It seems this is too long to post all at once so check out two posts for our whole adventure.
They say its better
late than never so here within the following pages are the many adventures of
our time Rickshaw Running 4500km across India from Kochi in the south all the
way to Shillong in the north east.
Sunday 7th April 2013
Today was the
first day on the road and not an ideal start after partying hard at the opening
party last night however there was so much faffing around that by the time we
drove our baby our onto the parade ground and out into the world we were ready
for action, but I’m getting ahead of myself.
We rocked up to the start point with all our gears and set about
securing our worldly possessions to the flimsy roof rack. With our rickshaw
packed we were ready to go but first we had to wait about for an age whilst all
was set up at the start line. I occupied myself by helping collect money for
the local animal shelter with the help of a gorgeous little puppy. And we were
yet again interviewed by the Indian news. At last the call was made to drive
across to the parade grounds and park our shaws in a semi-circle for some
speeches and drum banging. Alex was
behind the wheel as we set off to the start line somehow we ended up right at
the front of the pack and zoomed across the start line only to discover we had
no idea where we were going, we attempted to convoy with two other teams but
lost one to a breakdown fairly soon after the start the other team we managed
to stick with for the entire journey. We set about making our way out of Fort
Kochi we would have attracted enough attention anyway but with the other team
dressed in Spiderman morph suits we were mobbed almost continually. Eventually
we made it out of the city and stopped for snacks the decision was made to head
to Munnar to the mountains and to tea plantations for as far as the eye could
see. We started up and could feel our glorified lawn mowers struggling under
the strain. We rounded a corner and suddenly our Rickshaw Awesomage ground to a
halt luckily it was only out of petrol so we quickly topped up the tank. Then as we were filling up the second
rickshaw a motorbike came careening around the corner and drove straight into
our stationary vehicle. The back door to the engine was bent and petrol went
everywhere including all over Ayla in her eyes and mouth and burning her
delicate cleavage skin. Quick roadside first aid was required as I flushed out
her eyes with water and then eyewash. Back on the road night was falling it was
day one and we were breaking rule number one DO NO DRIVE AT NIGHT ON INDIAN
ROADS unfortunately for us it was a rule that we were yet to break again and
again. At this point much to our dismay the roads also began to worsen quickly
with potholes we could get lost in, and the darker it got the busier the roads
became soon we were being over taken
constantly by trucks and buses that blared past us into the night. Luckily it
wasn’t far to Munnar so we pushed on as soon as we drove into town we asked for
a hotel and were led to the closest one, it did the trick so we checked in
washed off the day’s stresses in the icy mountain water and headed to a local
restaurant to fill our bellies with some Aloo Gobi.
Monday 8th April 2013
We shipped out
this morning at about 7am it had rained during the night so we all had to sit
in wet seats. The air was still misty and the trees and grass was still covered
in dew as we rolled out of Munnar. It wasn’t long before all we could see for
miles around was tea shrubs lining both sides of the road occasionally we would
see a few tea pickers but for the most part it felt for a brief time as though
we were the only people in India. We stopped to take some photos and a convoy
of teams passed us for the next few days we were constantly playing cat and
mouse we would catch up and overtake and then they would. We drove up and up
with tea plantations as far as the eye could see but as we rounded the mountain
and began our decent on the other side the scenery changed and became much
drier. We rounded the corner and in front of us there was road works to
presumably widen the road there were men blasting sections of the mountain and
then a digger scrapping the rubble out of the way, at one point we had to drive
under the digger’s scoop which made for an awesome picture. We got to the
bottom of the mountain and were faced with long straight sections of highway
which made a massive change from the driving of yesterday but it did allow us
to build speed and make some good distances. Suddenly we found ourselves in a
chaotic city in a traffic jam there was a protest ahead and predictions of the
wait ranged from minutes to hours luckily a traffic policemen noticed us and
began ushering us and other small vehicles to take a diversion we ended up
driving through some crazy side streets that were clearly not designed for
anything more than pedestrians and bicycles we
hooned through and eventually came out back on the main road ahead of
the protest we carried on glad to be back on the open road. As we had made good
time we decided to push through until the next town and ended our day in a city
called Trichy it was a standard Indian city all hustle and bustle we looked in
the lonely planet and chose a place to stay now the challenge was to find it we
drove in circles and somehow ended up in the bus lane heading into the bus
exchange luckily no one seemed to mind and they all seemed intent on
helping us out alas no one knew where
the hotel was even though it was
supposedly across the road we sat in our rickshaws at a bit of a loss of what
to do when one of the Indian guys pointed straight opposite with a blank expression it was right in front
of us, clearly hunger was getting the better of us . We checked in and bumped
into another team doing the same. Later that evening we checked our position against
the other teams and seemed to be doing ok with that thought in mind we went to
sleep in our most likely rat infested hotel room.
