It was with heavy hearts that Kim and I said goodbye to our beloved friend, trusted steed and traveling companion Enzo. But, as with all good things, they must come to an end sooner or later. For us it was just a lot sooner than we had originally expected.
As I wrote in the post below, Leh, which was to be our premiere destination for the trip was hit hard by rain earlier in the month. We were hoping beyond hope that the road would open again this year but it has become clear to us now that the damage is so significant and so devastating that the roads will not open again until next year. With that in mind Kim and I had resigned ourselves to riding around the Northern state of Himichal Pradesh (translated into the land of snow capped mountains) but even there we ran out of road to ride on due to floods and landslides. So, with our options being to stay and ride in a very limited part of the North or head South to the flatter, hotter, even wetter plains, we decided to sell Enzo early, leave India behind and head to Thailand for what will be our third time on this trip alone.
Enzo had been a better bike than either of us could have hoped for and because we bought a newer bike at a good price we had no problem selling him. We bought him for 70,000 rupees and sold him almost one year later for 60,000 rupees which means that it only cost us $250 (plus what we put into him for maintenance and repairs) to have our own wheels and all the freedom that comes with it. We reckon we could have sold him for even more if we’d taken our time and advertised to other travelers but we wanted a quick and easy sale so we sold him to a dealer/mechanic who will, undoubtedly, find a great home for him in no time. We had the adventure of a lifetime and you just can’t put a price tag on that.
We covered 8,660 kms on Enzo and loved every single minute. We rode through two countries and zig-zagged our through eight states. We rode in all kinds of weather, on all kinds of roads, through all kinds of landscapes. We went from the hot, palm tree lined, paved roads of the densely populated South, crossed into Nepal where we survived the crazy traffic of Kathmandu and crossed back into India to ride through the less populated, un-paved, pine tree lined roads of the North. We ran over one baby chicken, clipped the side of one car with our luggage rack, collided very slowly with another motorbike in extremely crowded and chaotic traffic, rode through angry mobs of Maoists wielding sticks in Nepal, lost control of Enzo while going up a super slippery steep slope and fell over nearly going off an embankment, dropped Enzo and slid across the pavement while trying to avoid a puppy (I can tell you these things now that we’re no longer riding him!), escaped from two men who were chasing us out of a restricted national park, got stuck and had to get help to get him out of a particularly muddy stretch of road, got lost and drove miles in the wrong direction and were run off the road repeatedly by cars and trucks that were bigger than us . On the flip side however, Enzo never left us stranded on the side of the road, he was always there in the morning right where we'd left him, his gas was never stolen, we never had a serious accident, never burnt ourselves on the exhaust, never ran out of gas and never lost the keys. All things considered, it was a very successful mission!
In our opinion traveling by motorbike is the best way to see this incredible country and we can't wait until the day we come back to complete our journey to the far North! Farewell Enzo. May you bring as much joy and adventure to your next owners as you did to us! In the words of Kip "Peace out man"!
As I wrote in the post below, Leh, which was to be our premiere destination for the trip was hit hard by rain earlier in the month. We were hoping beyond hope that the road would open again this year but it has become clear to us now that the damage is so significant and so devastating that the roads will not open again until next year. With that in mind Kim and I had resigned ourselves to riding around the Northern state of Himichal Pradesh (translated into the land of snow capped mountains) but even there we ran out of road to ride on due to floods and landslides. So, with our options being to stay and ride in a very limited part of the North or head South to the flatter, hotter, even wetter plains, we decided to sell Enzo early, leave India behind and head to Thailand for what will be our third time on this trip alone.
Enzo had been a better bike than either of us could have hoped for and because we bought a newer bike at a good price we had no problem selling him. We bought him for 70,000 rupees and sold him almost one year later for 60,000 rupees which means that it only cost us $250 (plus what we put into him for maintenance and repairs) to have our own wheels and all the freedom that comes with it. We reckon we could have sold him for even more if we’d taken our time and advertised to other travelers but we wanted a quick and easy sale so we sold him to a dealer/mechanic who will, undoubtedly, find a great home for him in no time. We had the adventure of a lifetime and you just can’t put a price tag on that.
We covered 8,660 kms on Enzo and loved every single minute. We rode through two countries and zig-zagged our through eight states. We rode in all kinds of weather, on all kinds of roads, through all kinds of landscapes. We went from the hot, palm tree lined, paved roads of the densely populated South, crossed into Nepal where we survived the crazy traffic of Kathmandu and crossed back into India to ride through the less populated, un-paved, pine tree lined roads of the North. We ran over one baby chicken, clipped the side of one car with our luggage rack, collided very slowly with another motorbike in extremely crowded and chaotic traffic, rode through angry mobs of Maoists wielding sticks in Nepal, lost control of Enzo while going up a super slippery steep slope and fell over nearly going off an embankment, dropped Enzo and slid across the pavement while trying to avoid a puppy (I can tell you these things now that we’re no longer riding him!), escaped from two men who were chasing us out of a restricted national park, got stuck and had to get help to get him out of a particularly muddy stretch of road, got lost and drove miles in the wrong direction and were run off the road repeatedly by cars and trucks that were bigger than us . On the flip side however, Enzo never left us stranded on the side of the road, he was always there in the morning right where we'd left him, his gas was never stolen, we never had a serious accident, never burnt ourselves on the exhaust, never ran out of gas and never lost the keys. All things considered, it was a very successful mission!
In our opinion traveling by motorbike is the best way to see this incredible country and we can't wait until the day we come back to complete our journey to the far North! Farewell Enzo. May you bring as much joy and adventure to your next owners as you did to us! In the words of Kip "Peace out man"!
