There’s no place like home…

DAY 10

Chandigarh to Epsom (6,500km)

So I am writing this in an Uber from Heathrow airport, London, back to my house in Epsom.  It’s the last 30km of my epic Indian Motorcycling holiday and, even for a man that regularly travels with a hangover, this has been the most horrific journey I’ve ever had.  I left my hotel in Chandigarh, to get a taxi to the airport, roughly 22 hours ago and I am officially broken! You may remember the blog post for Day 9 concluding with me, in a taxi with Mat, Sheetal, Kaustabh and Richard, on our way to a local Indian brewery bar to meet Vikas for some drinks and fun.  Well, let me tell you how I have spent 30 hours since then…

The taxi from the hotel to the first bar, Beach N Brew, took about 20 minutes across downtown Chandigarh, and if I thought it was a mental, unforgiving city on a motorbike then I was in for a rude awakening in a local taxi.  In the 20 minutes we were in the car it wouldn’t be any exaggeration to say we nearly had 5 crashes. Our local taxi driver drove the car like an escaping bank robber, who had been struck blind seconds before getting the car jammed in second gear.  We thrashed our way across the city and ended alongside in a very western style ‘strip’ of bars, restaurants and shops, covered in awnings and neon lights with ‘cool’ names like The Purple Frog, Barbecue Nation and Rendezvous NightClub. We had reached our destination!

We all jumped out of the cab and headed straight into Beach n Brew https://www.facebook.com/BeachNBrew26/ for a few looseners.  It was a fantastic place I have to say!  We walked through a bar that wouldn’t have looked out of place in a New York Hotel, past the open kitchen where the food looked and smelled incredible and through to an enclosed garden area, with huge screens showing the cricket and some great seating areas.  We were seated at a table for 8, and immediately ordered HUGE glasses of premium lager. Rich took charge of ordering the food and got us a selection of finger food, and we were off and running. We sat and reminisced about the previous 9 days, laughing at some of the things we had seen and done and generally having a good time.  Soon Vikas arrived, looking clean and sharp in his jeans and jacket combo (whilst we all wore Planet Way Round t-shirts and jumpers) and joined us in having some fun. Soon, we were having too much fun. Large glasses of lager were accompanied by Tropical Tequila shots, which is essentially a shot of Tequila with some grilled Pineapple to wash it down with afterwards.  Rich organised two rounds of this, to go with our beers, and then we were up and off for our inaugural Chandigarh pub crawl.

Next stop was The Thirsty Vampire bar, along the same western style strip, complete with burly, grunting door staff who didn’t really want to let us (or anyone ) in.  We talked them into it though, walked down 2 sets of stairs and into an empty bar. It seems they were very good at scaring people off and not letting people in generally, to the point that the atmosphere in the empty bar was shit!  Good work lads! Regardless, Kaustabh ordered a round of B52’s, which we shot down in no time at all. We all then had a short spin on the dance floor, and then boom – we were off to bar number 3 of the #InauguralChandigarhPubCrawl We stopped on the way to pose for a few team photos, and it started to become obvious that some people were better at handling their alcohol than others.

Stop number 3 was Sector-7 Social, who seemed to recruit their front door staff from the same recruitment company as The Thirsty Vampire.  We sweet-talked our way in though, or rather Vikas sweet-talked our way in, and went into another really cool bar. It felt like a bar in Amsterdam or somewhere like that, with a huge bar with lots of lagers and beers on draft, a massive dance floor and then stadium style seating out the back for watching cricket on the big screens.  A waiter found us a booth overlooking the dance floor and Rich got on with ordering more food, beer and Tequilas. Now, the next few hours went by in a blur. We drank, we talked, we drank, we danced, we drank, we watched fights on the dance floor, we drank, we ate, we drank, we drank, we drank! By the end Kaustabh was pole dancing (I do have a video Kaustabh), Sheetal collapsed (I do have a photo Sheetal), Mat looked over the dancefloor like an unofficial ‘bouncer’ (I do have a photo Mat), Vikas kicked back, pulled faces and had a sit down dance (yes, I do have videos Vikas) and Rich fuelled everyone along with more beer, Tequila and finger snacks.  We had an amazing time! It was very nice to kick-back, relax and have some beers, knowing that we didn;t have to ride a motorbike in extreme conditions the following day. Some of us, of course, had to travel 6,500km on a plane, but that’s easy in comparison.

At about 12.30am we left Sector-7 Social and secured a taxi back to the hotel.  We said goodbye to Vikas outside the bar, and then Mat, Sheetal, Kaustabh, Richard and I got a taxi back to the hotel.  There was singing in the taxi, stories told, jokes told and people passing out (Sheetal) and before we knew it we were back.  There was, remarkably, a desire to have a night-cap when we got back from the hotel, but as I had to wake up in about 4 hours to get a taxi I made my apologies, said my goodbyes and went to our room.  I got to our room, brushed my teeth, put my sleeping shorts on, got into bed, closed my eyes, then opened them and low and behold it was 5.25am and time to wake up. FML! I showered, brushed my teeth, put my contact lenses in, dressed and then there was a gentle knock on the door.  It was Mat, still in tour guide mode, making sure I made the taxi on-time and didn’t miss my flight. I thanked him and then jumped into the taxi to start my epic trip. It was 5.45am Indian time, which is 00.15am UK time.

The taxi driver was a chatty fella, exactly what I didn’t need.  The 30 minutes it took to get to the airport were torture. He told me all about his brother sho now lived in West Norwood, who fixes gas boilers, and insisted that I give him my number onto pass onto him.  I was too tired to argue…and so far i have had 3 messages from him since I landed back in the UK. Once we got to Chandigarh airport for my flight to Delhi I had to figure out how things worked in an Indian airport, in comparison to a British airport, all the time hungover/still drunk.  It seems you have to first scan your bags through an x-ray machine, at which point they are sealed with cable ties. Weirdly, you can’t check power packs in your hold luggage, so I had to carry the two I had taken in my jeans pockets as I did not have any carry-on bags. Once you have done that you have to go to the check-in desks, as usual in the UK, but with the added ‘fun’ of the Indian approach to queuing.  People pushed in, pushed me out of the way, formed their own lines and generally did what they want to get checked-in. Luckily for me I didn’t care. I was too hungover/drunk to care so just stood quietly and eventually got to the front. The cable tied bags were taken, a paper boarding card issues (of course, always paper) and then it was off through security.

This was fairly simple, as in the UK, and then I was through to Chandigarh International Departures where there was one coffee shop and that was all.  I had coffee and water and then I saw them putting up the ‘lane management’ posts and ropes, so went and stood right at the front so that I was first in the queue (as no-one could push-in past the queue management system) and then I could just sit on the plane ASAP and go to sleep.  I was the 9th person on the plane. I genuinely don’t even know how people managed to push in past me? Oh well. I slept for the 45 minute flight and was only awoken as we bumped down onto the runway when we landed in Delhi. Now was the fun part. I knew that Delhi had a number of terminals that are quite spread out, and this would involve a shuttle bus journey, but was feeling particularly rough at this stage so was full of dread!  Soon though I reclaimed my luggage, found the shuttle bus, got my travel pass for the shuttle, rode the 15 minute bus ride, arrived at Terminal 3 and was gliding past the security on the door to check-in. In Indian airports they have what appear to be soldiers on the entrance doors, and if you don’t have a valid boarding pass and passport, then you aren’t even allowed to enter the terminal. No teary security gate goodbyes in India.

I joined the long Air India check-in queue, pushed my big bag along with my foot as we moved along, and after barely 15 minutes had checked in, got rid of my bags, been given my (paper) boarding card and was whizzing through security.  No issues whatsoever. And then, I was into the Aladins cave of a true international departures terminal. McDonalds, WH Smith, Subway, Boots, KFC….I was in heaven. I enjoyed a (large) 3 piece variety meal, went for an hours ‘relaxation’ massage at the O2 Spa and then sat and had a Starbucks whilst waiting for the plane to board.  By now it was 13.30pm Indian time and I had been on the go for 8 hours. I was 100% no longer drunk, and 200% definitely hungover. Luckily boarding happened quickly, and I found my seat in 33G. It was an aisle seat, with no-one in the seat next to me, and then a northern enlgish lady in the window seat of our three, 33I. The flight time was due to be 10 hours 30 minutes, because I think they have to fly around Pakistan air space so they don’t get shot down, so I settled in for a long sleep.  The flight was fairly uneventful. I watched Collateral Beauty and cried like a baby, I then watched Interstellar (again) and cried like a baby and then finally I watched old episodes of Cold Feet on my iphone and cried like a baby. I think, on reflection, I may have been a bit emotional about returning home. We landed back in the UK at 19.30pm UK time, 19 hours after I had left my hotel room! My bags were the last ones off the plane, and I eventually fell into an Uber at about 21.30pm UK time.  

When I got home at roughly 10.00pm I was so happy for so many reasons.  Firstly, I got to see Kristy, George and (of course) Charley after 12 days away.  There really is no place like home you know! Secondly, Kristy had cooked (rib-eye) Steak and Chips and cracked open a bottle of champagne.  The perfect celebration meal to come home too. Thirdly, I got to tell Kristy all about the amazing adventure I had been on and go through the 1,500 photos I had taken.  Fourth of all, and most importantly, I got to go to sleep in my own warm, fresh, bed with my own warm, fresh pyjamas. It’s great to go on an adventure, and I probably had one of the greatest holidays that I have ever had, or will ever have….but….I love my little life back here in the UK and I’m so thankful to get back to it.

If you made it this far, thanks so much for reading the blog.  I hope you enjoyed it? If so then please comment or share, if not then keep it to yourself!

All good things come to an end…

DAY 9

Tatta Pani to Chandigarh (150km)

Rich and I have just dropped off Eddy and The Honeybadger (yes, that’s what Rich named his bike) at the Royal Enfield Spa (workshop) following the completion of our 1,200km round trip.  We left Chandigarh 9 days ago with, to be honest, no real idea of what we’d signed up for, or what we were going to face.  Now it is completed, at least the motorcycling part, all I can say is…

What. A. Trip!

But more of that later, let me tell you how day 9 panned our for us.  It was a SLOW start to the day for sure.  After the Kingfishers and Rum of the night before, when we all agreed an 8.30am breakfast for a 9.30pm departure, Rich and I wandered down at about 9.05am and everyone had only just got there.  Rich and I were very pleased to see the British options on the breakfast menu again, so we ordered exactly the same as yesterday.  One omelette with toast and poached eggs on toast.  We can only assume the chef from the Palace Hotel must’ve sent the chef at the Hot Springs Hotel the YouTube link because the poached eggs were both quick and perfect.  It was a chilled start though as Rich flew the drone for a bit, Mat fixed the battery on his bike and I played with (and fed) a wild dog in the hotel garden. 

At about 10.00am or 10.15am we finally gathered our things together and set-off.  Rich and I were able to ditch the under leggings, the under armour tops and the big jackets.  The sun was blazing down so I rode in my pullover (such a British thing to do) and Rich rode in his new ‘Indian style’ cardigan thing.  With his beads around his neck and his wrist he looked like one of the locals, except for his pale skin and ginger hair and beard.  (I’m just kidding with you Salah G!) 

