Whizzing down the high road to Mumbai

Pune to Mumbai door-to-door in two-and-a-half hours— that’s quicker (and infinitely more pleasant) than getting from Versova to Nariman Point. Suddenly, it makes terrific sense to live in the land of morning music concerts and take the high road to Mumbai only when you need a shot of crowds and cosmopolitanism.
Even as recently as five years ago, this once-picturesque journey could take you eight gruelling hours, sometimes jammed precariously between hissing trucks, watching out for oncoming demented drivers with a death-wish.
And we’ve come a really long way from the 1800s, when the expedition took up to four days, involving carriages and palanquins negotiating difficult passes and the Indrayani river in spate. Not something a woman or a man could possibly undertake alone.
Now here we are, buzzing singly and severally up and down the Expressway, negotiating nothing more difficult than the occasional stupid speedster.
Three lanes, wayside phones, assistance, and virtually never a jam. Just like phoren, yet without the mind-numbing monotony of the freeways and autobahns of the Western world. Sweeping curves, tunnels, gradients, mountains, the occasional cow, waterfalls, two toll booths—one that plays the most nostalgia-evoking Marathi songs— all provide just enough of a diversion to ensure that you don’t drive in a semi-comatose state.
While you don’t really need to stop even once on this easy-peasy journey, why pass up the chance to watch how civic, clean, quiet and indigenously foody we can be? Going down it starts with neera, just before you hit the Expressway. (If you’re driving up to Pune, you can end your journey with it.) Dawncooled glasses of liquid handed to you by a lone man or woman in a tiny booth for just “rupaya chaar’’. “Kitna?’’ “Chaaar.’’It instantly hydrates you for the journey—you’re on your way.
As you merge into the Expressway, suddenly a great sense of well-being hits you. You settle into your seat, relax your grip on the steering wheel, check that your seat belt is in place and before you know it, you’re hitting an easy 100 kmph and possibly even more, without even realising it.
Only the occasional electronic signs that ask you to stick to 80 kmph provide a small check and balance, reminding you that you’re driving a dinky, four-year-old car. But on your right, on the fast track, whiz past low-slung, big cars, easily going at 160, without even the slightest hint of a quiver. Your little car does a small shudder in the whooshing wake of the big guy. But you’re not in any danger—your car, after all, is named after a macebearing god. Next stop, the famous batata wada man in a van.
The garlic competes with the potatoes for attention in each wada. Or, a few yards ahead, a food court that efficiently handles busloads of wayfarers hungry for wadas, dosas, bhajiya, sandwiches, all handed to you fresh and hot.
It feels like the Expressway has engendered its own etiquette—no one is jostling and shouting, everybody actually throws their trash where they should, and the restrooms are clean and odour-free. There’s clean water in steel glasses served by smiling men. Stalls on the side sell superbly fresh nimbu-paani, the usual fudge and chikki and, intriguingly, outstanding khajoor and anjeer rolls.
The quiet hum of humanity and the absence of brash branded foods are possibly the most compelling aspects of the Expressway food halts. Enjoy it while it lasts.
Nicely full, you clamber back into your rested vehicle, and you’re on your way again. As Mumbai looms up ahead, signalled by the end of the Expressway, you need to watch out. The ease and civility of the journey quickly gives way to haranguing hawkers at the signals, cars that seem to be driving far too close, and a feeling that perhaps the journey’s the thing. The destination’s a bit of a let-down.