I woke up at 5:00 am to find myself amidst hills. Watching hills has always been such an overwhelming experience for me & now was experiencing the same. I kept on looking around for almost an hour till my head refused to move from left to right.


The bus was still not in a very good condition. We all prayed to reach Manali soon. It was already 8:00 am & we were still 167 kms away from our destination. Driver stopped the bus a couple of times to repair it. After we had our breakfast at another dhaba, we moved towards Bilaspur. Bus maintained its consistent speed of 40 kms/hr.


Soon the bus was stopped by the people from Highway Authorities for routine check up. And then started the real fun. The only document which the driver had was his driver’s license. No R.C no pollution checks. Not even a single document related to that huge troublesome bus. Hilarious it was for me though people found it really shocking. But in India, there is a cure for everything. The people from the Highway Authorities demanded Rs 5000 to release the bus. That poor driver had no money, or this is what he said. So the passengers decided to contribute & get the bus released. We were so desperate to reach Manali that we were even ready to sell ourselves. Such small contribution stood nothing against that. There was only one thing which bothered me. If this bus would have met an accident, no one could claim anything from their insurance company. This episode gives us a lesson that whichever bus you board in, before u check your seats, don’t forget to check the papers from the driver.