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8 Years with my Ford Figo Aspire: Celebrated with a North Sikkim trip

26th April 2025, 11:52 by Kanad Kalasur

As the 8th year anniversary was happening, and I found myself with a long weekend in the middle of April. I thought, what better way of celebrating car ownership other than a long drive?

BHPian NaXal recently shared this with other enthusiasts:

Celebrating 8 years of TDCi with a North Sikkim Trip

8 Years ago, in April 2017, I took delivery of this car. Ford Aspire 1.5 TDCi Titanium. Till date, the car has covered around 60k kms and apart from Regular Service, one set of front brake disc pads and a battery along with a rear power window switch replacement, so far, it only needed regular oil change service.

As the 8th year anniversary was happening, and I found myself with a long weekend in the middle of April. I thought, what better way of celebrating car ownership other than a long drive?

Preparation – Mechanical Service

Aspiring difficult drives need some basic preparation so prepone the service and went to Ford Service Center (ASC) for a quick check up and service.

Although Ford India has shut shop, but their after sales/service is still functional and doing a decent job.

Initially, due to lack of time in my hand, I wanted to simply replace the engine oil, engine oil filter and air filter for this trip. However, the SA (service advisor) flat-out refused to perform the job. It was either a full service or no work policy at the service center I visited.

I had now two options, refuse to take the full service option and walk to do the work at any outside location or waste the entire day at ASC for this simple work that I needed.

Spare parts aren’t any issue since Ford Spare Parts Wherehouse is right on a main road near airport and being a hub location, everything is available there. Except the engine oil. Finding Ford 1.5 TDCi specific 5w30 engine oil is a challenge, very few oil available as retail in India meets their (Ford's) special text -> WSS-M2C913-D

I could only find Mobil Super™ 3000 X1 FORMULA FE 5W-30 at my disposal meeting this specs from outside stores. Due to limited time in my hand, online option wasn’t that suitable.

But with this oil, 3.5L pack is not going to meet the 3.8L requirement, I may have to waste money of extra can or buy a 500ml pack of Quartz 8000 NFC 5W-30 to mix and achieve the level. However, financially this outside route seems as expensive as doing a full service at Ford ASC since their sourced oil is available at almost half the price due to their purchase of large drums.

So I gave the SA a counter proposal, I would skip the wash and only do following,

Oil Change / Oil Filter Change / AirFilter Change / Cabin AC Filter Change / Complete Brake Service along with brake oil replacement and necessary bleeding and a quick but thorough visual inspection of the mechanicals by their best or most experienced available mechanic. I had replaced the coolant at my previous service visit so I skipped it.

Although Ford TDCi has no coolant replacement like many MJD, like Maruti DDiS, which needs coolant replacement at every alternate year, but proactively, I have replaced the coolant at my last service so I skipped replacing the coolant.

I needed the work done quickly and asked them to offer me some discount on the full service cost. SA accepted my proposal and they assigned two mechanics immediately at the job. Entire work was completed within 2 hours. Nothing unusual was found and car was deemed at very good condition to proceed.

SA kept his promise and offered a healthy discount. Initial estimate for a full service with my requirement was around Rs. 5700/- to Rs. 5900/- but after discount, I paid Rs. 4300/- for parts and labour

Extremely cheap, isn’t it? Especially when I compare with my family’s Maruti (Nexa) DDiS service costs.

Preparation – Tyres

My present tyres were still good enough for mountains, since just two months ago, in January 2025, I went to East and West Sikkim and I often drive to Darjeeling / Lava / Kalimpong.

However, North Sikkim is a different ballgame.

So I decided to prepone this work too. Hey, it’s 8 birthday afterall, so why not new shoe?

Initially I wanted to get stock make and model. This car came with Apollo Alnac 175/65-R14 but Apollo no longer selling this particular model. I tried my best to spent couple days in evening hours, after office, to roam around to find any stock but no luck. No dealer had any stock. I really wanted this tyre since it was much cheaper than my next choice.

So, I had to increase the budget for my next best possible option, Yokohama Earth 1.

Rs. 5250/- per tyre along with fitment, balancing (weight included) and alignment.

With the service and tyres taken care of, spent a few hours in city. To drive around and check for any issues post these works. No problem, car felt lively and eager to take up the challenge.

Let there be Light – Auxiliary Headlights / fog-lights
(Full DYI detachable setup)

Since a major part of drive was going to be through high speed highways in night hours, I needed more than my stock lights.

In modern era, the stock headlight / fog-light of Ford Aspire is really a joke. It’s kind of a big safety hazard against those trucks blasting their 6 to 8 pairs of 130/110 on your face.