Tuesday 9th April 2013
We headed out to
our Rickshaws this morning and discovered that the French team we saw last night
had left us a little present in our Rickshaws, little golden Eiffel Tower key
rings hanging on our dash. It seemed like it would be a good day if only we
could make it out of the city. Unknown to us girls the boys had asked a local
Rickshaw driver to guide us out of the city (we thought he was a creeper that
was following us for 45mins) finally he stopped, got out of his Rickshaw and
looking extremely pleased with himself pointed and announced “temple” right at
that moment several teams passed us heading in the other direction we had
followed this guy about for nothing. Eventually we left the town behind us and
were back on the highway when out of nowhere this guy appears beside us on a
motorbike with his knob out (this is the story we one most entertaining tale
from the road for) being three extremely immature girls we did what any girl
faced with a knob on a motorbike at 55km/hour would do and started roaring with
laughter and heckling him, unfortunately for us he took this as encouragement
and began to pleasure himself and started shouting across at us to touch it we
were horrified and began shouting abuse at him but in his lust he seemed to
take this as a sign he was in and pulled alongside us where he reached in and
grabbed at my boobs Ayla launched herself at him and barely restrained herself
from shoving him off his bike at full speed, thankfully at this point he sped
off into the distance we were absolutely raging (and spent the rest of the day
glaring at anyone on a motorbike) we did feel better about life though when he
returned a few minutes later with his knob still out and we all gobbed at him
which finally sent the message home to
him that we were not remotely interested in his tiny crusty penis what baffled
us the most though was his parting words he turned and with a look of genuine
hurt on his face sulked “you girls are arseholes” in my mind though its team Awesomage 1 Dirty
crusty knob on a motorbike 0. After stopping to recount our tale of molestation
to several teams pulled up for a chai we were back on the road we were just
chugging up an overpass when something didn’t feel right we slowly crawled to a
complete stop thankfully again it was nothing but a lack of petrol but with the
boys sped up ahead how we were going to fill up without the funnel was beyond
me. Luckily for us a handy Indian man stopped and fashioned us a funnel out of
a plastic bottle, it wasn’t the greatest though and we were wasting a lot of
fuel so we were glad when another team pulled up and let us borrow theirs. The
man that helped us left us with the parting words “In my country the women stay
at home” We caught up to the boys who had been joined by another team and we
all agreed to convoy to Pondicherry and the beach. We arrived there early afternoon and decided
to have some food we drove into a little hotel/ restaurant right by the beach
we were seated in a bamboo gazebo outside which when the fans were going was a
gorgeous cool temperature .there wasn’t much on the menu that was actually
available so I went for a green peace masala (it was green peas). After eating
it was still early so we decided to push onto a beach resort town called
Mamallapuram . We were still on the highway but it had changed from a boring
straight four laned highway to a two laned tree lined windy road. Although the
sea wasn’t always in view we knew it was somewhere just off to the right. The
drive was really pleasant as the scenery was beautiful and all the faces of the
people we passed were open and friendly.
We were speeding along when suddenly the boys exhaust fell off, it
couldn’t have happened at a more perfect spot for right across the road was a
mechanics. We stopped for a rest while the mechanics swiftly went to work
mending the Rickshaw. Whilst we were waiting Kurt and his team pulled up they were
heading to the same place so our convoy of three became a convoy of four. We
pulled into Mamallapuram in the late afternoon and headed straight for the sea
front as there were eleven of us in total and it was low season we got a good deal in a hotel right on the
water we rushed to throw our belongings into the rooms and headed out into the
ocean. As we had already attracted a large crowd us girls opted to swim in our
clothes (unfortunately for my I jumped on Kurt’s back and ripped my pants so
when I came out had to waddle up the beach with my legs clamped together) we
stayed in the water and watched the sunset from out beyond the breaks before
paddling back to shore, the electricity at our hotel didn’t come on until 7pm
so we sat on the balcony and people watched the fishermen pulling in the days
last catch dim light. Later that night we dined on fresh seafood in a local
restaurant with a few other teams who were also in town before crashing out. It
wasn’t a restful sleep as the electricity cut so the fan stopped and we were
all stuck to our beds with sweat.
