We Made It!!!!

Well, 3332km, 14 days, 2 countries and 6 Indian states, and we've made it to Shillong. 100k of winding hilly roads and mountain passes, through some amazing scenery, got us from Guwahati to Shillong today. Yesterday was a longer than expected day, 13 hours on the road in the end, but we got from Alipar Duar to Guwahati despite fog, cold, some shocking (and some nonexistent) roads, the usual quality of bridges here, and a few accident-caused traffic jams. We spent the night in probably our second-worst accomodation (not counting the park bench in Pondicherry), and so made an early start this morning to get up into the hills, making time of course for one of our now-customary amazing road-side breakfasts. This time it was potato roti with chunky soup, delicious. Stephanie did a fantastic job with the hills, though we did stop a few times to let her cool down, and the engine and gearbox don't sound too healthy now! Our mobile phones don't seem to be working here, which I'm told is because only locally registered phones have access to the network in these eastern states. Annoying, but not much we can do about it, so we'll be less-contactable until we fly out of here on the afternoon of the 17th. We've got a couple of days here, so some relaxing, a big party on the 15th and possibly even some clean clothes await us. Now, off to find the finish line, I suppose, we haven't officially checked in yet. -Ian

You know you get those "Himalayan" kinda days?

You know, when you think:

"I could really go for some delicious Samosas right now, probably accompanied by some spicy Dhal soup - where would be the most difficult yet rewarding place to achieve this for breakfast."

Then it hits you. The Himalayas!  I'll bet Stephanie could scamper up there, whilst avoiding the monkeys, and find a small hut with an extremely bemused fellow inside who could whip up just the thing.  So we did.

We also drove through a Bengal Tiger sanctuary, in our Rickshaw, which I suppose would look to a Tiger like a conveniently pre-opened  Sardine tin. We didn't see any Tiger's, however, but upon reflection we decided that this was probably for the best.

We also saw one other team today, so we pulled up to say hi... they were next to a very small shrine, where some old Holy Chap went for us with the red paint on our foreheads - so looking like we'd been cyclops'd during a paintball game we moved on.

It's an extremely military area, due to the Assam area having dissidents, and the proximity of Bangladesh, Nepal, Burma and the ever present threat of China too - we've seen fighter planes in the skies and many, many army/airforce bases which the maps obviously do not show.  Our map does however show a rather fine road which would be great if it had actually been built.

 

Right, that'll do for now, I reckon.

Ben.  

 

PS we will post some great pictures, as soon as we get our collective act together! 

A brief aside for those of you who've sponsored us thus far...

Hi All,

Firstly thanks for all the donations that are coming still in - with the gift aid supplement from the UK gov., we've now topped **1500 pounds**! 

The money will be going to AIDS patients in India; India's highways are the most efficient corridor for the transmission of AIDS in the world.  To combat this the government here has started a fairly frank advertising campaign (difficult when sex is a taboo subject in India - the TV is considered daring when it shows midriff, or dare I say it, kissing!), and some rather interesting signposts (with free condom vending machines attached) every 2km or so!

Anyway -Thanks for all your emails and texts... interestingly the question that keeps popping up is:

"Have Ian & you killed each other yet?"

So, firstly, thanks for the morbid concern. 

Secondly, the answer is no, but there have been some absolutely belting arguments, the kind only friends can get away with... So as a reward for your sponsorship I thought it would be nice to list some of the different ends of the discussions (you can probably reverse engineer the situation from there): - It can't be a stretch goal, if it's physically impossible (Ben to Ian whilst planning routes) - Stop it. You sound too business-y (Ian to Ben) - We'll I didn't see it until the last minute, and it was only your head (Ian to Ben (after hitting a sleeping policeman at 40km/h) - If that is the case then I hold you wholly accountable (Ben (some navigation error or other)

And there were a few other (very non professional) argument "closers" as well:

- He had right of way (me), Why? (Ian), He had a sword (Me) - Shut it ginger face (Ian to Ben (perfectly reasonably, we have horrible, horrible beards going on))

- Do they serve diet curry here? (Ben to Ian upon ordering dinner)

- Do you think that you'll ever marry the internet (Ben to Ian)

 

So there you are. 

 

Please take the time to read Ian's last post outlining the last few days of the Run - it has swords in it (really).  

 - Ben

Coal, Festivals and Nepal!

