Jan 05, 2005
It was pitch dark... a faint orange hue was filtering through the tent's skin... A shadow was lurking around... I jerked up... Boars? They missed Saurabh and have come for me? I peered sleepily. Eyes felt like lead and took some effort to open. And when they focussed, I realised it was Sanju searching for something. What's the pest up to at this wee hour? Camera, my brain whispered. Hmm, I laid back. Well, you've never seen a sunrise straight from bed, so this is you chance, Vishu. And up I went. I crawled out of tent, camera in hand, to find the sun. Nowhere! Hmm... trust Sanju... Well ok! the dark was the perfect cover for Jungle Paani.

Didn't understand? OK, let me translate for you, it's the first S of Triple S, our daily job sheet. Still didn't understand? Forget it guys... SSS = Shit, Shave and Shower.

So what I mean is we went our separate ways to accomplish the first, and left the other two for more habitable surroundings. I know it's shitty talk, but cant resist :-) This 'outdoor offloading' was soooo interesting. The only thing missing was a lota (and paani). I left my mark on the Rann periphery. The first amongst all 60kph'ers to do that :-) And sharing the honors was Sanju, of course.

I'd love to paint a nice picture for you here, something poetic like -
The sun was yet to rise...
Birds were singing in the background...
It was heaven on earth...
With Sanju and I waiting for the first rays of the sun...
But romance on the first morning in Kutch... HUH! I don't think so...
The sun was yet to rise...
It was dark and dusty...
A horrendously loud snore score came from the tents...
Sanju was just emerging out of the bushes...
Romantic... ha ha! i don't think so! So much for Romancing the Rann... oops... Roads.

Jungle paani seemed to have been a rushed affair for him too. He obviously shared my visions (of wild boars and asses attacking our behinds while we were at "it" ;-). I gave him a knowing smile and we drifted around... and suddenly, suddenly... everything changed!

The painting I couldn't draw for you earlier emerged from the sky as it broke up into a thousand colours, emitting into all kinds of reds and oranges. We got busy motographing. The rest of the gang started waking up, and the background score changed to click, snore, snore, click, click... snore, click click click...

Everybody was awake. Awake and searching for bushes... Seeing Saurabh go inspired me to an encore... The boars would target him first and in THAT was my safety valve. So off we went; Saurabh, Aman and I for Jungle Paani minus lota plus tissue.

Far away, life, it seemed had also begun for the day. A truck was dropping off labour at a nearby field. Closer in view, our community kitchen had opened its doors. Smells of cooking food were emanating from behind the broken wall. Onions and tomatoes were being chopped for what I thought would be breakfast. Don was being urged into the kitchen with the chorus of "Amol, chai pilao yaar!". Intermittently one could hear wishes of Happy Anniversary floating around. The anniversary cooks were doing their jobs - Gaurav was preparing Poha for breakfast, Shekharji took up after him to prepare Egg Burji. The Egg Burji, Poha and Tea were out of the world and believe me guys, I've never ever in my life tasted a breakfast that good! Now, in case you are smirking at me on commenting on the food quality, well, here I was celebrating an anniversary with 60kph after 6 months of marriage. Hmm... ain't that cool? And thus the appreciation!

Just like I was an extra at the D gang, I was an extra here as well :-) But oh no, I knew of a more pleasant (sic) job... Sanju was opening his designer ka pitara. I knew he was going to bring a genie out of the box - the most desirable model of the day. So I piled on to his team, dragging Vinod along. So you see, me was not on the D team, not on the logistics team, not on the cooking team but I didn't do too bad for myself. I was on the "Fixing the model in the middle of the dusty Rann team". Yes!

Three of us screwed her up real well before she was thrown open to the rest of the gang. And boy did she rock!

Immediately, the object of everybody's ardent affection...

Hijacked from my eyes before I could blink...

Climbing on top of the bikes,

Being laid below some people,

Hanging over some others...

Shit Man, not fair! "I was there tooooo!!!!"

