don't worry. it is no problem

Everything is possible…Yes yes, don’t worry… It is no problem..

A few of my favorite, often heard Indian phrases and somehow, it’s true, everything just seems to work out. In the final hour, at the last minute, just when you think there is absolutely no way in hell this is going to happen…Then, suddenly as my teacher Kumar says, “magic is there.”

We were on the road, driving the motorbike up up up, through the lush and winding coorg hills. And suddenly, the bike stopped, we were (at least we thought) 40 km away from anything remotely, village like. So, we pushed the bike into the shade and I said to Steven, “First let’s have a snack, and then, we will worry about the bike.” So, we stood in the shade on a beautiful road, and snacked on the snacks our Indian family had packed, homemade potato chips, chat, and a large ball of something sweet. Mmmmm…

Then, before we actually even looked at the bike, we made a plan. It seemed as if the bike was out of gas, although it shouldn’t have been because we had filled it just before departing. Our plan A, we would switch it to the reserve tank and it would make it to the nearest gas station (ha, pretty optimistic). Our plan B, if no reserve, I would hitch a ride to the nearest gas station while Steven waited with the bike, get gas and hitch a ride back. Our plan C, if it wasn’t a gas problem… well we didn’t think about that.

So, Steven turned on the reserve tank, and bam.. it started. Yay!! Part 1 of plan A worked, but we also knew we only had 1 liter, didn’t exactly know where the nearest petrol station was and knew the bike was guzzling gas at a faster rate than 30 km/liter. We also knew the biggest town was 40 km away. We crossed our fingers and hopped part 2 of plan A would work. About 10km from there, was a lovely little petrol station. Yay!!

We then, called the guesthouse we were staying at to tell them where we were and when we would be arriving. About 30 minutes later, we arrived, in the town nearest the guesthouse. We pulled over to figure out what we were going to do about lunch and suddenly a jeep pulled up next to us and the man inside said, “ Hello, Steven?” OMG!… It was the guesthouse owner. I guess he was just hanging out in town waiting for two white people to go by on a motorbike. He lead us to a little restaurant, we ate and then we followed him through miles of coffee plantations, to his own. We spent the night as the only guests at a gorgeous guesthouse high in the hills of Coorg. We wrote music and sang and played and had a wonderful time!

It is no problem. No problem at all.

Kerala..

Several days have passed and I have a lot to catch up on, but here is a glimpse into our second day of riding.

We traveled from the lush hills of Coorg through the rice paddies, and coffee plantations along the tiny windy roads, with no traffic, and beautiful scenery. How do I describe how I felt on the back of the Enfield? It may be indescribable. It was definitely a moment of freedom, and happiness.
We drove down down down out of the hills of Karnataka and into Kerala, and even though we were amongst the subtleness of simple life, India did not disappoint. We saw, more than one person, carrying a tree, yes, a tree, an entire tree trunk of bamboo, which is used as a ladder, to help with harvesting pepper off of the vine which grows high on trees. We saw overloaded, wagons carrying hay, we saw a man walking over 100 baby ducks. As usual, the unusual made me smile. Seemingly in a remote area, there are still people at every intersection, always in the right spot for us to ask if we were going in the correct direction.

After a few hours, we came to a road block where we reached the border, between the two states, Karnataka and Kerala. With an approving head wobble, they raised the divider and let us through. The temperature immediately changed from pleasant to oppressively hot. Welcome to Kerala and our heat and humidity…

The drive to Kannur was not as pleasant, but still an adventure, more traffic, more towns, and a lot of heat. We drove through several villages looking for a shady place to park and have something cool to drink, but somehow all the shaded places were welding shops. India is so funny. Finally, we just stopped and it felt good to get off the bike, walk around and drink a 7up.

We also had to pee, but it is always sooooooo unsatisfying to pee in India, especially as a woman. First, asking, and finding a toilet is not an easy task and then when one is found. It’s all hold your breath, close your eyes and get the hell out of there as fast as you can. So, I found a toilet and yes, it was unpleasant and Steven went after me and came back and said with a giggle, “ I don’t know what you find so unsatisfying about that.” I could write a whole book on Indian toilets and if you have not been, it’s impossible to understand in this short paragraph, but if you have been, then you know exactly what I am talking about.

We finally made it to our destination after 4 and a half hours of driving. It’s amazing here and I will write more about it later.

blowing in the wind

We made it. Our first day of traveling by Enfield. I decided half way through, it's my favorite way to travel. Well, I have always loved being on the back of a motorbike in India, but this is the first time we actually have done an overnight and will be doing more over the next 10 days. We drove from Mysore to Bylakuppe, the Tibetan settlements in S. India. There we met our good friend and monk, and had a lovely lunch with him. We briefly attended a special puja (ceremony) and were back on the road.

And up up up through the hills and windy small roads of Coorg, the coffee region. Oh it is so green and beautiful and it is harvest season. We saw the coffee being harvested and laid in the sun to dry. It's quiet here.

Right now as we get ready to sleep, we can hear crickets, the moon is bright and the stars are shining.

I feel as if I have exhaled and really started to relax. Mysore is such an amazing place, but somehow, I always run around like a crazy person, working, doing this, doing that, making jewelry, etc... Now, it's chill out time, observation time. Time to breathe and ride, ride into the wind.