Himalaya Enfield Challenge 2008
Day : -1- -2- -3- -4- -5- -6- -7- -8- -9- -10- -11- -12- -13- -14- -15- -16- -17- -18- -19- -20-
Date: 080907


10:50
Slept like a charm. Had breakfast, a toast with homemade jam and honey. Very tasty.
The owner appears to have a daughter who lives in the Netherlands, which caused enough funny small talks.

The departure was driving back down through villages and hamlets. After an hour we took a break and it appeared that Eddie had fallen with the bike.
But since he was the last riding no one noticed anything until we were stopped.
It appeared that the bike was fallen on his right leg and which he couldn't get it off his leg. It was just too heavy to move to get there.
Fortunately, there was someone around there (in the middle nowhare) who could help him up. He had not hurt himself.

At one time we had to drive through a tunnel which was 4,5 km long, without any light in it. So it was mandatory to drive without our sunglasses, and to turn on the lights of the bike,
The mechanics checked all the bikes yesterday on lights being functional and repaired them when necessary.
Despiste that we drove around 70 km/h through the tunnel, we were overtaken by trucks and busses. They really drove like crazy people. Taking over a long colon of verhicles, driving on the other half of the road, and some without having lights of there own.

After the tunnel we drove a piece of highway, and i took the Enfield against the 100 km/h. I didn't expect that, but he surely drives like a diesel. It just will not stop!

12:25
We're past the town Kulli. Lunch time.
Kullu is a real busy town, lot of people and cars. The bike of Danielle quit a few times, but she managed to get it going again.

The Indian people do not care about anything. In a very small street a public transportian bus stopped, and people got off or boarded the but. There was 1 guy that goff while he was still on the phone with his mobile. The mobile appeared to be owned by someone who stayed on the bus, as that person was half out of the bus asking the guy for his phone. But the guy kept talking on the phone and didn care about what was happening arround him. The consequence was that the whole street stopped moving because this guy wouldn hang up the phone. Everyone in the street started to use their horn to make clear that he had to quit so we could move along. He still didn care. Until a police man started to interfere with the guy, on which the mobile was returned and the bus started to move.
Pffff..... what a world.....

By the way, this street was the only place, besides Delhi, where we have see an electric stopsign during our whole trip in India.

15:30
We have arrived at the hotel in Manila.
I have had my boots polished at the entrance of the hotel for 50 ruppi ( about 80 eurocent ).
Along the way Danny had some bad luck with his bike, on which the head gasget had let go of the valve cover. This was repaired on the spot. ( later on it even seemed that a bolt was missing, and another was loose )
Danny continued on the bike of Danielle, and Danielle went on the back. She was then able to make some movies during the ride.

Arriving at the hotel, we quickly changed clothes, and went into town. First we went to a temple. There too we received the 'red dot' and donated some ruppies. In the city we visited the main street and went sight seeing in all the small streets. We wanted to make some call to home, and send some pictures bia the internet, but the power went down. So, during the shopping we had to use flashlights. But he Indian people were used to it, and everything continued.
Eventualy the power came back on line in the end of the afternoon, which resulted immeadiatly in more activities in the streets. I managed to send an email with some pictures, which took me 30 minutes and costed only 10 ruppies. This is really no money at all.

Back at the hotel we took the 'tuktuk', a small scooter on three wheels and covered.
It was almost a cart-race, three tuktuks who all tried to drive as fast as possible.
In the dark, straight up and with a very small light, it was fun !

In the evening we had diner and set down and relaxed some more. Went to bed at 22:15 so we could get up very early.
Breakfast in the open air.

A local old man

Boots being polished

Instructions how to use the prayer-drums

Geert in the tuktuk


What we thought of it => __"A super trip!"__
© 2008 Mike Beijerbacht