As we tracked back around the lake and then took a sharp right, we started to climb out of the valley we were in and back up the mountains.  The road was 90% good tarmac, and 10% shingle, with long, slow winding bends interspersed with tight hairpin bends.  Sounds horrific right?  Well 9 days ago I would have 100% agreed with you, but after 9 days of riding in all conditions, across all terrains on all types of roads, this was easy.  Not only was it easy, it was bloody good fun.  We stayed fairly close as a convoy of 4 bikes, because only Mat really knew the way and we looked good bombing around the roads, even if I say so myself!  We pottered along for about an hour.  Not really breaking our neck to get anywhere, but also not taking our time.  We stopped to take some photos every now and then, and we crawled through villages or gatherings of houses to take it all in.  Each kilometre was bitter sweet however as although it brought us closer to going home (which was good), it also bought us closer to the end of the adventure.  We stopped for a drink a couple of times and all in all it was a fairly uneventful morning.  Which was absolutely fine by us, we just wanted to get home safe and sound by this stage.  Mat selected a stunning route for us to have an enjoyable riding experience, whilst at the same time letting us have one last look at the rural areas of this beautiful country.  

After a while though we had to rejoin the main highway back down into Chandigarh.  Now this was a rude awakening I have to tell you.  We were straight back into the crazy hill I described on the first day, with cars, trucks, buses, motorcycles, pedestrians, dogs, cows, sheep and baboons EVERYWHERE!  The lanes were disconcertingly vague in their identification and construction.  Carriageways would start, stop, merge, be a contra-flow, vanish, become a mud road and any of another thousand outcomes.  It was absolutely crazy!  Luckily we took an executive decision to stop for lunch at…..McDonalds!  Now I’ve loved the country, the people and the culture but I’ve struggled with the food to be honest.  All the meals have been absolutely lovely, with the chicken at the army base my favourite, but it’s just not my thing.  Look, I’m British right.  I’ve been raised in bland, beige food, it’s not my fault! Now I know McDonalds is awful, and no-one should aspire to eat it regularly, but it was a smashing change I have to say.  Of course, in a land where the cow is sacred, beef is 100% not available but the Chicken sandwich and chicken nuggets I had were INCREDIBLE!

After our McDonalds feast all that was left was a 60 minute blast along the busiest roads I have ever ridden in my life, and probably ever will.  Rich turned on the go-pro, we all put our game faces on, and we had the best ride into Chandigarh.  I won’t even try to describe the conditions of the road, the volume and mix of traffic, people and livestock or the variety of directions that things came at you from.  Let me just say it was breath-taking, and when Rich uploads his go-pro footage to YouTube I will update the blog with links and you can check it out.  Eventually we reached the Royal Enfield workshop in Chandigarh, where we left Eddy, The Honeybadger, Leopard (Mats bike) and Kaustabh’s bike for some TLC and we returned to the same hotel we had started our adventure at 9 days ago.  

Which is where I am now.  As I lay here on the hotel bed, in my dust covered jeans, muddy boots and sweaty t-shirt whilst Rich takes the first shower (just like his sister!), I am sad for two reasons.

The first is that the trip is over.  It had been a tough few months prior to the trip and I definitely needed a break.  Luckily Kristy suggested I should go away with Rich, switch off and just escape for a while.  She’s a keeper that one!

Secondly I am sad because I will never be able to fully convey what an amazing trip it was and what an incredible country India is.  I’ve tried to in the blog, Rich and I have thousands of photos and hours of go-pro and drone footage, but they won’t even come close.  

When I think about the weather conditions we’ve ridden in, the kids getting their shirts, the ‘roads’ we’ve ridden on, sipping yak milk tea with the monks, meeting Tandup, Rixen and their family, the stunning countryside and villages we have ridden through and all the people we have been privileged to meet and spend time with, it’s impossible to describe.  

I do, as always, consider myself a very lucky chap and am grateful for so much about this trip.  I’m grateful to Rich for suggesting it and making it such fun.  We laughed a lot, probably too much at times, but I couldn’t have asked for a better person to hang out with!  To Kristy for insisting I go and taking on 10 days of single parenting.  I know George and Charley look small, but we (me) have raised them to be very demanding!  To everyone who donated a shirt for giving Rich and I the experience at the monastery, it really was a true once in a lifetime experience that I’ll never, ever forget.  The way the kids ran around us shouting ‘hostel hostel’ as they guided us to the place was like something from a film.  To Planet Way Rounds main man Mat, for planning and executing such an amazing trip (despite everything man and nature, and Rich and I, threw at him).  He did a fantastic job in ensuring we were (first of all) safe, had experiences and wanted for nothing.  I couldn’t recommend the trip more!  And finally, to all the other really lovely guys and girls we met and spent time with on the trip.  Kaustabh, who’s the joker of the group and always there to lighten the mood with some fun.  A very mischievous sense of humour as well!  Vikas, who likes to tell his stories and drink his rum.  The more rum he has, the more stories he tells, especially about his one true love – America.  Also helped me out massively with his continuous offer of using his hot-spot, he’s a really kind person!  Neeraj, the quiet guy who drove the jeep.  Quiet that is until he’s had a drink.  Talk about Jeckyl and Hyde!  He was always helpful to Rich and I though and I always felt like he was looking out for us and had our back! He was also a very funny guy, even when he spoke in his native language.  And then there was Sheetal and Shivika, the two girls who were always there looking after Rich and I.  Helping us with ordering food, figuring stuff out for us generally, answering my never ending questions, passing me hand sanitiser after poo-gate and surprising me with Nako the inflatable dog.  They all played a huge role in us having such a great holiday, and I genuinely hope we’ll stay in touch (on Facebook and Instagram) and if they ever come over to the Spain or the UK, they will give Rich and I the chance to repay their kindness. 

Mat, Sheetal, Kaustabh, Richard and I are now in a cab, heading out for one last drink, where Vikas will join us, and meal at a local brewery.  I’ll be doing one last blog tomorrow so I’ll let you know how it goes.  I’ll also let you know if I make it home.  My flight from Chandigarh to Delhi leaves at 7.55am…after an evening at a brewery.  Wish me luck!

BTW – For the record am still writing this using an Apple iPhone ‘notes’, in a cab, zooming through the crazy streets of Chandigarh, so apologies for any mistakes.  

#SorryNotSorry 

#WhatsImportantToYou 

Enjoying every last drop of India!

DAY 8

Rampur to Tatta Pani (100km)

Good news = I think I have finally defeated jet lag.  Wahoo!

Bad news = At 3am we had a room invader, so my sleep was still interrupted.

Nothing sinister, merely a drunken girl who stumbled into the room and tried to jump on Rich’s side of the bed, but he strong armed her and she fell into the bedside table.  No worries though as she ‘drunk bounced’ off the table before apologising profusely for being in the wrong room, and running out of the door.  No damage done except then I was wide awake (again), but at least it gave me time to finish yesterdays blog.  

What this did mean however was that by alarm time (9.00am), I was still pretty shattered and getting up was a struggle.  Not least because the bed was amazingly comfortable, and the room nice and warm.  Without turning all “India changed my life man!”, I do have to say I will never complain about a room being ‘cold’ again following this trip.  Until you have gone to bed completely fully clothed, as Rich and I had to do at Kalpa, then you’ll never truly understand what it is to be ‘cold’.  Eventually I jumped out of bed, showered and headed down to meet the team for breakfast.  With the exception of Vikas everyone was there already and had ordered.  Rich’s little face absolutely lit-up when he saw the UK options on the menu, as did mine, and he ordered the omelette whilst I ordered 2 poached eggs on toast to start the day.  Soon Vikas turned up and ordered, and then food slowly started to arrive.  Some fried eggs for Mat, a chicken sandwich for Sheetal, omelette for Rich…soon everyone had their breakfast, but me!  

Then everyone had finished their breakfasts and were sipping on their tea and coffee and still no show of mine.  We had laughingly been making a joke that my order had perhaps caused some panic in the kitchen, and envisaged the chef saying “Oh Jesus Christ, someone’s ACTUALLY ordered the f***ing poached egg – I told you not to put it on the menu!”  Or alternatively the chef googling it, watching a YouTube video and the creating a mini-graveyard of attempted poached eggs in front of him!  Ha ha ha!  Then Kaustabh caught a passing waiter and asked where my breakfast was, and it turned out this was exactly what was happening in the kitchen.  After about 10 more minutes the same waiter appeared with 2 servings of poached eggs on toast.  We couldn’t figure out if I got 2 portions by way of an apology, or if it was because he was so proud of getting 4 eggs correct.

Whatever the reason they were delicious and after wolfing them down, we kitted up and were on our way by 10.30am.  It appeared to me that the previous days festival was still underway outside the hotel, but on reflection I’m not sure if it was just a regular Saturday in the centre of Rampur?  Trumpets played, drums were beaten, the market stalls were still busy and traffic again crawled down the main stretch m, beeping and parping every 6 seconds or so.  The beauty of being on a motorbike, especially one as handsome as Eddy, was that we were soon around the traffic and heading out of the town and towards the hot spring spa at Tatta Pani. 

With ‘only’ 100km to cover today I decided that I was in no rush whatsoever, and would try and look around a bit more to take in some more of the sights, sounds and smells that rural India has to offer.  For the first part of the journey we were on the equivalent of a ‘B’ road in the UK.  Single carriageway, with a lane for each direction.  Long sections of beautiful tree lined roads were interspersed with little villages, or small collections of houses, for about 50km.  The tree lined sections were covered at about 60kmph, with the view through the trees of the huge river absolutely beautiful.  The roads were lined with cows, goats and wild dogs along the way, all going about their business.  Then as we’d get around the edges of the more inhabited parts, all the colours of India would start to appear.  People would be wearing the most vibrant pinks, greens, oranges, blues and ‘monk’ purples as they also went about their daily life.  People would be carrying huge bundles of ‘stuff’ to and from the villages or people would be sat in groups by the road, seemingly in lively discussion.   Then as we entered the villages themselves the people would be scurrying around in much larger numbers.  Shops were busy, dogs were everywhere, smells filled my helmet from the various food shops and in every town there was a garage/mechanic working like crazy on 3 or 4 cars at a time.  It was a beautiful ‘organised chaos’.  As we exited each village, to rejoin the tree lined sections, there were often children who would smile and wave, so we would beep our horns, or wave back as we carried on our journey.

After about 50km we took a right turn and went onto a single track road, cut into the side of the mountain, right next to the river.  It was a mixture of tarmac, dirt road and rocky track.  However, whereas this type of changing surface had been a challenge previously, partly due to inexperience and partly due to speed (as we were trying to ‘get to’ somewhere), it was an absolute joy today.  Taking it easy meant concentrating on the amazing smells of the countryside as we passed through ‘forests’, farmland, the odd house and random people walking seemingly in the middle of nowhere.  The road was relatively quiet, with the exception of the odd solitary bus or car, and the going was good.  We had a very brief stop to strip off a few layers, have a drink, hold a ‘throw a stone across the river’ contest and generally enjoy the amazing sunshine that had blessed us.  

