By Any Means: His Brand New Adventure From Wicklow to Wollongong (24 page)

I really liked this place, it was so rich and diverse; the people so full of life and yet with an acute sense of death that was as much a part of their lives as making tea or driving a rickshaw. The houses along the front were beautiful and ancient, weathered by river winds and monsoon rains. We asked Rajiv if there was any way we could see inside one. He thought about that for a moment then said perhaps there was.

We tied up the boat and, leaving the commercial area, followed Rajiv through a labyrinth of passageways and alleys, before climbing some steps to a large house that was split between four families. He introduced us to a small, white-haired man, a former banker who was now a Hindu priest. He explained that he had worked in the bank all his life, but had taken early retirement. Now he devoted himself to worship and meditation. He showed us round the house, leading us to the balcony and its stunning view, taking in the curve of the river and the mud banks beyond. Our host explained that in the old days all these great houses had been owned by kings and queens, but when it was decreed they could no longer own property, their workers took possession. They’d been split into apartments and passed down from generation to generation. This had been his uncle’s place and he lived here for fifty years before his nephew took it over. He loved books and art and spent most of his time meditating or portrait painting. The rest of the time he taught literature to schoolteachers so that they in turn could teach the children.

In a way, the priest personified Varanasi perfectly - calm, spiritual, but fully engaged in life. When we had soaked up the view, we thanked him for letting us into his home, and left him to his meditation.

15

The Cold Chain

Tomorrow we were leaving for Nepal. We had decided to buy a tuk-tuk in Varanasi and drive it to the station before taking a train to Gorakhpur. After that we would try to ship the tuk-tuk back to our office in London. We already had bikes stored there from Long Way Round and Race to Dakar and one of the trucks from Long Way Down, so it seemed fitting to have a suitable souvenir from By Any Means. I quite fancied pootling around in it in London, too.

When we told Rajiv our plan he looked at us a little strangely then shrugged his shoulders and said that anything was possible. An hour later a driver showed up with this really battered-looking tuk-tuk which he said he would sell us. It was almost midnight by now so we asked the driver to bring it back the next morning, where we could see it properly and give it the once-over.

Back in my room I called Mungo.

‘Charles.’

‘Mungo, how are you?’

‘I’m OK. I’m at my sister Claire’s house with my leg up on the sofa.’

‘How did it go?’

‘Really well, though the tear was more serious than they first thought: it’s what they call a “bucket handle”.’

Mungo explained that they had had to remove most of the cartilage, which did sound a lot more serious than we’d thought. He didn’t think it would cause him any problems in the short term but he might suffer a bit of arthritis when he was older. He reckoned it would be ten to fourteen days before he was fit enough to come back out, but should have full mobility in as little as three or four days.

I couldn’t believe it: literally a couple of days since it happened and there he was already recovering from an operation. His only problem was he’d rented out his house for the duration of the trip and so for the next few weeks he’d be kipping on people’s floors.

 

In the morning Rajiv showed up with the guy and his tuk-tuk. In the daylight it looked pretty ropey, but, pulling the lever to the left of the driver’s seat, the engine started first time. The only thing wrong with it was a broken plug lead, but it clearly still functioned. The exhaust was held on by a piece of wire and Russ reckoned one of the wheel bearings was shot, but the brakes were fine. Taking Rajiv to one side we told him how much we were prepared to part with and left it to him to negotiate a deal: if he beat the seller down far enough to make a profit for himself, that was fine by us.

Deal done, we had our very own tuk-tuk. Loading the bags, I drove Russ across Varanasi to the station. Halfway there the tuk-tuk conked out and rolled to a stop. I thought I knew what it was, though, and when I lifted the seat I could see that the plug lead was off. Wedging it in place, we were going again. By the time we made it to the station - a beautiful old building with a massive wheel on the top - we were both quite attached to our new vehicle, and were quite sorry to leave it behind. We wrote little dedications on the front - ‘hope to see you in London’.

