FireTravels #6—Roadtrip to Bangalore for the #2 India Steemit Accelerator!

in #travel7 years ago (edited)

The past week has been incredible but it also left me feeling drained. So I took some time off from writing to focus on some other aspects of my life. On the 30th of July, I organized the #2 India Steemit Accelerator in Bangalore and drove to the city with a couple of friends to execute it.


Approaching the dense and mighty Western Ghats!

We hit the road on Friday morning. I had my friends @sanjayjkamath and @rjsudeep join me on this trip. After an unexpected delay owing to a minor issue in my car which we got rectified quickly, we had a great time driving 400 kms into the IT hub of India.


Idli Vada with Sambar and Chutney. Breakfast at Mangalore. This is one of the best South Indian breakfast dishes!

Snaking through the Western Ghats, the national highway connecting my city of Mangalore with Bangalore is a busy highway. Parts of it is in a bad shape owing to the heavy rainfall in the region and truck traffic carrying heavy loads. But the rest of it is in a fantastic shape, worthy of a Supercar!


Beautiful roads that are being upgraded at the cost of some terrible deforestation.


Scraped my car in a few places no thanks to these potholes!

This was my longest drive after my accident in February and I was thrilled to undertake this journey. It's not often that I get to take a roadtrip with my friends so I felt we should hit the road instead of taking a quick flight!


A small stream in the forest!


L-R: Me, @sanjayjkamath and @rjsudeep


With "Saphira"-My limited edition Ford Fiesta 1.6S

We drove past Sakleshpur city, which is the only major town in the hills. The place is famous for its off-road trails, coffee plantations, estates, and wood work. You can find coffee plant carvings as well as these giant elephants made out of wood. The ones in these pictures sell for over 100,000 INR or $1500

We stopped at a well known veg-restaurant, 'Ossoor' that serves delicious local fare and had some Indian breads made out of Rice flour with chutney and pickles! It was delicious and not very heavy but it did make us a bit sleepy on the 2nd leg of our drive.

Once we had crossed over the hills into the plains, the roads were fantastic and butter smooth! It really made us wish that we were in a supercar as we were going flat-out in some areas as the roads were deserted and the freshly laid tarmac was ensuring a very smooth drive after the pot-hole ridden section we crossed earlier.

We entered the city by 4pm and drove to our friend @rjsudeep's house to drop him off and then we left to collect the memento. I wanted to give a memento to the Bosch's India head for Venture Capital. I think it turned out quite nicely with the Steem logo and the tagline for the India Steemit Accelerator! What do you think? I had placed an order over the week and it was ready for collection.


Empowering India With The Steem Blockchain!

With the last of my errands sorted, I booked a hotel room close to the venue for @sanjayjkamath and myself and we proceeded to get some rest for the day and meet with some friends later in the evening.


Dining with @bikergirl!


I was so hungry that I had a bite before I could take a picture!

My friend @bikergirl was in town and we met up for some dinner. But due to rain and confusion courtesy Google maps I had to walk about an hour to reach the restaurant she was at! It was a beautiful cafe but it shut down way too early. Luckily however we managed to grab some sandwiches and desserts before we were asked to leave.


@bikergirl's recommendation to get a Banoffee pie was great! It was delicious!


At the DYUART Cafe in Bangalore!


At the DYUART Cafe in Bangalore!

Candida dropped me back on her scooter to where my friends were at, and it felt great to be on a two-wheeler again after 7 months and feel the wind on my face!

I was still hungry so we had a round of cheesy chicken momos at the restaurant when I met up with @sanjayjkamath, @andreanoronha and our friend Vardhan. After an hour or so we came back to our hotel and called it a day!

The room was comfy and the WiFi worked. I had to catch up on some work and I got that quickly sorted out. We played some music on my bluetooth speaker and I dozed off listening to hotel california play on loop!

The next couple of days were great and I'll share that in my next post as well as the updates from the India Steemit Accelerator!


If you like my work kindly resteem it to your friends. You may also continue reading my recent posts which might interest you:

  1. I Donated $1300+ Of My Income Earned On Steemit Last Month and This is My Mid-2017 Donation Update!
  2. Dummies Guide to Basic Steemit Account Security + Account Recovery Guide! Must Read For Steemit Users!

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Thanks @firepower for this nice post!

Your post looks like you had a fun roadtrip in India. I like the elephants made of wood and also the food pictures. Upvoted and following!!

Thanks :)

Thanks for taking us with you on your road trip in Mangalore!
never been to India and somehow - the pics on this pic made it look like the way to Baguio in the Philippines
Nan and curry made me hungry again
it's almost 1 am
is that rice cake on the 1st pic?
I love Indian food and craving for a daal and tanduri chicken now :D

@englishtchrivy India is not far away, you will love to be here.

Such a amazing post. People dont know about it but India has beautiful unexplored places. I recently posted a blog about my travel experience in himachal pradesh. Check it out i am sure you would love it. I wish i had followers like you. Well some day i would. Also i checked your interview on on amsterdam steemit fest. It was so amazing to see a indian there, could not believe my eyes. Even I am trying to go the steem fest happening in Lisbon. Just saving enough money for my stay. really excited for it. I hope i see you there .

Any tips of how getting followers on steemit. Also it would be great help if you would resteem my latest blog as you have amazing fan following.

I have good content still struggling to find my place here

https://steemit.com/travel/@sukhpreetsingh/blog-4-travel-kalga-india-see-the-unseen-beauty-of-india-come-see-india-from-my-eyes-part-1

The pictures were really beautiful and the roads looked so amazing with it's rustic look.

@firepower - Bangalore is close to my heart since I have been visiting for the last 15 years. Though it has grown to be a little tiresome with the traffic from the quaint metro city it used to be, it still has its charm. Great to see pictures of the typical food that you could enjoy. The potholes in the road and the little water stream hidden in the forest ring a bell too. Great post. Wish I knew about the meetup. I have been traveling in very remote inland areas of the world and hardly had any decent coverage. I have, therefore been mostly out of touch except for one post which I could get posted today. Perhaps I have missed updates on the meetup. Thanks to your blog, I at least became aware. Upvoted.

I look forward to your next post @firepower, eagerly waiting for you to visit the North side of India to organize a steemit accelerator here. The roads is south are so much fun, I should plan a trip to Bangalore soon. :) Cheers

That sounds great @firepower unfortunately i couldn't attend the steemfest hoping to meet you people on next steemfest @naseerbhat ..

Super and all the best

Hi @firepower What a nice journey inside beautiful India. India is so big and has so many different environments it will take years to see it all. I always want to go back there and see other parts of the country. Thanks for sharing I get the taste of it again.

Is food in India really spicy? I should try that. I should go there. Thanks.

Food is spicy @joeyarnoldvn, but you'll never find food as delicious as in India. You must visit once.

@joeyarnoldvn Not always. India has so many different variants when it comes to food. But you can always ask the people who are preparing the food to make it more spicier and they would gladly do so :) Having lived in India for 26 years, I have not yet tasted even 1% of the cuisine the country has to offer. That should give you an idea of the vastness :)

Cool 😎 you look very happy with your gangs looking forward for next trip ☺️