Finally somebody gave her back to me and the result you can see in the Bangalore team pic. My job done, we all shared her and she had the honor to stand first in the queue with all 60kph'ers standing besides holding hands. That moment was also clicked for posterity. Everybody was satisfied :-) Sanju, the creator, most so and Gaurav looked very kicked to death too. His party rocked. But he sent her packing soon enough as it was time to roll into the Rann. Tents rolled up on bikes, the camping site was deserted.

The nomads were moving on :-)

All of us were in high spirits and dying to kick off except Karthik who was running high fever - well! As I've made it clear in the previous days, I don't have a career as a guide, armyman etc etc... But I do have a brother who is a doctor. So, it seemed to me that along with fever, Karthik was a bit dehydrated. So we gave him some fever pills and prepared a glucose drink for him to carry for as well. I was however seriously doubtful that he could ride any further. He couldn't and slept in the truck instead, his bike in the truck along with him.

But we could ride, and we were dying to. It was time to enter the Rann. The moment was celebrated with a round of honking... The honking seemed so coordinated that it was like music to the ears... Add the thumping and you had the Rann version of Jhankar Beats!

Now the problem was to start. Everybody it seemed had been waiting so long for the moment that nobody was putting the bikes into gear. And then of course somebody did and we all rode the dust filled track with our legs doing the balancing act towards the Rann. Crossing a half built temple on a track that held traces of salt spilt from the over laden trucks, bushes in some places around it.

For a kilometer or so, it was an eventless ride on dusty roads and then... and then... the terrain suddenly changed!

The view was so striking that I was struck expressionless for few seconds and wowowow was the solitary word that echoed in my mind. I looked around to catch Sanju's eye. His eyes shone with the same stricken bemused look - we smiled at each other - sometimes the best communication happens when you're on separate bikes. No words were exchanged; yep buddy, THIS is what we came for and yep! THIS is why we rode from Bangalore!

Barren land stretching ahead as far as the vision went and to as far as land met the sky. If this was 1600 BC, even I would have believed that the earth was flat. Such was the expanse and the mirage effect! Something one reads about in books but barely ever gets to see. Clear blue skies giving cover to what appeared to be a green house. Salt beds on one side and white salt dunes on the other. Adding to the green house effect. A green house with no greenery.

The land lay open before. No rules, no signals, no roads. 60kph was at it... Romancing the Rann (not the roads!). We rolled towards the sand dunes where one could see some movement. And it looked like humans. They were the workers there and they guided us to another track. We took their advice. Rode back in the opposite side leaving the beaten track to make our own. Everyone just followed each other or sometimes ran parallel. Our back-up truck couldn't follow and turned around to go the normal track into the Rann. In one word, we were on "shifty" ground here. The land would sometimes suddenly become soft and Titli would shake, giving me a scare. I could see Nicky skidding but controlling Histu's Enfie which she was riding.

I, for one, had no clue on how many kms would we be riding in the Rann; how long this balancing act would last on Titli; but formed a loose ride strategy of my own - just one wheel turn at a time, Vishu, one moment at a time. Without thinking too much of the land type lying next or how much of stress Titli could take. This terrain was so very unpredictable that it would be best to keep cool and just ride and manage as best as one could.

Just as these thoughts were swimming in my mind, Titli swung forward freely... Hmm... we'd hit a hard patch of land. I could see people speeding as if tomorrow wasn't gonna come. The sudden dust clouds and thumping excited a group of wild asses which turned tail and ran. In the eventless Rann, this became THE event and the bulls gave the asses a chase. We were like ass-herds speeding their asses to catch a glimpse of the fleeing wild asses :-) This didn't rhyme too well, did it? I didn't think so too :-) But that's exactly how we all looked. And I found the chase very asinine, to say the least. The class monitor had the same ideas and shook his head in concern. Concern not for us ass-herds but the asses we were chasing (I heard him say that the wild asses may die of a heart attack). He decided that it was important to pull the curtain down on this event. And off he thumped chasing everybody stopping them from chasing the asses any further. The Bulls stopped, much to the relief of the wild asses. They stopped too and turned back staring at all the mad bulls. No, no, not Bulleteers from Madras but us :-)

