after arriving at iitb at around 830am i decide that i will not go to sleep but rather stay up and try to sync to indian time the hardcore way. the 4 hours 30 minutes time difference to switzerland are quite noticeable.

we head out to customs and a very long while later we arrive and meet our agent, john.

entering customs free zone, we proceed to our container. the container looks very interesting, since there are cables coming from it and going into the local power distribution centre.

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the cables and the installation itself looks very dodgy. but interestingly enough, we get very clean 50hz 239V!

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then team TWIKE can concentrate on helping the other teams with their cars – we push the two thinks out of the container (their NaCl high temperature batteries seem to take longer to get back to temperature and charge) – the TWIKE only lost about 2% battery charge during transit and is able to get out of the container on its own. the last car, the green twingo, still needs to be pryed from the container, since it is still suspended at 30°.

the think city cars both are plugged in an we then start waiting for john to work his magic. here a picture of john and our trusted dockhand/forklift driver ranjeet.

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it takes a full 6 hours of going from counter to counter, moving vehicles from one part of customs to the other. in the next picture, we’re waiting again…

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during this time the TWIKE gets a first taste of what it means to be the first TWIKE to ever have been on the subcontinent: we always have a good 20-100 people around the vehicle!

twike at customs in mumbai
twike at customs in mumbai

inbetween we head off to a nearby stall and get some yummy lassi, which gives us a photo opp with some of the wave drivers!

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finally, at the end of the day, we can leave the compound and make our way back to mumbai with our cars.

heading off to mumbai after release from customs
heading off to mumbai after release from customs

the thinks stay at a nearby petrol station – we hope by the next day that the batteries will be hot enough to allow charging.

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