What's your YouTube channel?
Paonta Sahib to Chandigarh, 23rd-24th September
I made it to the gurdwara's morning langar pretty late, having slept through my early alarm. I've never stayed in a gurdwara before and it felt very strange to have my living quarters just round the back of a place of worship. This one seems pretty professional, too, with a booking office and a wing full of A/C rooms with attached bathrooms. Having eaten the gurdwara's food, I wanted to contribute back (sewa) and was told I could help by doling out food to others. It's not difficult , and I got quite into it, actually really enjoying myself. There's something extremely visceral about ladling dal and handing rotis to strangers who want food, and I felt more like I was doing something sacred than I did when paying respect to the holy book. On a much more trivial note, I loved the device they used to dispense water - a metal drum on wheels with a spout at the bottom activated by a bicycle brake handle at the top. I didn't get a picture, but it seems to be a common design, with several videos available online.
On the road, I once again found myself riding through the midday heat: a muggy 35° which feels like 40 according to my app. Now that the monsoon is over the weather forecast is very uniform, so it'll be like this every day now. I really need to adjust my schedule to ride in the morning, I think. Riding in the hot sun was especially tiring on the NH7 highway, with no shade, but things got much more fun with a left turn onto a minor road through the hills. With winding singletrack, minimal traffic, and foliage on either side, it was almost like being back in the Highlands - that is, if the Highlands had tropical weather and camels.
Again, I found myself the centre of attention on the road, with schoolchildren and adults alike staring at me as I passed. I try to smile at them, and the kids at least usually smile back. One woman on the back of a motorcycle gave me the absolute biggest most joyful smile in return, the kind that says "isn't it just great to be alive". Other entertainment came when I had to overtake a herd of cows walking down the road. I much prefer passing them in the opposite direction - coming from behind, I'm always nervous that I'll spook them, or one will suddenly lumber sideways into me.
I had a few fun encounters too: trying to buy hand gel at a pharmacy and getting invited to sit down for tea; stopping to adjust my brakes and being invited by a shopkeeper to lie down for a minute (apparently I really looked tired), and several guys on motorcycles riding beside me to ask where I'm from and what I'm doing. One boy riding a motorbike, probably around 11 years old, insisted that I must have a YouTube channel and if I didn't then I would make one. Another guy, an adult, got so excited on hearing that I was planning to cycle to Mumbai that he insisted on me stopping ahead at his family's roadside shop, and pressed into my hands a couple of cold drinks and a bag of various salty snack packets.
With so many people asking where I'm from, I've noticed that London or the UK get people very excited. One guy launched straight into immigration talk, asking for my advice on getting a visa. In general, people definitely see it as a place you go to get more money and a better life. For this reason, I've started to sometimes say I'm from Malaysia, inspired by a dodgy guest house manager who got confused by my passport's place of birth. It's technically true, and thankfully people don't seem to know anything about the country so it doesn't attract nearly as much attention. Everyone still assumes I must have a YouTube channel, though. I suppose it speaks to how unusual they consider my trip to be.
I'd planned to reach Naraingarh to stay at the gurdwara there, but upon arriving it turned out they wouldn't let me stay that night - something to do with someone important having a bad stomach. They directed me to a church, who directed me to another church, which was closed. At this point, it had gotten dark, but two passing women told me that I should try going to the dharamshala at the big roundabout for a place to stay. I didn't exactly know what a dharamshala was, apart from being a town in the Himalayas where the Dalai Lama lives. Still, I followed their directions and ended up at a Hindu temple. The group of young men standing outside who offered to help did initially make me suspicious, but they turned out to actually be the committee running the place and generously gave me a room and a basic meal.
After all the excitement of Tuesday, I was quite happy to have a less eventful day on Wednesday. I was eager to reach Chandigarh as early as possible to avoid the afternoon heat, and I made few breaks on the way. One notable exception was when a fellow bike tourer spotted me on the road - the first one I've seen yet! He was, of course, European - in fact, he was from the Lake District, and perhaps in his sixties. Travelling light with just two rear panniers of stuff, he was making his way to Nepal, having started in Amritsar. No doubt he'll have some big hills ahead of him in Nepal, but he was very laid back about the prospect. Best of luck to you, Nigel from the Lake District.
My own plan was to get to Chandigarh and stop there for a couple of days. I've got some relatives in Chandigarh's suburbs and I was planning to see them, as well as taking the opportunity to visit Decathlon. I still want to get some more spare quick links, and I'd like to clean my chain after all the sand I've been through recently. I'm also keen to see the city itself: it's the only planned city in India, laid out by Le Corbusier on a grid system. Supposedly, it's a great place to live and very clean, but I'm also expecting it to be quite car-centric. One compliment I've heard for it from car enthusiasts is that the roads are very wide, not something I generally consider a bonus. I'm going in with an open mind, and it'll be nice anyway to be in a bigger city with more life.