Somewhere along the way, geography and maths got the better of us and somehow slipped from our otherwise meticulous planning. Where we’d initially calculated the car journey between our Karnataka and Kerala lodgings to take a lazy six hours (nice and easily doable, even at a snail’s pace), the day before leaving Coorg we realised it was in fact going to take eleven!

With all the looming characteristics of a game changer, we leapt into action, investigating all possible alternatives, including whether to just bite the bullet and book a couple of flights to reach Lake Vembanad by dusk instead.

But after much deliberating, and when flight times didn’t quite line up with our ambitious itinerary, we decided screw it, we’ll stick with the original plan and we’ll see (and save) much more by car anyway. And the decision paid off, big time.

The alarm went off the next morning just before five, and by 6.30 we were back in our happy place (the glass is always half full in India!), once again perched in the back seat of the hired car, blurry and still half asleep, but ready to stare down the barrel of the gazillions of tarsealed kilometres that lay before us.

But Coorg threw us a curveball, and as luck would have it Jackie Stewart’s clone Shafi entered the frame that morning and got us from A to B in next to no time – so quick in fact that we had plenty of time to spare at the other end, and were able to toast a pot of hot coffee and take a comical series of obligatory snaps together (to confirm our survival) on the edge of the lake by late afternoon.

It had been an epic journey. We lost count of the absurdly bold (guys on Royal Enfields, Hondas, Yamahas you name it, precariously balancing the unthinkable – at one stage a 12 foot steel pole, later a stained glass window, quickly trumped by a newborn baby) and the beautiful (village wedding celebrations on the side of the road, another of south India’s infamous breakfast masala dosas – this time washed down with a creamy-fresh pineapple juice and a masala tea chaser).

We were at Shafi’s mercy and through the course of the day we sailed pin-straight down the centre of the map, which he knew like the back of his hand. Through small coastal towns and larger traffic-jammed metropolises like Kochi, we zipped down the coast with this very astute young man of (generally-speaking) very few words, who would occasionally break into a yarn or two (depending on the vista) about how salt or rice is produced by local villagers, or asking if he could turn up the car stereo to better hear his favourite power ballad.

At one stage feeling like a couple of extras in an out-take from The Fast & The Furious (the kind that turn to look at each other incredulously after a madcap stunt), we were in utter disbelief when, at well over 100kph, quiet, gentle Shafi successfully overtook two buses – between them – one overtaking the other down the centre line, and with a car on the opposite inside lane also overtaking them at the same time as us and at the same speed. It was the most bizarre thing and weirdly exhilarating, and it was all we could do to stop ourselves from high-fiving like a couple of nerds from New Zealand in the back.

When we eventually skidded to a dusty halt at the end of a labyrinth of quiet suburban lanes filled with beautiful bungalows and tropical gardens, and virtually fell out of the car at the feet of the concierge, we couldn’t quite believe where we’d landed. Here we were in the most serenely calm (after what we’d just experienced), and the most beautifully and extravagantly-curated entrance we’d seen yet. Yet again with the lucky white rat working his magic, we feigned disappointment when, due to a slight mix-up with our booking, we were upgraded to the largest suite in the manor, overlooking the lake. Could things get any better? We certainly didn’t want to jinx it.

After dropping us off, Shafi was steadfast about returning to Coorg that night – a journey that would see him arrive home to his wife and kids at first light the next day. With our pleas proving futile, and after eventually agreeing to stop and take proper rest breaks along the way (and photos – especially if he came across a bull elephant crossing), he set off on his way and we headed to the bottom of the garden for an early dinner of fresh calamari and lagers, under a bright orange Keralan sun which was just starting to set over the lake.

Lake Vembanad is charming. It’s a whopping 14 km at its widest point, 2,114 square kilometres in total (Lake Taupo is 216). It’s so big it’s considered one of the largest lakes in India, and one of the largest freshwater lakes in Asia. With causeways running in and out of it like veins, it’s a rich economic and food source for the many communities dotted around it. As we toasted lagers to Shafi, we looked forward to another highlight of our trip which was now just on the horizon – an overnighter on a houseboat meandering up and down Vembanad’s rivers from just outside Alleppey.

But we still had time to kill in this exquisite lakeside setting, and when we woke early the next morning and both checked for word from Shafi – there they were! Not just confirmation he’d arrived back in one piece, but image after image of the very encounter we’d so coveted! As bold as brass, in amongst the roadside vegetation of the forest foothills just outside Kodagu, a young bull elephant, waiting patiently to cross the road.