Every Person has his own choices, hobbies or interests. As My Hobby is touring on bike, especially long tours. I & my friends are passionate about bike tours. We completed many tours on bikes, as I travelled to many places of India on bike, like haridwar, Rishikesh, Mussorie, Shimla, Kullu-Manali, Solang Valley, Rohtang Pass, Indore, Mandu (M.P.), and Jhansi Etc. These types of tours on two wheelers are very adventurous & risky, especially on hilly roads. But for the adventure, we have to take risk.
My first tour planned with my college friends at the time of March 2010, when Kumbh fair in Haridwar was in progress. So we made a plan of touring to Kumbh on bikes, Because we heard so much about Kumbh & we were very excited for the trip. But the main problem we faced was that our family was against our decision of traveling to such a long distance by bikes. I had to convince my family, it took more than a week to get permission for the tour. Finally I got green signal from my side, but the other friends didn’t get the permission so they had to lie to their family members that they hired a Indica Car for the tour. We crossed the first hurdle coming in our way to live our passion.
Finally, I, along with my 3 friends, started our tours from Delhi to Haridwar. On 2nd April, 5’o clock in the morning, we started our bikes, 2 Pulsars, among which 1 bike was borrowed by a friend. We reached Haridwar at 2.00 p.m. Where we took a bath in the holy river Ganga, I forgot the ghat’s name but it is the very first ghat of the Ganga. We bathed for more than one hour there, as we were very tired. In the evening we took a bath at har ki pauri at the Aarti time. After
bathing we walked in various pavilions of holy saints on the banks of the Ganga.
Most pavilions played religious, spiritual songs & speeches on loud speakers in very high volumes, so nothing can be heard clearly.Many Pavilions runs langars (community kitchens), these pavilions had a very long queue of peoples for free food. The most interesting thing which was noticed by me was the pavilions for every city, towns and districts are available there, so we can say the whole India Was presented in the Kumbh. Many companies & Agencies were also present in the Kumbh for the advertisement of their brands.
That day, we walked around 3 to 4 hours and reached our guest house at 11 p.m. in the night, It was a very tiring day.Next day we again got ready for the bath in the Ganga because we want to fully enjoy the spirit of Kumbh. After that we planned to visit the “Chandi Devi” temple which is situated on a very high hill, it took more than 2 hours to reach temple, on the way back we took rope way, the so called trolley cars, and to our surprise it took only five minutes to travel down the hill, a adventurous and time efficient way of traveling. Same day, we visited the Haridwar market & Many temples. We also took the holy water of the Ganga, along with us. The City Was Very Crowded & Security was very Tight. The arrangement was good but you had to wait 1 to 2 hours to park your vehicles. local residents were helpful.
Next day, i.e. 4th April, we had to leave Haridwar, so we started our bikes, tied our bags and headed towards Delhi. The journey back home was very tiring, as the last three days were very busy but we enjoyed a lot too. We saw the entire India at one place; saw many saints, devotees from all over the world. The experience cannot be explained in words, you can only feel it.
P.S.: And one more important benefit of visiting Kumbh “Mene apne PAAP
bhi dho liye”.
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