The Goan wanderers
It was a great occasion to go to Goa again! After having driven for holidays in December 2015 and October 2016 in my Morris minor 1952, this was a good opportunity to test out my newly restored Hindustan 14 1950. In 2016 my Morris minor also participated in the first Goa tourism development corporation vintage car festival and was among the two cars from Bangalore which drove to Goa for the event, Arun and Mr.Vasudevan in their Fiat super select along with their family, being the other. The fantastic news for me to look forward to, this time, was my family Yash and Swara would be joining me. I was attempting a 1200+ kms drive with a two and a half year old, in a 67 year old car.
It was a pleasant surprise to hear of a VW event being organized in Goa at the same time as we had planned to drive. Arun as usual was game to drive to Goa as a stopover before he left everyone behind in his crusade of 3000+ kms in his trusty Mark 2 Ambassador. KVCCC members Pankaj Motreja and Srinivas gowda (both in their VW beetles) would also be part of the drive to Goa to participate in the VW event, friends Ryan in his VW bus, Murtaza in his Mercedes Benz would join us in the fun that lay ahead.
The itinerary was planned as follows;
Leave Bangalore on the early morning of the 1st of November 2017 and head to Hubli which was 400 kms away. Halt in Hubli for the night and leave to the lovely beaches of Palolem on the morning of the 2nd of November.
The joys of driving an old car on a highway towards a location such as Goa is spellbinding, not only are the roads good, it is a perfect mix of highway driving, country roads, ghat roads and the destination constantly beckons you to have a great time.
We left on the morning of the 1st and headed towards Hubli, with no incident worth mentioning we reached Hubli by evening.
About the car, the Hindustan ran perfectly well and was a great way to have a holiday with family. We are nowadays distracted and disturbed in several ways with the comforts that the modern cars offer. After the Goa drive the radio suddenly seems like a disturbance, the ac suffocating and the lack of petrol fumes surely causes withdrawal! The mechanical noises of an old car are blissful. The obsessed driver wondering if there really was a noise that nobody else in the car heard, real or imaginary is a common feature. The floating thought of whether the fuel float is functional is constant. Among such constant things that a classic car driver nitpicks on, I surely have learnt over several such long drives to start enjoying the moment of stepping back into time to feel nothing but the joy and pleasure of classic car motoring. All the countless times spent under a car or into it suddenly feel worth it.
We arrived in Palolem on the noon of 2nd November after negotiating some lovely country roads and the ghats of Karwar. We had settled into the huts on the lovely beach and had ourselves a well deserved beer with the feeling of having conquered nothing but our own fear of driving old cars over long distances.
Yash, Swara and I spent the next four days soaking in the lovely weather and the sea breeze of Goa. It seemed very short when we had to leave back to Bangalore on the morning of the 6th of November. But like all good things, this drive to Goa had to come to an end and it did. We left Palolem at 9 a.m. and were back home by 10 p.m. with stops for lunch, snacks and Dinner. Not bad for a 67 year old.
On our way back we caught up with Arun who quietly demonstrates what the old cars are capable of achieving if we only believe in them. My family and I had a wonderful time and look forward to our next escapade from the modern times!!
