Jan. 2 : Chiplun - continued problems

Sunday, January 2 :: Chiplun, India :: 60km today / 1433km total

If things went smoothly during a trip there wouldn't be much to talk about or remember, would there? I have decided that something or someone - Shiva, Allah, Ganesh, Brahma, Buddha, Krishna, I don't know who - does not want me to ride through India. I have also decided that I just must be too powerful, ripping apart my bike as I am :-)

After an unpleasant night (don't ask - but a prison cell would have been preferable) I rolled out of Mandangarh. Yes, 10km into the ride my pedals were wobbling again. I pulled into a "town" and waited for a bus to the main road, where I was hoping I could get more expertise than here in the middle of... nothing.

During the bus ride I had plenty of time to think. There's a metal cylinder inside my bottom bracket that is wobbling around and had lost some sort of tightening piece, that connects it to the frame. Well. The cylinder is steel and my frame is steel... and I wanted the cylinder to stop wobbling... after seeing some bike guys to tighten up the bottom bracket I asked to get it welded, so that it wouldn't move... ever again. This is not a solution I would have gone for in Canada, but here in India there are no spare parts for my kind of bike, and welding would just have to do. So for the 2nd time in about 36 hours a welding torch blasted away at my bike.

Now, onto the main North-South highway that connects Bombay to Goa. My pedals have a faint wobble, not noticable under most conditions, it will have to do. The road was smooth but immediately launched skywards for 4 tough kilometres. Topping the climb I was on a dry, very hot plateau, too far now from the Arabian Sea for any cooling breeze. Finally a long, winding descent, so twisting that I caught up to vehicles in front of me - on a bike I can take tight corners far faster than a car or bus, since I can ride tangents that they can't. I decided to stop early for the day, and start at dawn tomorrow... I was quite beaten mentally, physically, as well as being sleep and food-deprived from the last 2 days.

In town I scouted out a restaurant with a tandoor (Indian barbecue oven) so that I could get barbecued food and meat. The rice and curries are very greasy, in every place I've been so far in India, so tandoors are a great find. Also, I think meat cooked in a tandoor must be relatively safe. I picked up some tangerines (8 cents each) and a small watermelon (75 cents) to top it off.

Its 300km to the sun-kissed beaches of Goa... 2 days?