Team The Rickateers

The Road to Shillong...

After 30 hours of travel, 36 hours for T Lyall, The “Three Rickateers†finally arrived in Gahawati in the state of Meghalaya.  Coming from the Western influence of Singapore airport. Gahawati was a shock to the senses. A thinly tarsealed runway that looked like it would scuff up just by walking on it, let alone a sizeable aircraft. After negotiating the mysterious puddle on the bathroom floor. We received our bags with sigh after thinking the worst, and stupidly unprepared wandered into the fray of Indian drivers waiting like vultures to peck apart any unsuspecting westerner. What a wonderful confronting sight. After being Ker ranged into a vehicle, and realizing that seatbelts were clearly a western oppression We were taken on a 4 hour driving gauntlet, to Shillong. Dodging cows and people as frequently as our driver sat on the horn, careering past trucks, that are literally a shipping container on wheels dwarfing our tiny Hyundai, as oil and exhaust spewed forth from these unstoppable metal monsters fro[]()m a myriad of mechanical problems deep within. We saw more of these Beasts broken or written off. Some were missing wheels some limped on with broken axels. One Truck we saw teetered dangerously on a bridge the driver had slammed into, presumably while smoking opium, so he could stay awake. People were standing about scratching their heads wondering what could have possibly caused this accident, After being pinballed about on roads hardly fit for walking, The cause is painfully clear.

This place is Mental.

The constant aroma of Rubbish and Coal permeate and offend the nostrils liquefying the 28degree heat into a hot inescapable soup. Dust fills every orifice. Sound pollution sits on equal terms with human waste and general deposits pilled by the roadside creating a haven for the street dogs that wander the countryside.

Our first meal in India unfortunately was the McDonald’s Maharaja burger. It’s like a big mac with out the beef. It was terrible, and hurt our stomachs. But it could have been the post mix Coca cola made with puddle water. We will never know.

We had a curry that was like nothing ever tasted in the western world. By Indian standards it was probably rubbish but we got three for AUS 3 dollars, so we win.

We started meeting some of the other Rickshaw teams, had extremely cheap beers by our standards but apparently these were still expensive.

Then we slept. We were done.

This place is Mental.

C. Abernethy

Greg Campbell

Load Greg

Christiaan Abernethy

Load Christiaan

Anthony Lyall

Load Anthony

<iframe height="203" src="http://www.fundraiseonline.co.nz/external/widget.asp?id=19293" style="border: medium none" width="558">&amp;amp;lt;p&amp;amp;gt;Your browser does not support iframes. &amp;amp;lt;a href=&quot;http://www.fundraiseonline.co.nz/external/widget.asp?id=19293&quot; target=&quot;_blank&quot;&amp;amp;gt;Click here&amp;amp;lt;/a&amp;amp;gt; to view in a standard window.&amp;amp;lt;/p&amp;amp;gt;</iframe> <p><span style="font-family: 'Times','serif'; font-size: 10pt"><font face="georgia,palatino"><font size="3">Welcome to The Rickshaw Run, please keep all limbs inside the rickshaw at all times. In the likely event of an emergency - grin and bear it.</font></font></span></p><p><span style="font-family: 'Times','serif'; font-size: 10pt"></span><span style="font-family: 'Times','serif'; font-size: 10pt"><font face="georgia,palatino"><font size="3"> </font></font></span><span style="font-family: 'Times','serif'; font-size: 10pt"><font size="3"><font face="georgia,palatino">At 10am on the 10th of September 2011 </font></font></span><span style="font-family: 'Times','serif'; font-size: 10pt"><font face="georgia,palatino"><font size="3">we three (Tony, Christiaan and Greg) depart on a 5000km journey in a rickshaw across India from Shillong to &quot;The Golden City&quot; of Jaisalmer, Rajastan. This ludicrous (Adjective: So foolish, unreasonable, or out of place as to be ausing) adventure is ultimately a fundraising event for Frank Water </font></font></span><span style="font-family: 'Times','serif'; font-size: 10pt"><font face="georgia,palatino"><font size="3">and The NZ Red Cross </font></font></span><span style="font-family: 'Times','serif'; font-size: 10pt"><font face="georgia,palatino"><font size="3">(see &ldquo;Charity&rdquo; page on left).</font></font></span><span style="font-family: 'Times','serif'; font-size: 10pt"><font face="georgia,palatino"><font size="3"> </font></font></span><span style="font-family: 'Times','serif'; font-size: 10pt"><font face="georgia,palatino"><font size="3">Now 5000km sounds like a heck of a long way... and it is. What we intend to do is spend 2-3 weeks travelling around 8 hours a day at a max speed of 55km/h with&hellip; well, no road rules in a machine that is probably less technically advanced than a boat, just as sluggish, and has more chance of crashing than the first Wright brothers plane. Sounds to us like a hoot of a way to spend a few weeks.&nbsp;</font></font></span><span style="font-family: 'Times','serif'; font-size: 10pt"><font face="georgia,palatino" size="3"> <br /></font></span></p><p><span style="font-family: 'Times','serif'; font-size: 10pt"></span><span style="font-family: 'Times','serif'; font-size: 10pt"><font face="georgia,palatino"><font size="3">This epic adventure is not going to happen without your support. We can assure you that we&rsquo;re not just three kiwi blokes gallivanting through India seeing how many curries we can rack up in 5000km&rsquo;s. We are doing this wholly and solely for charity and we want to make this a big deal. From start to finish we are absolutely unaided. We have no support crew or any checkpoints we need to turn up at along the way. We are doing this to help the people of India receive sustainable clean water systems through our charity Frank Water as well as helping the NZ Red Cross in what is undeniably an extremely important time for them! We need your help to make this difference. We do not want this to be just our adventure, so keep tuning in to this site to read our blogs and look at pictures. Keep in touch with our map updates to ensure we&rsquo;re still in India as well as alive, but most of all please donate a little bit of your hard earned pennies to people in India and New Zealand doing it hard. Join our adventure and get the bug, because we&rsquo;ll be getting plenty in India, probably even some we&rsquo;ve never heard of.</font></font></span><span style="font-family: 'Times','serif'; font-size: 10pt"><font face="georgia,palatino" size="3">&nbsp;</font></span> </p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0.1pt 0cm"><span style="font-family: 'Times','serif'; font-size: 10pt"><font face="georgia,palatino"><font size="3">Thanks for your support, we look forward to having you on board!</font></font></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0.1pt 0cm">&nbsp;</p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0.1pt 0cm"><span style="font-family: 'Times','serif'; font-size: 10pt"><font face="Georgia" size="3"></font></span></p><span style="font-family: 'Times','serif'; font-size: 10pt"><font face="georgia,palatino"><font size="3">Christiaan, Greg and Tony AKA The Rickateers. <span style="color: red"></span></font></font></span><p>&nbsp;</p>