Kanva- A day out with RTMC

Kanva Dam is a minor irrigation project dam spanning 776 hectares and is about 15 kms in length. Built way back in 1946 across the River Kanva (a tributary of the River Cauvery), the dam is also a fisheries center with a number of trees and wooded hills surrounding it.

I was excited to go for this announce ride. I haven’t been to that place before. Moreover this is my second announce ride with RTMC and is going to be the gateway to RTMC membership.

Chandra, Piston, Kam and Sriram are the only guys I know in the ride group. For them too this is the second announce ride with RTMC. Piston again proved himself to be Mr. Late. This guy won’t pick up the phone in the morning. I am trying to wake him up as requested by him. Amazingly he kept his hands and ears away from the phone. 7:30 am, we all are ready to start the ride and I’m getting a call from Piston… sorry dude, couldn’t get up early, but don’t want to miss the ride, his friend also is ready to come with him for the ride as pillion. The option for him now is to join the ride at the breakfast halt. Thankfully the ride route is through the place where Piston stays. Finally before we finished the breakfast Piston makes it to our table.

Piston is more enthusiastic about doing laying his hands on his bike than taking it out for rides. Finally even that lifeless object started complaining about pathetic situation. It’d been in his own ‘personal garage- his porch’ for more than a month. Whenever we wanted him to come out for rides with us the only thing which pulled him back was the fact that the bike is not in running condition. I and Swami used to make fun of this quite often. I’m sure, Piston got fed up with this or not sure if it’s because of the bikes prayers, finally he decided to take to Farooq (his mechanic). Now, a few hours with the mechanic and the bike is ready.

We headed to Kanva after breakfast. There were more than 20 bikes for the ride; I don’t remember the exact no. though. Mysore road is in excellent condition to ride, a glance at the Speedo meter will prove it. The right deviation takes you to Kanva reservoir. It is difficult to figure out that turn. The road from the high way till the dam, I would call it an off road. Better you have a nice butt to take the impact or stand up on the foot rest.

One good thing about the reservoir area is that the place is not commercialized and of course it is very beautiful. You can take your bike close to the water; No shaky muddy cover to trap you or your bikes. I have memories of Marconahalli, another dam, where we had to put in our best to bring a 4x4 off a trap.

The dam site is very picturesque and tempting for any activity on the bike. I and piston took a round the lake ride close to water, a kind of off track ride. Different sides look different. One side we found few boats with no human being around, an abandoned brick furnace etc. giving the place a ghosted look. Chandra should have joined us and his camera would have a feast.

By the time we completed the ride and joined the group the usual introduction part was almost over. Being our second ride with RTMC I checked the procedure for induction to RTMC and I found the right guy to have a chat about this- Sid. He came for the ride with his Java 350cc, white colored bike, a solid restored piece of machine. Sid rides with his wife who is very passionate about riding. When she said she is still waiting for a ride to Vayanad that her hubby has promised to take her once, I felt unbelievable. Sreeram too came with his wife, nice to meet him for the second RTMC ride.

We returned back to Bangalore by noon without going for any more activities other than a line up before leaving the place. Chandra, Kam and I took lunch on the way back while piston split up on the way and ended up in some pub in Rajarajeswari nagar.