From The Latest Issue: The Joy Of Exploring India On Two Wheels

There are faster ways of travelling through India. There are more comfortable ways and more expensive ways. But after several decades travelling across this country on two wheels, I have come to believe that a motorcycle gives you something most other forms of transport take away: time.

Time to look, listen, stop, get lost and, occasionally, wonder why you thought that particular road was a good idea in the first place.

My present companion is Dug Dug, my motorcycle. Before Dug Dug, there were scooters, mopeds, a bicycle and an enthusiasm for roads that has survived considerably longer than my knees. I began travelling in India on a bicycle in January 1977. Back then, there were no smartphones, no GPS and no Google Maps. If a road disappeared, you asked somebody. If nobody knew where it went, you carried on anyway.

On a motorcycle, you do not pass through India; you enter it.

You smell wet earth before the monsoon, smoke from a roadside cooking fire, diesel from a passing truck, freshly cut wheat, cow dung, eucalyptus and dust. You feel the temperature change as you climb into the hills. The wind tells you something. The road surface tells you something. The trees tell you something.

I have always travelled slowly, and 40 km/h has often been a perfectly respectable speed for me. At that pace, even the trees have time to say hello. A car can carry you across a landscape while protecting you from it. A motorcycle does the opposite. It leaves you exposed to the weather, smells, sounds, dust and people. That is the whole point.

The real education begins when the road starts. India has a habit of correcting what you have read about her. You may know a town's history, but the tea seller knows its present. You may know the name of a river, but the farmer knows whether it still flows. You may arrive looking for a mountain, temple or forest and end up remembering the mechanic who repaired your puncture or the stranger who insisted you eat lunch at his house.

The road has also made me conscious of water and trees. From the saddle, environmental change is not abstract. It is a missing pond, a dry riverbed, a hill stripped of vegetation or a village without its old trees. My life has been tied to planting and protecting them. Trees are landmarks, shade providers, meeting places and witnesses.

A motorcycle also teaches you humility. You can decide where to go, but not what the weather will do. You can plan a route, but not control a landslide, a procession, a wedding, a buffalo in the middle of the highway, or a local gentleman who decides your motorcycle deserves a 10 minute inspection. India supplies enough comedy without a comedian.

Perhaps that is why riding has always restored something in me. When I am not riding, I tend to overthink. On a motorcycle, the world becomes wonderfully immediate. There is a bend ahead. There is rain approaching. There is a village where you might stop for tea. There is nothing else that needs your attention. The motorcycle is a moving meditation.

I am now over 60, and the body has begun to negotiate terms with the mind. The knees have opinions. The eyes have opinions. The bones have opinions. But the road remains persuasive. An accident in 2024 reminded me rather sharply that none of us owns the road forever. It made me less interested in counting kilometres and more interested in paying attention to them.

So I keep riding Dug Dug. Not to conquer roads, but to listen to them. Not to arrive quickly, but to arrive awake. At 40 km/h, there is still plenty of time.

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