I really don’t like cutting or splicing wires or do holes in my cars. I like them as stock as possible.

So ordered following from Amazon India,

HJG Laser Beam Mini Projectors -> https://amzn.to/3Ge6Fo3
Wireless (RF) Switch with Relay -> https://amzn.to/3EAVOE9
Male / Female Pair of Barrel Jacks -> https://amzn.to/4cBkDMZ
Zip Tie -> https://amzn.to/42Fl2td
10amp inline Car electrical fuse (Local Purchase)
Multiple Color Electrical Wires (Local Purchase)
Black Tape, Soft but thick Dual Sided tape (Book store), small paper cutting knife (local purchase)

Then I went to a nearby grill factory (local stutter / grill making shacks) to find the lightest possible material to make two "Z" shape clamps as per the measurement I took out from my car.

Connected the wireless remote box with the battery (placed the fuse in between box & battery) and pulled the wires up till my radiator grill (front side, between bumper grill and radiator)). Secured them via zip tie neatly so that nothing was lose or flapping around.

Aspire / Figo bumper has 4 screw up top to adjust the gap between bonnet and bumper lip.

I used those to pull the bumper little forward to allow placing my Z clam there. I used the same mounting holes to place the clamp and secure it with the same screw. I placed thick dual sided tape underneath to reduce vibration and prevent any scratch. However, still there were some vibration at idle, so had to place some tape in-front, below the lights and put a bottle cap below to ensure just enough pressure to kill the vibration completely.

I could now operate the light using remote. There was no need to pull any wires inside for operational switch or to tap / splice any wire or do fuse tapping.

This setup looks really unprofessional and outright ugly. But this is (Z clamp + lights) somewhat easily detachable while wiring staying hidden within the bonnet.

I only needed this for Kolkata to Siliguri and then Siliguri to Kolkata drive.

It takes around 15 mins to do following,

Open the Bonnet
Connect the fuse to make the setup live
Use a 4 pole screw driver to remove two screw (bumper lip)
Place the Z clamp (lights attacked) and tighten the two screw
Place the dual sided tape (in front of the bumper) along with those to bottle caps

Done, lights are operational. Then same routine in opposite order to remove the lights. As per my planned itinerary, I would only need to do this twice. One removal process after sunrise during onwards journey and one installation during return leg after sunset.

Extra -> Emptied the ASC given Shampoo water from wiper washer fluid tank and used one wiper washer fluid mix with anti-freezing property / Carried one 12v Tyre Inflator.

North Sikkim April 2025 Trip
Sikkim - The State with No Roads

Day 1 – Kolkata to Gangtok Sprint

Started with full tank of fuel from Kolkata at around 9PM after completing office. Took the “Kalyani Expressway” route. Excellent road conditions here, flew to my exit at “Kampa More” https://maps.app.goo.gl/r7wuoaZk48Y9XFsc8 in no time.

From “Kampa More” took a right turn in “Kachrapara HarinGhata Road” towards “Barajaguli More”. Road condition was good, local traffic was moderate, but too many speed humps made this small section irritating to drive. This section was mix of 50/50 single (very wide) lane and 2x2.

From “Barajaguli More”, connected up with NH12 (Old name NH34) by taking the left turn towards Siliguri. From here on, NH12 (old NH34) was full 2x2 double lane. Traffic was light to moderate and started to deplete as the night progressed.

Our first break came rather quickly at “Mother’s Hut” near “KrishnaNagar”. It was a rather long break for dinner and then toilet.

After dinner, as family buckled up to take some nap, I got my head down to push hard to take advantage of the light truck traffic to munch as much mile as possible before the next stop.

Aux lights & Ford DNA along with this explosive 1.5 TDCi showed their dominance here, I could easily maintain the road’s speed limit as my cruising average.

Apart from couple of section near “Baharampur Rail Gate” and few road repair sections, and “Farrakka Barrage”, the entire route was in good condition allowing very high cruising speed

Although, the trade mark feature of old NH34, the sudden few meters of massive broken patches remained. Thankfully, my light setups and Ford Aspire braking was good enough to safely spot them well in advance and then slow down to navigate out of them.

Our second break was at "Dalkhola" BP Pump / Azad hind Dhaba. It was a mistake to stop there. Toilets were in horrible condition as packs of 9400/9600 Volvos were also stopping there.