This disciplinary action became the unscheduled regroup point and was taken advantage of to motograph the asses and the bulls in the Rann. The tiled ground where we rode, the deep blue sky, or any other thing that caught our fancy. The others who didn't motograph just drifted around. A major chunk of people had gathered around the back-up vehicle. I was busy clicking my beauty and also observing others. The pillions wanted to ride on the Rann as well and soon they swapped places with the drivers. Meeta was riding Vinod's 500 with Vinod guiding her. same followed with Vijaya and Shekhar... And last but not the least, Laurence too had her experience of riding the Indian classic, a change from the Indian stud, I'm sure ;-)

It was "Amol, chai pilao yaar" time. His tea was needed to accompany a lunch of sandwiches and biscuits. I could see Ajay and Meher doing a drag along the track which inspired me and Sanju baba. Soon we too were dragging but immediately realised that it was not our cup of tea.

Back in our truck, Karthik was feeling better after resting and that was a good sign. Accompanying him was a monitor lizard, a stowaway from our previous camping site, luxuriating! It was shooed off but it was one tough cookie. It straight away latched on to the rear wheel of Aman's bike for solace. And refused to leave - try as hard as we might. GR, the gentle hearted soul that he is, was very much against leaving it in the Rann because he believed that it would die with no vegetation around. So we patted our humanitarian guy's back and left the lizard in the wheel for the time being. Eventually, the mean cheap buggers that we were, we threw it off in the Rann - (one good reason was that Aman didn't quite fancy the squiggly pillion to crawl up his ass when he wasnt watching :-)

Meanwhile the Model was out prancing around with the boys again and more pics followed. A Chaggada was spotted carrying some villagers. Saurabh, our hit man started walking towards it and God knows what he did - the chaggada had been negotiated for by the hour and it became part of the 60kph convoy. For motography only, of course ;-). Prem and Saurabh took turns riding it while others hopped on. The ladies had a taste of it too with Nicky in the driver's seat. In return, the villagers were treated to Amol's tea, some biscuits and our air pump for filling air in one of the Chaggada's deflated tyres.

While the boys played, Gaurav was planning ahead. He ensnared a salt pan owner to show us the way to Varnu, our campsite for the night. The way we were rolling seemed to indicate that we were on the right track in the morning, when we first ventured near the salt pans before we were (mis)guided by the workers. On the wayside, I noticed a few boats and 2 or 3 huts. My take is that the boats were used during the rainy season. Or maybe not :-). And don't ask me what rains have to do with boats in the desert of Rann. I did say, THAT was MY take on their presence. I might be wrong (I often am). But whatever... I didn't have time to ask around as we reached the salt pans - the Rann's only means of livelihood - Salt. This was a perfect moto-op and it was clicked. The white dunes of salt may not look so great in the pictures because of the mirage effect but they are such a treat to watch in the Rann.

That done, we moved on... The next track was deadly, to say the least. A mix of salt and slush. Constantly in 1st gear, our legs doing the balancing act... The going was getting very tough indeed. I saw Nicky losing balance and going into the ground. All the pillions were now walking alongside and by the time we reached safer ground, the bikes' engines were hiccupping from the the toil and the tyres heavy with muddy slush stuck on them. It occurred to me that the back-up vehicle, which was much heavier, would find it difficult to cross that patch. But the driver did a great job of it and managed to reach across just fine. And cheers to that Man! We did needed the truck around. We were thirsty and each of us had run out of water. The drinking water unit in the back-up vehicle was assembled and everyone stood in a line to fill their bottles. It looked like a scene straight out of a refugee camp in a famine zone :-)

A cop rode nearby with a pillion and told us that the track ahead was good and motorable. Thank God for small mercies, I thought. We rolled again. This zone more than made up for the previous punishing stretch; the bulls zoomed at high speeds. Stopping now and then to motograph the Rann or the blue skies. Histu and Shreekanth, our tail, had a job on their hands, and they did it splendidly making sure nobody was left behind even though it was a free for all driving zone there.

I was going at a steady pace following everyone and could see them congregating on a hillock. Just as I reached and parked my bike, Gaurav started hurrying up everyone... grr... I wasn't to be rushed though. So I did manage to click some portraits of Prem and his Predator.

