The Sedation of the Carefree Road

"For my part , I travel not to go anywhere, but to go. I travel
for travel's sake. The great affair is to move." - Robert Louis Stevenson

When I read these words of Robert Stevenson, it seemed to echo and resonate all around in my mind and ears. It was as if I have been listening to this all my life. As a child and through the years of my teen and adulthood, I read the 'Stopping by the woods on a snowy evening' (by Robert Frost), 'Daffodils' and 'Solitary Reaper' (by William Wordsworth) countless number of times. I used to wonder if ever I would be that traveler who saw the solitary reaper reaping and singing by herself that melancholy strain. I wanted to get lost in those dark woods of Robert Frost which makes a traveler forget his other worldly promises. Yes travel is what I had always wanted to do and will always want to do. Ever since I was a child I was amazed by travel shows. Deep inside my heart I had always thought, “This is all I want to do”. Yes I want to see the world, meet people, meet cultures, meet religions and meet food. The journey has always been more thrilling to me than the destination. Reaching the destination is just half the fun. It is said “Change is the only constant". So when I travel, I see my world changing constantly. I grow up cuddling in the lap of my mother nature.

I think I am among one of those few fortunate people in this world who has a soul mate who shares the same passion with the same vigor. It is this vigor and enthusiasm for travel which makes us hit the road again and again. Yes we try to travel by road where ever possible. Road. What is it which excites us so much about it? Why do we do it again and again even after realizing how tiring it always is? I wonder and I realize that it is the road which actually gives you a feeling that you are moving. You cross states, you meet people, and you try food at so many different places. You are a witness to the changing topographies, to the mountains turning into rivers and then into deserts. When you feel the chilling wind blowing from snow covered mountains and the scorching heat of the barren dry land pierce your skin, when the gushing clear sound of glacier water quenches your thirsty soul and when you wait for miles and miles to spot a green, that’s when you know you are moving, that’s when you know you are one with the nature and you realize the vastness of life and dead around you. That’s when you become modest because you realize how tiny you are.

The other reason of choosing to travel by road is our madness for food. We never carry food with us when we travel by road. (Might come as surprise to many). Yes I know as an Indian it is almost prerogative to carry food with you whenever you travel, sometimes making your food luggage heavier than your travel essentials. Many of us are also driven and hallucinated by our mother's words engraved in our brains saying “Beta bahar khana mat khana" (child do not have food outside).But none of these could ever suppress our huge lust for food by the road side Dhabas.  We do not know nor do we care on how hygienic it is because the food is always finger licking good. Yes the masalas in most of the cases are not cooked properly and many a times you can probably taste them all separately but that is how it is meant to be and that is what we yearn for after hours of riding or driving!!! That scrumptious feeling of sitting on a cot by the road and eating the heavenly Tandoori Roti , Dal Tadka and Chicken Curry with different states pouring in their local flavors in them is just second to none. This is something we really miss after we moved to States.

This feeling is an addiction. An addiction which no other drug can ever lead you into. We are addicted to the road.  It makes you high and so we hit the road again and again. Yes we do it to be high. So be it the 15 days back breaking bike trip to Ladhak or innumerable road trips to Goa and all around Maharashtra. Be it the 15 hours’ drive to Texas or Utah or the recent 11 hours drive to Las Vegas, we do it again and again just to be high.