Riding the Mountains Down

At the age of 47, Bettina Selby, mother of three grown-up children decided to cycle alone from Karachi to Kathmandu. Her account of this often hair-raising epic journey provides an unusual view of Pakistan and India, and records some vivid memorable encounters with people met on the road. Although she enjoyed much kindness and hospitality, the reaction of some local men to an unaccompanied Western woman was, to say the least, unpredictable and sometimes ecalated close to dangerous violence. The heavy physical stress of keeping going in broiling heat on dust-blown and treacherous roads full of speeding trucks, ancient buses, bullock carts and herds of animals was a constant drain. In the Himalayas the ride became even more dangerous with avalanches, floods, bad curry and stone throwing children. But Bettina survived it all and wrote an account which has become a travel classic.