STRAIGHT TRIPPING

Turning failed plans into an epic trip

For the past few weeks, we have been hearing about our colleagues in Mumbai having fun in t-shirts while we were rattling away precious calcium from our teeth in the terrible Delhi winter. So, we seized the opportunity and proposed we, too, experience the Hector by putting it through a trip to some of the lesser-known parts of Rajasthan.

We know the Hector is one of the most reliable cars available today, but we still wanted to test how it would fare against one of the highest peaks of Rajasthan. We had some great Rajasthani breakfast packed so we could enjoy it atop the 3800-foot high mountain with gigantic windmills as a backdrop. With that in mind, we set out on our 350 km drive towards our destination.

It was a straightforward plan, until someone said, ‘How hard could it be?’, that is. Needless to say, we were immediately offered a hotline to some not-very-pleased road trip gods. What was supposed to be a day trip turned into something much more than that.

By the time we had left Delhi, it was already half-past five in the evening. We could have left earlier, one could argue, but the firmware updates on one of our GPS devices had other plans. If you have spent time in Delhi during winter, you would know there are only two weather phenomena through this season — dense fog and night. The only difference between both of these on the road is that deafening horns are replaced by blinding high beams and fog lights. Knowing it wasn’t going to get any easier, we decided to head out to Jaipur for the night instead. And this is where the fun began.