We arrived in Varanasi early in the morning, got the bikes off the train, safely parked at the train station, and proceeded to find a room for the day. We then made our way down to the Ganges River and the ghats to show Ryan around. It was much, much hotter than it was when we were here last time! We only spent about an hour walking around and all decided it was too hot and headed back to the hotel room for some peace and quiet. It was here that we discovered the missing camera and mini-disc and put it all together: that rat bastard had stolen them!!! We went through every possible scenario and decided that it was either the rat bastard on the train or the staff of the hotel where we were staying. We all feel that the bastard on the train was probably the culprit. Well, that sucks and the site is down for now, but we had other business to take care of, namely catch a train to Calcutta with the bikes loaded up.

We arrived at the parcel office at the train station the recommended 2 hours prior to departure. Immediately we asked the parcel manager for the proper forms, etc. He surprisingly looked at our tickets and bikes and said "Impossible." He was referring to putting the bikes on the train. We’ve learned that nothing in India is impossible, so we pressed on with a confident smile (anything in India is possible.) From our ensuing discussion we discovered that in fact our train DID NOT originate from Varanasi and because of this the luggage cars would already be full and getting the Enfield on would not be possible. "Um, we actually have three Enfields." I added quietly. The manager looked back in amazement "Oh, no. Impossible." Time for the tourist temper tantrum. "You see, we HAVE to get to Calcutta with the bikes by tomorrow for an important meeting involving the web site…" and so on, ending in "We can pay! Please, we have to get there!" Then something happened to the stoic parcel manager! Maybe it was the money, maybe it was the beautiful song-like sound of our incessant pleading for this to happen, but the heart of the old manager was said to have grown three sizes that day. "Maybe" was all he said, which to us sounded like "yeah, sure, no worries." We waited around for an hour while Ryan ran to the bottle shop for some good luck, pre-departure beers. The manager filled out the necessary paper work and we paid the money but, to our disbelief, he refused the baksheesh. Yes, the heart of the old grinch of a parcel manager had truly grown and that evening he was even allowed to carve the roast beast.

"Well, we should get going, ehh. What track should we go to with the bikes?" we said to the manager. "Oh, don’t worry, we’ll take care of it," he replied. NO, no we're not going anywhere until we physically saw those bikes on the train. Seeing is believing after all. We then inquired "What track is the train arriving at?" No reply from anyone, just blank, dumb stares. "You mean no one knows which track we need to bring the bikes to?" Damn, I’m glad we had the sense to stay with the bikes. In India, you’ve got to follow it through to the bloody end, I tells ya. I ran to the main ticket office and found out the track number and ran back to Ryan and Jared. We immediately moved the bikes to track number 5 and waited. And waited and waited and waited some more. Finally, about an hour and a half later (right on schedule by India time) the train arrived. The loading of the bikes was about to begin.

Ryan’s rental bike went on first and fit easily into the very last luggage car lengthwise with about 5 bicycles stacked on top. The next car was open for both Jared’s and my bike. As the door lifted, we saw that the car already had some large wooden crates and boxes occupying the space. There was no way we were going to fit 2 bikes in this car, or at least I was secretly hoping. Impossible, ahhh, nothing in India is impossible. The karmic cycle returns to bite back. A crowd of train workers started jostling the crates and boxes around to make room, and then proceeded to load my bike up on the car and mercilessly wedge my bike in between these wooden things. Ok, one loaded and no space left. How in the hell we were going to get another bike on was beyond me. I helped the workers lift the bike’s front wheel up on the car and we tried to fit it in at different angles, all the while 3 workers trampled over my bike and threw Jared’s bike every which way. I tried to calm them down to be easier on the machines, but they were a determined bunch, I’ll give them that. The situation seemed to be getting desperate. This just wasn’t going to work without some serious dismantling of the bikes. Finally, this big sweaty worker jumped up on my bike, somehow grabbed Jared’s front wheel and began grunting as he heave-hoed the front of Jared’s bike on top of my bike. He kept tugging and tugging the bike further up my bike until the back wheel just cleared the car door. As soon as this critical event happened, the workers scurried off the car and the door slammed shut. I found my mouth gaping wide and my hands on top of my head. I wish someone had taken a picture of my face, priceless or incriminating.

