[bangarchand]

How old can a travelogue be to be really interesting? Travelling around the country by car is now a matter of choice for many people. But how about a 50 year old story of a tour by car that too in two of them?


During our grandfather's time i.e. in 1959, they travelled from Puttur to Kashi, Delhi all by car. I was not even born then. As a continuation, in 1974 there was an all-India car tour (32 days) in two ambassador cars under the supervision of my father and uncle. It is very special when you realise that both of them were farmers without much knowledge of English and Hindi.

This trip took place during the month of May. Two or three passengers were of 14-16 years old (me @ 14). A team of 14 including a two-year-old child. Google Maps didn't exist then. Father had an old and shabby (probably 1959) map in his hand. The money was kept inside a long cloth cover sewn together. At the same time, not only did oil prices rise dramatically globally (I remember 70 paise) but there was also rationing of oil. So there were two petrol cans of ten litres each in the back seat of both the cars.



I was in 8th standard then. My nearest brother was 9th. We (me and Jagganna) made a lot of preparations about a fortnight before. Even though we had only three pairs of shorts and shirts, there was constant analysis about where to wear them, when to wear them..! In fact, we had no information about where we were going except that we were going to Kashi. I protested that the old Hawaiian slippers that I had were worn-out and the earth was visible under the heel and wanted a new one. but my father did not agree, probably because he doubted that i will forget the chappals somewhere and for that the old ones suit better. My mother told my eldest brother to fetch a new pair for me. Don't laugh.. The time was such in villages then that If one had two knickers then it was deemed a luxury. So chances were that you would be wearing semi wets ones on many days.

We had rice, kerosene oil and utensils in the dickey. That is, we used to stop the car on the way and cook under a tree. Coconut dry chutney, pickles, rarely tomato rasam also. Women used to cook, elders would fetch water from bore wells, gangs of my age had to fetch twigs and branches from the roadside hill.

Dad was almost a Narendra Modi type. He used to sit leaning at the milestone and make a surgical strike very often by pointing out the mistakes of us who were all busy preparing our lunch under a tree.. Actually he was only 45 years old then. My uncle was 41. But it was a time when there was no hair dye, so people aged/looked old very quickly. So, although they used to do the talking in the car, the car was mostly driven by my elder brothers and the husband of my sister (BIL) who was married at that time. He was an engineer and because he knew Hindi, he and he alone used to be the official spokespersons in critical situations.

On the first day, we reached Shimoga on the Agumbe route at noon. There we had lunch and rested at our brother's house. Because there was no such thing as urgency like now. We only reached Hospet for an overnight stay. I only remember the room in TB Dam guest house. Hyderabad was pssed the next day. (I don't remember the details of all the days properly). But I remember vividly the Cooking in Adilabad roadside at midday in an impossibly fiery hot weather.

Our cars were two years old. But at that time its engine boiled in the midday sun, and its radiator had to be filled with water frequently. The next day and night, without knowing which city, we finally got a room in a small town called Pander Kawda in Maharashtra (now it is pretty big). The heat was so oppressive that we had to wet our bath towels and drape them on our body to sleep.. It was then that for the first time in our life, we saw shamiyan. We had seen only the pandals covered with coconut leaves in our rural areas till then and we thought that this shamiya is as modern as today's artificial intelligence. A wedding was being held in this shamiyaan right next to our hotel.

People were jumping, running and walking inside the pandal. At that time, our fathers and uncles, who are the most orthodox among us, gave judgment that it seems that a scuffle is happening in the marriage. Because in our tradition in coastal Karnataka marriage are a very serious business where all will sit upright as if a sermon is taking place. So naturally when we saw people singing , dancing, we concluded that they were just crazy.

Dad always used to sit in the front seat of the car. It is like the Prime Minister's throne for him. If any of us demanded to sit in the next seat, it was deemed as a massive crime..! I weighed a full 25 KG and as expected,was pencil thin and white. Although the visibility in the back seat was not good, I had enough strength in my legs to stand the whole day. It is very rare to drink coffee on the way. But dad used to go secretly and drank coke which was available for 55 paisa. After knowing that, I used to silently tail him, hear him curse but still got to drink coca cola occasionally.

