bikes on the roughest terrains of the Himalayas seem to be losing to women as hundreds
of female bikers from across the world are reaching here to prove their mettle.
All available roads have been trampled under the bikes ridden by women but they
are intended to do what men cannot do.
expeditions. Women bikers are searching if any motorable road has not yet seen
any female. Most of the women are newbie while very few of them are
professional, still they are testing their limits on 15,000 to 18,400 feet high
roads. Many women are joining men in their tours and proving their riding
skills. Not only that, some women riding their bikes alone in terrains of
Manali-Leh highway want to go beyond their limits.
“I’m loving
riding my bike on Himalayas. This is difficult but rewarding,” a well known
Canadian celebrity Lia Grimanis informed Discover Kullu Manali
over phone from Nubra Valley of Ladakh. Lia has an experience of biking on ice
in Norway when temperature was -55 degrees Celsius. “I’ll ask all women in my
country to try their luck on Manali-Leh highway once in their life.”
Manali-Leh highway. This is for the first time that Royal Enfields are not
easily available on rent in Manali. Motorbikes are being hired from outside the
state. 500CC bike, long leather shoes, windcheater, helmet and a bunch of long
hairs peeping out of the helmet, the Himalayan roads are thundering with
presence of adventurous housewives.
Unfortunately,
negligible numbers of women from India are daring to come out of the homes and compete
men on roads. “Our culture and traditional thoughts doesn’t allow women to ride
bikes like men do,” India’s first professional motor-biker Moksha Jetley rues,
who want to see more Indian female bikers riding on off-roads. “Hundreds of
women are riding their bikes on Manali-Leh, Shimla-Spiti, Leh-Zanskar,
Manali-Srinagar highways. But, I hardly meet any Indian. Yes, some of our women
have laid the foundation stone of a new era but I was never encouraged for my
biking passion by anybody in my country, though I’m encouraging my Indian
sisters,” she added.
on Manali-Leh highway is drawing more and more women every year. Though a
biking tour is expensive than the family holiday tour, but women, who have
tasted the fun of biking, are ready to pay any cost to live their dreams.
Moksha has
ridden her motorbike from Kanyakumari to Kashmir, Tibet, Napal and most of the
toughest roads of the Himalayas. She has been inspiring Indian women to come
out of their boundaries and live their dreams. She is launching a women
motor-biking expedition in November where her slogan would be ‘proud to be a
woman’. “Women can do anything. Why only cricket. We can beat men in all the
fields. Women have been forced to stay indoors for centuries, but this is the
time for men to worry,” she said.
Comments