Day 2 : Humans of Cochin

Previously, Yinghao gets pelted by bird shit and we were informed by Danny that it is actually a sign of good luck in India.

We take a long, leisurely breakfast and head to the Adventurist HQ to check out our Catbus for real and hopefully get some practice driving in.

That's us queuing up

Literally after this photo was taken our Chief Photographer runs over and asks us if we have her mobile phone.

Uh...no? No small amount of panic ensues. I know for sure she had it in the lobby before we boarded the tuk-tuk. Which means... it's probably on the tuk-tuk.

Real panic now.

I frantically call her number and there is a glimmer of hope because it's ringing. Her phone is on silent mode though so there is a good chance it might go completely unnoticed.

I don't think I've ever been so relieved to hear an Indian man's voice answer my call.

The amazing driver then makes it all the way back to return us the phone. Wow. I'll be honest, that was not at all the ending I envisioned. I was actually pretty sure we wouldn't see it again.

Hero of the day

With that and a quick bye and he's off. Didn't even get his name, although his vehicle number was KL07 BZ5950 (had to hastily remember that as he was driving off).

Other tuk-tuk drivers hanging around tell us we're really lucky because most of the time they will pick up other passengers and with every person that goes through the tuk-tuk the chance of the lost item disappearing goes up.

Looks like bird shit paid some dividends.

I don't really like to attribute it to luck though. Full credit to the great driver.

That was adventure enough for the day. We spend the rest of the day listening to the mechanic talk about the engine parts and learning the basics of handling our Catbus.

Free pro tips from a professional

So the guy giving our Chief motorcyclist pro tips doesn't actually work for the race organizer. He just happened to be a auto-rickshaw driver who was hanging around looking at what people were doing. And he's been driving for 20 years. He helped us fashion a funnel from a plastic bottle to fill our petrol tank with, taught us how to start the engine and all sorts of other assorted pro tips.

It's like this place is made of nice people; they're everywhere!

Finally getting some drives in

We get some test driving done and it's a roaring success. Or rather, Yinghao has a roaring success while the rest of us fumble around with the gears, bump into potholes and stall the engine. Still, we make it a few laps around the small area and I think we're good to go. HAHA.

Evening rolls around and we retire in search of a sunset, which we'll try to make a frequent feature of our trip.

Featuring The Third Wheel at Fort Kochi Beach

And with that we wind our day down, grab dinner and brave the hour-long traffic back for sleep.

Cheerios, Jik