The train was half an hour late, so we sat on the platform and waited. It was the hottest day we’d had so far - sticky and humid - and we were very glad to get on board the air-conditioned train when it did finally arrive. I rode by the open door, the wind blowing in my face, watching the flat and thirsty scenery flash by - small villages and arid farmland. Later on we got a call from Lucy confirming that as far as China was concerned a direct flight from Kathmandu to Guangzhou, north of Hong Kong, was our best bet.

 

 

On our last day in India I was woken by a thunderclap and rain rattling the window of my hotel room. It was just about dawn and the power was off, but I could see enough to pick out trees being buffeted by the rain and wind. Rain was seeping through the window frame and forming pools on the sill: it was a real old tempest and it looked set for the day.

We were heading for the border in an Ambassador, the iconic car of India: 1800 cc with five gears. Ours was creamy white and in lovely condition. We’d borrowed it and I’d hoped to drive but the owner was nervous so he supplied a driver. At that time of the morning in a raging storm there was little point in arguing so we set off through empty streets with just the odd bicycle out and about; one guy on the back of a motorbike holding an umbrella over the rider.

Out of town the rain got so bad that the road partially collapsed; we were heading deep into the country where everything was very green and very, very wet. Diverted off the road to avoid an obstruction, we ended up negotiating a stretch where the bank on our left had collapsed, massive hunks of rock strewn across our path. It was pretty hairy, the bank on our right looked as though it would go at any moment and two lanes of traffic were gingerly trying to pass each other. Now I was glad I wasn’t driving.

The Indian side of the border had to be one of the weirder crossings we’d experienced. Sunauli was a border town situated on a dirt road, with a really busy and really narrow main street. Shops sold everything from saris to plumbing supplies, with immigration on one side and customs on the other. Beyond that was an arch which said ‘Goodbye to India’ and fifty metres further you were in Nepal. Immigration was a building with a table under an open porch where we did the paperwork. After that it was across the road to customs, another open-fronted place where a couple of guys in soldiers’ uniforms were lounging around. They made it clear that they wanted money and when we wouldn’t give them any they decided to inspect our equipment item by item. They hauled the gear out of the boot and spread it on the road in front of a sari shop. Russ sat in the car covertly filming while Rina and I tried to deal with the soldiers. Rina had vouched for our equipment when we arrived so she had a lot riding on us not having any problems. The trouble was when Mungo had gone home he’d taken some gear with him, so some stuff on the carnet wasn’t actually there. The other thing was the carnet itself: when it was printed in London someone had duplicated a page so it looked like we had more equipment than we actually did. It took a while and a bribe would’ve done the trick but we’re not into that. We let them poke through all the gear and pick holes in the carnet while we waited under a sign that indicated we should report anyone asking for a bribe. Finally they got the message and let us repack and cross into Nepal.

In an instant, everything changed: India was gone. Nepal looked cleaner, fresher; the buildings were part colonial and part oriental with balconies and pagoda-style roofs. The people looked different, too - it was clear we were getting closer to oriental Asia.

We were met by a Nepalese guy called Binot who would try to help us reach Kathmandu by tomorrow night. He introduced us to another Binot who drove his tractor to and from the border, and was heading our way.

We were now on possibly the slowest form of transport we’d encountered so far - with the possible exception of the elephant in Delhi. I sat under the canvas canopy while Binot, who was a bit of a cheeky chappie in his twenties, told me about his job, which he’d been doing for about two years. He let me drive; the first time I’d driven a tractor since I was about thirteen. It was straightforward enough, though a bit wobbly, and so slow a bicycle went by. I think I saw a mouse overtake us at one point.

Leaving Binot to deliver his load we jumped on a local bus, which we hoped would take us up the road to the banks of the River Rafti, the third largest river in Nepal. The Rafti bordered the Chitwan National Park, which was where we’d arranged to meet Robin. He was finally arriving from London to help with the filming: we still had Deepak but Wency had left us in India. Robin filmed part of the Race to Dakar and would stay with us until Anne, the Danish camerawoman, flew out. It was all a bit complicated in the camera department but after Mungo’s injury it had been a case of improvise, adapt and overcome.

