The final episode – journey to Skyvark

The Last Episode – journey to Skyvark
We arrived in Chennai around 4pm after visiting two more temples. The tourguide who had accompanied us yesterday spoke such disconnected English that I had totally glazed over – over and out – finished – like in a classroom on a hot summers day. I was just not listening, I was so templed out.
In the airport hotel (I have a great picture, at some point I will do a Tripadvisor review on it – and the certificate of excellence which hangs proudly on the wall – will hang no more)- Dani and I were getting quite fidgety and decided to ask at reception if there was anywhere we could walk to.
“Is there anywhere we can walk to?”
“Sorry madam” – slight tilt of head from side to side
Me: “Is there anywhere we can walk to?” – a desire to tilt head from side to side
Man: “Madam sorry” – agitated tilt of head from side to side
Me: “Are there any shops?” – a desire to tilt head from side to side in an agitated fashion
Man: “Skyvark madam” – more head tilting
Me: “What is Skyvark?” – more head tilting desire
Man: “Madam Skyvark left then right” head in dizzy tilting state
Me: “Thank you” – no more desire to head tilt…
We went left and carried on for quite sometime asking various people if they knew where Skyvark was – we were greeted with a lot of head tilting and nonplussed expressions.
At some point we arrived at a motorway exit and Skyvark wherever and whatever it was, was eluding us and Dani suggested going back to the hotel. Now if there’s one thing I am consistent at, it’s being persistent at finding things and places that are seemingly impossible to find – Dani should’ve known this, she’s had wild trips on trains and buses through Japanese forests and on a boat in the pursuit of Mount Fuji (had it not been foggy we might’ve found it 3 hours earlier) however on that occasion we knew what we were looking for – Skyvark was at this point a complete mystery.
Before we got on the motorway two young Indian girls came our way, “excuse me please do you know where Skyvark is?” They then excitedly took us over 4 major roads giggling away at our horror as buses and trucks, scooters, cars and motorbikes zoomed at terrifying speed towards us and around us and almost through us. Now, I may be blonde, but I know the best way to cross an Asian road is to attach yourself to a local on the other side of them as to where the traffic is hurtling towards – they just know what they are doing and you have to trust them. You need bus 43e or 15b they gleefully told us and both Dani and I knew there was not a cat in hells chance of us boarding a local bus after seeing the carnage of 3 smashed buses like concertinas the previous day.
We then flagged down an “auto” which is basically an open air Robin Reliant with three wheels. Sounds smooth and cool but is not! – “skyvark” we said, as he thrust forward into ten lane traffic squashed into two. At this point I was slightly unconvinced we would have a full set of body parts on arrival – I am so bloody pessimistic – but had you been in that contraption you may have experienced something similar.
About 20 mins later we arrived at Skyvark – and mystery solved – a Shopping mall called Skywalk – a so obvious misunderstanding of pronunciation – I was almost disappointed it was a mall – Skyvark sounds like some fictional long lost village or at least something Game of Thrones like. Our destination discovered we entered the mall and were ever so slightly disconcerted to discover that a Marks and Spencer’s only sold men’s clothes and indeed the majority of shops catered for the male population. A bookshop secured a book for the plane and off we went to find a reliable Robin Reliant to take us back to our hotel. You may think the story ends here……but it doesn’t, as we didn’t know the name or address of the hotel and just as we had pursued Skyvark, so too did we pursue our hotel with a keycard which just had JP written on it.
In the whole of Chennai we found one reliable Robin Reliant man who with limited information was able to take us through some very dubious back roads (once again thoughts of an incomplete set of body parts went through my mind) – but lo and behold before we had been hacked apart, there we were in front of JP – God bless ye, lovely little Robin reliant man 🚙