Luckily for Jared, he was watching our luggage out of sight of the diabolical series of events. By looking at my face, he simply asked, "What the hell happened?" "Oh, the bikes are on alright, just not as we would have ideally wanted them to be!" Then again ideals are usually hard to obtain, aren’t they? We were rudely interrupted by a loud clank as the train lurched forward. "Shit, it’s leaving!" Now WE were the ones in danger of being left behind! We grabbed our stuff, ran to the door, and got on the train just as it was picking up speed. Close one! Well, nothing we can do about the bikes now, just pray the train is a smooth one…Lord help us. All ABOARD!!!!!! Next stop, Calcutta. Oh, Calcutta.

Chapter April 11 "Oh, Calcutta…" or "Oh, Kolkota"
The train ride to Calcutta went very smoothly. A couple of hours out of our destination we felt the humidity rise dramatically and the air become heavy. The vegetation suddenly became lush and green, with palm trees and bugs and water, water, water everywhere. It was a nice change from the dry desert where we had spent the last two months. We disembarked the train and quickly went to the luggage cars to see the bikes unloaded. We were expecting the worst. After finding someone to open the cargo door, Jared saw for the first time the manner in which our bikes had traveled across India’s heartland. We quickly snapped some photos before the eager workers unloaded our recklessly stacked machinery. We couldn’t believe that both our bikes had only suffered minor casualties. The paint on my front fender and right side cover had been dinged and chipped, Jared’s front blinker was cracked, and Ryan completely lost his "kill" switch. Not too bad, considering the circumstances!

We repacked our stuff onto our bikes with a million eyes upon us and headed off into the chaos that is Calcutta traffic with absolutely no sense of where we were headed. A bit of the usual question and answer game with locals finally led us to Sutter Street (the heart of Calcutta’s traveler’s area) where we found a hotel suitable for us and our trusty bikes. We ended up spending four days in the city proper, celebrating my birthday on April 13 for those of you who FORGOT! Highlights of our stay included visiting an excellent mechanic who timed and adjusted the carburetors and mine and Jared’s bike, an unusual trip to an Indian museum, the Museum of Science and Technology, and the purchase of a new seat for my bike. You see, my girlfriend, Lisa Anne Parker, will be joining us to ride on the back of my bike, so the solo seat had be swapped for one that would accomodate both our asses. Ending my solo travel career and the freedom of riding alone felt slightly monumental, but we were all looking forward (especially me) to another good friend joining our ruthless band of miscreants.

Chapter April 16 "Fancy Feast" or "Mangos: the Magical Fruit"
Baked beans on toast, boiled eggs, and garlic naan from our new favorite Sikh-run joint, the Khalsa Restaurant, oozed us on out of town. Pointing our wheels north, we headed into the hectic-ness that is the West Bengal highway system. Already, this part of the country felt much different, geographically and culturally. Here in the tropics the people seem as fertile as the soil! This absurd proliferation of life crowding the streets made for the most insane driving we’d seen to date. People, their vehicles, and every "hi-ho-the-dairyo" farm animal that exists leaked onto the road from every direction. I have described driving on Indian roads as being in a "live action" video game—well, now we had arrived at expert level. The road itself was sealed and in decent shape but busy as all hell. Sadly, I ran over a cat that day. I personally feel that the cat wanted to die that day and committed suicide by running directly under my front wheel, and hen finishing the job by running under my back wheel. The Royal Enfield Bullet, advertised as Built Like a Gun, adeptly shot down all nine lives of that cat. Needless to say I felt awful, but couldn’t do much about it. Both my wheels were still on the road and performance-wise, the bike never missed a beat. A truly killer machine.