My brother-in-law is an aviation nut and takes flying very seriously. He logs every flight with all sorts of details from the captain’s signature and cards to the tail number of the flight and so on. Like most of us nuts, he too has tried to incorporate his passion and work (he is an aviation lawyer) around each other. So obviously some of his craziness rubs off onto the rest of us. I mean, I don’t keep a log of every flight, but I have a vague idea of how many flights a year I end up taking. Turns out that 2023’s Vistara count was 32.
But I am not here to bore you with details of my time in the sky. What I am getting to is that over the last three years, I have written lots of these pieces from an elevation of 30,000ft because that time in the air is my time to sit back and reminisce about what fun things one has done in the month. So, let’s not break that tradition, especially for the anniversary issue here. I am starting this column from a flight back from Chandigarh to Mumbai. Speaking of seasons, the season of motorcycle festivals is over and sadly I seem to have missed them all. From Rider Mania to Moto Soul and finally India Bike Week. Rider Mania aside, IBW and Moto Soul (which for some weird reason, were on the same dates) were missed because I needed to be in Chandigarh helping out the family for a wedding that has taken over our lives for the last few months.
What I can’t fathom is why can’t all the brands and IBW join hands for one massive week of festivals. Imagine a week of festivities with motorcyclists riding all sorts of brands welcoming each other’s events and parties. Wouldn’t it be a brilliant way to grow the excellent Indian motorcycling community? I have not heard of such a joint moto celebration anywhere in the world so it would surely be a first. Where would all the moto brands coexist in one festival? The obvious answer is in Goa.
While the rest of my brethren were celebrating this year at whatever festivals they were at, I was busy running around with wedding chores but since I was back home in Chandigarh, the vehicle that was carrying me around was my Ducati DesertX. Which I have to say was the most perfect way to get chores done. From carrying 20kgs of raw materials to cook in the tandoor to ferrying my little nieces around, the Ducati did it all.
I had been a bit upset as post-August, I had not been able to ride my Ducati as much as I wanted. I did a trip to Zanskar which thanks to the mad monsoon in the mountains made it impossible to ride the Ducati up in time. So I ended up taking a Himalayan which was fun but I think the DesertX would have been more at home and more fun. Oh well, since Zanskar is not going anywhere anytime soon we shall add this ride to the list of many for 2024.
