Bihar

 

April 3  Gorakhpur-muzzaffarpur 266km

  Arrived in the new state of Bihar.  Said to be one of the poorest in the country and by the looks of things I would say its verry poor.  Some very huge potholes for a couple of hours today.  Its very slow going now.  All everything backs up bumper to bumper.  Cops tried to stop us today during the slow going crater sized hole road section. They were flagging us down but we just kept going and as usual they did not chase after us. Got sprayed with cow shit from a Lori truck in of me. Makes it worse that last week I turned to look at something and my visor flew right of my helmet.  Camilles flew off the same day.  Well you get what you paid for.  They were on 12 us dollars.

April 4 Muzzaffarpur-Araria  245km

    WOW the wind is CRANKING today.  Blowing us and sand all over!!  The wind does have a positive effect though. Its making it feel not as hot as the last few days of riding.  Good thing we have lots of practice riding in wind.  Its very windy, but we have ridden in worse down on route 40 in Patagonia last year.  The sand storm we were riding in today was a new one for us.  You know it’s a real sandstorm when it starts to shade out the sun. Its dancing all over the road so much it starts to put you in a hypnotic state.  Its like when you start to focus on the actual rain drops on your helmet visor instead of the road when its raining. Still no one puts on their headlights.  The only time they use headlights during the day is when they are riding down a one-way road the wrong way. I really think our air filters need a cleaning now  We do however get about 110 miles per gallon.  Camille's Hero Krishna seem to get a little better mileage than my Pee-Wee. 

     Passed two Cops on a bike today.  They pulled back up to the side of me and flagged me over.  I looke them over and they not only are real cops but they have guns instead of sticks(like usual),and are on wheel instead of foot.  I decided that yes its time to pull over.  There English is very little and my Hindi is just about nothing. They say” where you from?” and “whats in the bags?” I ssay “Problem?”  Then one pulls out his wallet and we are thinking they want money.  Nope he pulls out a passport photo of a white girl with brown hair.  He then motions for Camille to pull down her scarf.  He looks at the picture and then Camille and gives us the head bob that means OK. We start the bikes and hit the road.  Well that went a lot smoother than I thought it would.  Didn’t have to give them IDs or Money.