12 Sep 06
We start the second day of our 600-mile rickshaw race through India with an embarrassing breakdown. A couple of miles out of Mamallapuram (aka Mahabalipuram, once home to the 7th Century kings of Pallava), the engine cuts out, back in again, and out for good. It was hiccupping yesterday and we now fear the worst. The silence after the two-stroke racket is terrible - has everybody passed us?
Then comes the head-striking Homer moment and I check the petrol. There's no fuel gauge, so I insert the dipstick that hangs round the tank filler neck. Empty. D'oh! Then a small group appears, headed by the two Bath-based boys from Team Extreme Trifle. Turns out we weren't the only ones to forget fuel. They'd now filled up, and by simply popping off the fuel hose running into their carburettor, we siphon enough into a water bottle to make it to the next fuel station.
Filling up is quite a performance. The two-stroke engine needs 50ml of oil for every litre of fuel, but you can't just chuck in one followed by the other, as the oil would sink and clog the fuel line. It has to be mixed, and every petrol station has its own method - best we saw from the numerous attendants was to splash petrol into a funnel, in which you hold the oil-measuring cup. Petrol at 52 rupees a litre (about 60p) is expensive, especially when you're earning no more than £5 a day, as one rickshaw driver told us he did. No wonder he ekes out 60mpg to our estimated 40mpg.
