Kolli Hills on an NX 500

We rode from Bengaluru to Kolli Hills astride a Honda NX500 and it was a memorable ride for many reasons

- Joshua Varghese

TRAVELLING IN ANY form is an integral part of human nature. There is always a promise of the unknown on the hidden side of the horizon. For some, the journey may not be as important as the destination or vice-versa but for motorcycle enthusiasts like us, the adventure is crucial to the experience.

A trip to Kolli Hills in Tamil Nadu is something I have been meaning to do for a while. Such a ride is best done on a reliable machine and when Honda's BigWing division invited us to borrow any of their motorcycles, it felt like the final piece of the puzzle had fallen into place. The Bengaluru-Kolli Hills-Bengaluru route is largely free of potholes and traffic jams but there were a few stretches of roadworks en route, so an ADV seemed like the obvious choice. Honda's ADV portfolio includes the CB200X, the NX500 and the XL750 Transalp; available at BigWing dealerships across the country. We picked the NX because we felt it offered an interesting mix of comfort, performance and safety.

More than 500 kilometres to clock on highways, country roads, and the famous Kolli Hills hairpins felt like NX territory. This motorcycle is powered by a 471-cc, liquidcooled, eight-valve, parallel-twin engine that develops 48 hp and a peak torque of 43 Nm. In our market, that places this motorcycle as a good choice for someone moving up from a singlecylinder machine or an interesting alternative for those upgrading from an air-cooled twin.