Soon enough though we were circumnavigating a large lake, entering a small town, turning right, into a private driveway, and into the underground parking facilities of the Sandhya Hot Springs Wellness Centre. Mat pulled in first, lining his front wheel up to a wall, Rich parked tightly (parallel) to the right of him, me parallel to the left of Mat and Kaustabh parallel to the left of me.  There was a problem though.  Because everyone had made the effort to park tightly there was no room to widen my stance and put me feet down, to take the weight of Eddy.  With my feet so tight to the bike I started to topple to the left.  Fortunately Kaustabh was aware of what was potentially about to happen, and stuck his left leg out wide to take both our weight.  Somehow we stayed upright and I was able to squeeze off Eddy and put him on his central stand.  What a stupid way this would have been to have another ‘fall’.  Crisis averted we trudged up to reception , carrying motorcycling coats, helmets, rucksacks and sunglasses and checked into the hotel.  The setting on the lake was great, the hot spring pool looked incredible and most importantly the treatments looked very reasonably priced.  We enjoyed a Kingfisher on the terrace, along with some lunch, as we waited Neehaj and the team in the jeep to arrive.  Then Rich and I went and had a full body aromatherapy massage and hot oil Indian head massage, followed by 39 minutes in the hot spring pool to help try wash away the road.   

The treatments were so, so good and after, in the pool, we were joined by Mat, Kaustabh and Neehaj.  I hope it’s not offensive to them for me to say that none of them seemed naturally ‘at home’ in the water.  I sometimes forgot that the UK seems to be one of the few places where (almost) everyone is comfortable in the water.  Maybe it’s the fact we live on an island, or maybe it’s because in ‘my day’ school swimming lessons were compulsory, but Rich and I were definitely more ‘at home’ in the pool.  We had a good catch-up though and then all retired to our rooms at about 7pm to potter until dinner time at around 9pm.  Rich and I started to pick up some life admin, as we subconsciously started to think about returning to our normal lives.  I WhatsApp called Kristy, to see what was going on back at the ranch with her, George, Charley and her Dad (Nick) who she had visiting and generally relaxed a bit.

At 9pm we headed down for dinner with the group.  We sent the waiter out to buy some Kingfishers from the local shop, and sat on the terrace to enjoy dinner.  Initially conversation seemed a little stilted, as people were on their phones checking travel arrangements or returning to their normal lives.  But those of you that know me well will know that I am never going to allow that to continue for long, and as soon as i had confirmed my own travel plans (thanks to Air India bringing my flight  time forward by 90 minutes), I asked the group to individually talk about their own highlight and lowlight of the trip.  Soon the conversation and discussion was flowing as we all started reminiscing about this epic journey we had been on.  Then other questions came up from different people.  Where was the best food?  Which was the best hotel?  Which part of the drive was to the best?  As we sat out there together, chatting away comfortably, it was difficult to believe that we’d known each other for only 8 days and yet become so comfortable in each other’s company.  So comfortable in fact that we ended the evening by all learning, singing and refining the Subash Sharma/Copacababa song with each other.  I don’t want to reveal them here, but the final lyrics are coming along a treat and should definitely be ready for our final drinks in Chandigarh tomorrow afternoon.

And so we have only one day left.  150km to cover tomorrow, over maybe 4 hours!  It’s my intention to take my time again and enjoy everything that India has left to offer, ahead of flying home on Monday.  That is, of course, assuming Air India don’t just cancel my flight.

Now, to sleep…if only I could get this bloody song out of my head…

His name was Subash, oh Subash Sharma,

He’s more famous than Obama…

BTW – For the record am still writing this using an Apple iPhone ‘notes’ , at 5.30am, with jet lag in bed so apologies for any mistakes.  

#SorryNotSorry 

#WhatsImportantToYou 

It’s official – it’s Richardmania!

DAY 7

Pooh to Rampur (150km)

Another jet lagged ridden sleep plagued me for sixth night in a row ahead of the ride back to Rampur, which takes in the most treacherous road in the world.  This is not perfect preparation.  I likened this ‘most treacherous road in the world’ to the journey into Mordor on one of the early blog entries, so we were a little apprehensive ahead of the days ride.

Still, we jumped out of bed at 7.30am and prepped ourselves for the planned 8.00am departure.  This meant putting on the same pair of Under Armour leggings and long sleeved top for the 7th day in a row.  This was becoming a fairly easy task as the days went on though, as by now they were pretty much stood up on their own in the corner of the room with all the dust, sweat, mud and food that was ground into them.  And if you are imagining these items in a horrific, stinky way then take what you are imagining for them and multiply it by 10 for the poor socks I had to put on.  All I can say is thank goodness we move at 40-80kmph on the bikes so I don’t have to smell myself.  Urgh!

Our first burst of the journey was a quick 25km back to Spillow, the scene of our unplanned party on the third night, for some breakfast at our (now) regular place .  The road between Pooh and Spillow was a mix of perfect tarmac covered randomly in landslide slate or pot holes and complete dirt track, covered in rocks and shingle.  This made it hard to get a rhythm going as we were either flooring it (cautiously) over the tarmac, or stood up on the pegs negotiating uneven dirt tracks littered with huge rocks.  Add to this that the dirt roads were often wet, muddy or even glazed with a bit of black ice and it made for an interesting first few hours.  We went back past the spot of the ridiculous landslide which scuppered our plans previously, but I have to say it was almost impossible to spot where it had happened.  These Indian road builders are incredible machines I have to say.

I passed this 30-45 minutes of the journey by trying to come up with a song (in my head) about Subash Sharma, the bus driver who had gate-crashed our impromptu party in Spillow earlier this week.  I got this, which should be sung to  the tune of Copocabana by Barry Manilow…

His name is Subash, oh Subash Sharma

He likes to dance the old Lambada

His name is Subash, oh Subash Sharma

He loves old monk rum and is our fav-ou-rite bus driver (pronounced ‘drive-ah’)

Anyway…we were soon back in Spillow though, at our usual place, enjoying an omelette, some coffee and internet access after 3 ‘dry’ days.  The rest of the group were mocking us a bit about this, the ‘old westerners not able to cope without technology’, but tbh we didn’t care as it was great to connect with loved ones after being out of touch.  I also updated 3 days worth of blog, posted the photos from the Monastery and checked my flights still looked good (which they did) so it was great first pit-stop of the day in my opinion.  As we still had a couple of the donated football shirts left over we gave the owner/chef, who seemed to work 18 hours a day, a Tottenham shirt for himself and an Arsenal shirt for his brother.  As we left we could already hear them arguing about who was the top London club. 

We stripped off some layers and jumped back on the bikes, quite literally because the sun was shining and we wanted to get out on the next section of road ASAP.  We waved goodbye and beeped furiously to our mate as we left Spillow, and within seconds were up to 80kmph as we tried to get some miles on the clock.  This was the main part of the ‘Mordor Road’ from a few days ago, but in brilliant sunshine it was a completely different experience.  It was actually lots of fun!  In the sunshine the rocks, pot holes and changes from tarmac to dirt road and vice versa, were very easy to spot.  This meant we could keep a good average speed through gunning it in the tarmac, and riding whilst stood on the pegs over the dirt roads.  There were a couple of shaky moments as the switch to dirt road perhaps came a little sooner than expected, or an oncoming vehicle appeared on my side of the road following a blind corner, but nothing major.

After about another hour of riding we stopped at a little roadside shop, just after one of the many bridges, for a drink and a quick check of timings for the plan.  Whilst Mat went into the shop to buy coke and sprite, Rich and I stayed outside in the sunshine.  In about 30 seconds a very small, very cute little puppy came around the corner to say hello.  As we fed him some biscuits another one appeared, and also a small dog covered in Holi powder.  There were a couple of tin huts nearby where people were obviously living, shanty town style, and all these dogs ‘belonged’ to these people.  Soon 4 very shy, very dirty kids appeared from the shack and watched Rich and I with great interest as we fed the pups.  Eventually the elder one, a girl of maybe 7, worked her way close enough to help feed the pups and within 3 minutes they were happily feeding the dogs.  As I was doing this with the kids, Kaustabh appeared with 4 chocolate bars he had bought from the shop and gave one each to the kids.  They scurried off to eat them in one of the shacks behind the shop.  Also at this time Rich had wandered off to start hand feeding biscuits to a bull that was just ambling around in the street.  All the while cars zoomed through this little selection of buildings, livestock and children with just a toot in the horn as any kind of safety warning. 

It seems very dangerous to me, a fully fledged ‘westerner’, that this is how the people and animals of India live. But, it seems to work, and with very little severe consequences (at least that we have seen or heard about over the last 7 days).  With children, dogs, bulls and us all fed and watered we were again back on the bikes with the little matter of the last, most dangerous part of the worlds most treacherous road to go before lunch at the Little Chef again.  Rich led the way along this section and he absolutely nailed it.  I followed him, or rather tried too, and Rich rode the road perfectly.  This section was 95% smooth tarmac, which covers the tight, winding bends on the road literally cut into the rock face.  Check the pictures on social media if you want to see the worlds scariest road!  Within an hour we reached the Little Chef, and that even includes a 15 minutes stop for Rich to fly the drone above the worlds most treacherous road – and nearly lose it thanks to the change in altitude the moment it went over the edge of the ravine.  

Mat was doing some minor running repairs to his bike as we arrived st the Little Chef, so he told us just to go in and order whatever we wanted.  When we checked the menu Rich and I were surprised to see a Grilled Chicken Sandwich and French Fries, so we ordered two of them and went to the safety of the roof to eat them.  This was a great place to take a 45 minute break and watch the world go by for a bit, so that is what we did.  As our loosely defined Grilled Chicken Sandwich arrived, we ate and watched huge army trucks, dumped trucks and packed buses whizz past the ‘restaurant’ at breakneck speeds on a track barely wide enough for one car.  It was obvious why this was considered the most treacherous road in the world from up here now, but it just seemed fun when we were in the middle of it.  There was just time to feed one more wild, but very timid dog, some more biscuits and then we were on our way.  We had decided to stick to our original plan of staying at the New Nabh Heritage Hotel, after flirting with the idea of pushing on an extra 100km to the Hit Springs restaurant, but with no confirmed availability we decided to stick with the plan.  

From the Little Chef we dropped into Rampur in about 30 minutes, including a last, final stop for fuel.  Eddy was very thirsty following his run along the cliff top road, but still purring like a kitten.  As we descended down, in our little 4 bike convoy, into central Rampur we suddenly noticed it getting busier and busier.  By the time we reached the entrance to the hotel, which is set in the grounds of the Kings palace, there were literally thousands of people milling around, amongst cars, market stalls, tuk tuks and the gate to the hotel.  Mat spoke to a local police officer on the gate who helped us dissect our way in past the masses crowds, and onto the hotel forecourt where we parked our bikes up.  It transpired that we had arrived on the one day of the year where there is a festival in the grounds of the palace (our hotel) where each of the local villages brings their god down to present them to the king.  This meant that tens of thousands of people were here at our hotel and about to party, Indian style.  

