Hsinchu City, Hsinchu County, Taiwan, R.O.C
It was mid-January 2011 when the ad caught my eye. Inside-back-cover advertisements aren’t something that I usually pay much attention to, but this one was different. Prominently featuring a grinning, slightly dishevelled rider seated astride a mucky Royal Enfield with the Himalayas stretched out before him, it demanded a second look.
Perhaps it was because I’d recently watched the documentary ‘Riding Solo to the Top of the World’, narrating one man’s journey to the remote Changthang Plateau in Ladakh, or perhaps it was simply the self-satisfied look of accomplishment on the rider’s face. It’s tricky to say exactly why it stopped me in my tracks; suffice to say that it did.
Pouring myself a cup of tea I typed the webpage into my address bar. The tea grew cold and stained the cup as I sat transfixed by a promotional video.
Motorbikes.
Mountains.
Mmmmm…..
*****
Enduro Himalaya boldly proclaimed: “If this journey doesn’t change your life it will certainly change the way you see it. Way up in the sky life is very different, the faces and places you encounter will be unlike anywhere else on earth. The Himalayas are not for the faint hearted; the mountains sheer magnitude is a test in itself, add to that the unpredictable weather, the constant risk of landslides, sudden border closures, and route changes, and you realise why this life experience doesn’t appeal to every biker”
Well, it certainly appealed to me.
The Karakoram and Himalaya are the tallest mountain ranges on the face of the planet, and mountains and motorcycles are one of my very favourite combinations. So that was it. I was hooked. Well, I was until I looked at the price. Gulp!! $5,500 Cdn (depending on exchange rates) for a shade over two weeks. To be fair, that included flights, bike rental, accommodation, breakfasts and dinners, and a full support crew in case of breakdowns or emergencies. Still…
As I was committed to joining my parents on their Alaskan cruise, 2011 was out of the question. 2012, however, was completely open. As an added benefit, the extra year would give me more time to save and plan. I e-mailed the tour company some general questions then fired off an excited e-mail to my motorcycling compatriots Tim, David, and Nigel.
I’m thinking of doing this next year – www.endurohimalaya.com
The only person who replied was Tim: I say, go for it!
I wrote back: There are self-guided tours that you can do as well; not sure how that works exactly but I’ve e-mailed them to try and find out some info. Not much of a ‘tour’ kinda guy…
He replied: But one man and one machine is a true adventure! Worthy of a book.
Well, I didn’t know about that, but increasingly excited by the lure of riding some of the world’s most remote and demanding roads, I began scouring adventure riding forums and threads, staying up into the wee hours to pore over personal accounts, route recommendations, and tour reviews. Then I read about Khardung-La. At an elevation of 18,380 ft it is billed as the ‘World’s Highest Motorable Road’. Getting there involves riding up into the Himalaya mountains to the cold, high altitude desert of Leh / Ladakh which lies at an altitude of 11,500 feet within the disputed territory of Jammu and Kashmir. Now, that sounded like a challenge!
It was around this time that I started wondering if I could rope anybody else into joining me. After all, it would be the ride of a lifetime; something to tell the grandkids about and bore friends and family members with for years to come. Excitement, thrills, heart-stopping scenery, and a bit of adventure. What lover of two wheels wouldn’t be interested in that? Granted, the tour price was a bit high but, unable to think of much else, I’d been poking around online and had found places in Delhi that would rent motorcycles for around $12 a day. Hotels were likewise laughably cheap. The kernel of an idea had begun to form. Maybe we could do it by ourselves. After all, I’m not much of a tour kinda guy.
I fired off another e-mail to Tim, David and Nigel: 2 men and 2 machines would be better. When do you retire? 50th birthday celebrations anybody??
Once again, the only person to reply was Tim: I like the sound of that idea. Maybe we can do it sooner than you think…
It was 12:49 pm, Monday, January 24, 2011.
And so it began…
*****
Friday, August 17th, 2012
Hsinchu City, Hsinchu County, Taiwan, R.O.C
If it’s not too late to make a long story short, it’s fair to say that over the past 19 months there has been barely a day that I haven’t researched, posted, e-mailed or, at a bare minimum, thought about our upcoming ‘ride of a lifetime’. The plan has evolved from a guided tour with a bunch of strangers to me and Tim riding for 3 weeks on a 3,000 km self-guided tour from Delhi to Leh, Ladakh and back.
With four kids, basement renovations, church commitments, and a full time job, Tim was never going to have much time for dedicated collaborative planning. On occasion this both concerned and irritated me. I didn’t want him to think our trip was becoming my trip. However, the one topic that managed to command his full attention was that of which bikes we should rent. Logically we should have chosen the most reliable options, but our hearts kept pulling us in another direction.
The Royal Enfield motto is “Made like a gun, goes like a bullet’. Perhaps a rubber bullet. The bikes are notoriously unreliable, which is strange when you consider that, barring a few minor upgrades they’ve been building exactly the same bikes for the past 50 years. You’d have thought the process would be perfected by now. But, apparently not.
The original brand name was licensed in 1890 and by 1912 Royal Enfield was already competing at the Isle of Man TT. In 1956 Enfield of India began assembling Bullet motorcycles under license using UK components and in 1995 they bought the rights to use the Royal Enfield name. Forget Indian or Harley Davidson, Royal Enfield is the oldest (still manufactured) motorcycle brand in the world and Bullets hold the record for the longest uninterrupted production run of any motorcycle ever.
Still, they break down. A lot. And we didn’t really want to be stranded on some windswept, freezing high pass by an insurmountable mechanical malfunction. Perhaps a Honda or an Indian built Pulsar would be more reliable choices than the lumpy, thumping single? But, no matter how we tried to convince ourselves that the less agricultural alternatives would offer superior reliability and fuel economy, we were repeatedly swayed by the Enfield’s indefinable allure and retro charm.
With that decision made, Tim let me run with the rest of the details. Although it was impossible to consider every eventuality, I did the best I could. That being said, my objectives were not to create a strict, day-by-day itinerary. Fixed and inflexible feels like a constant looming deadline, leaves no room for spontaneity, and sucks some of the joy out of the venture. So, with that in mind, I tried to plan our destinations and distances with as much ‘give’ as possible.
Speaking of destinations, in addition to planning the route we also had to consider the direction. Clockwise meant we would ascend more gradually, allowing our bodies more time to acclimatize to the oxygen depleted air and reducing our chances of developing pulmonary edema or Acute Mountain Sickness. Counter-clockwise meant we’d tackle the notorious Rohtang Pass close to the start of the trip when we could be fairly sure the narrow, muddy ‘road‘ would be open. Renowned for landslides and miles long traffic jams, we didn’t want to get stuck on it towards the end of the ride when the weather might be turning (and Tim had a flight to catch). Eventually we agreed on clockwise and hoped that Rohtang wouldn’t present too many problems.
Over the next few weeks, I researched, contacted and communicated in exacting detail with a number of motorcycle rental shops to compare rates, options, booking fees, security deposits, methods of payment, and additional, or included extras. An Excel Spreadsheet documenting all the accumulated information seemed like a useful idea, so I created one and sent it to Tim, allowing him to make a direct comparison between all the shops in one colour coordinated file instead of having to sift through countless e-mails. After much discussion we settled on a shop called BulletWallas. Purchased from the original Indian owners by a couple of Kiwis, we reasoned that, with any luck, they might be more scrupulous with their bike preparation which would result in more reliable motorcycles.
There was a lot left to do, but the trip was taking shape…
(to be continued).
Roads Less Travelled 