Goodbye India ...... Hello Nepal !

14th March - Gorakhpur to Birrathir distance 100km - descent 20m - av speed 22.5km/hr - current position 26,27N 83,40E

The day started well with Dickie entertaining us at breakfast with an editorial in the Indiana national paper giving guidance on how to behave on the festival of “Holy” which is today. This festival revolves around bright coloured paints being thrown at each other. In various parts of the country (and in Nepal) it can be carnage as nobody is safe from the onslaught of bright pink, red green blue paints being randomly thrown from windows, cars or just directly at you in the street. ….or so was my personal experience in Nepal . So I was expecting the worst ….or the best depending on how you look at it. We saw lots of paints for sale and several people both young and old were covered in bright colours but the worst we got was a few children with a bad aim. Actually they weren't that bad as they managed to get the Slick Mc Nic who is always the cleanest in our gang. They couldn't have chosen a better target..Well done!

Getting out of town showed the team up as being all to ready to trust whoever is leading. Mr P (our driver) was leading in the van to get us out of the maze and although Indian he managed to go the wrong way round a roundabout and we all (except our independently minded leader Dom) followed him. Given the random nature of traffic here, it really didn't prove too much of a problem, it merely highlighted our potential lemming instincts….here's hoping that we follow the right person up the mountain!

Our last day cycling in India was a great way to leave with positive impressions. It has to be said we have all struggled with the incessant horn blowing, congestion and general noise pollution. Today we have had the least horny day of our trip through India ! Was this the end of India or the beginning of Nepal?

Dickie and Ro went off with Mr P to the border. They needed to get through and unpack the van and say goodbye to it and Mr P. It has been their easiest border to date (with no Martha holding up proceedings it is hardly a surprise). They got through in minutes rather than hours or even days. All bodes well. All that was left to do was say goodbye to the stacking systems that have kept the support team's world in order on the journey so far. We only have 4 more days on the road to get to Katmandu so we have tried to get rid of anything we will never use again like cookers and saucepans and the list goes on. No tears were shed by Ro as she managed to keep her stacking crates to create a new light weight system...hooray!

Sarah has found heaven by finally being able to use her bottle of Radox bubble bath which she has carried in her bag all the way. This is the first time we have had a bath in 3 months. She says it was worth the wait and baggage space.

Jamie has shown yet another set of skills (is that possible I hear you ask?) by arranging for us to meet a Practical Action project (one of the charities we are supporting). We hope to be with them tomorrow morning and seeing first hand how their projects work to benefit people in need.

There is a potential strike going on tomorrow (Maoist driven) so we may have some issues with transport for our kit. Tune in again tomorrow, same time same place for the next episode of Everestmax ………

Posted by Pauline

The Worst Road In India?

13th March - Faizabad to Gorakhpur - distance 142km - descent 30m - av speed 22.5km/hr - current position 26,27N 83,40E

We woke to the news that England had lost to France in the rugby with a dismal showing (so I am told) and that South Africa had amazingly beaten Australia in the world record 5th one day international – well done SA. Yes sport does run my life…

After leaving Faizabad we crossed the Ghaghara River and watched as the locals carried out their daily routines using the water supplied by the river. Us taking an interest in this, is probably similar to the locals crowding round us every time we stop. The only difference being that we are British so like to do things discreetly from a distance!

On the whole the roads in India have been very good and we foolishly expected this to continue to the Nepalese border, especially since we were following the main road which runs from the border to Delhi . How wrong could we be. The road was horrendous and the bikes, much to my sadness, took a major pounding. Of the 142km we cycled today, probably 120km of it was in need of a total resurface. This is enough to test even the patience of Dickie.

Sarah was committed to her pyramid fitness training today, whilst Dom needed the help of the local children to find a key part to his IPOD shuffle. Dom likes to paint a picture of the children in every country annoying him, and hassling him, but he is always the first to talk to them and encourage them over for a photo or two. Luckily he could use his charm to use their highly tuned eyes to his advantage.

Whilst Rowena went ahead to find a hotel for the night, Pauline's thoughts switched to returning to Nepal, a place she used to work in 8 years ago with her husband Phil who is joining us for the climbing phase of the trip. The final “bad” stretch of road saw Jamie quickly lead the team into Gorakhpur to escape the constant horn blowing which reached new heights today.