TDCi drunk some black gold as I drunk a small cup of black coffee. Used the horrible toilet and stretched the legs before resuming the push towards Siliguri via NH27 (old NH31)

Road conditions were horrible right after “Dalkhola” towards Siliguri. Although it was a toll way with 2x2 double lane but just horrible roads. The pain continued till “Kishanganj” and beyond, as good road sections only started before “Islampur”.

Reached “Siliguri Bagdogra AirPort” with daylight breaking out but with heavy rain.

Gave a short stop beside a roadside empty shack. I removed the aux lights as family used the time to freshen up and brushing the teeth in that shade while stretching our legs.

Navigated through the Siliguri early morning city traffic towards “Sevok Forest Road”. Road conditions at Bengal side of the hills were mostly good. Wide enough for two large trucks cross each other, well paved but not like what one might find their climb to Manali. There were certain narrow sections choking the traffic and heavy opposite traffic always keep you busy.

Heavy rain continued as we pressed on towards Gangtok. Climbing at a steady speed, keeping up with the local tourist vehicle traffic while enjoying the mountain roads and Ford driving DNA.

However, the joy was short lived as, right before Kalimpong, I found myself in a massive traffic jam. It seemed there was previous notification about NH10 closure on my travel dates for repair work. But fortunately, work was stopped due to heavy rain but unfortunately, traffic was crawling via those under construction sections of NH10. One side at a time, traffic crawled and we climbed at a walking pace.

TDCi is known for it’s heavy clutch and soon the joy of mountain roads turned into bitter knee pain. After driving 650 kms throughout the night, who can enjoy that much of constant clutching while climbing up?

The pain continued till "Rongpo" (WB/SK Border). After multiple traffic jams, multiple long stops, traffic started flowing normally. However, NH10 was still showing the signs of heavy damage it took back in 2023 with Teesta Floods.

Reached Gangtok and checked into my hotel by late afternoon.

This delay messed up my plans of permit process since by the time I would fresh up and take launch, I knew the permit cell would be closed for the day. But still drove down the Central Permit Cell at Gangtok and found many agents roaming around to catch potential clients like me.

I had previously done my permit myself from 3rd mile check post for East Sikkim so I knew this wasn’t a big deal but it would be troublesome for me to navigate the heavy morning tourist traffic & long queue of permit window since I planned to leave really early next morning for North Sikkim. So decided to bite the bullet and hire the services of a permit agent for the job. Rs. 1500/- for 5N/6D North Sikkim Permit (car + people) was promised at Hotel delivery by 6:30AM

I went back to hotel and then took a taxi to MG Marg for some leisure time but rain spoiled everything, had to return back early and sleep early for next day travel.

Day 2 – North Sikkim

Woke up early with heavy sky and thunderous rain. Permit agent was nowhere on time. Infact he kept on delaying and I got the physical permit papers in hand by 10:30AM only. I was supposed to start the drive at 6:30 but started 5 hours late at 11AM.

Fortunately, I had a xerox (photo copy) store near to the hotel so quickly did multiple copies of xerox. As you need to submit photo copy at numerous check points.

By the way, someone start few portable photo copy business at Sikkim. They charge Rs. 5 to Rs. 20 (depending on the place) for single copy of xerox. Seriously, think, Rs. 20 per copy? Sure, one can understand the remote location, power issues and all that but Rs. 20 a copy?

Anyway, the store near to me didn’t rob me that much, I was charged the lowest figure.

We already had a really late start, on top, city traffic along with heavy tourist traffic delayed us further. I took the longer but relatively easier route towards “Mangan” via NH310A (Tashi View Point).

Roads were narrow, climb was getting stiffer compared to Siliguri to Gangtok (NH10). Broken roads, especially at narrow hairpins was already making me worried about my decision to bring a compact sedan in this route. But still it was somewhat manageable.

This route has multiple tourist destinations, we only stopped at those which were right on the main road. Traffic movement was slow due to heavy tourist traffic along with long walks from roadside parking. But multiple stops meant we lost more and more time.

As we proceeded further, slowly, smaller cars started to disappear. Bolero, Innova type large SUVs were the only one where our tiny TDCi felt bit odd.

We reached lower Mangan junction (called Upper Mangshila) point by 3PM. Sikkim Police sign boards informed us that the Mangan to Chungtham route via Naga Falls was closed for tourists. It was washed out in last flood. All cars were redirected down towards Dikchu for river crossing and then an alternative route (which is not available in Google Maps).

Although I saw bikers still pushing on that old Naga Falls route.

Now diversion from here means, this was the last Petrol Pump for the entire route and my 40L tank (incl reserve) won't do the entire route. Same was confirmed by the petrol pump people too as I could see all the local tourist vehicles were filling up extra cans of fuel. The pump was really busy with long queue as every single vehicle on this route was waiting in line to get their fuel.