Wednesday 10th April 2013
Today was not a
great day it started off with so much promise as we farewelled the other teams
in town and shipped out ourselves it all started with our desire to not drive
through Chennai (Madras). It all started when almost immediately we hit a
massively busy highway the traffic must have all been heading for Chennai. Our
first bad experience was when two guys in a van overtook us they were smiling and waving as they flew
past but then slowed right down in front of us we drove along behind them for a
short while but it was getting a bit ridiculous so we attempted an overtake
they then sped up forcing across two lanes into the far right as we couldn’t
drop back in behind them because there was too much traffic we were then stuck
in the far right going to slow but unable to move back across because no one
would let us in all the trucks and buses behind us were blaring their horns angrily
in the end I stuck out my arm and we prayed whatever was behind us would let us
across. Thankfully we got back to the left but were a bit shaken up. We were
driving along in a straight line towards the Chennai bypass when suddenly the
boys pulled a U-turn we followed behind them unable to ask what was going on as
they had already sped off. Our next bad experience happened not long after we suddenly
ground to a halt we had run out of gas, by now we were confidant in dealing
with that but what we weren’t happy about was being stuck on an extremely busy
highway with no hard shoulder. We set about making a bottle funnel and filled
our tank up all without any assistance we drove on and caught up with the boys
who were waiting up ahead. Our third bad experience was being completely and
utterly lost for about three hours at one point we were so lost a policeman
helped us by guiding us through a short cut back to the main road and then
holding up traffic for us to drive through and not just like one or two cars no
he held up two lanes of screaming, honking, cars, trucks, buses, Rickshaws and
cows. Finally we were back on the road we wanted to be on the same road we had
been on hours earlier heading towards the Chennai bypass. We drove through the
toll gate and encounter bad experience four a traffic jam caused by a truck
that had toppled over, luckily it didn’t look as though any one was hurt and
the traffic freed up once past the accident. Bad experience five was getting
lost for a second time in one day, we had decided to drive to a beach resort that
was on the other side of a city but after driving through the city it turned
out there were no hotels there/it was a million miles away/ it was a left
turn/right turn/keep going straight depending on who you asked so we decided to
sack that off and head for the next biggest town 60 odd km away. Bad experience
number six was night driving on the highway which was terrifying as our lights
did nothing to light up the road they only served to make us be seen by bigger
vehicles and all oncoming traffic drives with full beams so we were blinded every
time a car came towards us. We pulled into Kavali which looked quite dead
luckily everyone kept waving us on until suddenly we hit a bustling, lively
main road, we pulled into a hotel where there were three teams already parked
up. This was a positive end to our soul destroying day. We headed for a big
group meal and catch up in a very local restaurant which served the best Dahl
India has to offer (Just ask Ayla about it)
Thursday 11th April 2013
We left Kavali
and the other teams about 8am this morning hoping to make up some of the time
we lost yesterday overall we made good time and travelled a good distance today
but we did have several hold ups. The first was that we were almost run off the
road by the leader of the congress party and his vast entourage they had us
pose for picture after picture all holding their party flag (unfortunately no
one spoke enough English for us to find out what their policies are so let’s
just hope they are the good guys.) no doubt our faces will be gracing the party
propaganda for the next few months. Not long after we were back on the road we
were flagged down by a policeman we stopped and it transpired that rather than
having done anything wrong he just wanted to show us the local police station
so we u-turned and drove the wrong way down the hard shoulder of the motorway
to see it. When faced with the steep ramp off the road I turned sharply and
gunned it taking the rickshaw onto two wheels sideways, I’m pretty sure this
makes me eligible for stuntwomen status. the chief of police seemed less than
impressed with having his fortress invaded by a bunch of ragamuffins in
Rickshaws but the rest of the force was jubilant and cameras and pones were
produced from desks pockets bags and lockers all to snap us the policemen took
turns posing with us and we even got a photo with the local plain clothes cop
or as we excitedly called him the “secret police” this seemed to make his day. We
pushed on and by early afternoon we had made it to the town in which we had
planned to stay for the night, as we drove through the boys spied pizza hut and
before we knew it we had parked the shaws in an underground parking lot and
were dining on a global favourite. It tasted the same as any pizza hut anywhere
in the world and as I would come to realise western food is just not as satisfying
or as filling as the Indian food and Alex drank too much Pepsi so as we drove
out of town she was shaking with a sugar rush. Back on the road we were yet again
caught out by the pesky decent of the sun and were soon driving in the dark we
headed for Tadepallegudem we made the turn off and ended up in this tiny
village which was just a few roadside shacks and some very unfriendly looking
people dismayed we were prepared to drive back to the motorway and continue but
a guy on a motorbike asked us to follow him it turned out we weren’t where we
wanted to be and so followed him up the road and into a somewhat sizable town.
We checked into a hotel where we had a suite on the roof terrace the hotel was
strange with the lobby fully lit up and the roof terrace lit but the rest of
the hotel plunged in eirre darkness. And a small child intent on constantly
sniffing air freshener we told his brother who spoke English to stop him but it
was no use the kid was intent on making his rain lemony fresh. We took a walk to
a local restaurant passing by several ginormous pigs which seemed to inhabit
the gutters eating all the filth. We walked into a dimly lit eating
establishment where all eyes were on us we sat at a table so dark we had to
read the menus by the light from phones towards the end of the deliciously
spicy meal the power cut out and the proprietor came over and asked us to leave
it was certainly a bizarre dining experience.
