The fateful night

This story must be told...

Driving through the Ghats to Goa is a little dream for many of us. Google for some of the place on this route and you would see so many stories of rides through these gorgeous ranges. I have been through the region twice before. Once was on a Bus trip to Goa. It was myself with Gayatri. The second time I and Ish went for Ralph's marriage. This one was in the Car. It seems though, that twice is not good enough…

As times had it, I (incidentally) became father of a girl and a boy within two.five year span. Two years is 104 weekends. That's a big number of lost opportunities to hop onto the road again. I was itching to do this trip. But this time not alone, but with my new larger family. Gayatri, Mitali, Abhimanyu and my brother Ambuj. Many saturday mornings would just start with discussing how this trip would turn out to be, if we ever did it. Both Gayatri and Ambuj, would wonder, why am I so eager for this. They hadn't seen the magic of the place afterall. And so it became even more important.

Pawan was loaded with the thought of hosting the 2006 SMS Picnic. For those who don't know, our group in Texas Instruments is called as SMS. It's not the usual acronym. Stands for System Modeling and Simulation. The plan was to have a weekend Picnic at Karwar's Devbagh beach resort. It was a company picnic, and we thought because we have a family to carry, we should go in our car. We thought, since we would drive it would be good to stay an extra day over there. However, circumstances changed, and we couldn't plan for a two day stay, but still decided to do a car trip. So that was that. What's special about it. So folks keep reading...

We would talk about our journey to Karwar and stay there sometime later may be never. But what needs to be told is the return trip.

We had come via the Chitradurga Hubli Route. That was a pretty un-interesting landscape. Given that we were already here, we thought why not do a Karwar - Mangalore, which runs along the coast and then to Bangalore. It was Sunday afternoon. We decided to leave Karwar. So we started around 4:15 PM from Devbagh main office. After having gone some far, we were completely awed by the beauty of the nature. Lush green hills on one side and the sea on the other. The weather was drizzly as ever in Ghats.

The drive looked breezy, but never thought it was risky. The place was making us drive fast. Something un-toward happened. There was a sudden bout of showers, and the wipers had to start full speed. A slow truck was moving ahead of us... Had to overtake it. Saw a car coming from the opposite side. I didn't want to reduce speed and thought to overtake. But as providence had thought a buffalo suddenly appeared and ran across the road. This was an absolute surprise. I glided my vehicle towards left to avoid buffalo. I kept turning left and the buffalo also speeded up. We still had an almost head on collison, and the buffalo jumped in the air and landed on its feet. Slowly it stood but fell on the ground again. I just managed to stop my car and avoided a crash into the shops. It was a state of shock. We just kept watching in numbness the poor animal. It was already raining hard. A few fellow buffalos came up to this injured one, and went back. Slowly this soul gathered some strength and got up. He was walking ok. I felt slightly relived. Gathering some courage to drive on further, we got the car back on road, and started moving. The car looked to be ok. The mood inside was sad. It was raining hard. Wiper was slashing across windscreen, and my brother on my side was still in shock. We kept moving but didn't feel right. So we took a stop ahead and just to change the mood, bought some water bottles and generated a talk. Also I thought it is a good time to give the car to Ambuj. So he started carefully. At times, I must admit, he looks to be a better driver...

Kept moving.. It rained, stopped, rained for quite sometime. It was already about 6:30. We were in Kumta. Pawan gave a call. There bus was already starting from Karwar. He got an update that said that we should not take the Mangalore route, but cross the ghat right away to take the shimoga route. We were at Kamat in Kumta having an evening cup of tea. The road was supposed to be blocked and it would have increased our travel time significantly. We took the advice, and decided to change our route.

At honnavar we stopped for a few minutes, we got the air checked and then took the turn into the ghat section. The road initially was fabulous. This was for about 4 kms. It was already getting dark.

Kept moving on. The road became thinner, but there was very little crowd. Because of the rains, parts of the road were muddy. There was a biker ahead of us, and he didn't see this mud well, and slipped. Recovered. We moved on.

The headlights of our car were changing their intensity. Ambuj, was not feeling good about it. Sometime later, in the deep of the ghats, with woods all around, the early darkness of the winters, the two headlight bulbs fused. I was shocked. We were in the middle of nowhere. Gayatri, Two Kids and my brother. What can we do. We tried the emergency lights. They were still blinking. There was no one around. May there were some jungle inhabitants, but none came to meet us. Had to make a decision. We can't stay in here like this. Why not just keep moving.

