What are we doing?
Find out exactly what we're up to by visiting our website at www.curried-away.co.uk
The challenge is to get from the southern tip of India to Darjeeling in the worst possible vehicle available to mankind. No comfort. No reliability. No speed.
- We have to do this in a short space of time, to avoid being sacked by our employers. (We're looking at having to drive day and night for 3 weeks to achieve this.)
- We have to raise a considerable amount of money for charity in the process (that's where you come in!)
- We have to try to enjoy ourselves (this is a secondary requirement)
That’s basically it. On Christmas night, we will get ourselves packed and ready and in the early hours of Boxing day we’ll haul ourselves to an airport and fly to Mumbai. From there we will take a connecting flight down to Cochin, in the South west of India. The current reckoning is that we will land there at 7:40pm on 27th of December.
The following morning, on the 28th we will set off on a journey that is likely to cover at least 3,000km. We will avoid the main roads in favour of coastal paths to begin with, and then a route through the relatively unpopulated central regions of India.
All being well, we will head up towards Delhi and visit the Taj Mahal, then chug through some Tiger reserves, en route to our finishing point of Darjeeling; 3km above sea-level, in the Himalayan foothills.
The challenge is to do this, to stay alive for the duration, and to raise loads of money for charity in the process.
Who are we raising money for?
Mercy Corps. The rickshaw and the funds we raise will be distributed, under the expertise of Mercy Corps to needy Indian families and causes. Traditionally, hard working people can get trapped in a cycle of poverty in India, by taking prohibitive loans to buy rickshaws and run a business. In the years that follow, as much as 80% of their earnings just service their debts. We want to reward the hard working people who are trying to make a stab of things, by helping them to set up their own businesses, and have the honour of controlling their own destiny. Mercy Corps are a respected and efficient charity and we are proud to support their work.
