Before we got into Banswara, the Snackbox encountered a flat tyre. We had to roll the beast off the the side of the road to a rather large and perfect sized rock to use as a jack. With the help of a bystander, pushed the Snackbox to it side and slipped the rock underneath. Easy peasy change, although I'm pretty sure that rock had been in cow poo because it was not mud on my hands
Made it to Indore without a breakdown.... I lied.
For ever greatful to the super friendly locals who are willing to help out(despite not having any mechanical knowledge). We've been lucky so far with breaking down in front of a mechanic's workshop and had a new piston installed and the piston chamber mechined because the piston was rubbing the sides. They nearly ripped us off for it and wanted more than what was agreed on but a government worker who spoke English happened to drive by and gave us his number and told us to call him if we ran into 'trouble'. With that sorted and the snackbox ran like a gem until this morning but nothing like a new spark plug couldn't fix!
Holy shit! Nearly didn't have a room to sleep in tonight. Did the old fashion turning up to the reception desk and enquired room availability. None of this booking.com or Goibibo nonsense.
The hardest part was not the long 10hr drive from Ooty to Bangalore, it was the bloody drive in Bangalore itself at 7-8pm took us and hour to do 2.8km. Holy Cheese Balls
Second time driving at night (only cause we had too not that we wanted too) Thank god for our LED flood light as everyone in the city had their high beams on!
Made it to Bangalore by 6:30 and didn't get to the accomodation until 8 due to traffic! There isn't any flooding here anymore as far as we can see but some parts of the city still don't have power. Stopped for lunch in Mysore after our decent from around 2400m altitude. To the guys we met at breakfast just outside of Ooty, it's not too much of a drive on the highway if you can stick to 60kph ;)
No breakdowns, but after 2 days of A LOT of mountain driving, I will be pulling the wheels off to check the brakes. Some squeaking going on which tells me I may have worn them out. Good thing I have a massive carpark underneath an apartment block to play in!
Today was rather uneventful compared to yesterday. We still haven't fixed our flat tyre we got yesterday? Maybe we should keep it as a good luck charm and not get it fixed at all?
Snackbox is running beautifully with the speedo reading 55kph on the highway and just humming along. We made it to Ooty in the daytime too which was a bonus, then found out our accommodation was another hour away so cancelled and became VIP members of hotel Gaylord.
Passing busses and trucks going up mountains has become second nature now, 3rd gear approach, tip it in hard to the hairpin and grab second with some throttle to kick the tail out and get a good run up.
Heading to Bangalore tomorrow if we can. We have just checked the news and seen the pictures of cars underwater. It's worth a shot, we haven't been in a foreign city under heavy flooding before.
Best of luck to the teams we left for dead at the bottom of the range as we sped past them, 2 trucks and a bus in one hit. I wonder if they are still jealous of the spotlight we have installed?
Today was rather uneventful compared to yesterday. We still haven't fixed our flat tyre we got yesterday? Maybe we should keep it as a good luck charm and not get it fixed at all?
Snackbox is running beautifully with the speedo reading 55kph on the highway and just humming along. We made it to Ooty in the daytime too which was a bonus, then found out our accommodation was another hour away so cancelled and became VIP members of hotel Gaylord.
Passing busses and trucks going up mountains has become second nature now, 3rd gear approach, tip it in hard to the hairpin and grab second with some throttle to kick the tail out and get a good run up.
Heading to Bangalore tomorrow if we can. We have just checked the news and seen the pictures of cars underwater. It's worth a shot, we haven't been in a foreign city under heavy flooding before.
Best of luck to the teams we left for dead at the bottom of the range as we sped past them, 2 trucks and a bus in one hit. I wonder if they are still jealous of the spotlight we have installed?
So last night we managed to make it to our hotel at 8PM. The spotlight we brought over from back home made all the buses and trucks pull over and stop to let us past so a good investment.
We had a few problems with Snackbox (our tuk tuk):
Ran out of fuel,
Dirty fuel filter,
Sticky carby float,
Change spark plug,
Flat tyre.
Also some waterfalls are 'natural theme parks' with thousands of tourists parking on single lane roads. That slowed us down a bit.
Otherwise all is good and time to catch up to the teams we passed last night camping in a tiny cold shack!
In kochi and absolutely f@#^> good night y'all
Free food at Changi via Changi voucher!!! Come at me duck noodle soup and get in my belly!
