At first I thought the rear tire was flat,
but closer inspection revealed that most of the spokes in the rear wheel
were sheared off. This picture shows only two spokes still attached and
ten broken spokes on the near hub.
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We are only stranded for a few minutes before
a crowd begins to form around us even so far out in the middle of
nowhere. After 40 minutes, and as the sun is setting, our savior comes
in the form of a tuktuk. Which is a relief, because we were preparing to
sleep on the sand dunes that night.
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Here we're trying to secure the bike with a
couple of bungee cords. The back wheel of the bike extends out quite a
ways and only when a passing camel driver offers us some rope is the
bike really secured.
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| The bike is hoisted in, a
price is fixed and we ride away into the sunset with all our gear down
the last stretch of highway to Jodhpur. (The driver doesn't always
remember to allow for the extra bulk of the bike on the left side and we
knock over a couple of pedestrians, a scooter, a bicycle, and smash a
wooden archway on the way into town.) |
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We arrive in Jodhpur and wake up on Sunday
morning, so the adventure of fixing the bike will have to wait another
day. The young man running the guest house where we are staying says
that we paid way too much for our poorly built new bike. His older used
Enfield was purchased for $700 and he says he'll be able to sell it for
as much. And it is much prettier. And it never breaks down.
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We rest in the comfort of the guest house for
a day. Even without leaving the building, we can see the beautiful fort
and surrounding blue buildings of the old city.
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Blue painted houses used to be a sign that a
brahmin or priest class person lived there. But now maybe it is just
fashionable.
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Maybe its these cool Mediteranean buildings
that encourage us to move up our schedule to fly to Greece. Or maybe it
is the many days of Indian cuisine that we've had. [We hate to say it,
but the best Indian food we've had has been cooked in homes or in Indian
restaurants in America. India's Indian restaurants are usually a grave
disappointment.]
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