We left the tiny town of Bagodar at about eight without breakfast, keen to leave the place behind. Yesterday had been exhausting and today turned out to be no different. We drove all day down the same road, National Highway 2. In Australia a 'national highway' means travelling along at the speed limit with one hand on the wheel and having a relaxing drive. There was no relaxing on the NH2. More on the NH2 below.
We had been driving for just a few minutes when we drove over a large object that clattered and clanked on the road behind us. We looked at each other. Neither of us had seen it on the road. Most people might think they had just overlooked it but being accustomed to old Alfas we knew what else it could be - we had just shed a car part. I ran back to find a strange looking rectangular box with some carbon pouring out of it. I thought about what might use carbon on the car and the exhaust canister came to mind. Was it from our car? I looked closely and smiled at the 'Torino, Italy' markings on the side of it. We shoved the carbon back in, decided we didn't need it and kept going.
The Grand Trunk Road. One of the great roads from history and we are privileged to be driving down it. A road that links Kolkata to Delhi and beyond. Once upon a time it went all the way to Kabul. It's hard to think of a world where Kabul was an important place but I guess it just goes to show how much things change with time. The route of the road was established in the 16th century. We have been driving down it ever since we left Kolkata. These days it goes by the less glorious title of National highway 2 (NH2). Countless armies have marched down it, pilgrims and every conceivable manner of trader has plied the route over half a millennia. Rudyard Kipling referred to it as 'India's sixth river' and wrote that "such a river of life exists nowhere else in the world". These days it's a four lane dual carriage highway and without written history you would never know that it was anything but a road across the North of India.
This is a shameless excuse to put a picture of our car on this blog. I took it as we came back from our lunch stop. I will admit it's not the most stunning car and has plenty of Alfa subtlety rather than any in your extrovert styling but that's quite fine with us and essential for this trip.
We will always remember the drive into Allahabad as being one of the most intense pieces of driving we have done outside of motorsport. It was mostly done as walking pace. The last two lines may appear to be a contradiction and I am not sure that I have the time or skill to convey in words how a drive at walking pace can be so exhausting but this truly was. The streets in the old part of Allahabad are tight and crowded. Very crowded. People, bicycles, hand carts, rickshaws, Tuk-tuks, dogs, motorcycles, cows, craters. Everything but the craters are moving and they are either touching your car or centimetres from it. The Tuk tuk drivers have crash bars around their vehicles and are not abashed to bump your beautiful paintwork so they have to given extra room. There is on-coming traffic down a road only really wide enough to be one-way so they must be catered for well in advance. All the smaller motorised vehicles are constantly trying to squeeze past while you are trying to squeeze past hand carts loaded with goods and everyone squeezes in to occupy every last little bit of space. I don't really have any pictures, even though I was naviagting as I was too busy assessing threats to take pictures! Julian did an excellent job of driving and we managed to arrive scratch free. After we had emptied the car I took a picture of our centre console, still covered in sweat from the intensity of the experience. We managed to find a place that actually sold alcohol (not common in India) and had a well deserved drink and it tasted wonderful!
An early rise was necessary as we had a great deal of distance to cover and after our experience of a few nights ago we knew we had to be in by sundown. The Grand Trunk Road might be a four lane dual carriageway but we only averaged 50km/hr over the last three days. The locals are going no faster. There isn't actually all that much traffic, but there isn't any real sense of keeping to the left or consideration for other motorists so you are constantly speeding up and slowing down. We never really went any faster than 100km/hr (or there abouts, our speedo is broken) and then only on the brief stretches where both sides were fenced in. The presence of the pot holes and the tendency of the local pedestrians and scooters just walk out on to the road without looking rules out higher speeds.
More assorted pictures from the Grand Trunk Road.