Awesome twosome: Man Mohan Singh and his wife Annu at Pangong Tso

You’ve managed to squeeze a few days out of your busy schedule. The heat is unbearable and you’re dying for a whiff of fresh air. Your car, just back from the garage, is all geared up for a long drive. What do you do? Drive away to the hills, is Man Mohan aka Koko Singh’s prompt response. And if you’re driving by the book ? or his books, for that matter ? the list of tips could be never ending. For Singh has, over the past two years, painstakingly written as many as four books under the title Driving Holidays in the Himalayas, for people who want to savour the pleasures of height.

The four-book series ? on Ladakh, Zanskar, Uttaranchal and Sikkim ? is a handy guide for anyone who’s eager to hit the hills in a car. But it would be incorrect to say that the places Singh mentions in his books can only be reached by car. For where the tarmac ends, Singh and his wife Annu, take to feet and survey trekking routes branching out of road-heads and scour the gorges and mountain slopes for adventure opportunities.

Travelling comes naturally to Singh. “When I was a child, my family would go for regular vacations in Kashmir,” he says. “That was how I got initiated into travelling, and it remained a passion through my years of growing up.”

Professional demands did, however, throw a spanner in Singh’s exciting itineraries in between. Singh was into business and he never had enough time to venture out of the city. It kept getting stifling and there came a point when Singh couldn’t take it anymore. In 1989, he quit everything and took up a job with Sruti, a non governmental organisation devoted to social and economic development in rural and urban India. Once out of the corporate groove, it did not take long for Singh to take wing. For someone who had ? even with a hectic schedule ? managed to hit the ‘eject’ button a couple of times and speed away towards the horizon, this new job was a blessing. Soon after, Singh’s first great expedition to the hills was in a Maruti 800. When he finally took his car as a service vehicle for his friend Rajeev Khanna at the Himalayan Rally, he experienced another dimension to travelling. “Driving has always been a pleasure, but there’s nothing like combining it with travelling.”

Thus began a new chapter in Singh’s life. From Maruti 800, Singh soon graduated to a Zen and today he owns a Honda City. Mind you, all his cars have clocked a fair number of kilometres on a higher altitude.

“Soon there came a time when Annu and I began to gain a dangerous reputation for travelling,” chuckles Singh. “That’s when I thought of working out something more substantial out of our sojourns and the first thing that came to our mind was a book devoted to travelling.”

Work on Driving Holidays... began about two years ago, says Singh, though the preliminary work had begun several years ago. “In fact, we had to cross-check all the information we had gathered earlier. Things such as road conditions, the number of petrol stations on one’s way, the hotel tariff and food expenses ? everything had changed over time,” says Singh.

Now all that may sound fine. But given that India has already been explored by wanderlusts and that several reputed travel guides ? including the Lonely Planet ? are already available on the racks, what does his books say that other books haven’t said already? “Pictures, to begin with,” defends Singh, arguing that many travel guides don’t have an adequate pictorial back-up that gives travellers a peek into the region they are keen to visit. Driving Holidays... is full of pictures, taken by the couple and their photographer-friend Ipshita Barua. “Second, the books are primarily meant for people who are eager to drive up in their vehicles, instead of backpacking. It includes information that may be relevant, such as the availability of petrol, permits and service stations,” says Singh. With all four books on the shelves, Singh’s eyes are now on Bhutan, a country he intends to drive across. “I don’t know yet if the trip might result in another book,” he says. A part from the sales of the book, published by Rupa & Co., is to be directed to Sruti for charitable purposes.

The more, then, the merrier.