Rich and I were shown to our rooms, where we found we had THE prime view of the celebrations from our own private balcony.  Not only that, but the hotel room itself was immaculate.  Full running hot water, flushable toilet, fresh linen and towels and a massive super king sized bed.  Rich and I couldn’t believe it.  We ordered 2 Kingfisher beers on room service and sat in our balcony enjoying the music, dancing and general energy from the festival.  Eventually the shower called my name and I stood and savoured my first, proper hot shower since the first night.  The dirt and dust flowed off me like a river, as a culmination of a weeks road travel was washed away down the plug hole.  Rich was very keen to get down in the festival though, and fly his drone, so we rushed down out of the hotel entrance and into the grounds to get in the middle of it all.  

Rich was like a celebrity from the moment we exited the hotel.  Maybe it was his pale skin and ginger hair, maybe the locals thought he was Prince Harry or maybe the locals had just not seen many ‘white men’ in their time, but whatever it was Rich was a king.  Some local youths asked for a photo the moment he left the hotel.  People quite literally just stared as he walked past, and then he got the drone out and full Richardmania kicked it.  Mat and Kaustabh asked two local female police officers if it was OK to fly the drone, to which they received a shrugged approval, so Rich rigged it up and had it in the air in about 3 minutes.  Within that short time a small group of about 5-10 people had appeared to peer over his shoulder, pace around the drone on the floor and generally check King Rich out.  Well if that was the first wave of submission to the King, once the drone was up and moving around Rich enjoyed a relative Tsunami of appreciation.  The local people fairly shoved me out of the way to get a look at the iPhone screen on Richs drone control pad.  Soon he had 20 people around him, then 40, then 60.  The more he walked around flying the drone, the more disciples he acquired.  The footage he captured was absolutely incredible, both in the grounds of the palace and out on the Main Street where the procession went after exiting the hotel.  I’m sure Rich will put it online when we are back home for all to see.

As the drone ran out of battery and returned back to earth, a crowd of about 100 locals swarmed around Rich as he casually strolled to pick up the drone and return to being a mere mortal.  We then packed it up into Richs rucksack and all went for a stroll down the main drag to enjoy the sights, sounds, smells and tastes of this festival.  Mat led the way followed by Neehaj, Sheetal, Shivika, Kaustabh, Rich and myself.  The only one missing was Vikas, but as he had been wearing camouflage trousers since arriving at the hotel he was always going to be hard to spot.  (I used to have some camouflage trousers btw, but I put them down once and now can’t find them anywhere!). As we walked down the street we tried all the local foods and (none alcoholic) drinks and threw ourselves into the festivities.  Rich in particular got right in the middle of things and ended up dancing right in the middle of the procession, like some kind of Bollywood star.  Legend.  

We made our way back to the hotel and Rich went for a pre-dinner shower, whilst we sat in the now emptying grounds of the palace gardens.  I went and sat alone on the central band stand type structure, (it’s probably some hugely significant religious structure that I have just dismissed), and reflected on another crazy day.  To land at a hotel right in the middle of these celebrations, was incredibly good luck I think.  Or maybe better still, it was good karma following the episode ay Key Monastery.  Either way it was nice to be one day nearer to home, Kristy and of course #GeorgeAndCharley. We have had an incredible ‘holiday’, and enjoyed everything that India has had to offer/throw at us, but as it was once said ‘there’s no place like home’.  

All that remained today were drinks in the (posh) hotel bar, to share some jokes and stories with our new found friends and some food (curry) before retiring for hopefully an amazing nights sleep in THAT bed.  Only one short day tomorrow  (100k to the Hot Springs) and then 4 hours back into Chandigarh on Sunday morning to go now.  Well, that and an afternoon ‘pub crawl’ around Chandigarh on Sunday afternoon.  

BTW – For the record am still writing this using an Apple iPhone ‘notes’ , at 4.00am, with jet lag in bed so apologies for any mistakes.  

#SorryNotSorry 

#WhatsImportantToYou 

Back in the saddle again…

DAY 6

Kaza to Pooh (150km)

Well I prayed and prayed and prayed last night and guess what, we awoke to beautiful, blazing sunshine in the morning which is EXACTLY what we needed!  With the first 45km set to be along the muddiest, wettest road that I have ever had the displeasure of travelling on, some sunshine to melt the ice was just what we needed. 

The next thing I noticed after the sunshine blazing through the window of our room was a knocking on our door.  I jumped out to open it and was confronted by Pema, who was very keen to wish us a happy holi!  It seemed that today was a big celebration of ‘Holi’ in Kaza, and India generally.  This meant that Pema took great delight in putting the coloured powder on our face, all the time with a huge smile on hers.  Whilst we all pottered around, pre our final breakfast at Tandup & Rixens, everybody was wishing everyone a ‘happy holi’ and covering each other in coloured powder as we all packed our bags.  By the time I got around to bushing my teeth I looked like a Uniciorn had thrown up on me!  It was fun to be in the house around the kids whilst they celebrated though, as they had their cousins in as well.  They seemed very happy and excited which was the perfect antidote to Rich and mines mood as we realised we now had to head back.

When we booked the trip the original itinerary was to continue on from Kaza, through to Manali, which was another 250km or so on.  But with the weather being particularly bad, the pass was closed, so the new plan was to head back the way we had come but with some detours to make it interesting.  So we sorted the bikes out at the house where they were stored (Eddy had a big icicle on his wheel but he was fine thanks for asking) and headed back out on the road from Kaza to Tabo.  

This time we were prepared however.  Mentally prepared for 90 minutes of hell. physically prepared with waterproof trousers and emotionally prepared by having the sun shining in our backs.  And you know what, apart from some heart stopping slides on the ice or in the mud, the ride to Tabo was breathtaking.  The views on this road are almost indescribable…but here goes.  The snow covered mountains surrounding the whole area are so immense in size.  These are only broken up by some mountains which obviously get more sun than others, which without the snow appear as huge stone monoliths.  When you see the exposed rocks, without the snow covering, you get more of an impression of what the landscape is truly like.  After about 75 minutes of this we reached the outskirts of Tabo and stopped for a coffee at the same place we ate at when we left Tabo 2 days previously.

It was nice to have a pit stop.  Rich changed his shoes and socks which had gotten wet, I walked around in my socks to warm my feet up in the sunshine and stocked up on more water and biscuits for the dogs and then we all sat and drank lovely, milky, sweet coffee.  Then that was it, we were off again.  Our next target was to reach Nako, the place where I had the most harrowing, highest dump of my life 2 days previously.  This mean we were predominantly on tarmac roads covered in small rocks and stones from landslides, with the odd, occasional dirt track thrown in.  Whether it was tarmac or dirt road, it was cut into the side of the rocky mountain which meant huge overhanging rock structures above your head and a massive, never ending drop to your right.  Yet, here we were zooming along these winding roads at up to 40kmph in our 4 bike convoy.  After a long, long period of downhill riding we again started the climb up to Nako.  This took us back into the road that looked like it was lifted straight out of the Italian Job or a Janes Bind film, with its black tarmac road zigzagging up the side of the mountain. 

There were longish straights where you could get up to 60kmph in 3rd or 4th gear, but almost immediately as you’d hit that you had to slow down to 1st gear to navigate the hairpin bends.  This started out as fun, but about 10 minutes into our 30 minute task I started to get a migraine, which for me starts with blurry, flickering vision around the edges of my eyes.  We stopped, to wait for Kaustubh who had stopped up catch-up with the guys in the jeep, so I lay in the sunshine on the floor to hopefully alley a full on migraine.  After about 10 minutes Kaustubh arrived so, feeling slightly better, we got back on the bikes and finished our climb.  As we arrived in Nako, to a welcoming committee of donkeys and dogs, I knew it was important for me to eat something as soon as I could and then go and lie in the sun again.  Matt ordered me a rice and beans dish which I demolished in seconds, after which I went to lie on the floor, in the sunshine, next to a monument/temple.  Well I don’t know how long I lay there for, I think maybe 15 minutes, but when I woke up not only did I feel much better but one of the wild mountain dogs had come and sat next to me.  

This pleased me immensely, as when I get these migraines at home I usually lie with George and Charley until it feels better.  This was a beautiful black and brown dog, with a few battle scars around one eye, that had purple holi celebration powder all over him.  I feed him a packet of the biscuits I had picked up and then he became really affectionate, demanding I stroke him for about 15 minutes.  As always on this trip though, we had to kit up and carry on, so I said goodbye (with a second pack of biscuits) and then we were off.  

Next came my least favourite part of the outward journey, the rocky, chalky, dusty road down to the bridge that joined the two mountain ranges.  If I thought this road was horrendous for me on the way up then i was in for a rude awakening.  The surface and the incline of the track (I can’t in all honesty call it a road) made these 9 of the worst hairpin bends in the world in my opinion. You had to ride the straights stood up on your pegs, for balance and control, and then drop right down to first gear to get around the hairpin bends.  All the time not daring to touch either break as this would put you immediately into a skid.  On the whole I think, as a fairly inexperienced rider, I coped fairly well with this.  With the one exception where I came out of a left hairpin bend fairly wide, to try and stay upright, straight into the face of an oncoming bus.  I touched the brakes to try and slow myself and the rear wheel started to slide out to the right, straight into the line of the bus, but I released the brake, throttled down and pulled to the left of the bus in one movement.  This was the nearest miss of the trip for me, but the some of the skills I have learnt during the last six days endured I knew what to do and did it effectively.

Soon we were at the bottom of two mountain ranges, crossing the bridge that led to a much more developed road surface to climb back up to Pooh where we were due to say.  I am not ashamed to say I punched the air and was screaming with delight in my helmet to know we had finished those bits of the trip for good.  There are definitely still some tricky sections to come over the next 3 days, but the Kaza to Tabo quagmire and the immediate descent from Nako on the chalky road were by far the most testing.  All that was left now was about 30km up to the Military camp at Pooh, where we were staying because Mat had pulled in a few favours.  With it being a military camp  it meant guaranteed hot water and functioning western style toilets, which would be an incredible treat following the hot water in a bucket flushing technique required at our homestay in Kaza.  

  

These 30km passed very smoothly and without incident.  We passed through a few very small villages where we were greeted by either livestock in the road (cows, donkeys, sheep, etc), or by happy, smiling kids waving and wanting to high five us as we mother past.  We stopped at the same border office as on the way out, so that they could check us back into this specific region.  (I fed the cutest puppy some biscuits whilst we waited!). Then, boom, a final 10km burst along a smooth, winding, tarmac climb up to Pooh.  It was nice to have a 80-100kmph blast for a bit following all the slow control required throughout the rest of the day.  Soon we turned right as we entered Pooh, we again zigzagged our way up another mountain, meaning yet more hairpin bends, and pulled into the ‘camp’ at about 5.00pm.  We were shattered, dirty and in need of tea, but very happy to be back here.  

With another piping hot shower courtesy of Richs travel shower and a warm in front of our 1970’s style two bar electric fire, we were good to go and join the group for our dinner (chicken curry) and some Rum to ‘help us sleep’.  With only 3 days left now some of our biking gear was in a wet, sorry state, so we set up an amphitheater of drying around our two bar fire and went to sleep to dream of home.  

3 days and 500km to go until Chandigarh! 

