Tuesday 19th February
made me want to do EnduroIndia. We started in the cool air of Kodai,
fleeces on for the first time, and our destination was Munnar in tea
country.
The scenery was mesmerising...great mountain ranges, hot plains, then
the stunningly beautiful tea country. There was a real risk of coming
off the bike because you just wanted to look everywhere at once. If
heaven exists, it is the tea country at Munnar. Vast hillsides covred
in neatly clipped bushes, the women clipping them in their bright
saris, the waterfalls, the birds...quite, quite mesmerising.
And the riding was such good fun...long, winding roads that need your
concentration but that I found far easier than I would have on the
first day. You wanted to fky along, but also to crawl and soak in the
amazing surroundings.
I felt really emotional at the finish...partly because of the sheer
mental exhaustion of continually challenging riding, partly because
there was an awareness that this incredible journey was nearing its
end, and partly because for the first time i really felt the need to
be alone, so I took myself off to a quiet corner and had a 'moment'.
I think a lot of people did though...it would take a very hard
person not to be moved by this whole journey.
In the evenig, some of us explored down town Munnar. It is a fantastic
place, although there had been a strike that meant everything was
closed until after 6pm. This wasn'tjust a local strike, it affeccted
the whole of India and was in protest at the rise in petrol prices
last week. What i found fascinating by Munnar were the hammer and
sickles flying everywhere. And sometimes you do get the feeling that
it is like an old Soviet state...every task seems to require at least
five people...the first person takes your order, the second takes it
to a third person, who will get your drink, but then a fourth person
will bring it to you, leving the fifth person to take payment. But it
seems to work becase Kerala has all the signs of being one of the
wealthiest parts of the country, but also the first place I've seen
something resembling a soup kitchen, patronised by a mix of the poor
and the gap year students you see everywhere.
I love this country...I love its openly curious people, I love the
vast landscapes, i love its complete and utter disregard for anything
health and safety related...every journey puts you in peril of some
sort or other...even a simple trip to the shops, but people survive
regardless.
Perhaps we just need to ligthen up.
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