We kept the blinkers on. The light would shine red, and then go off, shine red and then go off. Eyes would go blind, and then see again. We kept moving slowly in the serpentine roads of the hills, without headlights for a few kms. A bus came by, and overtook us. He had the lights of course, and in his lights we could see the road we need to follow. We started chasing the bus. The bus was a local town to town ferry. It would stop in between, drop people and move on. Since it was Ghats, there were many times, when the bus would suddenly vanish, and we would get caught in complete darkness. Again we would put the blinkers on and kept moving. I would admit, it must have been difficult to drive like this for Ambuj. Soon we reached a small town on the route. A shop was open.

We asked him, can we get headlights here. No way. Can we get a torch. No. Do you have batteries. Yes. Where can we find a torch. In the next village 5 kms ahead. Ok. Where is the closest mechanic. Either 25 km behind in Honnavar, or 60 km ahead at Shimoga. Thanks. We did buy the batteries though. We did not think of doing a night halt.

Moved on. In the darkness of the night, out of nowhere, in that jungle as we were driving with no lights, we saw an Indica parked on the right side of the street. It had it's cabin light on and the driver was reading a newspaper sitting on the driver seat. May be he can help us. We stopped on the curb, and went up to him. We are coming from Honavar and going towards Shimoga. Our both the bulbs have fused, and we are just wondering, if you have a spare bulb with you. Let me check. He opens the glove box and finds one. This was the relief, the light in the darkness of the night we couldn't have imagined.
"So many thoughts crossed the mind. The belief in God, the theories on wonderful co-incidences, what is this person doing here, we are lucky to get the help and what not. One thing that has lasted me from that moment in time when we found the bulb to even today is that the forces did conspire to help us on our decision to move forward and not go back. This would be an ever confidence provider."

We were naive. Inexperienced. He had the bulb. and we didn't have the stuff to replace the bulb. How unprepared we had started on this trip. So we sought his help. He started his car, got it forward and put right in front of our vehicle. He put his lights on, so that the bonut of our car could be seen, and then the bulb replacement exercise began in that jungle darkness. We managed to open one of the bulb cases, and found the wiring to be completely burnt. We tried the second one. This had some hope. The casing came out properly, and the bulb got in. When we started the car, wow there was light. At least one bulb was glowing. This was the second relief for the soul.

This was the maximum help we could have expected. While the help we got was more than anything we could pay for, we believed it still needs some token of appreciation. Coming from Bangalore, and been in similar but not exactly the same situation, these are the situations of opportunity in our economy. Get the emergency vehicle, correct the problem, and hand over a bill of atleast 2ooo in the hands. We had some money. We thanked the gentleman, how much we should pay him for all that he did for us. This person said.

"Just pay me for the bulb. That would be about 50 rs"
"But there is so much you have done for us"
"That's my duty sir"
"You must atleast take some more"

We offered him 100 rs, and he was completely satisfied.
"We felt so humble in this situation. The simplicity of life so far away from metro civilization. How complicated we have made ourselves to be."

Well thanks. And let's move on. We can see life back again. We can see the road. We can move. Let's go as far as we can and find the first repair shop we can get. We kept driving. Quiet and easy, relaxed and enjoying the darkness of the ghats and the jungle. The time was ticking. 8:30 PM, 9, 10. Villages were passing by. Little Edison bulbs glowing. Shops closed. No commerce. Why should they stay awake late. We kept crossing town after town. Shimoga passed by. No shop of any interest for repair of the car's system could be found anywhere. But we were doing good. Sometimes we were still seeing the glow of the car light kept shimmering up and down.

We took a break. Got the petrol filled up in the car. Moved on. The road was sometimes good and bad. Somewhere in between the light again went off around 3:00 AM. But we were well on the flat lands, by this time. The night was moon lit, and we could atleast guess the way the road was going. Having come out from what we had seen, this was much better. We kept driving. Sometimes there would be a Sumo coming from behind, and we would just move in the headlight glow of that. That set some minimum speed expectation on us. And it was above 70 km/hr. We drove and drove, for 2 hours, till we hit Tumkur. This town is the transportation hub, and is on the main Bangalore Pune highway. It was early morning, and the car almost completely broke down in it's electrical system. However, the most difficult part was already done. The office bus, which took the different route, was behind us. We called our friends in the bus, and asked them to stop to pick up Gayatri and our kids. They followed. We spent sometime analyzing the situation with all our friends in the bus, and finally they moved on. I and Ambuj were left with the Car in Tumkur, and it was about 6:15. Here on, it is just the usual story. Nothing significant to be told. So I won't bother you with this.
"This journey is unforgettable for us.. as it taught us so much..."

By the way, my car drives much better now, because I have begun caring about it more. And we also carry some good spares in our car now. Just in case...
Emergency strikes only when you are unprepared. Because it won't be an emergency if you are prepared.. It won't make a story. Isn't it....