BTW – For the record am still writing this using an Apple iPhone ‘notes’ in bed so apologies for any mistakes.  

#SorryNotSorry 

#WhatsImportantToYou 

A day full of good karma…

DAY 5

A rest-day from the motorbikes (80km) 

With the previous night bringing a warm shower, an amazing meal, a hot fire, no alcohol and a semi-functional western style toilet I awoke on Wednesday morning (day 5) full of the joys of spring.

The bed at Tandup & Rixens homestay was comfortable and warm and despite the best efforts of jet lag, I managed to get a few good hours sleep.  What was pretty weird though was that when I first closed my eyes to go to sleep, all I saw was road whizzing towards me.  After four days of constant movement, and having a personal average speed of about 40kmph, it was obviously too much to just expect my brain to switch off.  I think the final horrific road of yesterday had broken me physically, emotionally and mentally. 

But I awoke fresh for the day ahead and appreciative that this was a rest day, and I wouldn’t have get on Eddy.  Of course I would miss him, but absence makes the heart grow fonder and all that.  We were off out and about in the jeep today to do some proper tourist activities, so didn’t have to get up early, layer up on clothing, pack rucksacks and bags or concentrate at all in any way.  Absolute bliss!  This ‘adventuring’ is good for the mind and soul but bugger me, it’s pretty tiring! 

We met for breakfast for 9.00am and enjoyed a lovely omelet and some potato bread made by Rixen, all washed down with milky, sugary coffee as usual.  We then strolled out of the house at about 10.15am to be driven about for the day.  Mat had secured a local guide to be the driver of our jeep for the day, his name was Cherry and he was an absolute legend.  Mat drive the jeep that had come along the whole way with us, accompanied by Vikas, Sheetal, Shivka and , whilst Cherry manfully drove our jeep supported by Kaustubh, Rich and I.  

Our first destination was Kibber to try to spot the elusive snow leopard that had been seen in these parts in recent days.  This meant a 45 minute drive along another fairly treacherous road, but this seemed much, much nicer in the jeep.  Cherry drive the jeep expertly as well and it was obvious he’d been driving these roads for a long, long time.  He was scooting along, cussing other drivers when they took more than 3 seconds to make their mind up and knew every passing place along the way.  There were a few heart in mouth moments when he moved to the left, the side of the drop so large you’d end up in Australia, to avoid oncoming traffic.  In one particular instance I instinctively grabbed Richs hand all Thelma and Louise style, but Cherry casually swung the jeep back to the right and not a second was wasted!  He even came to rescue of our other jeep, driven by Mat, as it became stuck in the snow after it had moved right to let a car pass.  We were all jumping out to bounce it and give it a push but Cherry just wandered up the snow bank on the right, grabbed a handful of peddles, three then under the rear wheels and out popped the jeep. Soon we were arriving on the outskirts of the village, which seemed surrounded by photographers and wildlife buffs armed with binoculars, tripods and cameras with telephoto lens.  This poor snow leopard seemingly stood no chance, and yet we kind of looked for 30 minutes and didn’t see hide nor hair of it.  We took some photos of the amazing view of the village in one direction, and also the incoming snowstorm whiteout coming at us from the other direction, and then jumped back in our jeeps and headed off. 

Next stop was the highest bridge in India, at TBC which is 13,596 feet above sea level.  The road out to the bridge was even more precarious than the road to Kibber, bends got tighter, road got muddier, pot holes got deeper but none of this worries Cherry.  Foot down the whole way, still cussing, still giving zero f***s!  When we got to the bridge it took your breath away as a feet of engineering.  Here we were, roughly 700km from the nearest city, with only dirt tracks to transport machinery and materials and somehow they had built the most incredible bridge.  Watch the video on Rich or mines social media if you don’t believe me!  We were again met by hordes of tripod wielding locals, all peering curiously over the side of the bridge into the huge, deep ravine.  We parked up, got out and looked over the side of the bridge to see 3 or 4 Ibaks (deer like creatures) chilling out on the thinnest of ledges, about 500 foot up the cliff.  All the locals were there in the hope that the snow leopard would pop-up to hunt and eat the Ibak.  I honestly don’t know what I was more amazed by, the dedication of the wildlife photographers or the ingenuity of the Ibaks? 

We took our required tourist photos and videos and then we were back in the truck and off to the Key Monastery.  This is the highest Monastery in India (everything is the highest around here though, so it doesn’t even impress me any more) and looks incredible when you approach it, just perched up there on the hill.  Thanks to Cherry we were there in no time and once we had climbed the hill and the steps on foot, were again wandering around an incredible place.  We looked at their prayer rooms which were over 1,000 years old, and marvelled at the simplicity of these and their lives in general.  As Rich and I were wandering around with Mat though, Kaustabh explained to one of the monks that we had 100 football shirts for the kids but we didn’t know where they were or how to get the shirts to them.  Thanks to Kaustabh though we were pointed in the direction of the monastery school.  When we got there it was very quiet and with no obvious way in.  Another passing monk pointed us in the direction of the top floor and we somehow found the steps to get up there.  Once in the building it was like a ghost town, but after trying a couple of classrooms we eventually bundled into a room containing one monk and 5 or 6 kids.  Mat and Kaustabh explained to them what was happening and the idea behind the shirt donations and huge smiles immediately spread across the kids faces.  The 5 or 6 kids then looked through all the shirts and eventually picked the ones they wanted (for future reference they all wanted Ronaldo or Messi) and happily posed for some photos.  In the meantime the monk had arranged for another kid to come to the classroom to take us to ‘Hostel’ as that was where all the other kids were.  We picked up all the shirts that the first 5 or 6 kids had been through and started following this 6 or 7 year old through a catacomb of corridors and rooms under the monastery.  As we moved along an excited child popped out, shouting ‘hostel, hostel’, then another appeared, then another and eventually we were surrounded by kids guiding us through this maze of alleyways.  Some kids took Rich and I by the hand, with one in particular keen to get a Messi shirt off Rich before we even got there!  

After about 5 minutes though we finally entered ‘hostel’.  This was a large room with beds all around 3 sides of the room, a bookshelf for personal belongings across the 4th wall and a wood burner sat in the middle.  By now there were around 50 kids in the room, all very,  dry keen to secure their own shirt.  By now it was just Rich, Mat, Shivka and I in hostel with the kids and they were very happy and excited.  3 senior monks then came in and joined us and in no time were were handing out the shirts.  We would hold up a shirt, tell them the team and size and then pass it to the first kid that wanted it.  We did this for ages.  Some kids were keeping their powder dry for a specific shirt, some were putting their hands up for everything, some got a shirt but then saw another one they wanted later so would swap, it’s fair to say it was an incredible experience.   There are lots of pictures and videos on Rich and mines social media, they are definitely worth checking out.  Even the senior monks wanted in on the action as I remember one taking the Australia shirt (thanks Rob Simons), one took the Barcelona orange away shirt (thanks Bill Fisher) and one took an Everton shirt (thanks Lesley Gregory and all my cousins up north).  The fun, energy and love in this room was absolutely inspiring and I’d like to thank everyone who donated for making it happen.  I tried to get photos of all the kids with all the shirts but it became pretty impossible, so my sincere apologies if you donated a shirt but I didn’t catch a photo of it with it’s recipient.  I can 100% promise you that if you did then your donation totally made a child in Key Monastery very very happy.  Thank you from the bottom of mine, and their, hearts.

Then something almost as incredible happened, the monks in the hostel as we have the shirts out (and bagged themselves some amazing shirts) asked us to join them for tea.  Not in the touristy front office part where everyone gets tea from a flask, but up in their living quarters right in the heart of the monastery.  So, Mat, Rich, Shivka and I joined 3 monks in their small little room where they live and do everything for tea.  The main guy put some wood in the burner, went to get some water, poured us tea and then cracked open two packets of biscuits as well.  Then the 7 of us just sat in their room and chatted like it was the most normal thing in the world.  They asked us how the idea came about and where we were from, we asked them if they ‘monked’ from 9-6 and then got to relax (no they don’t btw, it’s 24/7) and if they got to travel to other monasteries (no they don’t, they have dedicated themselves to Key Monastery) and just had fun understanding each other’s lives.  They presented us with a white silk scarf each by way of appreciation and invited us back in the summer as VIP’s for their big festival.  It was an incredible 30 minutes I promise you.  As we left we asked what we should bring next time and they advised spirts equipment (footballs, etc) or stationary for the kids school work.  and the good thing is you can just post-it to them direct yourself if you feel like doing something nice…

Key Monastery

Kaza

India

Apparently it will definitely get there.  So there you go!

Following this we headed back to Kaza as it was gone 3.00pm and we hadn’t eaten yet with all the excitement.  When we got back to the village Mat, Rich, Shivka, Vikas and I went into the village centre to eat and pick up some gifts for friends and family.  Without giving anything away to anyone back home, the shopping was good and the food even better.  We ate in a place called Maya Kitchen, and whilst from the outside it may look a bit dirty the food was so, so good.  We had mutton dumplings in a soup and they were excellent.  Following this we popped to a few shops and picked up a few bits and bobs.  At some point Shivka noticed I had a pack of about 5 or 6 dogs just following me around.  There must have been around 70 people milling around the shops in the village centre but all the dogs followed me.  I am either the dog whisperer or the weakest link.  As we finished shopping we bumped into Tandup who was on his way back to the homestay so we followed him back.  Once there we chilled for a while in the warm communal room with the wood burner and at 9pm we all had dinner.

It was rice, chicken curry, roti bread and dal and it was absolutely delicious.  Tandup and Rixen have been amazing hosts so we bought Pema a dolly, gave Tenzin (their son) an Orlando Pirates football shirt donated by Rich, bought Rixen 2 big balls of wool (she loves knitting) and gave Tandup an England shirt and a Watford jumper as thank-you gifts.  After dinner we drank Tandups moonshine and I played snap with Tenzim  and Pema.  It was a perfect, lovely end to (another) amazing, unforgettable day here in India.

Even the thought of heading back the way we came tomorrow couldn’t ruin my mood, despite the thought of the initial bit of road we’ll face.  The wet, muddy, cold quagmire will be fine tomorrow because not only will I wear my waterproofs the whole way I got 2 plastic bags from Kaza to put over my feet before we set-off.  The estimate is that it’s 600 miles back to Chandigarh and we have 4 days to do it.  We are aiming to do 160km tomorrow and stay in somewhere called Pooh, but we are at the mercy of the weather.  As I type this at 23.40 on Wednesday it is dumping snow outside, so this could be interesting.  Wish us luck!  I’ll be praying for sunshine again. 

BTW – For the record am still writing this using an Apple iPhone ‘notes’ in bed so apologies for any mistakes.  

#SorryNotSorry 

#WhatsImportantToYou 

Chris Rea – This is the road to hell

DAY 4

Spillow to Kaza (150km)

Today Rich & mines adventure truly took us into the back of beyond as we finally ended the day in Kaza, which is 13,000 feet above see level and barely 30km from the Chinese border!  It was an unforgettable, totally epic day all be told.  9 hours on the bike, 150km covered in total, 2 minor biking incidents and we rode along every kind of road surface imaginable to man.