From pandharkawada we proceeded to jabalpur. During those times the National highways were just two lanes and when under repair it used to be single lane. The wheat fields were so near the road side that we could just touch them with our hands. On that evening when Dad was driving our car grazed a cycle rickshaw and the driver fell on the road. All of us got down and found some damage on the rikshaw and our left headlight was smashed. The rickshaw driver had some bruises on his forearm. My mom applied some Burnol on his bruises simply because the medications that we carried were bare minimum. In no time a crowd of fifty gathered and my Dad tried to buy truce by paying him a lump sum of Rs.10/..! The crowd was furious and then a Sardarji appeared from the fields, pacified them and asked us to pay the driver Rs. 75/ and allowed us to leave the place.



That evening we reached Allahabad and stayed in a choultry, as I remember. As soon as we got our rooms the ladies in the car used to cook our dinner in the corridors of the choultry. Next morning we visited the Sangam and had to do a tough bargain with the boat people and finally I think we paid Rs. 2.50/per head to sail till the Sangam point.

Then we went to Kashi, had Lord Vishwanath darshan and then went to Saranath. From Saranath, we drove through UP and stayed in Kanpur. We at that age felt that Kanpur was a big city. Next, our destination was New delhi. Even in Delhi the driving was not very different from any other city at that time because Delhi was not as big as it is now and we could navigate through Parliament area, Red fort. That effort looks very commendable now since we did not have any road maps or the present google map navigation.





Next we went to Haridwar, had a holy dip in river Ganga and went to Rishikesh. During those days the Badrinath was deemed not suitable for cars, especially for outsiders. We parked our two ambassadors outside our choultry there and booked tickets in a local bus to Badrinath. Those buses were small and probably were seating only 25-30 passengers. They had bonnets like old Bedford lorries. The seats were bare minimum and almost everyone in the bus used to vomit copiously all through the journey. Rest of the passengers were all north Indians . We were 13 in all with one small baby also. The roads were scary and looked so narrow that I used to feel that it was moving on a walking pathway..!

We stayed in a choultry/Asharmat Joshimut. I did not know who was arranging for the rooms during the tour. Probably our elder brothers and Brother-in-Law who knew hindi were doing that. The ashram was very dark with no electricity and it was full of Sadhus only. Most of us were terrified by the ambience there.

Next day we left for Badrinath and had a room in another choultry. I still remember the place very vividly and you just can't imagine how badrinath looked then. I remember that we had our breakfast in govt hotel Devlok then and found last year that a Hotel with the same is still there. But I am not sure if both are the same. The hotel charged a Masala Dosa full 10/Rs. Then which during those times was astronomical. The days were such that in the afternoon we climbed a small hillock behind the Badrinath temple where for the first time in our life we were able to touch ice..! You can imagine our astonishment as none of us had any refrigerator at that time in our homes.



From Badrinath we had come to Chandigadh and I don't remember which route we took to that journey. At Chandigarh, we got our rooms in a house like a lodge and the owner was a lady. We at that time were shocked to find her wearing salwar rather than saree. This was because then nobody used to wear salwar in south India. We used to call it Punjabi dress.

From Chandigarh we proceeded to Jammu, did not do any sightseeing there and went to Kashmir. For small kids like me driving through the jawahar tunnel was mesmerising. At Kashmir we had rooms in a hotel near Dal lake. We went boating there, visited the shalimar garden and then Shankaracharya hill. We did not know then that there is one important place called Lal chowk in Srinagar. Next day we proceeded to Gulmarg. The horse ride cost, I think, 7.50/Rs and our seniors thought it was very expensive and made most of us travel in gondolas which, then, used to go a very short distance. I being the junior most smelt rat and felt that those who go in Horse were actually going to see a lot of snow. I cried hard to take me on the horse and My mom intervened and forced the seniors to hire a horse for me. They were so angry with me for this expense that when i used to scream when the horse was moving to the side and they used to curse me instead of giving me support.



From Kashmir we went toJaipur. It should be noted that lots of water melons were being sold all over North India and we used to buy them frequently every day. But those coupled with unhygienic cooking on the roadside made many of us suffer stomach upset, diarrhoea and few had fever also. Few of our elders had to be actually taken to a doctor at Jaipur.

Since it was already more than 25 days since we left our home, we were not very high on spirits and after visiting one or two places in Jaipur we headed towards the south. On the way we had lunch in Navsari where we were surprised to find that the owner was from our own district and spoke tulu language with us. There are lots of people from the Bunt community in places like Surath, Baroda etc.

