Himalayas 4 - From holy mess to holiness

Nomadic Knights.

It’s probably Saturday. We’ve been biking for about four days and have now reached the only example of a Tibetan village in India, where at least and at last there is some peace and a few moments to write.

The first days biking, in anger, was long and hard and made longer and harder by a landslide. I didn’t see that bit.

In the dense mist I was at the head of the group and following Alex, but had lost sight of him and had followed a car on what seemed the main road. It was all paved and going downhill. The other was signposted in Hindi and the car wasn’t going that way. Most signposts on anything more than local roads are in English.

Anyway I didn’t think twice and followed the car downhill. The car stopped and I pottered on downhill at a gentle pace, out of the mist and along a gentle wooded road with occasional bits of tarmac. It was all rather pleasant.

Ten minutes later no sight or sound of anyone else so I stopped at the next habitation, a small shack with a lorry outside.

With no Hindi I tried to ask if any bike had passed. With lots of gestures and smiles passing between us the guy seemed to say no. So I sent an SMS to Michael and Alex (useful the Indian SIM and wonderful there was a signal!) that I was somewhere near habitation and if they called the people could explain where I was.

I waited for another ten minutes for the rest but no one came so I concluded I was on the wrong road. So I sent another text saying i was going back to where I last saw Alex.

Halfway back was a junction that I had not seen on the way down, obviously where I’d followed the car. So I stopped and within a couple of minutes heard the unmistakable putter of a Royal Enfield coming out of the mist and rain.

Alex was so happy to see me, but was obviously concerned.

There had been a landslide further down which had completely removed the road. They all thought i had gone over the edge. Of course to me this idea seemed silly as I would have to pass Alex (which I never do) and been driving far too fast to stop in time (which was possible but not probable in the bad conditions).

Of course I was happy to find everyone again and they’d had a difficult time negotiating the appalling conditions only to be faced with coming through them again on the way back up the hill.

My joy did not go down well!

It was a long ride back. Up a rough road with loose stones and mud and bumps and water and turns and narrow and just rough. At the end I was tired and we were back to where we started that morning.

The front suspension felt hard with every tiny stone and bump transmitted through the bike up my rigidly stressed grip and arms. But of course I am known for whingeing about the bike so I said nothing.

Coming downhill, out of the worst of the mist, but it was still damp, a very young girl comes into the road, looking for a high five.

I veered, rather than swerved, to avoid her and suddenly the front of the bike seems to drift. I couldn’t hold it and down we go.

Quite hard. The front forks are destroyed and the headlight smashed.

My new hi-vis wet weather gear is ripped, as is my hip. I wasn’t going fast so there was no helmet bashing. But it was all very strange.

Michael, Keith and Martin saw it all, stopped and dragged me and the bike off the road. Keith thought the front forks had broken, which seemed logical enough for me to leap on as an excuse.

The van arrived with the support team. The wonderful Doc treated me for shock, which in my adrenaline fueled state was logical, but felt completely unnecessary. He also patched up the missing portion of hip flesh.

Vidhya superbly got chai for everyone, it was well past time for a chai stop, and Ashraf rapidly repaired the destroyed front section of the bike!

I think the girl’s family owned the small shack that made chai.

It was really good having a full back-up team, mechanical, medical and spiritual.

Even better they didn’t make me feel as though it was my fault (however much it may, or may not, have been!).

A spill wrecks my confidence for a while and as with most sports confidence is what improves performance. Overconfidence can be a killer, but without confidence all sorts of extra effort brings mediocre results.

So for the rest of the day I was slow and wobbly and not good company, but Michael as always knew the fine line between providing support and letting me wallow in my own self-incrimination.

We made through increasingly stunning countryside to Sarahan. We stopped in the centre as Alex and Vidhya went on to find the hotel. This was the first time they’d stayed there.

It was up a back alley and we had to squeeze the bikes over the pavement and through a small opening into a front garden.

The hotel looked like a rapidly fabricated concrete construction, similar to a 1960’s Eastern European rush job. But painted pink.

Michael organised separate rooms for us with a connecting balcony. Very sociable. I was edgy about taking a shower, which was cold, but more for the possible germs on the coffee saucer sized hole on my hip.

Stupidly I sprayed Savlon on it, which spiced the evening up. Then saw Doc for a new dressing and his antiseptic was far more gentle.

We all grabbed a warm beer from the freshly bought case (hotels don’t sell booze) and looked at the view.

Then Vidhya took us off to see the famous Bhimakali temple, which is some thousand years old.

It was interesting to see the temple, which had incredibly intricate woodwork outside, which you may be able to see past the beaming smiles! 

The temple itself was guarded by an armed soldier who watched as we left all cameras and phones in little lockers and donned hats. 

The temple was almost entirely made of wood and inside every 5 yards on the ancient wooden walls were hung unmistakably incongruous red fire extinguishers. The narrow wooden stairs led to an overhanging balcony with staggering views. The shrine was obviously very sacred, we did not go in and even tried to keep quiet in respect of those that did.

We got back our gear and took lots of photos from outside the holy area, some of which I stole for this blog.

The ancient holy monument outside had some interesting artwork. The red symbolizes blood and they used to have human sacrifices here. The image on the right seems a lot more fun!

Back at the hotel, supper was good solid north Indian food, not all of it spicy, in a big wooden dining room with no fire extinguishers. Of course leading to lots of Everard (the Burning Chair Man) based speculation.

I slept really badly with the aches from the spill and even took two paracetamol and tomorrow would be a big day.