It would be fair to say though that despite it being an early start, it was not a rolling start.  Everyone was definitely struggling a little following our late night rum and dancing exploits with ace bus driver Subesh Sharma but we were all up, fed, watered and on the bikes by 8am sharp, to try and make up time lost by yesterday’s road closure.  Sharp might actually be the wrong word on reflection as the first couple of hours felt particularly sluggish and really hard work.  Our first goal for the day was simply to make it past the part of the road that had been closed the day before.  We re-rode the same part of the road for the third time in about 12 hours and arrived to find not only was it open, but that it looked like  a complete brand new pristine bit of road. It was genuinely like the 50 tonne landslide from the previous day had never happened. 

The riding between 8am and around 10am was on the whole very enjoyable.  The roads were generally good, smooth tarmac with long, slow winding curves on which I could really open Eddy up. (He’s fine BTW – thanks for asking!). The only thing that was annoying was the fact that the sun wasn’t really right up in the sky yet so lots of the riding was in the shade.  This meant that it was quite cold, both from the shade and from the wind from hitting 80kmph on some of the straights.  As with the day before Rich and I had both decided to just ride in jeans (and Under Armour leggings) and carry our waterproofs (snow-boarding pants) in our rucksacks as we knew it would be warm eventually.  Unfortunately for us ‘eventually’ was 2 hours further away than on previous days, which we hadn’t fully understood in our (slightly) hungover state.  The other slightly annoying part of the 8am to 10am ride was that you’d often go from dark shade to bright sunshine, and vice-versa, as the sun rose and we traversed the various mountain peaks.  This meant it was sometimes hard to pick up the line of the road or worse still, see fallen stones and rocks  or oncoming pot-holes.  But we persevered until the sun rose high in the sky.

But as has been the case throughout this ‘holiday’, ha-ha, yeah good one Rich, as one challenge disappears another one pops up out of nowhere.  As we reached the bottom point of two huge adjoining mountains and emerged into solid, consistent sunshine, we also hit the worst road surface of the whole trip in my opinion.  Loose chalky rocks with a light covering of shingle.  Then, to add insult to injury, it transpired that we’d climb up this next mountain through a series of tight hairpin bends for about 30 minutes.  Hairpin bends, steep inclines and loose, dusty, rocks covered in shingle are not a motorcycle riders friend.  The four of us (Mat the guide, Rich, me and Kaustub) started the climb and it was horrendous.  Navigating hairpin bends, when the surface is extremely unstable and there is a cloud of chalky dust from the vehicle in front, means you move along like a granny on a frosty morning. 

After what seemed like about fifteen years we reached a little collection of buildings at about 12,000 feet apparently called Nako.  We took some photos, had a coffee (the coffee here in India btw is INCREDIBLE!) and something to eat and then started gathering ourselves to crack-on.  The problem was that it was now about midday and I really needed to, erm, how can I say this politely…go for a dump.  I asked Mat and he advised me that normal operating procedure at this kind of place was to find a big rock and go and relieve yourself behind it.  Erm, no thanks!  The next option was to take a walk just behind the place that cooked and fed us food and do my business there.  Reluctantly I walked down to check it out and straight into some random Indian guy, squatting with his back to me, amongst a minefield of human excrement, ‘dropping off the kids’.  Well, those of you that know me well will know my gag reflex is quite week so this was no longer a viable option – not that I’m sure it ever was!  

So I decided enough was enough and to just try and ignore for now.  But just as I’d come to accept this fate Sheetal (a lovely, friendly lady who is doing the Jeep tour with us) told me she had secured the key to the restaurants actual toilets.  Buoyed by this news I grabbed some loo roll offered up by Vikas (a chap also doing the jeep tour) and ran around the corner to find what I can only describe as a tin shack.  Still, beggars can’t be choosers I thought and went in and did my business in the h ole in the ground.  To ‘flush’ there was a bucket of water with a plastic cup in it to throw down the toilet.  The whole experience was horrific for everyone and everything involved.  Never again!  Ever!

Anyhow, crisis averted we were back on the bikes and off again.  Now a saying I have started really understand on this tour is, ‘what goes up must come down’, because we now started our descent down the same mountain we’d just spent 30 mins climbing.  Good news, the road is beautiful immaculate tarmac.  Bad news, the hairpin bends are back and there is a covering of thin dust on every single bend.  Queue repeats of the climb up the mountain and me gingerly navigating steep hairpin bends, constantly feeling like the bike is going to slide out from under me.  Somehow though we managed to stay upright and at about 1.30pm we reached the hotel that we were due to stay at the previous night, before the landslide.  We stopped briefly as Mat chatted to the owner and then we were off again.  

Now the roads turned very rocky.  Well actually it’s probably fairer to point out they were made of beautiful tarmac but, this tarmac was covered by all sizes of rock and stone that had slid down from the huge mountain on our right hand side.  On the left hand side was a drop so steep, and far, that if you looked closely you could just about see Australia.  Talk about being caught between a rock and a hard place!  This road wound and snaked like this for miles and miles.  I constantly lived in fear of clipping a rock and disappearing off to Oz.  As with all these obstacles though this eventually ended as we reached Tabo.  Here we went off to see the worlds oldest monastery, which was built around 996AD.  We parked up and wandered around the place for 20 minutes or so.  It was absolutely incredible to think that it had been there for over a thousand years.  There were real life monks knocking around as well, but I found these slightly less overwhelming as one was on his iPhone the whole time and the other was wearing the exact same Nike trainers that I have.  

As we left Tabo though we saw 4 little kids with what we assumed was their Mum so we stopped to say hello and offer them some of the football shirts I had collected (with the help of generous friends, colleagues and family).  They absolutely snapped them up!  One kid chose a Barcelona shirt, one loved the Real Madrid shirt, one really wanted the Man Utd shirt and the final little guy was genuinely thrilled to pick out a Bracknell Town FC shirt.  I didn’t have the heart to tell him, so I left him smiling and enjoying his new acquisition.  Bless him!  After Tabo we stopped fairly quickly to grab lunch at a local ‘restaurant’, which seemed very much like someone’s house, but they served up a cracking Wagamama’s style noodle soup.  It was so tasty, I can recommend it massively.  Keep an eye out for them on JustEat or Deliveroo…maybe they deliver.

And then ‘all’ we supposedly had left was the 30km from Tabo to Kaza, at least that was what we thought.  We knew we had to get a wriggle on to get to Kaza before the sun vanished behind the mountains for the day, as otherwise any water that might be on the road would freeze, which makes it extremely treacherous for motorbikes.  As we joined the Tabo to Kaza road it initially looked stunning.  The road sat between, on the right a huge rock covered mountain slope and, on the left, a huge expanse of snow that was covering a frozen river.  As we started along the road two hazards became immediately obvious.  Firstly, little stones and rocks often came rolling down the hill from your right and bounced across the path in front of you.  Secondly, this road was simply horrific.  A horrible combination of mud, rocks and pot holes filled with icey water.  As with all the other days (with the exception of yesterday) the last few hours ride was going to be a test! 

We rode along in convoy, Mat often leading the way with Kaustub sweeping at the back or vice-versa, all trying to pick the driest route we could along the mud track.  The challenge with this however was that any changes to your direction had to made very smoothly, and subtlety, otherwise you’d be riding against the natural mud channels that had formed, which would cause huge uncontrollable slides.  The other pain point was that you had absolutely no idea how deep any of the pot holes were, or which were the ‘good’ ones to go through.  This meant you’d pick a route through the first couple you could see, but then because you had to keep on your line as much as possible (because of the mud lines) you’d end up hitting bigger, deeper pot holes that you couldn’t avoid.

Now, what would’ve really helped Rich and I out at this stage would have been to be told ‘this last bit of road can sometimes be wet and muddy at this time of year, you should put your waterproof pants on’.  But this didn’t happen and by the time we realised this road was going to be a big, wet, muddy mess the whole way we were both already big, wet, muddy messes, so we just kept on keeping on.  Our guide Mat graciously apologised to us later on in the day, saying he too had been caught out by exactly how bad it was and that he’d never seen it like that at this time of year.  We 100% appreciated his explanation later on when he gave it, when we’d made it to Kaza, were sat in front of a nice hot wood burner, drinking coffee but I’ll be honest.  When I was sat astride Eddy, on this endless, wet, muddy hell, with my feet soaking wet and frozen…I was feeling a little negative.  This road was such a test, even for experienced riders like Mat and Kaustub, and I had 6 or 7 nervy moments when the bike started sliding away from me, which got the old heart beating, but generally I was going slow and steady.  On all other roads we tried to stay together as a group, but on this road it was much better to go at your own pace so we kind of got split up a bit.  After a while I realised I was completely on my own, but knew that Rich & Kaustub were behind me somewhere, so I decided to wait for them. After about 5 minutes they both arrived looking a little sheepish and giggling like school children.  It transpired that they’d had a little ‘incident’ on the road a few miles back.  

Rich has gone through a water filled pot-hole which had frozen ice on the bottom, his handlebars had turned and he’d slid and landed in the snow drift. Kaustub had been so busy watching Rich’s exploits that when Rich wobbled and span off, he had hit the very same pot hole and fell off onto the road himself.  This has happened so many times with me on this trip.  Someone has a wobble in front of you and you immediately wobble yourself behind them.  The only thing I can like liken it to is when you go ice skating, and the person in front of you stumbles and you immediately stumble behind them.  Anyhow, they were both completely fine and we are very happy as a group to have only had 3 very minor falls so far. 

After 30km on this quagmire of a road I was thrilled at the prospect of us arriving in Kaza, so was surprised when we all stopped to take a picture of a frozen waterfall and found out there were still 15km to go.  Now we were in dangerous, accident territory.  My feet were absolutely soaked through and freezing cold, my hand were totally frozen (despite 3 layers of gloves), some of the puddles were starting to freeze and my mind was in a dark, dark place.  Concentrating on anything is so difficult when you can’t feel your feet or your fingers, but slow and steady wins the race and after another 10 minutes or so we finally reached the outskirts of Kaza.  Now though the cold was spreading up my legs and up into my body.  I had started shivering and my teeth were going like those you find in a joke shop. 

Luckily, after a brief failed attempt to top the bikes up with fuel at the worlds highest filling station (everything is ‘the worlds highest’ here – as Vikas pointed out I’d experienced ‘my highest dump ever) we headed to meet our homestay host Tandup, his wife Rixin and their kids Tanzin and Pema. Homestay means that you actually stay with a local family, and we completely lucked out with our hosts.  They had the wood burner going as we arrived, ushered us into the warm and gave us hot, milky, sugary coffee.  Once we had defrosted a little they then generously gave Rich a bucket of boiling water and we christened his portable shower (not together!). It. Was. Amazing.

After this we all gathered in the communal room, the one with the wood burner, and enjoyed a fantastic meal of rice, curried cottage cheese and peas and dal made by Tabdup and Rixin.  Tandup offered us a taste of his moonshine (which was like schnapps) which he stored in a Tropicana bottle and despite the language barrier we all enjoyed a laugh and a joke as we said Tropicana tasted different 13,000 feet up in the mountains.