Local shops were selling 10L plastic cans for fuel carry. I tried to search for 20L tubs but only 10L was available. So bought 2 of them and used plastic waste bags to tightly secure them to prevent leakage along with filling up the car to its brim.

We took our launch here and then started the onwards journey towards Dikchu. One could see the scale of the disaster which happened two years ago. Road conditions were moderate since road building work from Upper Mangshila to Dickhu is almost done.

There was an army (BRO) controlled bridge at Dikchu to cross the river to go to the other side. Single lane, one car at a time. Traffic jam was somewhat massive. Took some time to cross the bridge

The new but temporary route is just a trail, cut through the mountains and dense forest. Not visible in Google Maps, we went ahead. Road went from bad to worst to no roads under no time.

Really narrow sections, with really stiff climbs, often progress getting stuck due to on-coming traffic.

Soon I released, I was the only small car in this route full of Innova, Bolero and Scorpio. On top, every single passing driver was giving me a bantering look, especially their eyes were down at my Ground Clearance and it didn’t take long for me to figure out why.

This recent rain had made this temporary route into a full fledge off roading adventure trail.

Rain wasn’t stopping, on top, slow movement meant within no time it was full dark.

BRO personals were present, here and there, with their on spot limited equipment, trying to counter the effects of this present heavy rain but their limited on spot resources were simply overwhelmed.

Inclines were like vertical wall at times, with lot of water crossing and instead of roads, it was just rocks with boulders along with toppings of mud, slush and huge holes along with heavy rain in complete darkness.

Bigger higher GC SUVs were constantly scraping, sliding and was showing their struggle to climb those really poor sections. One may understand, what was my condition with a low ground clearance, FWD compact sedan.

I was trapped, there was no way of turning back from this point with such heavy upwards traffic behind me and conditions were simply out of scope for this low GC FWD car.

Circus was what I was doing for those completely washed out sections.

Here are some Glimps for reference -> https://www.instagram.com/thesikkimt...0H4S_4W/?hl=en things were much worse than this. I dont have many pictures since it was dark, get an idea from this.

High RPM clutch slippage to keep the momentum, massive burn out wheel spins, rapid opposite directional steering movement to try and find that little grip, little traction to move forward and climb up. I was sacrificing the entire underbody with just one aim to protect my bumper lip (radiator) and front right section of engine bay (oil pan).

At times, some sections felt impossible. Either I was going to damage the radiator or burst open the oil pan or simple my tyres would slit open with such burn outs against the rocks. But TDCi and Yokohama kept on taking the hits and kept on climbing. Felt like its Lord Mahadev himself was pushing it up in those hopeless conditions.

With every passing hour, at every traffic jam, those bantering looks of local drivers slowly started to change into a compassionate look. At those long stand-still waiting periods, slowly they came up to talk, to chat, and started to give some advices and tips.

First we crossed “Chungtham”. Entire rider fleet seemed to call it a day by this time and were searching for night stay there at Chungtham town. But the cars pressed on via Chopta Valley towards Lachen with similar horrible road conditions with heavy rain

It was like middle of the night (around 12:30), our convoy of “Lachen” Bound vehicles crossed the Lachen Check Post (permit verification) and entered the sleepy dark village. Roads suddenly became good, network returned (only AirTel, no Jio) and lights started to turn on all around. What felt like a few houses small village, now looked like a proper small mountain town with lights visible all around.

The entire town is basically a giant home stay. Every house is like hotel but without any staff since the family of that house manages the entire facility.

I had prior booking and my host called me up asking for my whereabouts. She took my car number and relayed that to a family member who was standing at the main road to catch me and direct me towards their home stay hotel.

Nice 4 storied building with plenty of double / triple / 4 bed rooms along with attach bathrooms. All modern facilities one could expect from a small hotel. They didn’t have grid power, it was down. So it was a small but heavy duty generator.

Geyser didn’t run, a small boy took our luggage up stairs and came running back with a bucket full of hot water. All these without asking. Husband of the host came to meet us at our room asking for anything that we may need. My better half did all the interacting, since I was almost burnt out.

I was exhausted, physically and mentally, I was completely burnt out. Mentally I was somewhat shaking, I was still at disbelieve that this car made it so far without any breakdown.

We weren’t the only guest, our convey had other local tourist vehicles bringing many other tourists into the hotel. We were given 15/20 mins to prepare and were asked to come up to the top floor for our dinner in their dining area. As the rest of the guests settled down at dining room, for some reason, the host invited me and my better half to join the family in their kitchen. Perhaps, she cloud read my mental condition at that point.

