“Enroute – MOONLAND” || Snow Biking in India by Aneesh Airborne Awasthi

It was a bright sunny morning simla had received fresh snow fall. As every year I had a plan to ride on it. This was my KTM’s first intro with snow. I started from palampur my home town to simla to have the white ride reached simla around evening.

    Stayed simla at my friends place and made all necessary checkups of my bike. Bike was all fit to ride through. I invited my friend Sharang to come along he was there for the pillion seat ever ready as always.

 
   
We started around 10 am as before that wont have been possible before that because of crisp black ice. We were all packed in warm clothes to fight the all odd’s. Started from simla city reached charabra market (a place near kufri) from where the road diverts to the Kalyani Helipad. We had a heavy brunch here & kept all knick knacks for the ride ahead. The road till this marked was fine because the CPWD had made it through for the Army movements to Kinnaur valley by pushing the snow sidewards with the help of snow cutters.

    The main challenge had begun from this place. The first few meters on snow we realized that it won’t be possible to ride with pillion. So Sharang got down and walked along. I had no problem on riding over the snow. But as the gradient started increasing the challenge began. I had to come off my bike and push it along acceleration. The distance between the charabra marked and the helipad was not more than 2kms but moving every meter was a fight. Some tourists had gone up walking to the helipad to see the whit helipad. They were quiet amazed to see the bike and us doing such kind of thing. They clicked few pictures with bike and they asked as not to push any further as the snow was more than 3fts at few points. Me and Sharang decided to take her till the point till where we can. I had couple of falls but thanks to snow for holding me up. After doing the push and pull for more than 3hours our bodies started paying the toll. KTM’s average dropped to 5kmpl because of heavy acceleration. We were just short by 200 meters but for two of us it got to be close to impossible to move any further. We laid branches on snow so that the tire could make traction and let the bike move further. But after a point that too failed. Two Police guys were on Patrol and came and spoke to us. They were too amused to see the bike here. They told us that the snow would get hard in few hours as then was setting down which would had let to zero movement on the right track and asked us to return back.
    Sharng and I decided to make it to the top but the time and our bodies were not allowing we went to the top walking and saw the first sight of the Top. It was “MOON Land” which I prompted first. Amazing it was. We decide to leave our bike there and go back home and rest and come afresh next day.

    There was a local resident nearby I requested them to let my bike be parked there and they agreed. We walked back through a shortcut trail through the woods. We reached Dhali a close by place and asked a local friend to pick us up. He dropped us to the mall. We had a nice refreshing stroll there. And went back home and took a sound sleep.
    Next morning we started early I asked two more friend’s to accompany us Shrey Banta with his 4X4 Gypsy joined us for the backup. Satvik also came in for help. We were four in no. today. We took all the safety harness which was required to make it to the top today finally. We parked the gypsy at charabra market and walked through with the ropes. Spotted the bike after 12 hours she was intact and covered with fresh snow. Believe me she was looking beautiful. We reached the bike and made the final arrangement to move further. A rope was tied to the frond shocker and was pulled by three of them ahead and I was over the saddle accelerating her. After all the push and pull we made it to the top. We all spent some time there. We decided to roll back.

    Coming down was another task as brakes were of no use on snow. We tied the rope backwards from the rear pillion handle to make it stop. I was atop of bike.
    Reached back to masobra market where the KTM spotted the road after a while. This Bike nd Hike ride was a memorable one as I experienced the nature more closely.
    And got to know my bike better in more adverse conditions.