Golden Quadrilateral Ride with Benu - the Itinerary

Thousands of travel enthusiasts bitten by the notorious highway bug have successfully explored the Golden Quadrilateral circuit without any major glitch. Yes, presently the GQ road network is pretty awesome as per Indian standard in majority of its length. If you're anticipating an uninterrupted six-lane to pamper you under the brand hospitality of Golden Quadrilateral then your expectation will be hurt real bad. In the entire 6,261 kilometres I rode, there were several patches which had either too many undulations, potholes, diversions, cattle grazing, two-way traffic, or shitty combinations of some of them. There were multiple occasions in those 13 days when I had literally cursed myself for presuming a butter-smooth highway cruise. But, as soon as my #GQRideWithBenu got concluded and I reflected over the journey as a whole, all I could remember were wide inviting roads, persistently changing landscapes and few beautiful human interactions. 

Okay, here I'll share my actual ride itinerary with you. If you compare this itinerary with the one I had published in the announcement post before commencing the trip, you'll find 10-15% alterations. In case you haven't checked out my older post- Golden Quadrilateral itinerary on two wheels, please spend a minute on that. Sticking to the old plan was equally possible, only if I was a little more strict with my morning rituals. At first have a quick glance at my ride flowchart. Let me remind you, in the drafting phase I was pretty focused on fencing stress and night ride out of my GQ itinerary. Although we had a crash on the final day, no buffer day was needed to make up for the loss. I guess the minimal yet thoughtful trip planning had worked out in my favour just fine.

Golden Quadrilateral Ride with Benu - the Planning

Covering 6,261 kilometres solo in 13 days at a relaxed pace, certainly deserved good hours of planning and preparation. Yes, planning plays a significant role in smooth execution of any trip, and it becomes an absolute necessity when you're rolling on two wheels under a long itinerary. We riders admit it or not, long distance motorcycling in a country like India is a bigger gamble than other modes of transport. Reason is definitely multi-factorial. Being avid motorcycle lovers we can spend hours defending all arguments against motorcycle touring, but that doesn't change the fact that it is relatively riskier. Motorbiking has a tremendous addictive potential. Once your genes express their love towards two wheels it's very unlikely that any word of caution can hold you back. From my personal experience I can vouch, nothing pisses off a rider more than unsolicited advice like- "You should have planned such a long journey on your car". It is perfectly okay if you don't give a shit to voices who fail to fathom your passion, but don't let carelessness get over your head while planning your motorcycle trip.

Sincere planning coupled with basic preparation can drastically mitigate uncertainties associated with motorcycling on Indian highways and help coping up with most least expected situations. Hope you've spent your few minutes in scrolling down my last article on #GQRideWithBenu, where I had narrated about the conception of this Golden Quadrilateral ride. After reading whatever I've penned so far you must be curious to know the meticulous planning I did undertake before executing this great Indian road trip. Would you pardon the procrastinator if I confess- I barely did any homework before executing the #GQRideWithBenu? Ah hold on, this article was not meant to inject you with silly dose of Saturday humour. Despite my apparent indolence in planning, there were few ideas, principles and minor initiatives which I had compiled before the trip and remained rigid to. Those proved to be beneficial and certainly aided in successful completion of the GQ circuit.

Golden Quadrilateral Ride with Benu - the Conception

Ah finally I could tick off one more item from my ever-growing bucket list! I'm delighted to inform you that #GQRideWithBenu got concluded on a thrilling note. Theoretically it might be an exaggeration if I say I went for a great Indian road trip because my country is too vast to be explored on a single breath, but driving 6,261 kilometres in 11 days, traversing more than a dozen of Indian states and innumerable cities was no less enriching for this enthusiast traveller on two wheels. My actual Golden Quadrilateral (GQ) itinerary comprised 13 days, among which two were strictly no-ride days. Those two lazy days were well utilised in pampering my aching upper body muscles while capturing essence of two cities- Mumbai and Udaipur. If you've gone through my previous blog post where I had officially announced this journey just one night before flagging off the ride, you must be already aware of my route details. 

For first time readers of poetry of roads I would make a quick recap. Golden Quadrilateral is the largest highway network in India which connects four major metro cities- Kolkata, Chennai, Mumbai and Delhi, spanning over an estimated length of 5,846 kilometres. Interestingly, GQ is the fifth longest highway network in the world, traversing through thirteen Indian states, and connecting a whole bunch of large Indian cities besides those four metros- Bhubaneshwar, Vishakhapatnam, Bangalore, Pune, Surat, Vadodara, Jaipur, Ajmer, Gurgaon, Agra, Kanpur, Varanasi, Dhanbad etc. to mention a few. Although the planned itinerary published earlier got altered at few places my ride remained totally unaffected, and I could cover everything I had thought of. Thankfully the buffer day was not required. Well, I'll talk about the planning, materialised itinerary, day-wise updates in subsequent blogs. Today let me narrate you the story behind conception of this Golden Quadrilateral ride. It surely needed a dedicated post as too many people have asked me: Why #GQRideWithBenu?