Well it's been quite a few days since we've been able to find any internet access, but we've got plenty of miles covered in the meantime.After we last updated, we left Cuttack and headed north, finishing off teh last of National Highway 5, and passing into West Bengal state. We had to stop at the border there and pay a hefty road tax, but we're covered for 6 months now, so no worries on that front at least if we take a little longer than planned!After a night spent in almost-comfort, we decided to head cross-country a little bit to try and avoid Calcutta. What followed was a day's driving on generally good roads, through some lovely scenery, though we did make one wrong turn which led us (almost) to a money-soliciting road block (we turned around), and gave another bemused 'tax' collector 5 rupees in exchange for a receipt we can't read.At this point Stephanie's exhaust was coming loose again, so we stopped in a small village to borrow a wrench, only to have two mechanics (and 18 observers) swarming over the back of the rickshaw.They removed the engine cover, and the exhaust, and extracted a small piece of sheared metal (a washer where the exhaust connects to the manifold, I thnk). One of the two mechanics took it over to his shop, and fabricated a new one out of an old pot lid in about 5 minutes. We were back on the road 10 minutes later with the exhaust tightened, and the engine performing better than ever before!We finished that evening in what appears to be a coal mining town (Raniganj), everything for miles around was coated in black dust. Not the best town to spend some time in, so we got on the road nice and early. A wrong turn led us to a closed road that led us to an open pit coal mine, so we turned around and with some friendly directions, made our way north on increasingly good roads, making to to the main north-south road mid-afternoon, and meeting up with another Rickshaw team along the way.We'd been seeing small, then larger, festivals/celebrations in the towns we were passing through, with drumming, singing and dancing (and some worrying waving about of swords) and at about 4pm came to the largest one yet, where we decided to lay low for an hour or two to avoid the chaos. We still attracted plenty of attention, though, there seems to be something inherently fascinating about a couple of westerners driving around in a rickshaw!Found a brand new hotel just after dark, and another 4 rickshaw teams showed up shortly after, so we spent a while swapping stories, then all posed for publicity photos for the hotel, not sure our faces will draw much business!We'd discovered that there is an ongoing petrol tanker driver's strike, which has added an extra element of difficulty to the trip, with most of the stations we passed for a few days out of petrol. Luckily Stephanie's getting about 32km/l, and we've got a spare tank with us, so we've not been stranded yet!We made it up to Siligurin on the 9th, and found a quite nice hotel for the next couple of nights. Today we had a lie in, then went to nepal for lunch (and the passport stamp). Proved quite a timeconsuming adventure, plenty of forms to fill out and taxes to pay to get a rickshaw into Nepal!We're going to head to Darjeeling (by jeep, not rickshaw) tomorrow, then on the 12th set off for the last 600-odd kilometers to Shillong, we should be there well in time for the party on the 15th!2650km so far... 600 to go. Having a great time!

Stephanie Strops!

Well, well, well... a couple of very busy days!

Stephanie showed the first signs of stress (probably from the "short cut roads" from the day before!).  After a good start yesterday (Sunday 4th) we experienced our first "knocking" sound.  Apon inspection it appeared as though our exhaust was making good it's escape, which we attempted to repair on the road, which duly broke after 3km. 

We stopped and had it repaired by someone who knew what they were doing (a bit unfair on us; we only lacked tools, parts, commitment and experience...) and we were on our way again.

Even with this slight set back we managed to cover 328km, only topped by an astonishing 378km today!  We we're slightly hampered by the lack of motorway today but a 6:30 start is nothing to men whom eat curry for breakfast. And lunch. And Dinner. Every day so far.

The only major issue we have is we are walking with "pimp-step" limps, where the sun has gouged it's mark across only our right legs from the constant driving North East...

We're a day away from Kolkata, but we've amde a decision to cut across country to try and avoid the horrific traffic!

Ben

Ben finds a shortcut...

 

Well after getting a good night's sleep in Ongole, we were on the road nice and early today, with some random indian fried foods for a breakfast-to-go. Only one siting of another team today (after somehow ending up in the same bar as 6 or so last night), think the groups may be spreading up a bit along their various routes.

More highway driving today, which is quick, but a little boring, so Ben thought we should head off the beaten path a little this afternoon, and we took a 'short' cut to Rajahmundry. Beautiful scenery, but some terrible roads. 1 ill-advised overtaking maneuver (I forgot I was in a rickshaw, not a BMW), 1 broken roof-rack mount, 4 psycho bus drivers and 75 bone-shaking kilometers later, we arrive at a huge river, which our maps told us we couldn't cross. Hah, what do mapmakers know? We found a long and barely paved bridge across the Godavari river, which brought us right into the middle of town and next to a pretty good hotel! And Stephanie (yes, we've named the Rickshaw) gets to rest in a garage tonight. Result.

323km today, would have been more had we gone the long (and paved) way here, but happy with progress so far. Kolkota by Tuesday?

 

 

The Race is On!!

Hi All,

 We've now been racing (albeit at 40km/p/h) for two days, and have managed a mighty 500km!

Having stayed on/near a building site North of Chennai on night one, achieving 2 hours sleep (between us), we were up and out this morning as soon as we could stop our teeth rattling!

Our rickshaw has been reliable, and the locals (on the whole) remarkably warm and friendly.

Joint sitings include:  1 Parrot, two monkeys, cows (approx 1000), bison, oxen, goats, pigs, sticks, chicken, and no chicken (an empty hutch holding lorry!).

As always - more to follow!

Ben

We're here!

 

Well after our business class flight (thanks for the upgrade, BA!) we landed at Chennai at 1am, then spent 3 hours in a taxi getting to Pondicherry, and slept on a bench on the beachfront waiting for the hotels to open. Which were all full. We spent about 2 hours walking around the town and eventually found a place with the help of a rickshaw driver (a good omen!).

After 24 hours of traveling, we took a nap, then headed off to a warehouse to get to know our very own rickshaw. She looks great, despite the conspicous Union Flag, which Ben's painted over. She's all ready to go tomorrow morning, so all we've got left to do tonight is party!

More from the road, next year...

 -Ian