Very warm and comforting people they were. But unfortunately, her cooking was completely opposite. She cooked many items for us that night. Always ready to meet any need of ours but unfortunately, I could not eat much. It wasn’t bad but rather food was just tasteless. Rather I enjoyed my chat with the family, it helped me to calm down. Their warm hospitality cooled my nerves and made me relax. By this time, all the local tourist vehicle drivers lodging in this hotel came up stairs. They suggested me to start really early for our target of Gurudombar Lake

May be the food was alright, it was me who wasn't but in anyway, used my emergency ration to fill the belly before crashing out in the bed.

Day 3 – Failed Attempt of Gurudombar Lake

With just 4 hours of sleep, we were up by 5AM.

By then, I realized my mistake of single day booking of “Lachen”. I really needed a break after 2 days of so many hours of tough driving. It would have been really nice if I could take this day off to rest at Lachen and attempt Gurudombar on next morning. But the previous night’s food experience discouraged me to do so.

We started the drive out from Lachen at around 5:30AM. Rain never stopped in this trip apart from slowing down to drizzle then increasing again. Not just us, the entire convey of bikers and tourist cars were in the road towards Gurudombar. Road conditions after Lachen was mostly good. Roads were narrow but almost the entire traffic was moving up so didn’t face any slowdown till we reached the river crossing. It was here, where the 2023 flash flood basically started.

It was completely washed out, BRO had a temporary road built to get down to riverbed then use a small temporary bridge to cross the waterline and then another temporary road up connecting up to the main road.

Traffic was stuck at this point, since rain ensured much higher water level and those makeshift up & down connections were somewhat unpassable. Few bikers and RWD SUVs were stuck due to the stiff angel along with mud and boulders.

BRO had stopped the traffic and were assisting the stuck vehicles. Soon the section was deemed closed and their onside heavy equipment deployed to try and manage the conditions. Traffic was backed up for several kms with so many tourist vehicles, army convoy, bikes and one tiny out state TDCi

Meanwhile, I could see, from bantering looks to compassion and now worrying faces of local drivers staring at my car. I could judge from their body language they were discussing about my car. I walked up to them, who were bunched up together and tried to strike a conversation.

Meanwhile, some locals from Lachen drove up to the tail of the traffic jam and then walked up further with Tea / Coffee and some food. Soon we had roadside vendors selling those food & drinks as the entire traffic waited for hours in rain for the road to reopen.

Local drivers offered me some treats like popcorn or local small food items which they had bought from those local vendors along with some tea and started to express their deep concern about this section. They themselves were worried since the section to them felt unusually difficult at this point. They knew from their comrades who got stuck with their A/T tyre high GC RWD SUVs that little TDCi had next to no chance with it’s approach angle. Boulders & holes were too tall for the front bumper lip to clear with a speedy momentum

They advised me to first asses the conditions by watching the traffic and then attempting. But not to brute force it since a breakdown here would be seriously problematic. A Scorpio-N driver, parked just behind me with only two guests on board offered me & family a ride in his car to “Gurudombar” and “Kalapaththar”

Kind of disheartening for me since man and machine are supposed to be one unit. If I go, so must the car. Can’t leave it behind, but looking at the disappointment in the eyes of my better half, I agreed.

But Lord Mahadev had other plans.

If TDCi wasn't going, no one would. Since the rain never stopped, water level never subsided and onsite equipment were not enough, BRO needed more trucks, materials. Which wasn’t possible due to this massive traffic jam. So the army personal walked up through the queue, asking all to returned back down to Lachen to clear the road for their heavy equipment to come up for the work. Lake route, by then, was effectively closed for civilian movement.

After 4 hours of wait, the entire pack took U turn with broken hearts, shattered dreams and utter disappointment and started the drive down to "Lachen".

My home stay hotel hosts were adamant to feed us a meal before letting us go. There was no way I could hurt their feelings with blunt no, so had a cup of black coffee, which fortunately tasted alright and started our descend down to Chungtham. Crossed those difficult section through the "Chopta Valley" in daylight. This time around, while descending, it felt little in control, unlike the climb of previous night. Here with daylight, I could see the front car and long view of read ahead properly and then plan my moving track and tackle it accordingly.

From Chungtham to Lachung, the road conditions were overall good. Wide enough road and only a few washed out section or water crossings. Mood lightened up, my worries were gone as Lachung was seriously beautiful. So many flowers all around. The views were stunning.