Climbing ride to Yercaud/Kolli Hills

[Jagannath Moorthy]

Hi,

I'm planning to do a short climbing ride this weekend to Yercaud and Kolli hills. My plan is to take a bus to Salem, climb Yercaud and then ride down to Raasipuram on Saturday, then climb Kolli on Sunday and take a bus back to Bangalore. 

Any suggestions on the plan? Also, where can I get myself and my cycle onto a Salem bound bus? I'm hoping to start really early on Saturday morning (3:30-4:00 am), will I get a bus at that time?

Regards

Jagan

[Jagannath Moorthy]

Hi,

I went on this ride yesterday. It was not the best experience, I found it quite difficult to get a bus from bommanahlli so ended up changing buses at hosur and Krishnagiri and so starting the climb only at noon. It was hot and I was low on energy plus totally out of shape, but finally made it up after multiple stops. I realised that it will be difficult for me to climb kolli hills after this, so took a bus back to Bangalore.

But the main reason for writing this is to inform and caution. While I was struggling up, I saw a young guy coming down at fairly high speed. I waved but he was in his own world and zoomed past. Later on the way down, the forest official stopped me and told that he had met with an accident. He braked and fell and a truck ran over his leg. He showed me pictures and it was horrific to see, we could see the bone and it looked like he would lose that leg.  The officer said that his life was not in danger other than the leg injury, which was a relief.

Please do take care when coming downhill on any hill. Especially on road bikes where the brakes are not as strong as mtb and leaning down, visibility is less. It only takes a second and our roads are unforgiving.

Regards

Jagan

[berkeleydb]

Quite disturbing to know about the accident.  Any idea if the cyclist was from Bangalore / someone from this forum?

Re: your bus ride -- I have seen that getting into buses can be hit/miss in various ways.  Were you trying to get into a volvo, or agener al category bus?

My sense is the volvo staff can be more rigid, unless one is boarding at the start point.  I think their interim stops tend to be very short, and they seem to think it might be a huge delay, if you try to load your cycle into their luggage area.  Also, if you have bought a official luggage ticket for a volvo, the driver/conductor may think there really is no incentive for them to be considerate interms of giving you time to load/unload the bike.

The regular category bus driver/conductor are probably going to completely pocket the extra fare (w/o luggage ticket) they take from you for the bike, so it is more likely they will be keen to get you on board.  If you get a chance to chat with the volvo driver/conductor and can convey you are fine paying something extra, over and above the luggage ticket, they might suddenly become quite friendly.

Getting a pleasant boarding experience into a bus, with a bike, is one of the top things that plays on my mind when I do a bike tour.

Have_not done the Yercaud climb; have been meaning to plan a ride there.

-{db}.

[Praveen M]

" Getting a pleasant boarding experience into a bus, with a bike, is one of the top things that plays on my mind when I do a bike tour."

Totally agree.

But of late, though I have always manged to carry bike in Volvo/bus, the whole thing has been quite stressful with unwanted discussions, few refusals, tips(??) for conductors/TCs etc.

Planning to either ride bike all through from start to destination or use some private transport or keep bike in Mysuru (only applicable to my case).

-Praveen