Started out positively today with an early start, great navigation, and a couple mid-drive jokes about driving on Indian roads with Tuk Norris... Until about 9am.. It seems Vilas 'the only mechanic in Goa who can fix auto-rickshaws' needs to go back to auto-rickshaw mechanic school. Half way up a hill we had a friendly man frantically waving for us to stop us he pulled up next to us, but being the slightly jaded and behind schedule team we are, we decided to decline what we thought was another generous impromptu photo-shoot opportunity in favour of actually getting to our destination.. How wrong we were. On his third blue-in-the-face attempt we vaguely heard 'OIIILLLLL!!!'..
So an hour and a half later, via various stops in small villiages, roadside garages, and way more mechanics than could actually help, we refilled the gear oil, and handilly plugged the gaping hole left by Vilas' lazy wizardry (he's not a real wizard). So as it stands we have a makeshift screw wrapped in threading tape shoved into the perinium of our old tuks engine - come on the adventure!
Approximately 668 near misses with trucks and buses later - very few our fault, there's very little regard for any semblance of etiquette on these roads - our headlights fell off. After again neglecting what we thought was a grainy nokia 6120 photo opportunity with a friendly chap on a bike, again the same result.. Fortunately the headlights weren't lost, they'd been caught on some of our garnish and were merely hanging on whilst being dragged next to our front wheel...
With light fading and blood pressure reaching dangerously high levels we happened upon Ullal Beach , a literal oasis after a pretty low day. After hot shower, room service beers and a candle lit dinner on the beach, we passed out to the soundtrack of Eddie Murphy's Dr Doolittle..
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