The ride onwards looked so simple, I sighted a small stretch filled with sand and then an elevated piece of land... cool... and I began riding at my own pace, enjoying the surroundings but keeping the guys in view. Far ahead it seemed they had stopped moving. Strange... Another stop? So soon? The back-up vehicle looked stalled with all the riders standing in a group near it. I thought they must be waiting for lazy bums like me so I stopped at a distance to capture the whole group. A picture i thought would be named "60kph'ers wait for Vishu the Great" :-) (That's how the pictures of the accident site came about). As I looked through my lens to click, I saw Sanju waving frantically at me to rush over. Well! this dude always disturbs my photo composing. Bugger... Where's the fire anyway? But I did go to him nevertheless.

I reached to deep silence... it gave me an eerie discomforting feeling. Someone told me Nikhil and Shekharji had crashed into other. I entered the crowd to find Shekharji in shock, face dripping with blood and Vijaya sitting behind him for support. Both wrists were strangely placed. They looked fractured. Shit.. my God... Praveen and Vinod were carrying out the first aid, with others helping them. I felt torn and walked towards Titli to get a crepe bandage... Sanju walked with me and filled me in - Shekharji had hit a bad patch of slush at high speed and his bike fishtailed and highslided, taking 3 turns in the air, throwing Vijaya and him off before crashing into the ground. A look at his mangled bike gave me a fair idea of how bad it would have been. The front fork was almost twisted to the right. Shekharji was still not talking and I could see Vijaya being consoled by Meeta. Slowly Shekharji came out of the initial shock of being thrown off at such a high speed with his wife as pillion. It can be stunning! Luckily Vijaya was unhurt. We used the crepe bandage as make shift stilts for his wrists with paddings torn from lumbar support belts of different people. The bike was loaded on to the back-up vehicle.

The riders' devil-may-care attitude had gone with the wind. The feeling that nothing could go wrong in the Rann had undergone a drastic change. Something very wrong had happened and the air was rife with anxiety. The sun setting in the backdrop was no consolation either. We still needed to reach Varnu before dark. Our guide (the salt pan owner) couldn't take all the excitement and had disappeared. The accident had delayed us and he now knew that if he led us to Varnu, he would have to return in the dark which he did not wan't to do. Choice less, we moved on without him.

What followed was a nightmarish experience. Slushy ground with deep tracks made by passing salt-carrying trucks. This stretch needed negotiating at a speed of 5 kmph using the clutch in 1st gear. The back-up vehicle had problems following us so we cleared the way for it to go ahead. That was a BIG mistake. Its weight and tyres made deeper trenches in the slush and made it near impossible for bikes to follow - the foot pegs and the brake lever were scraping along the slush. You can imagine how deep we were dug into it! It was becoming impossible to change gears and I thought Titli's gear box was jamming up on me.

Some of the bulls forked out of the track to make their own tracks. I could see the Don get out of the track safely along with Jay, Dhruv and the backup vehicle. I took that way out myself. Only to find Sanju and his Dhanno parked ahead. His clutch plates were burnt and Dhanno had stalled. Intent on helping him out, I put Titli in neutral but Sanju was more pragmatic and waved me off. It was pretty obvious that once stopped Titli may not start again. So, I continued on the track and was out of it but not before I noticed Praveen in trouble and pointed it out to him. His bike was wobbling dangerously. He had made his own track too and had a problem on his hands now as his back tyre had a puncture. I reached the back-up vehicle, parked Titli and looked back at scene of the disaster patch I had just crossed.

Darkness was creeping in and the sun was bright orange. In normal circumstances, I would imagine all of us would be clicking it. But real life was happening out here. The view of the patch was pretty grim from where I stood. I felt a slight hesitation as my hands moved to fish out my camera. But no... I don't mourn that easily :-) So out came my cam and the sun was captured setting in the Rann. That done, off I went to the grim scene - Dipesh's bike's brake lever had broken off, his clutch plates were burnt. Vinod was stuggling to get out of the track he'd made, Anuj's bike was down and also Ajay's. Nicky's bike was stuck in the slush and Shreekanth was riding other bikes stuck at the end one by one towards the back-up vehicle. He was the most efficient tail I've seen... Cheers to him!

