Having figured out that the only really pleasant part of the day is from about 6:00-8:30am, I was up on the rooftop

Having figured out that the only really pleasant part of the day is from about 6:00-8:30am, I was up on the rooftop early to do a little writing while Jason caught a few extra zzz’s. I realize how shocking that sounds to everyone who knows how much I appreciate mornings back home!

Around 10:30 we headed over to the Jawahar Niwas Palace, the official host of the Rickshaw Run. It is an architecturally stunning yet shabbily maintained former Maharaja’s Palace. As we entered the grounds, we got to see the lineup of rickshaws — one for each of the 70 participating teams. It was quite an impressive sight!

It didn’t take us long to track down Hillary — the name we have christened our strong, very experienced (19,000km on the odometer) rickshaw — who we are certain has the grit to get us going in the right direction. After a few minutes of doing the paperwork — strikingly similar to renting a car in the US — Mitzi gave us a crash course in driving, handed us the keys and sent us on our way. The organizers have set up a pretty wild test course spread out over the palace grounds. Driving the thing is a total rush, but as the reality of driving it 1,700 miles set in, so did a fresh round of stomach flutters.

In the afternoon, we attended the mandatory “mechanical talk” designed to help us diagnose the mechanical problems that we will certainly encounter, and approaches to fixing the more basic issues.

We have met several other teams at this point and enjoyed dinner with Theo and Chris, a couple of Germans. Poke around for their blog under the team name “Men of Track” (a play on Men in Black) if you want a different perspective of what’s going on here.

Cheers,
Brian & Jason

PS… For reference, our planned route is below!