Our next destination was Bombay (Mumbai) and all of us were thrilled to see massive traffic going in lane discipline in Marine drive. From Mumbai we may have taken two full days to reach our town Puttur.

Conclusion

A tour like this then, that is, half a century ago was unheard off in our place. Even Though the preparations were very rudimentary, we need to salute our elders for having organised such a long tour for 32 days without the assistance of any modern gadgets, Maps etc. one should also remember that the time was such that there were no telephones in our town at all at that time..! As there was a threat of petrol scarcity we had carried a ten litre can of petrol in both the cars and they were kept in the floor of the rear seat and none of us grumbled about its presence, the smell or the lack of space due to that. The highways were very narrow and very frequently we used to find diversions all over India due to some repair of a culvert or something else. Two ambassadors did fairly well.Our brothers were telling us that the mileage it was giving was between 9 and 10 KMPL. But when the temperature used to north of 40 degrees in places like adilabad, nizamabad, the car engines used to boil and we used to stop them under the shade of the tree and fill the radiator with fresh water. The tour was a sort of epoch-making event in our town so much so that I was honoured by our Headmaster during the morning assembly.

[GTO]

Thread moved from the Assembly Line to the Travelogues section. Thanks for sharing!

Going to our homepage tomorrow

Just adding a note again that the pics are representative.

[megazoid]

Terrific! I can only imagine how the times must have been. Absolutely loved the little specials like dad occupying the front seat and calling the shots and the radiator rituals. Reading this was a delight.

[funkykar]

Wow lovely log here. Such a drive isn't easy even in todays standards, gadgets, gizmos etc. You guys doing it with full family that too 2 cars half a century ago, unimaginable!!

Happy to see our cars in the first representative pic. Black one belonged to @Arun1100 and green one to me.

[arun1100]

Great thread there, one of a kind I have read in Team Bhp!

Eager to know, do you remember the regn number of the cars?

I was born in the '80s and I do remember such trips in my Dad's MM540 to Mangalore, Goa, Bombay, Tirupati etc and in the later years in his Padmini. We were family of 6 (three sisters, parents and me) and during such long journeys, my Dad was the Driver, mom used to sit next to him in the passenger seat and me in the center as the Padmini had bench seat. At the rear, my three elder sisters used to sit. When I am sleepy, I used to go back and sleep on the lap of my three sisters.

As for the car's maintenance during such journeys, my Dad used to check the radiator water regularly and also touch and feel the temperature of the tyres if they were very hot to ensure the wheel bearings are fine.

Good old days!

Among the recent journeys in an old car, this trip from Nashik to Bangalore with Bhpian funkykar in a Padmini is my fav!
https://www.team-bhp.com/forum/trave...ml#post3602206 (Pre-Loved '97 Premier Padmini S1 - From Nasik to Bangalore)

Also this trip to Mangalore in a Ambassador!
https://www.team-bhp.com/forum/trave...ml#post4178827 (A HOT summer drive: Bangalore to Mangalore in an Ambassador!)

[Axe77]

What an absolutely delightful and unique travelogue, taking many of us back several decades to our childhood. Thanks for the effort in penning this and sharing with all of us. A great read indeed.

[Kkumar]

What a memorable journey you must have had? Many things mentioned in your travelogue will be unfathomable to the latest generation. Kudos to the elders who planned and executed such a wonderful trip. Thank you for sharing and keep on munching miles.

[deepfusion]

Great narration of the nostalgia. Even the representative photographs are enough to take the readers back to the times. Like it has done for me.

My father used to bring me to accompany him to Delhi, and we used to sit in those Harley three-wheelers plying in Chandni Chowk area. It felt so good. I have tried (and failed) to buy one of those Harley driven three wheelers. With such sparse traffic, and the long stretches we used to walk back then, it was all a dream if thought about today.

[Mystic]

You took me back in time 5 decades back. Those were the good old golden days when the journey was full of life throughout on the rural roads / even on national highways with 2 lane roads. The drive was lively throughout and would not be boring a bit. I had many good memories of such trips in my childhood especially as my father was an engineer in the roads department with Govt and he is always on the roads. In those days, we used to stop at every few kms of the journey and spend time in one of the bungalows built along the road side for engineers to take rest as a pit stop.

