This weekend, having nothing much to do, I started on a drive. With a tiring week behind, I wanted to get away from the maddening crowd.
My village, near Anandpur Sahib, is a very peaceful place that offers the seclusion I wanted, so the wheels turned that way and driving from Chandigarh via Mullanpur, Kurali, Ropar and Ghanauli I reached the Nakkian barrage on the SYL and NHC canals. Here, I turned right to cross the two canals and carried on on the far bank of the SYL. While travelling on this road, there is a diversion towards the right that goes into the arrid land of hillocks, seasonal rivers and Kikar forests, called the Kandi belt. This belt forms a border between Punjab and Himachal, and beyond this belt, the hills start rising and on the top of these hills stands the holy temple or Mata Naina Devi Ji. Having travelled on that road hundreds of times, I had seen that road and thought that it would be nice to bring a 4x4 vehicle and explore this area. Some pictures of the terrain.
I decided that I will explore this area. But I was driving a 2x4 vehicle, that too a front wheel drive, so I decided to stick to the road, or at least a trail and keep the off roading for a later time, with a more equipped vehicle. Not that I haven't taken my 2003 Esteem, lovingly called 'Black Magic', offroad before. It has gone off the beaten track on numerous occasions earlier. However, this time I was alone, while in previous outings, I had friends along, and on many occasions, at least another vehicle was there to help in case of any breakdowns or getting stuck. Blackie is also getting old and has seen a lot of battering and neglect.
Initially, the road was good, even great.
However, the black tarmac soon changed to a gravel road and then a dirt track full or stones and deep ruts.
However, very soon even this track ended and I could only make out a faint trail ahead. This is where the road ended and I had to decide if I wanted to press ahead or turn back and head for the road.
The immense confidence that I have in my car made me shift into the forward gear. I decided to try a bit of it and not to try anything fancy. So much for the first decesion to stick to a road.
I spent a couple of hours. However, could not capture much of the action as I was busy driving. Had to park and get out of the car to click a photo. I wish I had a better camera that could capture video. My mobile camera can record videos of upto 20 secs only, so had to be content with just pictures. The actual experience was amazing. Blackie got bogged down once, which caused some worry, and some very sharp self critisizm at not being able to stick to logical decisions.
Here I would like to make the usual disclaimer that I have a fair experience of such conditions and have full confidence in my vehicle. As my village was only 8-10 kilometers away and I was only a couple of miles out of a mobile network, I also had the option to call for help in case of any eventuality. That is why I decided to go ahead with the adventure. Otherwise, I would never try this alone nor suggest anyone else to do it. In such settings, things can go wrong and turn ugly pretty soon.
On a river bed full of sand, a front wheel drive is the worst kind of vehicle that you can have, and thus the most challanging. The extra weight of the engine makes the front sink in the soft sand and harder you rev to get out, the deeper you sink.
There are a few tricks I have learned for such scenarios. Easiest is to reduce the pressure of air in front tyres. This will give more surface area and better traction. However, I could not do that, as my way back to civilization lay through some miles of dirt track and under inflated tyres would have been a new problem on the way back. Therefore, I decided to try the 'Rocks and Foot Mats' way. In this you just place some stones in front of the tyres, to make the way a bit hard, then lay foot mats of the car on top of the rcks in front of the tyres, like a track. Then slowly rock the car back and forth and once it is little free from the sand, crawl over the mat, stop, remove the mat and place it at the front again. You repeat this till you sail through to solid ground.
It took me a good part of an hour to get out of the river bed. I then rested for about 30 minutes, to watch the Sun set and allow the car to cool down a bit. The I headed back home after promising myself to return soon with Blackie and a 4x4 Jeep. The off roading will still be done by Blackie. The 4x4 would just be the recovery vehicle.
My village, near Anandpur Sahib, is a very peaceful place that offers the seclusion I wanted, so the wheels turned that way and driving from Chandigarh via Mullanpur, Kurali, Ropar and Ghanauli I reached the Nakkian barrage on the SYL and NHC canals. Here, I turned right to cross the two canals and carried on on the far bank of the SYL. While travelling on this road, there is a diversion towards the right that goes into the arrid land of hillocks, seasonal rivers and Kikar forests, called the Kandi belt. This belt forms a border between Punjab and Himachal, and beyond this belt, the hills start rising and on the top of these hills stands the holy temple or Mata Naina Devi Ji. Having travelled on that road hundreds of times, I had seen that road and thought that it would be nice to bring a 4x4 vehicle and explore this area. Some pictures of the terrain.
 |
| The playground |
I decided that I will explore this area. But I was driving a 2x4 vehicle, that too a front wheel drive, so I decided to stick to the road, or at least a trail and keep the off roading for a later time, with a more equipped vehicle. Not that I haven't taken my 2003 Esteem, lovingly called 'Black Magic', offroad before. It has gone off the beaten track on numerous occasions earlier. However, this time I was alone, while in previous outings, I had friends along, and on many occasions, at least another vehicle was there to help in case of any breakdowns or getting stuck. Blackie is also getting old and has seen a lot of battering and neglect.
 |
| The Black Magic |
However, the black tarmac soon changed to a gravel road and then a dirt track full or stones and deep ruts.
However, very soon even this track ended and I could only make out a faint trail ahead. This is where the road ended and I had to decide if I wanted to press ahead or turn back and head for the road.
The immense confidence that I have in my car made me shift into the forward gear. I decided to try a bit of it and not to try anything fancy. So much for the first decesion to stick to a road.
 |
| On a river bed |
 |
Can you see the Grin?      |
I spent a couple of hours. However, could not capture much of the action as I was busy driving. Had to park and get out of the car to click a photo. I wish I had a better camera that could capture video. My mobile camera can record videos of upto 20 secs only, so had to be content with just pictures. The actual experience was amazing. Blackie got bogged down once, which caused some worry, and some very sharp self critisizm at not being able to stick to logical decisions.
On a river bed full of sand, a front wheel drive is the worst kind of vehicle that you can have, and thus the most challanging. The extra weight of the engine makes the front sink in the soft sand and harder you rev to get out, the deeper you sink.
There are a few tricks I have learned for such scenarios. Easiest is to reduce the pressure of air in front tyres. This will give more surface area and better traction. However, I could not do that, as my way back to civilization lay through some miles of dirt track and under inflated tyres would have been a new problem on the way back. Therefore, I decided to try the 'Rocks and Foot Mats' way. In this you just place some stones in front of the tyres, to make the way a bit hard, then lay foot mats of the car on top of the rcks in front of the tyres, like a track. Then slowly rock the car back and forth and once it is little free from the sand, crawl over the mat, stop, remove the mat and place it at the front again. You repeat this till you sail through to solid ground.
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