As I reflect back on the day now, it was a completely unforgettable experience that with hindsight, definitely provided us with true, real life, adventure.  The roads we’ve driven along, the things we’ve seen, the people we’ve met and the experiences this whole trip have brought (so far) really are like something you can never imagine and I will never be able to adequately describe.  

BTW – For the record am still writing this using an Apple iPhone ‘notes’ in bed so apologies for any mistakes.  

#SorryNotSorry 

#WhatsImportantToYou 

An evening with Subash Sharma…

DAY 3

Kalpa to Spillow (40km)

Today has been an incredibly interesting day as the ‘plan’ slowly fell apart due to incredible, uncontrollable circumstances on the roads…but more of that later!  (See what I’m doing there, tying you in to reading the whole thing!)

So Rich and I woke up not frozen to death and after many, many prayers actually to brilliant sunshine blazing through our window.  After how cold it was the night before, and all the talk of -17 tomorrow I was dreading the worst, but I have to say the sun was beating down and helped us start the day in a positive mood.  Once we had dressed (oh wait there?, we slept in all the clothes we had to avoid hyperthermia) and enjoyed breakfast the next thing we had to do was visit the local government office to secure an ILP.  (I didn’t ask a lot, but it’s essentially a bit of paper that lets you ride your motorbike across the Himalayas).  

This was not a simple task.  One thing that Rich and I have learned in our 72 hours here in India is that it is very much a ‘paper based’ system which takes lot of time and patience…and this experience was no different.  We filled the forms out in about 17 seconds, had our photo taken in about 43 seconds and then sat and waited for about 90 minutes for some high ranking government official to sign our form.  We sat, waited, chilled and generally tried to embrace the process but it was quite frustrating.  The sun was shining, we finally had all the right gear on  and yet we couldn’t go anywhere.  This would 100% come back and bite us on the ass later on as you’ll see!  (Still tempting you with a much more fun and interesting blog later on!)

Eventually Rich and I said “let’s go and have a wander around the village whilst we wait”.  Then, just as when you are in a restaurant waiting for your food and you finally decide to go for a wee and your food turns up just to annoy you, the government official wandered back over with our bit of paper.  We quickly jumped on our bikes (Eddy is doing very well, thanks for asking) and headed off for the day.  We had a little, tiny bit of a false start as we initially stopped for petrol but they wouldn’t sell it to none locals so we got turned away, but we had enough fuel to get going.

The initial riding was again very cool and lots of fun.  The roads were good, the weather was good, Eddy was purring and we cracked off 25km with no issues whatsoever.  Eventually the incredible roads started to be interspersed with sections of gravel roads, or shingle roads, or sharp rocky roads or worst still wet muddy roads, but it was all still fun as the weather was incredible.  We enjoyed some hairpin bends, we crossed some small streams, we rode along roads that passed under huge, overhanging rocks, we crossed rickety old bridges that should be in Indiana Jones films and we zoomed along beautiful tarmac roads.  It was amazing fun.  And then someone fell over.  Me! 

It was such a stupid, nothing fall as well.  We’d rode along loads of roads consisting of rocks and shingle, stood on our pegs (rather than sat on our seats because it is much more comfortable) with no issues and no big deal.  Then somehow I ended up at the front of the group (as Mat stopped to film us going through a stream) along a particularly rocky, uneven and thin part of the road just as two massive dumper trucks came at us.  The first truck passed us with no issue (as there was LOTS of room to pass) but then the second truck and I came face to face just as the road narrowed to the width of a piece of spaghetti and I may have panicked a little.  I decided to stop, to let the 15 tonne truck come through, but as I braked and stuck my left foot down to stop, I put it down on some loose shingle and my foot slid out from under me.  What followed was a slow motion ‘fall’ as I tried to stop the bike (and myself) from falling over with zero success.  I eventually found myself stricken on some sharp, jagged rocks but had luckily fallen perfectly and had no weight of the bike on myself.  The bike was quickly lifted off me and I picked myself up sheepishly to much initial concern, and eventual merriment as I was the first to fall.  Whilst I was fine I soon noticed that EDDY WAS HURT!  I’ll never forgive myself, ever!

We were soon back up and running though and despite my embarrassment, with no ill effects.  We continued for about another 10km before we decided to make an impromptu stop in Spillow for some coffee and snacks.  Spillow was a very small village but we landed at the one coffee/snack place and enjoyed some hot, milky, sugary coffee along with some freshly cooked Samosas.  Soon we were again back on the road, fully content, enjoying the amazing conditions and all set to push on the relishing 90km to Chango Nichla.  But this is where the plan fell apart!  (Aren’t you glad you kept reading!)

Zipping along nicely we soon came across a growing queue of traffic parked on the road.  We pushed to the front, as you can on motorbikes, and parked up.  Asking around we heard that whilst undertaking some blasting to improve the roads, there had been a little landslide that needed clearing up before we could progress.  OK we thought, no problem, we’ll join the queue.  After about an hour sat in the road intermittently being covered on huge dust clouds we went to check on what had happened.  We soon found that the ‘little landslide’ was in fact a huge landslide that they weren’t in any way prepared for.  Whilst blasting out a small rock they had in fact caused a huge overhang to fall into the ‘road’, for which they only had one digger on site to deal.  Now.  Whilst I like to think I am pretty capable with words there is no way I can describe the scale of this.   Check out Rich or mines Instagram and you’ll see what I mean.  

This meant a huge delay.  Initially we were kind of told one hour so we sat by our bikes and waited.  Some played Uno, some slept and some made friends with a stray dog (yes, that was me).  Anyway, after a couple of hours of waiting we decided that rather than wait and risk having to ride another 75km in the dark, we would go back to Spillow, eat and chill out for a bit and wait for traffic to pass us once the road was opened.  Once back in Spillow we went back to the same cafe and relaxed.  Initially we had some more coffee and some more Samosas, but eventually it started to go dark so we realised we would need to stay here and try again tomorrow.  Mat soon sorted rooms and food for us and we realised we could now chill the f*^k out.  At this point two things happened.

The first was that whilst we sat and drank coffee overlooking the road, a randy bull started to mount a willing cow right in front of us.  The problem with this was that right in front of us was where we had parked our motorcycles and the bull was pushing the cow right at our bikes.  The poor doe eyed thing was bounced onto Mats bike (Leopard) which looked like it was going to topple into Richs bike (Honeybadger) and ultimately into my bike, gorgeous Eddy.  Mat ran out and scared the two bovines in the middle of their love act though so the crisis was averted.  Thank goodness,

The second thing that happened was that we gut drunk.  As a group, We all got drunk.  VERY drunk.  We started out on large Kingfishers, which soon became large glasses of rum.  We drank a bit and played UNO.  Then we drank a little more and played some music.  Then we drank a LOT more and started singing and dancing.  Like REALLY singing and dancing.  We were having SUCH fun that we barely noticed that the village became full of cars again as the road had obviously reopened.  Even sooner again the town was quieter once more as all the blocked up cars had passed through.  But it wasn’t quiet for long as the last ‘car’ to stop in town was in fact the local bus service driven by their ace driver, Subash Sharma.

Subash immediately wandered over to our little kerbside party, drank his body weight in Rum (in about 15 minutes) and then really got the party started.  Soon people were doing the ‘light bulb’ Bollywood type dance, holding chairs in the air (whilst dancing) and generally acting very, very drunk.  This continued for a while, and was very funny.  After the stress and tension of the morning at the Government office, followed by 2 hours sat waiting for the road to open, this was just what was needed.  Soon all the lagers were gone, all the Rum was gone and it was time for a quick chicken curry  and then it was time for bed.

After the previous nights sub-zero conditions I am pleased to report that tonight’s accommodation was much better.  Rich and I showered under a lukewarm stream of water and then retired to our warm, single beds ahead of tomorrow’s further adventures.  We agreed as a group on an early start to try and make up lost time, but it will be interesting to see who makes it after the partying that we enjoyed this evening.  On the plus side, if we don’t fancy riding we now know a decent bus driver! 

BTW – For the record am writing this using an Apple iPhone ‘notes’ in bed, at 00.15am following lots of Kingfishers and Runs, so apologies for any mistakes.  

#SorryNotSorry 

#WhatsImportantToYou 

To Mordor we go…

DAY 2

Theog to Kalpa (200km)

After a restless, jet lagged sleep, we were up and at em for an 8am breakfast meeting ahead of a 9am departure.   Today we were due to cover 200km as we worked our way across to Kalpa, and really started climbing into the snow covered Himalayas.  The whole group seemed in good spirits over breakfast but with Rich & I particularly happy with the menu option of French Toast & French Fries for our breakfast to help up carb-up ahead of our day.  It really had the feel of a snow boarding or skiing holiday at the breakfast table I have to say.  Mountain views, wooden interiors, hearty breakfasts and lots of talk about “nearly wiping out’” the day before.  The only difference being that a wipe out here would really mess you up.  Like….really!

Breakfast done, the jeep was soon loaded up with none essentials and I was climbing onto trusty Eddy ahead of the days ride.  After a few issues getting him going – he’s just like his Dad, a bit slow in the morning – we were soon turning left out of the hotel and on our way to Kapla.  

Today’s riding can essentially be split into 2 parts.  Pre-lunch & post lunch. 

Pre-lunch was a beautiful dream.  Our route was initially a descent from Theog down to Rampur and it turned out that not only were they good roads but they were also fairly quiet, which meant lots of fun.  Long winding downhill roads with gentle curves with 2 lanes evenly shared between traffic from both directions.  None of those ‘take your life in your hands’ overtaking manoeuvres where you ended up face to face with an oncoming bus, just lots of room to play!  We had a lovely ride where we saw a herd of Vultures feasting on a dead cow, (herd definitively isn’t the right   collective noun btw), we saw blacksmiths working in their tents by the side of the road (which I suspect were also their homes) and we saw Indian women washing clothes by hand in streams or by waterfalls.  We stopped a couple of times for some photo opportunities and as we pulled of from the second one we had to negotiate a 10cm big o f snow, which gave a good taste of what’s to come.  Which is horrific wheel spins, sliding and a general lack of control if the 10cm snow drift is anything to go by.  

As we reached Rampur we stopped for a coffee and to use the ATM to withdraw another 28,000,000 rupees (about £4.20 sterling) before saddling up again to head to the Little Chef for lunch.  Yes you read that right, we were going to a Little Chef for our lunch.  Following the coffee the roads started to get a little more testing but generally they were still ok.  There were some parts which they obviously haven’t finished yet, and also dare I say it some parts which they obviously haven’t even started yet, but by and large the roads were good and the riding good.

At about 1.30pm we stopped at the Little Chef for lunch.  Now, those of you from the UK expecting a little man in a chefs hat on a red and white sign are going to be VERY disappointed.  This was a small local building manned by 3 happy Indian guys who served us a very tasty, chilli-con-carne inspired meal which was just what was needed!  Lunch break came and went though & we were soon back at it.