This scene was getting really heavy, we all needed to move. The stalled bikes needed serious mending, Shekharji needed medical attention. Immediate remedial action was required and a plan took shape. It was decided that the gang would split. Those already out of the slush with operating bikes would be led by Don to Varnu and Don would come back for the stranded. I decided to stay back to help out and Amol along with Freya, Prem and the backup vehicle left for Varnu to set up the base camp.

Them gone, it was time for us to help the others. And everyone did their their bit. There wasn't much to be done though. Sanju's, Anuj's, Ajay's and Dipesh's bike refused to start. Sanju and I pushed Dhanno out of the sticky track. Praveen was busy changing the tube and in the dark was finding it really tough. We could remove some mud from Nicky's bike. Without waiting for Amol we decided that the rolling bikes should move towards the way Don and the others went. Just a little ahead, I spotted a light coming towards us and it was Amol (I'm sure you guys read how the Don went through hell to get back to us). He not only went through hell, the guy was coming back for more! This time Amol led us to Varnu. Some of us would come back with food and water for those stranded with their bikes. It was pitch dark and following Amol, I was thinking to myself, this Don was a real one - with a lion's heart. How on earth did he manage to find his way back all alone to the accident site? It was black everywhere - no landmarks, no proper track and it was so easy to get lost.

After a few minutes of riding, I could spot a light and a structure. That particular stretch was surrounded by thorny bushes and also some mounds. The structure was the Varnu temple which was our camping site for the night. I saw Shekharji sitting in the truck. Some others were collecting firewood from the near by bushes to light up a fire. Gaurav and Nikhil were talking of finding a way to go to the next village and also check out if there was a medical help nearby. As they were leaving, Nikhil suggested that we start our bikes and switch on the head lights after sometime, so that we could act as their beacons as they retraced back to the camping site in the pitch darkness. Meanwhile Aman, Prem and Histu went back to the breakdown site with water and biscuits. Rest of us got busy unloading the essential things needed for the night from the back up vehicle. Shekharji wanted to lie down and we helped him out of the truck and on to a sleeping bag.

As decided, Aman and I took our bikes on to an elevation and started the engines with the head lights on and kept a watch on any lights from the opposite end. The waiting was hell. I started sipping some neat Vodka to calm me down. As time passed, a gamut of emotions were running through me. We could spot some light; I thought the guys were coming back and as suddenly as the lights had appeared they would disappear. This went on for 2 hrs and I tell you, waiting is far more difficult than action. That much I can say, for sure.

Just then we saw 2 lights coming our way. It was Gaurav and Nikhil returning victorious, battling nerves in the darkness and the terrain of Rann. They had found a way out to the nearest village and highway! It was decided that Gaurav and Aman would escort the backup vehicle to the village and if need be to Gandhidham, the nearest city. People from the breakdown site also joined in leaving their bikes behind. Who would steal them in Rann? (this time they uttered the word Rann with respect). Praveen replaced his back tyre with the stationary Dhanno's tyre as he could not replace the tube in the night, having punctured around 3 more tubes trying.

Sanju was depressed but the world is nothing if not the balancing of an equation :-). So to balance our equation, Karthik was up and about and joined Gaurav and Nikhil till the highway to head back to Ahmedabad. Gaurav was supposed to call Ajay's Dad at Gandhidham to arrange for the hospital. Meeta and Nicky prepared sandwiches for the driver and helper of the back-up vehicle. Both were very nice chaps who were hell bent on taking Shekharji to the hospital at any cost. Some grub was forced down the throats of the fatigued Gaurav and Aman before they hit the tracks. I also fixed food and a shot of vodka and a bed for Sanju.

This was going to be a long long night with only the sky above us and the imaginary God in the temple watching over all our buddies spread out across. Huh huh... well... searching a road out of Rann... So much for the romance!

The day had started with Sanju excitedly searching for his camera in a pitch dark tent. The day was ending. Once again it was pitch dark, but the spirit had changed now. He was speechless and gloomy. My last thought as I lay down next to him was - romancing the rann - ah it was a difficult bed fellow indeed.