Tomorrow closes our Indian chapter and opens a new one in Nepal. Suddenly this expedition is becoming very real and the team remain fully focused on the ultimate challenge which lies ahead.

Posted by Nic

Jamie's out of the saddle

12th March - Lucknow to Faizabad - distance 132km - descent 12m - av speed 25.4km/hr - current position 26,25N 82,15E

Don't worry, Jamie's not turned round and given up, the problem is that he ate so much of Ro's belated chocolate birthday cake yesterday and such was the extra weight that his saddle stem sheared right off this morning! As always a group of locals gathered to watch the show but in this case they turned out to be useful as one produced a big pair of pliers. Dom rose to the challenge and cycled off to catch up the van and get a spare stem, what a good leader he is.

Nic, Pauline, Ro and Dickie raced each other up the front, well, Pauline, Ro and Dickie raced, Nic and his monster muscles let them chase him! I plodded at the back, taking in India. It sounds flippant but not much happened today, we just cycled through India. It is a place that bombards every sense all the time, there is something new to look at every couple of metres and everyday is full of variety. I hope that our blogs have given you some idea of the chaos. It's funny but after a while all the chaos becomes kind of normal and so it becomes another day in India. The difference today was the level of poverty. The houses have been made of mud and straw rather than bricks and there have been lots of little mowgly's running around. The road was narrower and had real moments of the jungle book with trees draped in vines.

We are nearing Kathmandu before the final push into China and our minds are turning to the mountain. Looking back over the past 3 months we were surprised to realise that we have only seen 11 other white faces in the entire journey. Kathmandu might be a bit of a culture shock! There is a good contingent of friends and family coming out to meet us in Kathmandu which is a real moral boost for the team. There is still a substantial ride to go and a very substantial up hill before Base Camp but after the flat of India we are all looking forward to it. Everest is calling.

Posted by Sarah

A Welcome Day Off

11th March - Lucknow - Day off

As the sun rose the Everestmax team stayed in bed for a change and enjoyed their first lie in since Amritsar. With little to do apart from cleaning the tent and a few administrative emails, today could almost qualify as a proper day off.

Whilst we waited for breakfast to arrive the efficient Everestmax deep cleaning team closed up ready for action. Dressed in shorts and tee shirts, Nic, Sarah, Dom, Jamie and Pauline, with her dazzling lilly white legs, obviously knew something I didn't. The boys wasted no time in ridiculing Pauline as her legs, in sunlight for the first time in 10 weeks, could be seen from space as they blinded all around. The shy and demure Pauline calmly grabbed the hose and took sweet revenge. As a neutral umpire and gentleman, I kept well out of the way and would call it a honourable draw although I don't think we have heard the end of jibes or seen the last of the legs. The faeces of a thousand waifs and strays have finally been cleansed and the tent should now be ready for base camp.

The highlight of the day was the celebration of Ro's birthday for the second time. In theory Sarah organised the birthday cake because we failed miserably on 26th Feb and because Nic and I were the only people eating at the time and not because she is addicted to chocolate and needed a fix. Such was the success of the idea, we have all decided that we are related to royalty and will have 2 birthdays this year to keep the flow of cakes coming. A unanimous decision was made that a 2kg cake should be the minimum size in future as 2 slices each simply isn't enough after a late breakfast and a 3 course lunch.

We all look forward to Tuesdays weigh in.

Posted By Dickie

The Grand Trunk Road.

10th March - Sitapur to Lucknow - distance 82km - descent 56m - av speed 25km/hr - current position 26,55N 81,00E

The weather finally broke today. Not the massive thunderstorm that the hot, muggy night would have led us to expect but a gentle drizzle that took the heat out of the day and kept the dust down. Refreshing cycling weather.

We left town through the usual smog of a hundred tiny bonfires. The locals very neatly sweep the earth in front of their shops creating piles of leaves, plastic and general debris. There doesn't seem to be any organised rubbish collection so some of it is burnt while the rest just gets swept on down the street until it collects in unkempt corners or finds its way into gutters and streams where it piles up and rots. Dogs, cows and children rummage through this garbage trying to find something tasty for breakfast!

