Night Ride to Shimla

Since the ride over Kunzum and Rohtang, it has been quite hard to write. It felt as though the story with us arriving in Manali, had reached a natural conclusion. We had completed the circuit round the Spiti Valley, we had crossed the dread passes, we had achieved our mission.

Finding endings, or knowing when they should come, is sometimes as hard as the ending itself. Sooner or later, Dan and I will have to part, his part in my story in India will finish, and I will have to find a new story. But I wasn't sure when this should be - Manali? Shimla? Should I even come back to Delhi. I felt lost and not sure what to do.

But of course the story wasn't over. We hadnt completed the journey, the circuit wasn't compete. We started in Shimla, and so the story would need to end there. Although we could have parted in Vashisht, it felt right to come back to where we had met.

We spent 2 days in Vashist. Mostly hanging out with James and taking it easy. We walked to a waterfall one day - beautiful and rubbish strewn like lots of India. We walked to Old Manali another. We had long breakfasts on a high terrace overlooking the Valley. We drank beer and ate Italian food in a cosy wooden 'Seating Hall'. We explored the crazy alleys of Old Vashisht, and visited the holy hot spring.

All interesting things, and all have little stories in, but it felt like recovery time. Like doing nothing, relaxing after our
exertions round the Spiti valley. For one thing it was a lot warmer, maybe 10 or more degrees, which made it feel like summer.

I felt really comfortable in Vashisit. Its mixture of tourists, enterprising locals, hippies, thrill seekers, entrepreneurs, hikers, bikers, dope heads, locals, Bengalsi, Europeans was an atmosphere I knew and enjoyed. Dan found it irritating at times, but I would have been happy there for a while. But he had to get back to Shimla to get back to Afghanistan, so planned our trip back.

'Up at 8, check and service the bikes by 9. Breakfast, pack and check out and on the road by 10'. But of course it didn't start like that at all.

'My bike wont start,' Dan called up. Not sure why. He replaced the spark plug, still no joy. 'If its the electics, it could be anything,' he sighed. 'They are a dirty job, and could take ages. We'll push start it, and I'll take it to the bike shop at the bottom of the hill. And someone has stolen all the fucking bungees from the back. Bastards'.

So we pushed his bike up through the little alleyways to the main square, which was quite an effort, and let him go and sort his bike out. Meanwhile, I cleaned my muddy leathers and packed.

At ten am he was back. 'Fancy riding two up?' he said cheerfully? 'What, I don't understand' I replied. 'Sold the bike for 90,000. Fuck Rajesh and his pile of shit bikes'.

'WHHHAT.... oh you're joking. Very funny. I take it all is ok then'.

'Yeah, the battery is not holding its charge. Means that I will have to park on a hill overnight, although should be ok on a trip. Lets go and have breakfast.

So breakfast, with Hhhhemmmes. Our last time possibly we will see him, so we made it last. He has been an excellent person to be with, witty, clever, fun, relaxed, cheerful. I will miss him.

I had already packed my gear, but Dan spent a while doing his. We then had to take all the bags up to the main square, and try and tie them on with the few bungees we had left. Then checking out, which was delayed because they charged a different price to the one they quoted, so we argued but then had to pay.

By which time it was gone 12. We had so replenish my gear oil, so another stop at the bike shop. We then bumped into Trixie from Kaza, which delayed us even further. She said she would join us down the hill, so we waited, then I some petrol, but she still didn't come, so Dan went to look for her, and then she turned up but Dan wasn't there, and then we had to wait for Dan, and then when he turned up say the goodbyes all over again......

I was really chafing to get going. This was just crazy delays. it was a long way to Shimla. We had lost time on.

When we got going though the drive was great. After a week in Spiti, properly tarmacced roads, stalls, shops, people, hotels, villages and towns still seemed a novelty. We sped down the river valley, sometimes hitting 80km an hour.

But time was against us. I had decided to take the Jelori Pass rather the National Highway all the way to Shimla. Its a more direct route with less traffic, and a lot more scenic, but the road is a lot more windy, and significantly lower grade. I had taken this road a couple of weeks before, when I travelled from Chirgeon to Raju's homestay, and I had forgotten how bad it was.

We made the 3000m pass about 5pm. Not bad time really, but Shimla was still 180 odd kilometres away and night was falling,

'Are you sure this a quicker route?' Dan asked again. 'No, but its more direct'. I started feeling terribly guilty about going this way, and kicking myself for the decision. Dan was planning to drive to Delhi the next day to catch his flight, and it looked like we wouldn't get back to Shimla.

'We aren't going to make it, are we. Perhaps we better stay somewhere else. Narkanda, how about that, only 80km? Don't feel guilty mate, its not your fault'. But I felt that it was.

So we started down the pass, which dropped probably about 1800m. Quickly it got dark, but the air was a lot warmer and felt almost tropical compared to the temperatures we had been in. Although visibility was low, it was exhilarating.

At the bottom, Dan turned to me and said 'I'm actually quite enjoying this. It reminds me of driving round at night when I was 16. Why don't we push on to Shimla?'.

And so we did. Drove for four hours under the stars, mostly up hills, overtaking a few lorries, but mostly we had the road to ourselves. At times it was exciting, at times cold, at times tedious, and probably at times dangerous too.

In a way, it was as challenging as the Road to Manali. The road took as much concentration, there was the discomfort of the cold, but there was also the thrill of the ride too.

Dan kept spirits up by laughing a lot and joking about the Indian Road Authority, bad drivers, and Bike Rental Shops. "Do you know what I'm going to say when people ask me how my holiday was? Character building!', or 'I took my girlfriend on a biking holiday round northern India. Jamaica? Yeah, I had to. She wanted to go to Thailand'.

There were some funny incidents on the route. We stopped for Chai in Narkanda, about 2 hours form Shimla, and had to shoo cows away from our bikes - they seemed to want to earth the leather gloves or lick the paint or something. Instead we watched them scavenge the rubbish piles, and then the heaps of plastic garbage that the shop owners had set on fire.

We eventually got to Spars Lodge at about 11. Food was waiting for us, and my usual room was ready. I was very glad to get there, and happy that we had pushed on.

The next morning I was still feeling guilty about the choice of route, but I realised that actually it was not really the route that was the problem, but our late starting time. I was feeling so bad because I was actually resentful about our late start.

So I took the mick out of Dan for being lazy romantic and slothful. He responded by saying my riding clothes were camp. And that I always ate his crisps when I said I didn't want any. I said he looked like he had leprosy he was peeling so much.... and so on and so on as men do to relieve tension and get things out in the open. We both laughed together and at each other and with each other and both felt a lot better for it.

I can recommend riding at night in India. There is little traffic and the stars are bright above. If you can understand and let go of guilt and bad feelings and resentment, then the world, wherever you are, is a wonderful place.