Introduction

Riding is a pleasure. But when that Riding is with your best buddies, the pleasure is doubled. Add a mystc, wild location to it and the pleasure is infinite. Not to forget the awesome food. The please-o-meter just climbs higher and higher. The North East part of India has been in the wishlist of many riders. But few get to accompalish it. I was one of the lucky ones.

It all started way back in July 2010. The idea of going to Bhutan was floated by Nilu. It was too fanciful to miss. Slowly the idea was exposed to few more riders and by Feb 2011, 7 riders were confirmed. These were:

Nilutpal Hazarika - Bajaj Pulsar 200 - Sinha Saab
Gyananath Moshahari - Hero Honda Karizma - Fukku
Mrinal Doley - Royal Enfield Classic 500 - Monk
Mrinaljit Dutta - Bajar Avenger 200 - John
Satadal Payeng - Bajaj Pulsar 150 - Fall Guy
Sir AK Brahma - Yamaha R15 - Mamaji
Diptinder Singh Chhabra - Royal Enfield Electra 4S - Kenny

Now began the task of planning out the itinerary. Two weeks of vacation time was carved out of our schedules. Arunachal Pradesh was added along with Bhutan. For me, Arunachal was described in one word. Mystic. This was before I visited the place. Nilu earlier described it as 'the place with the highest density of poisonous snakes'. Now, it can be described as Wild. Nilu began to prepare the itinerary. We had no idea about the kind of terrain, the road condition, the weather, we would be encountering. Help was taken from all possible sources. Another riding comrade Vibhor who had just returned from Red Dragon Ride provided inputs. The permits for entry into Bhutan would be no problem. They can be obtained on the spot. Nilu got the ILPs made for Arunachal early. The itinerary was repeatedly worked on so that we could get good time to explore both the territories comfortably. But the biggest task was still remaining. The motorcycles.

The initial plan was to take the machines along with us in Rajdhani to Guwahati. But our tickets had a long waitlist and the status was not climbing up. Gati refused to take bikes outside New Delhi. WTF. This was a constraint in New Delhi only. They were willing to take the bikes from Panipat. WTF. Aggarwal Packers & Movers were another bunch of fuckups. We took an online estimate and the cost was 3800 per bike. On contacting the agency, they estimated a price of Rs 10000 per bike. Even after repeatedly asking the reason for this inflated cost, we were not given a reason. Company policy. WTF. The time of departure was looming closer and we still did not have a mode to transport our motorcycles.
We booked sleeper tickets on the only other train going to Guwahati from New Delhi Railway Station (NE Express was now shifted to Anand Vihar Terminal). On 26th of March, Doley, Dutta and me went to New Delhi station to board the bikes. We contacted an agent. They were also now cashing in on the situation of lesser number of trains. They quoted a price of Rs 5000 per bike. WTF. Our logical reason told us that we could get the bikes delivered at the doorstep by some other Movers & Packers at less than that cost. We followed our reason and returned with our bikes. Over the next couple of days, Dutta found out that another agency, Caravan was charging Rs 6000 per bike. I found another M&P in Noida that quoted Rs 10000 for 3 bikes. The transit time was quoted as a week. This sounded like a sweet deal and we readily agreed. We saw later that theirs was the biggest fuckup.