I shared some of the photos of cars we owned 5 decades back in the following threads. I still remember the day when our red Beetle had one of the tyres detached from the car at high speeds like in a movie. We were all safe and my father had humour to laugh it off after such a frightening experience.

One thing that is glaringly visible from those drives to present day is that people in that generation had a great attitude towards life in general, great sense of humour and the adventure spirit. Now a days, I have to keep on reminding all people in my car to not sleep and see the phones on long drives covering 1000 kms non stop but to enjoy the drive by watching the beautiful view. I remind them to pray and do namskaram to the great rivers like Krishna, Godavari when we are crossing them on a bridge.

Originally Posted by Mystic

This incident is so fresh in my mind which happened half a century back (Yes. You heard it right 50 years back).

https://www.team-bhp.com/forum/intro...6-decades.html (Hello Team-BHP! Growing up with automobiles for 6 decades)

[Chisels121]

Wow the travelogues from the olden days are certainly WILD. Your family certainly had the courage to do this without much help as people who had seen the pre independence India were surely built different.It's weird to think that this travelogue took place when my Dad was a toddler and my grandparents were in their 20's.My grandparents also travelled a lot but they did that by train as in those days East India wasn't really safe and everyday there were stories of dacoits and thefts happening all over U.P and Bihar. One popular road trip they had when they were going to their village and passing through a dense forest road and suddenly grandpa and his brother heard the sound of hooves. They realised it could be dacoits so they hid grandmother in the underside of the jeep's rear seat and sure enough they were dacoits who were drunk and looking for women for that night but they couldn't locate grandma in the dark and as they knew grandpa was from a big village, they let him go. According to grandma that was the only time she thanked God for her under 5-feet height.

Safe to say she never travels by road in the dark even to this day.
Also sorry for stuffing my own story in your thread.

[GeeTee TSI]

Absolutely enjoyed the descriptive travelogue despite having no actual photos (left to one's imagination!). Road trips of this magnitude in those days were truly for the intrepid given how rudimentary our infrastructure was (both roads and the cars). Working on machines as well as food along the wayside was so much in the spirit of adventure!

[bangarchand]

Originally Posted by funkykar

Wow lovely log here. Such a drive isn't easy even in todays standards, gadgets, gizmos etc. You guys doing it with full family that too 2 cars half a century ago, unimaginable!!

Happy to see our cars in the first representative pic. Black one belonged to @Arun1100 and green one to me.

Really...? I had randomly got the pictures from google. Both the cars as well as the ambience suited those times..🙏🙏🙏🙏🙏

[bangarchand]

Originally Posted by arun1100

Great thread there, one of a kind I have read in Team Bhp!

Eager to know, do you remember the regn number of the cars?

I was born in the '80s and I do remember such trips in my Dad's MM540 to Mangalore, Goa, Bombay, Tirupati etc and in the later years in his Padmini. We were family of 6 (three sisters, parents and me) and during such long journeys, my Dad was the Driver, mom used to sit next to him in the passenger seat and me in the center as the Padmini had bench seat. At the rear, my three elder sisters used to sit. When I am sleepy, I used to go back and sleep on the lap of my three sisters.

As for the car's maintenance during such journeys, my Dad used to check the radiator water regularly and also touch and feel the temperature of the tyres if they were very hot to ensure the wheel bearings are fine.

Good old days!

Among the recent journeys in an old car, this trip from Nashik to Bangalore with Bhpian funkykar in a Padmini is my fav!
https://www.team-bhp.com/forum/trave...ml#post3602206 (Pre-Loved '97 Premier Padmini S1 - From Nasik to Bangalore)

Also this trip to Mangalore in a Ambassador!
https://www.team-bhp.com/forum/trave...ml#post4178827 (A HOT summer drive: Bangalore to Mangalore in an Ambassador!)

Oh. Yes.. I think our car was MYG 2179 and our uncles car was 1072 and probably that was also MYG or MEX. I am not too sure

[Pynummoottil]

All I can say is 'wow'. Fantastic.

[Doc_nerd]

I wouldn't dare do such a long road trip even in the present day with all the amenities available now. And your family doing that in the 70's is mindboggling. Yeah, those days were different. People and their aspirations were simple. Life moved at a slow pace. Good to read your article sir.