Now the post-lunch ride wasn’t quite as nice.  The roads were extremely unpredictable and quickly went from tarmac, to shingle, to mud, to potholes and back to tarmac within minutes.   Add to this the fact that the road was single lane and often winding like something out of the Italian Job  and this made the ride very challenging.  We were back to suicidal bus drivers, distracted truck drivers and F1 wannabe car drivers both heading out way and also heading right at us.  Throw in some black ice and a drop in the temperature and we were back to having to absolutely 100% concentrate for every second.  

After descending due what felt like days we eventually ended up in what looked like a slate mine, but I think was actually a power station, for about 30 minutes.  It honestly felt like riding into Mordor.  It has started spitting with rain, it was getting cold and the landscape was all sharp, jagged rocks with a road surface to match.  We pushed on though and after working out way through a section of road covered by fresh landslide, and stopping for pictures at a beautiful waterfall, we could finally see many many snow covered peaks of the Himalayas.   Once we had passed through Mordor we were again back on tarmac roads and able to gun it a bit, only tempered by hitting crater sized pot-holes at 80kmph every now and then to keep you on your toes.  

Finally we bore left and really started to climb towards Kalpa.  Rich tells me Kalpa sits at 10,000 feet and we climbed them all by crawling our way up a winding road consisting of about 50 hairpin bends.   Eventually, at about 6pm, just as I was losing all sense of feeling in my frozen fingers we finally reached our hotel.  It had been a slog since after lunch but I can honestly say an enjoyable, character forming slog.

All that was left was to enjoy a warm, rejuvenating shower, a meal in front of a roaring natural fire and then retire to our beds covered in natural throws and sheepskins ahead of tomorrow.  Sadly the hotels here at 10,000 feet up the Himalayas are no thrills and ours had the added pleasure of frozen pipes and a power cut.  The food was nice though (chicken curry!) and the Rum shots particularly warming!

However, as I lie here in bed, a double bed, alongside Kristys brother Richard, both fully clothed to keep warm, including hat and gloves I am a little worried (again) ahead of tomorrow.  For tomorrow they tell us we are heading into the ‘cold parts’ of the trip, with talk of -17 degrees.  I’m worried enough that I’m not going to make it through the night tonight without getting hyperthermia and they are talking (excitedly) about earning our ‘Snow Runner’ titles in -17.  FML!

All that said, Rich and I wanted an adventure, the unknown and to step outside our comfort zone.  Mission accomplished.  I will never, ever complain about being cold at home ever again! 

BTW – In case it’s not clear, I’m loving it so far!  100%!  And for the record am writing this using iphone ‘notes’ in bed, barely able to feel my fingers so apologies for any typos.  

#WhatsImportantToYou 

Mid-life Crisis Motorcycle Tour

DAY 1

Chandigarh to Theog

To be completely frank, i am going to struggle to describe the first days ride of the Planet Way Round tour in sufficient detail to do it any kind of justice…but I will try.

From the moment we pulled out of the Velvet Clark’s Exotica hotel in Chandigarh at around 9.30am, until I finally, wearily slid off the bike at the Exotica Hotel in Theog at 6.00pm, my senses have been completely overloaded in so many ways.

To be completely honest, I was a little nervous about the motorcycling element of this trip from the moment I booked it, and the experience of travelling by car from Delhi to Chandigarh yesterday had done zero to allay my fears.  My usual ride in the UK is a 125cc Mutt, complete with ‘L’ plates (don’t hate the plate!). Now, my Mutt Eugene is indeed a fine motorbike but he’s nothing compared to the 500cc Royal Enfield Himalayan beasts that we were due to ride here in India.  So I’m sure you can appreciate my trepidation in just ‘jumping on’ this new bike & just ‘heading’ out of the city!

Acclimatisation to my new bike, Eddy (after Sir Edmund Hillary) consisted of a 30 second whizz around the hotel car park and then that was it, we were off!  Luckily our first ride lasted only about 250 metres as we needed to fuel up & the petrol station was right next door.  Those 250 metres happened without (major) incident, which helped build my confidence, but as we sat getting our bikes fuelled up I sat and watched the road we were about to join.  

It. Was. Bedlam.

I swear I am not exaggerating one bit when I say it was like the 24 hour Le Mans race meets Wacky Races.  The carriageway looked like it was probably designed and built for 3 lanes of traffic, but there seemed to be 8 or 9 lanes that had formed organically.  As we set off I remembered our guide Mats sound words of advice that ‘if in doubt stay on the left’ as I watched a self-made contra-flow lane of cars and motorcycles heading straight at me, on our road, on my left!  We headed along a small section of this crazy motorway before bearing left down a smaller side road, to join a different motorway to head out of the city.  The smaller road threw up different challenges immediately however as the unpredictability of people on foot was introduced to the mix!

Now, as well as cars, trucks, buses, motorcycles and tractors to navigate, we had people.  And if there are 2 things I have learned about Indian people in the 24 hours I have been here it is that:

1: There are lots and lots and lots of them

2: They go wherever the heck they want

I am not exaggerating (and hopefully not being disrespectful in any way) to say that the only thing I can liken it too would be trying to ride (a very small, scaled down Ant sized motorcycle) through an Ants nest after you have just scuffed it up and made it angry.  Picture the chaos of thousands of Ants moving I every direction, in a big old hurry, and then trying to ride a big, new, scary motorbike right through the middle of it!  

Every lane, junction, roadside shop, set of traffic lights and (frequently stopping) bus created absolute pandemonium.  But slowly and surely the 4 of us on the motorbikes negotiated our way out of the city, on what I was led to believe was the main highway.  I say led to believe because at any given moment 3 lanes became 1, or even minus 1 as our lane would quite literally just cease to exist or just turn onto another self made pop-up contra-flow.  Or suddenly, out of nowhere, all of the lanes would just fill up through sheer volume of traffic which for the Indian traffic and pedestrians simply inspired more creativity.  Then our side of the carriageway would just start their own contraflow, or just parp parp parp their way through the blockage like Toad of Toad Hall.  It was undoubtedly one of the most frightening experiences of my life, but also one of the most exhilarating.

With every passing pop-up contra-flow, suicidal pedestrian or parping 10 tonne lorry seemingly 3mm from my rear wheel telling me to ‘hurry-up’ we moved further away from the city though.  Soon the roads because longer, straighter and less filled with craziness.  (For ‘less-filled’ try and picture the M25 on a Friday evening at about 5.30pm.  Everything is relative!). Soon we were speeding along at 80kmph, enjoying the blazing sunshine, wind in our faces and able to enjoy some of the sights, sounds and smells of India.  I can’t begin to explain how amazing this was, watching this crazy country whizz past as I sat astride Eddy. My open face helmet, sunnies on just watching everyone and everything.  

This amazing experience lasted about 10 minutes, as we eventually took a left (past a man walking along, single handedly carrying enough leaves to re-thatch the whole roof of our whole cottage) and onto a two lane road as we began our initial ascent into the mountains.  Now, if I thought the motorways out of the city were a little testing then I was in for a rude awakening.  The combination of single carriageway roads, with all the bicycles, motorbikes, cars, trucks and buses (often squeezing 3 lanes of traffic into that single carriageway) heading both ways, coupled with hap hazard approach to the management of road works, resulted in a real life version of the computer game Ridge Racer.  The hills were steep, the drops were massive, the traffic from the opposite direction was often heading right at you and the roads has ridiculously bad, unpredictable surfaces.  We stayed on this road for about an hour I think with on pit-stop for a Fanta Limon.  Either side of the pit-stop it was a white knuckle ride.  Just when I thought i had a handle on the road or the conditions something new popped up.  As you banked around a left hand corner suddenly there would be a beautifully hand painted Punjab Roadways bus 98% of the way on your side of the road.  Or a big cow just wandering around.  Or a big pile of built up rubble, just left blocking our lane.  Or a pack of street dogs, looking for trouble.  Or groups of wild monkeys (baboons I think) just sat in the road watching you like motorcycle appreciation society.  You actually had no idea at all what was coming at any point.

And yet we kept climbing, up and up and up we went.  Eventually the sides of the roads became less built up with buildings, shops and towns and we were on proper open(ish) road.  We could open the bikes up a bit, break a little as we banked nicely into the corners and then accelerate out as we continued into the mountains.  This was weirdly my favourite part of the day.  The roads were still crazy, and you didn’t know what was around any corner, but this felt like an adventure beginning.  Eventually we ducked off the main road onto another side road as we were heading to Chail to join our guide Mat, at the 16th annual reunion of his bikers gang up in the hills.  

We arrived there at about 1.00pm (I think) which was three and a half hours after we had set off.  My arse was killing me so I was glad to get off Eddy for a while.  Mats friends were very welcoming as Rich and I joined them for lunch for a few hours.  Rich and I watched as they all rocked up on their amazing collection of motorbikes, greeted each other enthusiastically and set about catching up on old times.  Rich and I played some pool, ate some amazing chicken curry and generally just chilled.

Eventually we were all kitted up again and on our way as we made the final stretch heading toward Thego, where our hotel awaited.  The ride after lunch was definitely colder than before, which brought its own challenges.  After stopping for lunch and stiffening up, it took a while to get back into the groove.  Thank goodness I had bought a new flip-face helmet before I left the UK though as the altitude and the cooler air called for a full face helmet to keep warm.  Whilst the roads in the afternoon were much quieter, I found the riding harder.  It was now tree-lined mountain roads, single carriageway for both directions and a combination of concrete, shingle, mud or ice (as we reached our highest point for the day).  I had a couple of ‘moments’ as the back wheel slid in the mud, ice or just on the loose stone which made my mind cast forward to what was to come – much much worse apparently.  Urgh!

Nevertheless we kept on going, with a couple of stops to take some photos.  Towns and villages almost completely vanished for about 30 minutes before we dropped into the craziness of Shimla.  Shimla is apparently a bit holiday destination for people who want to see the Himalayas but aren’t dumb enough to do it on a motorbike.  We passed through there at about 5.00pm and for about 10km it was so busy again as we obviously caught the end of the day.  Cars parked/abandoned everywhere along the side of the road were suddenly pulling out with zero warning, people walking everywhere, stalls on the side of the road selling everything from shell suits and wellies to hand carved animals and kebabs, busses, trucks and now also huge packs of horses used for taking tourists up the mountains.  (Is packs the right noun for a collection of horses?). We rode over the highest point of Shimla and then started to drop down again, out of the bedlam.  All that remained was one last 20 minute jaunt along what actually turned out to be the most dangerous road of the day in my opinion.  I don’t know if it was because it was the end of a tiring day, or because the road was predominantly filled with local buses where the drivers know the route like the back of their hand, or even because it was now so cold I was concentrating on my frozen fingers more than the road, but this last bit (for me) was not enjoyable at all.  Eventually though we passed through the last populated village of the day and our hotel for the night came into view.

Eddy was quickly abandoned and a warm shower was followed by another curry and some rum before retiring for the night at 10.00pm.  We have another 200km to cover tomorrow apparently, and as I am awake at 4.00am writing this blog (bloody jet lag) it’s going to be another tough one I think.  

I posted on FB earlier 

‘Day 1 done.  Absolutely incredible days riding.  Can’t put into words the day I’ve had!’

But I’ve tried to here, and time, energy and frost bitten fingers permitting will continue to try to do so.

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