Three TV hosts, two camera crews, and three hundred kilos of rattling tin. More than 2500 kilometers to cover in two weeks with about 8 horse-power and without doubt, not an ounce of common sense between us.
Today we set off from the shores of the Arabian Sea on the south west coast of the Indian sub-continent with two goals; to get to Nepal by September 26th, and to get there in one piece.
What was I thinking when I took this on?
First, the three hosts had never met, and it’s our job to record how they’ll get on, both now, as we hit the road here in Goa and how well they’ll be getting on after bumping cheek to cheek for up to eight long hours every day as they creep closer and closer toward the Himalayas.
Then there’s the rickshaw itself. We do TV, we don’t know tuk-tuk. We’ve had a day to decorate it, give it a name, rig cameras, make sure it’s carrying all the spare parts it needs – and enough fuel. And last of all, to find someone to teach the guys how to drive it.
Our Indian crew think we’re nuts. But even today, it’s become clear to me why we need them so badly. We’ve had continuous debates about what route we should take, but their local knowledge is proving invaluable. And their ways of dealing with local people along the way have already got us out of a couple of scrapes.
Coordinating and navigating the scooter, two support cars and our crew of 12 has been the biggest challenge. We were lost within ten minutes of the start and spent more than an hour waiting for our “lunch on the run” to be cooked. So we arrived in Belgaum after dark – not ideal on the first day, but right now, we are still all in one piece and we have some truly awesome footage to show for it.
Today we left the coast behind us and climbed the Western Ghats. Tomorrow we push north through Karnataka into Maharashtra and the town of Bijapur. Nepal feels very far away.
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