What would Dervla do?

Since I’m still not venturing outside Britain (I can’t face the uncertainty of it all), I’m relying on travel writers to take me to fascinating places. I’ve been reading Dervla Murphy’s first book, Full Tilt: Ireland to India with a Bicycle. My immediate thought was, “Why on earth would she do that?” Who would choose to head out in January 1963 during the coldest winter in 80 years to cycle alone through some of the most unhospitable and dangerous terrain in the world?  On page 4 the wind is so strong that she’s blown off her bike and lands on a frozen stream, and by page 5 her hands are frost-bitten. Things only get worse. Why didn’t she just cycle around Ireland, which is very beautiful and has only baby mountains and no hostile tribesmen lying in wait? Because she’s made of much, much sterner stuff than me, that’s why.

Dervla sets off on her bike, Roz by name, equipped with not much more than a .25 automatic pistol and copies of Nehru’s History of India and the Penguin edition of William Blake’s poems. Well, she did pack some clothes, spare parts for Roz and a few medical supplies, but not a lot more. She was only 31 years old and admits that to this day she doesn’t know how to repair a puncture, which is just about the only thing we have in common. I won’t even cycle to the next village because I don’t think the roads are safe. Dervla cycled across seven glaciers! Maybe that’s why I loved her more and more with every page. I’m lost in admiration and can imagine her leading armies and running small empires. Although I’m sure that she’d have nothing to do with either one.

Would Dervla be put off travel by the thought of reams of paperwork, Covid tests and the threat of last-minute cancellations and quarantine? Of course she wouldn’t. She survives stoning by “mullahs and turbaned youths”, being attacked by a pack of wolves and the unwelcome attentions of a “six-foot scantily clad Kurd” (that gun came in very handy). Along the way she endures broken ribs, extreme dehydration, near starvation and dysentery. After seven gruelling months, she finally arrives in Delhi and, instead of offering a prayer of thanksgiving for her safe arrival and jumping on the next plane home, she decides to look for some voluntary work in the city before she heads off on her travels again. As you do.

I’m not sure if I’d look to Dervla Murphy for words of wisdom, but I think she’s earned the final word: “If anyone ever asks you to drive three donkeys and a foal for twenty-four miles through the Karakorum Mountains, be very firm and refuse to do so.”