TRAVERSE Issue 43 - August 2024 | Page 15

TRAVERSE 15
occasionally .
Our Travel Scientists ’ liaison , the regally named Princely , offers advice , some a little serious , some more so , “ don ’ t try to make logic of the traffic , it ’ s a river and should be treated as such , you ’ re a raft that must go with the flow , occasionally guided by an oar ” … or other vehicle it would sometimes seem .
The offers of advice lead us into the traffic of Goa . For someone that has ventured to India previously it felt almost sedate , timid in fact . We eased in and set off toward our first destination . The uninitiated are immediately confronted with the potentially impossible of the Indian road network . Vast highways suddenly give way to dirt tracks and road construction , a detour here , a bypass there . None of it makes sense , yet it all works . The open sides of the Tuk Tuk allow a full sensory overload , the sights , the noise , the smell … at times pleasant and inviting , encouraging the traveller to pick flowers or look for a meal , more often that not a stench that reeks of charred plastic and festering waste . It ’ s not for the weak of stomach or feint of heart , India repulses some and yet for many it becomes an addiction that despite the drawbacks seems to pull one closer .
Part of that pull is accredited to the Travel Scientists whose Rickshaw Challenges
TRAVERSE 15