Amol never ceases to amaze me with his limitless ingeniuity and kindness. Also he amuses all my crazy whims. One such whim was the Pandharpur-Narsobhawadi-Tulja Bhawani trip. A spiritual trip in a 300 km radius.Amol was recovering from a freak accident that resulted in a knee surgery. For 2 months Amol was on a walker/wheelchair, barely mobile,barely eating,barely happy, holed up in a room in pain and I was the one whining and managed to guilt trip Amol into this road trip. Our trusted Nexon EV(Karupatti) was on her last breaths in a TATA workshop wiithout a proper diagnosis. So we bought TATA Curvv EV(Tulja) akin to replacing an aging pet with an energetic pup(Curvv EV promised range was 585 Km) to lessen the grief. So Tulja, Amol with his "just off the walker but still in a brace leg," "bright eyed and bushy tailed" me and ever enthusiastic Mohammed (Mhd to Amol is Pg Wodehouse characters Jeeves to Bertie Wooster)set out on Ganesh Chathurti.
The skies were grey with rain clouds,Google maps shotest routes had bumpy village roads, Amboli waterfalls I was allowed a picture and definitely no water, we missed our road trip constants-snack manager Adi and good humoured navigator Shiva sorely and Amol was in the passenger seat. The mood was sombre.
We cheered ourselves with small talk and big Ganpati idols enroute.Tulja showed adequate range to reach destination but Amol wanted a tea break and we tried to charge the Tulja in Ajara. The charging station did not boot up and we headed to Narsobawadi with lots of hope and a tiny bit of anxiety.At nightfall the roads veered to gravel covered ,truck filled road-works related diversions highway.With fast draining charge and faster fading lights of civilisation we drove through fields flanked small roads.Ganpati installation processions brought lots of light, people and hope and a minimum 5 minutes discussion about each idol that we passed by.Catching the first glimpse of Krishna river on the Google maps display on the dashboard screen we reached our accomodation at Narsobawadi on the banks of the river. We were welcomed warmly to hot homecooked Maharashtrian meal prepared by our host matriach at our accomodation. Tulja was put to charge before we dined , 'Car before Care' was always Amols motto. "Bagwati
" and me woke up to this lovely sight. Just when we thought how lucky these people are to wake up to this every morning we were busted. Krishna floods atleast thrice a year and they have to have a quick evacuation plan always.That sounded rough.
We headed to give Tulja her breakfast, her power meal at Malu EV charging station. Downloaded an app, charged it with money,plugged the cord in and Bingo.You guessed it right. This too wouldnot work. Amol and me snarled at each other . It still didnot work. Amol called a mobile number listed as helpline. Who is going to pick your call T 7 am on a Sunday morning, I remarked sarcastically. And I was so wrong.The owner of the charging station picked up the call, walked Amol through the steps and Voila! Tulja hungrily slurped it all up.
Mr Malu even came and restored our belief in our crazy all EV roadtrip plan.
We headed to Pandharpur and this time Amol took the wheel. As we pulled into the holy city , an agitated crowd started banging at our windows. A nearly twice bent over old lady was brushed by our Tulja. Now Tulja is loaded with many features and even more sensors. So much so that the mandatory new car garland was being sensed as an objectionable object. And she couldnot detect a crouched over human being on the kerb. Mohammed sprang into action and strictly asked us to keep the windows rolled up. 3 cops materialised.One cop took a picture of our car number plate.We were not the pavement driving drunk drivers but that mob was scary. Luckily the lady accepted that she was in the wrong by sitting on the road and graciously accepted our apologies and the mob dispersed ephemerally.
We joined a snaking kilometer long queue for the "pad darshan" of Vitthoba.The path was shaded, we made friends with some co-devotees, grumbled at some 'jugadu' ones but the experience was priceless. I was awed at the entrepreneurial skills of the locals along the temple queue. Chakna ,Makhna, cut fruits, jhunka bhakar stalls all serviced pilgrims at a height of 6 feet on the elevated pathway.A lady even was serving tea with a 6 feet elongated serving mug. Infact it was so entertaining that we didinot realise that we were in queue for 2 hours.
After the wholesome spiritual experience of Vitthoba and Rukumai we started on a charging station hunt. After 1 non working, 1 working but not booted we found 1partially working charging point on the way. So with partial car charge and a partial lunch we headed to Tuljapur. Tulja Bhawani temple steps and levels tested Amol's newly minted left knee. At one point I could feel it quiver next to mine while waitng in queue.But Bhawani's piercing eyes did perk up Amol and with new vigour we set about looking for another charging station. Yet again our strike rate was 1 in 3. The first one tested our Tulja's and Mohammed's off roading skills. Google maps took us on a narrow mudpath to a dimly lit cowshed. The only other light on that dark night was the lone firefly. And I am not kidding when I say that the glow worm's glow was brighter. We retraced our path , this time asking for directions from locals and we reached another charging station. We were such veterans at rejection that we first dialled the helpline (At all other charging stations we downloaded an app and filled the app wallet with money, only to find it not working.At the end of the roadtrip Amol has 4 EV charging apps on his phone and some thousands parked in each app)
We drove onto to Solapur at nightfall with little charge and plenty worry. If in some way our collective passenger anxiety could be harnessed we could have driven Tulja to the moon.Once again Google maps led us to a non existant charging station . I thought rains happen in movies on a cue to make sad sadder. It happened to us in Solapur. 10 minutes of fat rain drops turned that ring roads of Solapur to slush. Rain outside, low driving range inside fogged all our adult reasoning. Amol finally had his "Hey Krishna" moment(For context, at Draupadi's vastraharan when all else failed she just submitted and put her hands up and hailed Krishna to the rescue.) And Krishna did come to our rescue in the form of Dr Kiran Joshi. A nephrologist but I swear he wore the beatific smile and a halo that night. 9 pm on a rainy Sunday, he reached out to us in 10 minutes in a auto while sharing location and words of encouragement all the while. A couple of phone calls and info gathered on the auto ride Tulja started to charge in 15 minutes.Dr Kiran made sure we ate, Tulja charged , rain abated and the rivers parted to form a fourlane highway to Narsobawadi before disappearing into the light.
Amol took the wheel this time aka In a high risk medical case the most experienced always does the procedure.ETA was 1:30am with 60 km range to spare to destination.M & me were glad to nod off. At the stroke of 12 I woke up to a completely fogged screen in a cold sweat.Visuals of next day newspaper headlines, "Doctor couple pilgrimage in a new EV turns fatal" started floating in front of my eyes. We were 100km from destination with 20km range to spare. So Amol had turned off the A/C. The windows could not be rolled down because the drag will increase and worsen the car performance.Putting all our heads together we dropped the speed to 60KMPH and steadily increased the car range. We found the sweet spot for the windows, slightly rolled down to prevent the windscreen from fogging and yet not adding to the drag.The next 90 minutes we drove in a silent prayer.
WE tested Amol's knee, Tulja's EV capabilities and our team work indeed that night.
The next morning after a short visit to the Dattaguru temple on the cofluence of the river Panchganga with the river Krishna and Kirdapur Khopeshwar temple we headed back home safe, sound and grateful
