Puducherry

Well we didn't get up early, on account of Mr C and the Chennai Licensing Authorities, so we really needed to crack on and get some miles done. Sadly, Carruthers' bike had other ideas and the thing was proving difficult to turn over, let alone start. The kickstarter was slipping and since this connects via the clutch, the repairs would seem not to have been 100% successful. We couldn't even bump-start it because that requires a working clutch too. But after 20 minutes of precision swearing, it fired up and Carruthers headed off, not to Goa but back to the repair centre for a new clutch. For all I know, he's still there.

Supportively, I left him to his woes because I had a long 350km ride down to Puducherry and watching him, watching a man fit a new clutch, would have been pointless. 

The scenery en route was pretty ordinary by Indian standards, although they do like a nice temple around these parts e.g. This be-scaffolded beauty is in Tiruvannamalai

 

Otherwise an uneventful journey so let's skip on to Pondy itself:

Having been a French colony, the style of the place could accurately be called French Colonial (I know, I'm like Dan Cruickshank's idiot brother). More so than any other Indian town I've visited in this trip, it is strikingly chock full of European tourists, which is a bit of a jolt. And then, since they are either rich elderly types, buying authentic Hindu antiquarian art (made last Tuesday) or neo-hippy kids rocking dreadlocks, the place might be much nicer without them. Oh well "chaque une..." as they say in the French colonies 

 

I popped out to "Bar Trying Too Hard" which thought it was edgy but, in truth, just looked like someone had put a couple of decks in your local curry house. It served lame cocktails and, of course, no Indian beer except Kingfisher. It was run by a short balding chap who claimed to have DJ-ed all over the globe and taught Carl Cox everything he knows. I didn't catch his name but I overheard the staff use a couple of words to describe him and from those, I think he must have been called "DJ Phat Khan"

All in all, it wasn't looking promising but they completely redeemed themselves with the best fish curry I've ever eaten. It was absolutely bloody yumbles.

However, DJ P-K then played The Birdy Song, (OK, I made that bit up) so I necked my Kingfisher and went for a wander.

Next stop was a trendy biker bar which was rather jolly, although being India, they really only acknowledge the existence of Enfields. Still, they had a very nice one sitting in the downstairs bar. 

I plodded around a few other bars in a futile search for homebrew stout but all I could find, other than Kingfisher, was Fosters....or "Fisters" as I saw written outside one place. I very much wanted to go in just to ask "Do you serve Fisters?" "Absolutely sir. Whatever you get up to on your holiday, is of no concern to us" 

Boom! Boom!

Basil