One Hell of a Trip on 9.01.2010

Written by Sathya 3 comments Posted in: , ,


   Never ever insult a scooty again. That fragile looking vehicle is capable of more than we think is possible. Ever imagined going on a 300km trip on a scooty with your friend. Am sure many of you may not even think that wouldn’t be much of a hope for the rider to reach the destination and back within the same day, and none for the vehicle.

Well, let me tell u something. It’s very much possible to have such a trip can come back in one piece. I and DOT went on a trip to two architectural locations namely Halebidu and Belur [In case you are wonder, these locations are in Karnataka] on January, 9th 2010. The original plan was to take a sturdier vehicle for the trip. But then, all the other vehicle renters were not willing to easily part with their vehicles. Nope, can’t blame them either. People don’t readily trust a “Drumstick” and a “Tomato” [I won’t lie, am not the Drumstick and DOT is not the Tomato, and rest is for u to figure out].

Let me just describe to condition of the scooty before continuing any further. The brakes were loose, the indicators were out of service, the horn had gone completely hay wired, the back wheel had just been fixed for a puncture about three weeks back, the last service was about 4 months back, max speed obtainable was __ (the speed indicator doesn’t work so I am not sure. Something between 40 to 50 km/h, I think.), the vehicle is itself is about 10 yrs old, and to top it all, it belongs so a friend of mine (that’s rite folks, wasn’t even mine).

So well, on the morning of 9th [a Saturday on top of everything], we two brave souls set out to make one of the journeys of a life time. Our first destination was originally Belur but seeing that Halebidu was shorter by 5 km we decided to slightly alter the route. It actually didn’t matter; since we still had to cover over 150km (to the original 155km). The onward journey was without much incident in the initial phase except for a few smiles from people who were just shocked to discover our starting city (Mysore) and our destinations. In fact, it would be more appropriate to state that they really thought that we had lost our minds.

Neways, the first phase was till Halebidu, and it went well till about 5 km before we reached our destinations. What happened? Something very common! A puncture. The back wheel for punctured. And thank fully for us, just about ½ km from a village. Once, the tyre was fixed, then we set out on our way again and reached there by around 1:30pm. Then we started from Halebidu by around 4:30 and went towards Belur. Now finally when we had started out the return journey it was about 7:00pm.

About driving for 70km, in the pitch black darkness, and deserted road, we felt it again. The back wheel just gave way to another puncture. Amazing conditions: - middle of nowhere, punctured scooty, two guys who don’t know kanada, and time: 9:30pm. Thankfully, a guy stopped and informed us about a village about a km away. Luckily, we positioned in a very approachable position, since once that village would have been crossed, the next one is very far away and almost impossible to reach by foot.

We push the scooty till the village, park it inside a police station (we had no clue that it was one), and found the mechanic of the village (who happened to be only person, in a village of over 800 people, who knew Hindi). Imagine our plight, when the power goes off as repairs were going on (under the street light). But he continued the repair under the light from our cell phones. Thankfully, the power was back in another 30 minutes. But even after fixing all the repairs (quite a few emerged, seems that it was because of the excessive heat produced) there was still a small leakage.

Since it was close to midnight, we took up on the offer of the mechanic to stay in his house. It was pretty small house [One room split into three: 1.Storage / wash area 2.Sleeping 3.Kitchen, each divided by a wall], but a happy one. We had dinner (imagine at midnight, there is lots of humanity still left man), but we were asked to sleep in the first room (not surprising since he was married), and although there were no fan in the house, the village was cool enough (in fact, v were using blanket and that too after wearing our jackets).

But frankly, it was one of the best sleeps I have ever had. We got up really early in the morning, got the final repairs done and then quickly left by around 8:30am, but more before he introduced us to almost everyone in the village telling out weird story. The rest of the journey was uneventful and we soon reached back home by around 10:30am.

So that’s the whole journey in a nut shell (a big nut shell). So now you know, why I would furiously supposed the scooty, irrespective of the comments that I would receive against that vehicle. It after all saved our lives.

3 comments:

  1. Unknown

    scooty....and u...bhecharee scooty...

    Sat Feb 13, 07:09:00 PM GMT+5:30
  2. Unknown

    just u two and a scooty....how creepy .....

    Sat Feb 13, 07:11:00 PM GMT+5:30
  3. Unknown

    u look really very cute in the first pic..

    Sat Feb 13, 11:51:00 PM GMT+5:30

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