-- From Bangalore to Chennai

The 16/01 around 9:30, I met Mr. Prabash in charge of Central Warehousing Corporation, CWC. He assures me that the warehouse had a stock of Michelin tires belonging to Radials International. I phoned Mr. Amit ARORA with my mobile. He informed me that it came the following day from Delhi about 11:00. I also discussed with a mechanic for the installation of the tires. We agreed to re-examine the price after the meeting with Mr. Amit ARORA. Then I went to a cybercafé located in these north-eastern suburbs of Bangalore to issue the weekly page of my website.

The 17/01 I met Mr. Amit ARORA. During the meeting, I learned that the stock of this type of tyres, 240 items, existed only since the 28/11/2006 on behalf of the Indian army in assembly TTF (Tyre, Tube & Flap). Radials International is the exclusive representative of Michelin in India. Several deposits are installed in India for any type of Michelin tires. The travellers can address directly to Mr. Amit ARORA to buy Michelin tyres. (See practical Information of the bar of the menus).

The day 18/01 started with the impossibility to open the metal curtain of the tyre warehouse. I waited up to 10:00 the opening of this rusted and smashed curtain: that is India.
The way to the workshop of the tyres took approximately an hour on a much-encumbered road where a tractor broke the right block of the indicator light in a hazardous driving. Of course, not insurance and not refunding, that is India.
The workshop is a shop at the edge of the road, a cover protecting a compressor and minimum tools. Work was carried out on the ground in a powdery dust, that is India.
Work began around 11:00. The exit of the spare wheels from the trunk and the assembly of the tyres finished after the arrangement of the trunk about 16:30. No major difficulties, if it was not the inflation of the tyres to avoid the deterioration of the Tyrant joints. Indeed, at the disassembling, one of the joints was twisted and unusable. I had two joints in spare part.
The Tyran joints are unknown in India. Michelin does not import them, because the supply is TTF.

The 19/01 I carried out a revision of the truck, pressure of the tyres, readjustment, full of water etc. I left around 11:15 to go to A1 Plazza of Reliance before Chittoor where I arrived about 16:00.

The 20/01 before leaving, I checked once again the pressure of the tyres and the stowing of the objects in the trunk, then I took a hot shower in A1 Plazza. I arrived at Kanchipuram around 14:30. I visited two temples, Kailashanatha and Varadaraja where I bivouacked.

The 21/01 I visited three other temples, Ekambareshwara, Kamakshi and Venkanatha.
Kanchipuram, small village of 200.000 inhabitants, is one of the seven Holy Hinduism Cities, known for its temples and its saris out of silk. The temples are representative of Dravidian art of south India. Construction of the temples and realization of the sculptures are under controls of the canonical texts of Vastu-shastra and Shilpa-shastra.
Kailashanatha is the oldest, VI century AD, and the most beautiful preceding the temple of the Rivage of Mamallapuram. The others are later and are preceded by a gopuram, pyramidal tower, which can reach 59 meters in Ekambareshwara. They are equipped with a mandapa, hypostyle hall, whose pillars are carved with canonical scenes, Varadarja.
I left Kanchipuram at the end of the morning to approach Chennai where I wished to enter the 22/01 in the early morning to look for a bivouac in the city!

The target of the stay in Chennai was to solve administrative problems, Carnet de Passage in Douanes and instruction of the transfer file of my truck into Malaysia.