepal. The new plan was to head north to Nagpur and then to Khajuraho to see the temples there. Afterwards, we may stop in Varanasi on our way to Sarnath. Sarnath is one of the four important cities for Buddhist pilgrims, and since the other three are all nearby, we decided to try to visit them all. The other three cities are Bodhgaya and Kushinagar in India and Lumbini in Nepal.

By the time we figured this out it was too late to leave for Nagpur today because it is over three hundred miles away. Instead we had a lunch of street food and then went back to the crappy but fast internet cafe, where we posted the rest of our photos to Smugmug and looked up accommodations for the next several days. I also spent some time on HUBB researching air freight from Kathmandu to Bangkok, Oriental city. (I'll take 80s music for two hundred, Alex) In anticipation of a couple of long rides over the next two days, we packed all our gear tonight and put a couple changes of underwear in our daypacks.

0 miles.