Thursday, August 3, 2001:  On to Bidar, India (Penny)

The village of last night’s stay was really cool because it was like there had been an old castle there. The architecture looked like a European fairytale style, but in India it seemed odd. After many thanks, we headed out toward Bidar. I was eager to go because I had not gone to the bathroom since the day before, partly because of my fear of snakes, partly because of the fact that there were guys outside, and mostly because I was exhausted. (You may wonder why I didn’t just find a latrine. There weren’t any.)

As we went on we passed through village after village and soon our tummys told us it was time for breakfast. We stopped at a village where people said we could get food. Good thing Tad knew what he was looking for because I passed right by the little house with a thatch porch and two dirty plastic chairs out front. I wonder how many white people these villagers had seen besides us, because we were quite a popular show. In fact I’m sure we helped the guy’s business because if you bought tea you got front row seats to watch the foreigners eat while everyone else (except the elder men) were scooted outside.

Breakfast was puris and this thing that was like porridge and then add some salt and a bunch of different spices to it, a few unidentifiable black things, some bay leaves and, wa-la, there you have it. After our mystery porridge we got some directions and got to pedaling again.

We found a bridge that looked big enough to take a break on, so we broke open some more bars of goodness (granola bars I had brought from home) and enjoyed the breeze and the view. It was really beautiful. The river flows out into this lake/wetlands area and we were surrounded by rolling hills. I had to go to the bathroom but since it was pretty much a straight drop down on the sides, I decided not to risk going down the bank. Instead, I saw this concrete block that would at least hide me from one direction, so I decided to try it out. After I got back Tad was still hungry and suggested cooking up some of our instant oatmeal. He looked around for a spot and then cheerily suggested, "How about over behind that concrete thing so it would block the wind?" I couldn’t help it, I started busting up laughing, and when I finally caught my breath I told him why this might not be the best idea. We both had a good laugh out of that one.

You know the line in that oldies song where it says "You know that all good things must end some day," well that’s what our road seemed to be doing after we got off the bridge. It got more and more broken up until we were basically biking through constant mud puddles and more mud! It was quite an adventure, and there were a few times when it wasn’t the funnest biking conditions in the world, but Tad always got my attitude up with a joke or something like that.

To get to the lunch stop we coasted down three kilometers of beautiful down hill. It was so fun, almost too good to be true. In fact, it was too good to be true when we found out that we had taken the wrong turn and had to go back up that lovely little slant. Luckily it wasn’t too far.

We were low on water in that village so we asked for some, and a man took our bottles to go fill them. I wasn’t too excited about that, but we didn’t really have a choice when he just took off with them and we had to stay with the bikes. I got out my purifier and was going to double the dosage on this batch. My bottles are identical, so when I looked away, I forgot which bottle I had purified. Now this meant I would either pick the bottle with stuff already in it and quadruple the dosage or pick the right one and purify it. I felt like the guy on Princess Bride when he has to pick which cup has the poison in it. I ended up putting a double dosage in each one.

Later along the ride I tried one of my water bottles and spit it out right away. It was the weirdest tasting water I have ever had in my life. It was lemony and chemically and metaly all at once! (I think I guessed wrong on the bottles.)

At one of our other stops there was a herd of cows and the villagers were watching them. After instructions from Tad to RUN if the cows decided to, we took some pictures with the people (really cool people, great smiles!!). It was neat. At one of the villages there were these kids that ran a long ways behind us chanting bye, bye, ta, ta! (What we had just said to them.) They were so full of life and happiness, it was very fun to see. We joked a little about being the Pied Piper and taking all the children with us.

As we finally neared Bidar (after the help of many people’s directions), it seemed to be our final test. The last few kilometers we uphill, windy, a little rain and it was getting dark, so we had to get in pretty soon. When we stopped for a break, some kind of bug started sucking on Tad, so we just kept right on going. Finally, soaking, muddy and very excited to have made it, we pulled into a hotel. After a 70 km day I was proud of what we had done. It felt really good to make that destination after 4 days of biking.

Penny