CRAZY JOURNEY: DAY 94: CALCUTTA TO DELHI

NON-STOP CALCUTTA TO DELHI IN 26 HOURS!

Safety First on Indian Roads!

We eventually got to the motorway leading our of Calcutta at around 12.30am only to hit a terrible traffic jam. It turns out that a huge amount of commercial trucks travel by night to avoid the weight restrictions. After this initial blockade and already knackered from the day at the port, this drive seemed like a big ask no matter how determined we were to get to Delhi.

We continued for a few hours and couldn't believe the complete disorganisation of the roads and the crazy drivers on them. At times we were in complete disbelief when in the distance, headlights appeared to be heading straight for us on our own side of the motorway. Sure enough it was an oncoming truck which we had to swerve to avoid. Unbelievably this was a common occurrence and seemed quite acceptable. We saw the aftermath of several horrific truck crashes, which came as no surprise after dealing first hand with their blind overtaking, lack of visibility and over-weighted loads.

A common sight on our drive to Delhi!

Most trucks don't even have rear view mirrors, and lazily rely on passers-by to beep and let them know you're coming. This can be a shot in the dark as sometimes the don't hear you til the last second. Most trucks have colourful reminders of this necessity painted on the back of them.

A lazy reminder for those overtaking!!

Dave, with eyes starting to close, decided to get a quick power nap at the side of the road. However after ten minutes we woke up devoured by mosquitoes with about 20 bites between us! Deciding to just chin it, Dave pushed on through the night, with Fintan asleep beside him, reaching the Holy City of Varanasi, at feat in itself, by 11am.

Continuing hard and stopping strictly for petrol and junk food, we passed through plenty of interesting towns such as Allahabad and Kanpur. These were generally manic places and completely slowed our progress as we had to squeeze the Hummer through teaming streets filled with cows, camels, rik-shaws and crowds of people. Some of our petrol stops have been priceless, with practically the whole town coming to stare at the car and whiteboy contents!

The usual interested crowd check out the car and its blonde heads inside!

Flying through Agra on the final 3 hour stretch to Delhi, Dave took on a Zombie-like appearance and claimed to be hallucinating behind the wheel. An hour from Delhi, we got lucky news that Dave's mum and sister's flight had been delayed, giving us just enough time to meet them at the airport. Dave's super-human effort over 26 hours with no sleep or meals got us to the airport at 1.30am and in the nick of time! We eventually found the girls in a manic Delhi airport not long after they arrived. We also happened to meet Scottish Jamie who was also leaving and after a quick goodbye, we headed to our hotels for well earned rest!