The bus dropped us close to the river where we found a couple of guys waiting with dugout canoes. The last time I’d been in one I was seventeen and fearless. Now I was forty and fatter than I wanted to be and these looked very unstable. The river was wide and green and I wasn’t fooled by how calm it seemed: I swear I could hear the roaring of rapids up ahead. But this was the most direct way of getting to the lodge. Fishermen and traders had been canoeing the river for thousands of years. I decided if it was good enough for them it was good enough for me.

Fortunately we had a guide, who sat on the back with his legs stretched out and a paddle in his hands. The canoe was very long and very narrow and felt really unstable. I went up front with Russ a few feet behind and the whole thing rocked so dangerously I thought Russ was doing it deliberately.

‘Keep still, Russ, will you,’ I said.

‘Believe me, Charley - I’m not moving.’

Of course the river didn’t remain calm: pretty soon it got choppy, then choppier still until there was quite a swell lifting. It would take us an hour to the lodge, and with the waves slapping the sides this was not going to be very relaxing. We bobbed along, rolling from side to side, all the time feeling as if the boat would tip over at any minute. We held on for grim death. It was some kind of welcome: a day of rain and paperwork, a striking difference in cultures and now the most unstable form of travel known to man. If that wasn’t enough, in the morning we’d be riding elephants.

 

I called mine Betty. That wasn’t her name but I couldn’t pronounce the name the keeper told me, so Betty it was. We had a jeep waiting an hour up the road and this was the way we had decided to reach it - two elephants, both females. But first we had to take them down to the waterhole for a bath.

Betty didn’t want to get down on her knees, and I didn’t blame her. I waded in to offer some encouragement, wincing at the sharp stones underfoot. Meanwhile Russ’s elephant wandered in and rolled over without any fuss, while the driver worked his way up her shoulder and onto her ribs - once perched there he began washing her down. Betty, seeing that it wasn’t so bad, finally followed suit. The keeper told us that these two elephants got along well, as most of their elephants did. However, the ones that didn’t like each other didn’t like each other’s driver either, which made life interesting. Elephants have long life spans and are famed for their ability to remember so much: if you mistreat one and you come across it again twenty years later, it certainly won’t have forgotten you.

Betty had pink patches on her ears and a pinkish trunk that had once been bitten by another elephant. I climbed onto her back as she knelt down, using her tail as a rope and stepping on her foot. I sat with my legs spread on a canvas saddle behind the driver and waited while Russ hesitantly mounted his, telling me he just didn’t feel right about stepping on her foot. Then we were off, lumbering across open pasture to the dirt road that drifted through the trees. It was a gentle, rolling and rocking motion - much easier and more comfortable than riding a horse. The view was superb; sitting so high we could see for miles and the country was spectacular. The villages were beautifully kept; the houses neat and the yards swept. Some were traditional thatch while others were made of whitewashed concrete blocks with tin roofs. The pace of life felt gentle: an old world and yet touched by the new. We passed one traditional home with ochre and stucco walls and a magnificent old thatch, chickens pecking for grubs in the yard while a barefoot woman chatted on a mobile phone. We wandered past a little school and the kids came chasing after us, yelling hello and asking for pens.

My driver had an umbrella and I perched underneath it for shade. Perfect, I thought. We’d been in Nepal for less than a day and already we’d canoed the Rafti, and now we were heading towards the capital on a couple of elephants.

Back on the ground we commandeered another Willys-type US army jeep: this one was grey with a grey hood and the driver had plastered the interior with pictures of famous Indian actresses. The weather was changing; we were climbing now and the sky had slipped from a brilliant blue to an ominous-looking purple. We had forty miles to the next town and another five hours after that to Kathmandu.

‘You know, I love this place already,’ Russ told me as we loaded the gear. ‘There’s an almost magical feel to it.’

There was a definite colonial feel to some of the houses now; balconies supported by pillars, surrounded by fenced-in gardens with the land beyond them tilled for farming. There was a gentleness to the atmosphere that made you want to stop off and chill out for a few weeks.