10th riding day 98 km to Harihara

My hosts got up early and gave me heavy breakfast so that I can have a really good start. The sun was shining and road was tolerably good and I was making good progress. Bhadravathi Shimoga road is double lane and really good. Few people followed me for a couple of kilometers by a rickshaw tempo and was able to stop me on damaged road. Here is a small clip of them discussing about my trike.

I had reorganized my baggage for easier handling and one of the changes was putting both Li Ion chargers on the bag on top instead of pannier bags. I realized my mistake when they sagged on one side and top heavy meaning higher centre of gravity means stability problems. So placed them in panniers once again. This took some more precious minutes.

Clouds start accumulating in the sky by the time I reached Shimoga and anticipating the rain, I put on my space suit and covered the baggage with plastic sheet. Actually it was false alarm and there was not much rain.

The road condition deteriorated once I turned towards Honnali road within Shimoga city. The scenery after Shimoga was lovely with lot of paddy fields and some plantation crops too. I was very happy when I saw couple of Mitsubhishi power tillers with trailers attached. It was first powered vehicle I drove in road almost forty years back. It needed no license & I was underage for getting driving license.

I had very miserable time in Shimoga Honnali road. Constant rattling means even pedals get those shocks and transmitted to knees. I was worried as my knees may not be able to absorb these shocks continuously. Pedaling had become more difficult. As I suffer from urinary inconsistency, the rattling squeeze the bladder too. So my napkins get saturated in very little time ands I have no privacy by roadside to change them.

Meanwhile I saw a elderly gentleman sitting on a stone slab and spoke to him. He invited me for tea and I said I will be coming for tea only if I can get some power too. He agreed and gave both. He was in his seventies. He had some land under paddy and areca and two sons in local politics. He spoke about labour problems and harvesting is done on contract basis.

Twice people in cars/ tempo stopped me for a discussion. As usual gave them ten minutes intro and continued. Finally reached Honnali @ 2.30 PM and sight Udupi hotel was wonderful. Had my lunch there. There are couple of Udupi hotels in Honnali.

Road after Honnali is okay. There is some climbing involved in hilly area which locals call as ghat which I did not find too difficult. Other side of this ghat was a big lake. When I went near water so locals advised me to go to the other side meaning water is cleaner there. When I repacked my bags and about to leave, while turning upwards on left side, there was imbalance and trike toppled. On the other side of lake, I lost interest to take photographs or to wash myself.

There are plenty of lodges in Harihara and I checked into Nandini and went out for some food. I did not try to continue as next town with lodge is too far away. The rattling experienced yesterday in Honnali road is still felt, especially to rib cage and I want a hot bath before I move today. I hope to go beyond Hospet today.