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| One of the locals |
A good day for Team Shamrock.
There was one complicated Regularity Stage; three different speeds on along uphill track. We were 5 seconds off the perfect time and it allowed us to move up in the standings.
The drive today was on much-improved roads and through beautiful mountain roads with great green vistas, we climbed up and down today getting as high as 8,500 ft.; we're spending the night at Nainital at 6,600 ft.
Big news: One of the crews spotted a small leopard. Yesterday, we all came upon a small calf that was dead and mutilated alongside the road. Turns out a large mother leopard had killed the calf and had eaten part of the carcass. When she finished one of her offspring came to feast. He got half way into the road, but was frightened by the noise of the cars and scampered back into the bush. Big thrill for this crew to spot the small leopard. So far I've only spotted monkeys; both brown and grey, as well as farm animals.....cows, goats, sheep, all of which walk everywhere at any time.
Many have the competitors have had various small accidents- nothing serious, but scraped, bent fenders and dented bumpers. Today one crew had a scrape with a motorbike seriously dented a door. We've had a few scratches and our passenger-side mirror has 'bumped into" by a few passing vehicles.
Tomorrow we will cross the India/NEPAL border in the early afternoon. Border crossings are always difficult and require a lot of patience.
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| Small family farm growing rice |
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| Small village street |
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| Stanley trying to be creative |