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It had been some time since we went for a holiday, my wife and I. Well, about 5 months after a week-long foreign trip isn’t too long for a working man of limited means, but try explaining that to your wife. There had been a few smaller weekend outings in the interim, and a slightly longer half-week escapade too, but all that, apparently, doesn’t count. So when I heard about this Skoda Superb that needed to be ‘delivered’ (makes you feel like one Jason Statham for a moment) to Delhi from Mumbai, I thought probably I could coerce my wife into thinking of this road-trip as the small holiday she wanted. Knowing her liking for ‘taking it easy’ on holidays, and a fetish for well appointed (and expensive) hotels, I did not give myself much of a chance for being able to persuade here. Surprisingly, though, the idea caught her fancy and she agreed promptly.
A few phone calls were made to friends whom we’d would pick up enroute and in a jiffy we had a holiday plan that looked reasonably, if not extremely exciting. We started off from Mumbai at 10:30pm, having duly exceeded our scheduled departure time of 8:00 pm by more than two hours. A broken down BEST bus on the exit from Mulund saw us getting caught in jam on a road where I haven’t seen a traffic snarl in the past 4 years.
After wasting half an hour, we had hit the Ghodbunder Road, and the journey thereon was expected to be rather smooth. Except that it wasn’t meant to be. We hadn’t logged more than a few kilometers on the trip meter when the tyre pressure monitoring system warned us of low tyre pressure. This wasn’t good news, as it was late in the night, and putting the spare to use would mean that we wouldn’t have any back-up to rely on if the second tyre also went flat.
I got down from the car and checked all the tyres. Thankfully none of the tyres appeared to be worrisomely low on pressure, so the car could be driven some distance without having to replace the wheel. With some luck, we managed to find a tyre repair shop after a few kilometers. After having the tyre pressure duly checked, I concluded that the pressure loss was minimal, and it wasn’t as knotty a situation as it originally appeared. We could afford to drive on, without worrying too much about the tyres.
Our next stop was supposed to be Ahmedabad, about 560 kilometers from Mumbai. The traffic jam and the tyre fiasco had cost us a good one hour and we didn’t see ourselves arriving at Ahmedabad before 6:00 am. To make things worse, constant rain throughout impaired visibility and eliminated our chances to push the pedal and cover up for some of the lost time.
The road conditions, once we left Mumbai improved drastically. The road surface on the NH8 is in good shape, and four lane roads on NH8 with a median duly separating traffic from opposing directions allows you to maintain reasonably good speeds without taking any undue chances.
Old time English classics for music, snacks, reminiscing our courtship period and a few squabbles kept us occupied and alert. Toll booths kept appearing one after another, making us lighten our wallets and ensuring sleep was never in sight. This was the Independence Day eve and we were pleased to see the preparations in full swing at a McDonald’s outlet we halted at for a small snack and loo break.
The drive was fun, thanks to the interesting conversations, smooth roads and a very capable car under our behinds. While the dark surroundings meant there wasn’t much to see and appreciate, we did manage to come across a few interesting sights.
First was the fabulous Golden Bridge over the river Narmada. Our old friend and arguably the finest bike tourer in the country, Arnob Gupta had advised us to take a detour from the national highway into the city of Bharuch to beat the traffic jam courtesy the under-construction bridge on the NH8. We followed his orders and managed to beat the jam. In the process we also had the privilege of witnessing this fabulous, narrow, old-worldly bridge over the river Narmada.
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A typical Amit’s article
Always a delight to read.