Today was a short ride into Lucknow, only about 90km, and being close to a big town the road was good. I have often heard it said that roads are the arteries of a country but I have never known it to be so true as here in India. Tha Grand Trunk Road is 3000 miles long and goes all the way to Calcutta. Lined with trees to give it shade, it is alive with a constant stream of people, livestock and traffic - an incredibly noisy combination! Everything that is grown in the fields is loaded onto vehicles and taken away to be ground, pressed, pulped or sold. The cottage industries that line the road are an inspiration. The sounds of machinery thumping can be heard from small houses and yards. Basic cafes and truckstops serving traditional food and cold drinks are everywhere. Thousands of bricks are made by hand in the fields. These are dried in the sun and then carried down the road to be fired - the tall, thin factory chimneys belching smoke. Heavy, wooden carts are driven by people of all ages. Boys of seven or eight are put in charge of lumbering oxen. Men snooze on the back of their carts, their ox amble home along routes they must walk every day. Dogs, monkeys, peacocks, goats, boars, donkeys and cows live (and die) within feet of the traffic. Women and small children gather sticks, brush and dung by the side of the road, wasting nothing. Rickshaws go by stacked with the most absurd loads.. enormous wrought iron gates, thirty-foot bamboo ladders..! Tractors load their trailers with far too many people, tuk-tuks burst with school children, people hang off the back of vans, the insides already stuffed to capacity. Trucks and lorries scream past, their horns constantly blaring. Wide loads cause traffic jams in town. Any method of transport is legal and any amount of goods can be stacked up as high and as wide as possible. There seem to be no limits. Only the laws of nature seem to have any say. We often pass lorries with punctures or worse, which have overturned, their goods spilled onto the road. Rocks are carefully placed around the vehicle to guide traffic past and life goes on.

Poverty is becoming more noticeable. On the outskirts of the towns, between the houses, shops and rough, wooden stalls, people are living under the trees in shacks made of mud, straw, wood, corrugated iron or even plastic bags. Children play by the side of the road inches from the lorries that speed by, their chances of survival must be about the same as the dogs they play with.

As the cyclists sped past all this the weather worsened. The rain fell more steadily and the road became muddy. Most of this mud ended up on Pauline's face, although she now has competition – Jamie was particularly dirty today and I also seem to be a mud magnet! Nic always manages to stay clean and we have no idea how. Dickie decided to postpone his training schedule and take things a little slower after he had his first fall, the slick roads getting the better of him. Everyone decided that in the wet weather the lorries should be given even more space than usual. Sarah won the urchin award as she finally managed to kill off her cycling trousers. These have been dyed, mended and patched. Today they went in the bin - filthy,wet rags. Why did she leave it so long? Nic and Dom set a roaring pace this morning which Sarah tried to keep up with. To her irritation, just as she was almost worn out, Nic began to casually peel an orange whilst cycling.

Pauline invented a new move in Hackey (Hackey Sack is a very skilled keepy-uppy game involving a tiny bag of beans – no hands allowed – excellent for killing time while waiting for the van, food, taxis etc) The move involved inadvertently catching it in the sunglasses hanging round her neck – very neat - and then deftly landing it on her knee before passing it to the next person. It needs practice! Sarah flailed her way through the game while Dom managed to stab himself in the bottom on a very thorny potted plant. Jamie is still the undisputed master but we are all improving every day. Demonstrations can be seen at after dinner speeches now available from September 2006 - contact Pauline for details.

Posted by Ro.

Long, Flat and Hot

9th March - Bareilly to Sitapur- distance 166km - descent 96m - av speed 25.6km/hr - current position 27,35N 80,45 E

The slickly oiled Everestmax team was on the road at 8:30am. We needed to get 160km done today in the hope of reaching at least a version of a hotel. India is not a good place for wild camping for several reasons. Firstly, there would not be a patch of land that wasn't already being used for something that grows or sells and if neither it would probably be a rubbish dump. Secondly, we would have to have a rota for crowd control. It is bad enough when we stop for a drink, but if we were to start getting out the tent and kit, they would think the circus had come to town and we could probably sell tickets.