Friday 12th April 2013
We left Tadepallegudem
expecting it to take an age to find our
way out of the maze like town but it proved to be fairly simple we were soon on
our way and the plan was to head to a beach resort city where we could get our
babies serviced and chill by the beach for a sort while. We were sat at a
traffic junction on the motorway when we saw a bus collide with a local
Rickshaw squashing it between the bus and the road barrier. Luckily no one was
hurt and there was minimal damage done to the shaw . at that point the boys who
were behind us were yelling out to us I stuck my head out and looked where they
were pointing our roof rack had snapped under the weight of our bags (no doubt
the horrendous amount of speed bumps and rumble strips did nothing to help the
situation) we pulled over and piled all the bags inside the rickshaw and
continued on our merry way the rest of the day’s drive was along uninspiring
highways until we reached Vishakhapatnam (or more easily for some reason
ZigZag) we pulled into the hilly city and headed straight to the waterfront to
look for accommodation, we checked into a beachfront lodge that looked clean
and comfortable (we later came in to find a whole host of creepy crawlies
running about all over the crisp clean sheets) we then took the Rickshaws for
some pampering first stop was the welders to get our roof rack sorted, it had
been welded and re-welded so many times there was more weld then metal the
process didn’t take too long so we were soon off to find a mechanics to have
them serviced, the advice was a full service every 1000km but as we were to
long you shouldn’t mend something that isn’t broken. We sat about while the
mechanics greased some shafts, changed the oil and gave the engines a once
over. With the Rickshaws running smoothly we followed a local driver to a restaurant
as seemed to be the theme the more expensive a place the worse the food tastes
so feeling bitterly disappointed with our pathetic meal we drove back to the
hotel and parked up before walking across the road to the sea. We wandered up
and down the seafront posing for photos in front of a large creepy baby statue
and upsetting the guards by climbing on top of a mini elephant statue then sat,
watched the ocean and contemplated the meaning of dreams.
Saturday 13th April 2013
We woke up this
morning in anticipation of clean clothes returned fresh from the hotels laundry
service when the girl brought them in they were not only soaking wet but
dirtier then when we had handed them over anything white had been stained pink
or blue and they didn’t even smell clean unfortunately for us we had paid in
advance on good faith so I set about trying to get some of the money back after
some intense haggling and being told there was no more money as it had been
taken to the bank the dude opened up the sofa in the hotel lobby and pulled out
a massive wad of cash I managed to get back half of the money to then get asked
for a tip all I could do was laugh. Soon we were on the road but it wasn’t long
before the boys vehicle started to act funny the engine kept cutting out
causing them to come to a stop we spent the morning trying to establish what
the problem was and had to tow them several times annoyingly after wasting half
the day we realised it was as simple as turning the valve for the fuel reserve
as the hose was blocked no petrol was getting to the engine. (this was to be
the first of two ridiculous time wasting breakdowns) onwards we pushed yet
again chasing the sun we settled on a place to stay and turned off the highway
the light was fading fast as we turned into a town called Chhatrapur the
streets were teeming with cars, motorbikes, people and cows and dogs sleeping
all over the road we drove along asking for a hotel but were met mostly with
hostile glares and dismissive waves to somewhere called the lodge which on
inspection was still largely uncompleted and lacked not only any luxuries such
as electricity and water but also the basics such as windows or a floor. We persevered
heading out of the main drag and into more of a shanty town type area when
Ganesh smiled on us for the first time that day and sent us help in the form of
Ramesh, he guided us on his motorbike to the only functioning hotel in town and
we were quickly checked in with him getting us a good price. He left us to
shower and get ourselves sorted and then as we understood it he was going to
come back and take us out for dinner. About 30mins later there was a knock at
our door it was Ramesh and his wife. His wife explained to us that the men of
Chhattrapur had cheap mentalities and so would think us girls were beeches
(bitches) and that harm would come to us if we were alone on the streets. For that
reason it was decided that we would get food and eat in our hotel room, the
food was amazing and we had our first taste of Masala naan (or Kulcha depending
on where you are) its naan bread stuffed with veg this one was tomato and potato
and tasted amazing it was a bit of a messy meal eating Indian style with our
hands which proves tricky when its Dahl and rice. Whilst we ate Ramesh told us
all about themselves theirs is a marriage of love and her families do not
approve only in the last year have they resumed talking to the couple. Ramesh’s
father is the chief of police and he gave us his contact details in case
anything happened to us at any time during our visit in India.
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