The sights of the day are never dull in India. Our resident ornithologist Jamie got positively excited today as he jumped off his bike to get a photo of two red headed cranes…they are the only birds that have got him excited on the whole trip so far…they must be interesting! Sarah always manages to get some colourful events and today was an orange holy man next to a very bright Hindu statue, obviously very normal here. It is amazing how quickly these weird and quirky scenes become the norm for us too. Now it has to have a certain level of weird for us to think of stopping!

I am pleased to report that the team is all fit healthy and with fully functional digestive systems…….hooray! This also means I am back to keeping the boys on their training programme. I would never claim to be able to beat them (yet), but if they snooze they lose and sometimes I can creep up on them and ….. boom ……there I am leading the way and hearing their ream of excuses of why I had managed to pass……never let your guard down boys!.

Dom, our inspirational leader, kept his troops entertained by doing a great impression of Tarzan on some hanging vines. Bless him, he never really did more than hang off a vine. He pretended (very well I might add) that he couldn't catch the next vine while swinging. He preferred his team to shine by doing it better than him….for ever selfless.

Ro and Dickie were the only casualties of punctures today and as usual they shared everything equally, one each. Ro scored a coo, when she got the last leg of the day which involved negotiating another chaotic town of rickshaws, bikes, cars, horses, oxen and of course people all sharing the same road at different speeds. The only thing I can compare it to is a living version of some computer game as you dodge and dive between them all. Nic showed a streak of chivalry and didn't box me in between an ox and lorry as we all attempt to be the King or Queen Dodger. We will let you know when I…oops the winner is crowned.

Posted by Pauline

It's not over till the fat lady sings..!

8th March - Amroha to Bareilly - distance 128km - descent 96m - av speed 25.6km/hr - current position 28, 20N 79 30 E

Yesterday was always going to be difficult to beat after some beautiful scenery. All the more so as we slept last night in a hotel hosting a Hindu wedding which finished at 6am. We emerged bleary eyed this morning after trying to sleep through walls that shook to the latest Indian techno tracks. We left the small lanes behind and were back on a busy main road complete with mad bus drivers and heavily laden carts of sugar cane. With eyes focused firmly on the traffic it was harder to enjoy the sights on either side. Nevertheless we made quick progress and sped through the first 50km in a couple of hours. We briefly enjoyed the tranquillity of a new road complete with hard shoulder. This was after Nic's altercation with a policeman after he attempted to run the tollgate in the wrong lane. Pauline was still a little below par this morning but is making a steady recovery. Out of desperation she donned the Everestmax away strip, complete with orange go faster stripe. Copying Dom's bike technique is one thing but now his dress sense – whatever next! Lunch was in another open air café complete with open air sewer beneath a rickety table. The most entertaining aspect was seeing Sarah cycling off afterwards trailing toilet paper out of her trousers. The locals must have thought this was some peculiar and modern form of bike decoration. Pauline missed the excitement turning left out of lunch instead of right and heading back towards the Dead Sea. Does she know something we don't? Dickie and Ro took turns on the bike again getting in some useful training for the fast approaching mountain. Jamie even borrowed Dickie's heart monitor for a stretch. Desperate to maximise his performance he too has resorted to technology! The last leg saw Nic's chain snap, only the second we have had on the whole trip. He blamed it on the immense force he exerts, but the rest of the team suspected over cleaning had worn it out. We stopped briefly to watch a huge group of women and young girls sorting through red chillis. They were shy at first but soon welcomed us taking pictures.

We arrived in the town of Bareilly at 5pm to hear the news of the bomb blasts in Varanassi, some distance away but still in Uttar Pradesh. It is a timely reminder that there are hazards throughout this trip despite the relative security of India to Pakistan. It seems we are still haunted by bird flu and chicken is again off the menu in our hotel tonight. In spite of our steady progress we are all too aware that now more than ever is the time for caution on this trip. We continue to do all we can as a team to ensure our journey is a cautious one and we have every intention of reaching Kathmandu safe and sound in only two weeks time. We have already overcome too many obstacles to do otherwise. A month from today the climbers will arrive on the mountain and the cyclists a couple of days afterwards. The most exciting part of this expedition is yet to unfold so keep watching…!

Posted by Dom