Dunhuang, China
Trip Start
Jun 01, 2008
1
29
35
Trip End
Nov 12, 2008
Dunhuang, Gansu, China
Friday, October 10, 2008
Imagine this, you cycle 75km in an extremely tough headwind, at moments you are going around 11km an hour to even slow down to 8km when climbing the hills. It takes you around 4 and half hours to get to lunch ...you are starving and when you get there you are given bread for your tuna sandwich which is so hard you would not even want to give it to your kids to use as a frisbee as it will kill people. At the best it is good for a nice round door stopper, but to ask us to put it in our mouth and actually manage to bite through it is utterly insane. The excuse we were given, this is how they make bread here...and we only bought it yesterday. Cant fool me!! not when 500 meters back there was beautiful fresh round bread on the site of the road for sale. The complains coming out of every bodies mouth was fair but kept me entertained that is for sure.In the afternoon the wind dropped off a bit so it didn't take us another 4,5 hours to get to camp but had enough time to set up my tent, have two beer i had been carrying in my back pannier for 30 km's. Dinner was served...a nice bowl of spaghetti bolognese, there were no leftovers as you can imagine.. we all were a little hungry.
DAY 123 "8 hours an hour...." - desertcamp - 140km
...is what I did for many hours of the day..8km's!! The morning started off ok, Max and I were solving all worlds problems, but once the sun was fully up the headwind appeared. Stronger and gustier than I have ever experienced on a bike. Dangerous as well as the wind blew you across the road as you didn't have the strength to stay in the same spot. When the trucks were flying past it made it even worse. It felt like you were having a pillow fight, as on one hand the wind was hitting you in the face and then the trucks came past to give you another blow across. At two occasions I had to stop as it was too much and would have been thrown off my bike. Whilst struggling through the wind I came across some weird animal statues painted white. Strange thing to see giraffes, a deer, a bull in the desert..rather peculiar. Maybe to keep people entertained when traveling across these long stretches of the desert. Bit like Australia with their big bananas, big prawn etc.. Anyways my afternoon was even going slower than my morning and for a couple of hours I seriously was only doing 8km's an hour. At stages it was really getting to me, but you get out of those bad mind moments. One time Joost came cycling past and tried to encourage me, "Manon only 28km to go!", thanks Joost but as I am going 8km that means another 3,5hours!!! I know he meant it nicely, but man that was tough. Finally after 120km the road turned slightly which helped me enormously. So after 9 hours and 10 minutes on the bike, having left camp at 8.30am and arrived at 6.30pm I finally got there. Have I told you how much I hate headwinds! And to make matters worse the wind continued throughout the night, which didn't help at all as the noise was so loud, i would describe it as the sound of a subway inside my tent...I think I slept for 1 hour at the most, not that we need much sleep on this trip..oh dear!
DAY 124&125 "3,500km to Beijing" - 280km
..the roadsigns to Beijing have started to appear, sounds so close but still so far. The temperatures are getting colder and we only have another 6 camping days left before we start staying in hotels due to the cold but also as we are slowly moving to more civilized areas where finding a camping spot might not be as easy. No more setting up tent, baby wipe showers, desert toilets and miles' cooking. I think I will only miss the latter. I have combined the last two days as it was "same same" except for staying in a hotel in Hami on one of the two nights, but besides that it was like "Groundhog day". Desert, strong headwinds and 140km each day, with the pleasure of some more animal statues to keep you entertained, no villages though. Had a chat to one of the dirt sweep ladies, they keep the roads immaculate even out here in the desert. Now that makes you really appreciate your job and will think twice before I complain about my job again. Sadly enough no beers to enjoy at the end of the ride but one of the riders had bought some odd looking rum which we put in our hot chocolates and coffee and enjoyed the amazing sky full of stars, as you can imagine they are spectacular out in the desert.
DAY 126 "10,000km"!!!!!!!!! - 140km
Can you believe it, i cant believe it myself but it is true. Would I ever cycle that amount in one go again, I don't think so, but who knows...This morning there was a big chill in the air when we got up, very hard to get going when it is so cold and you are so nice and snug in your sleeping bag. But somehow we manage to do it again, and cycled another 140km through the desert. I reckon tough that legs only last for four months till you need to get new ones. They say they get stronger but that I now know is a lie...I need new ones! Especially when today we also did quite a bit of climbing and some of the flat changed into rolling hills, few camels but still no villages and people besides the trucks flying past 100 miles an hour. We did cross into a new province (Gansu) however after having been in the the Xinjuang province for quite some time now, almost like crossing a border without the 10 hours waiting. When we got to camp it was quite cold so with the help of our local support we built a fire to keep warm whilst eating before retiring to our tents.
DAY 127 "Freezing cold but a tailwind! " - Camp to Dunhunag 140km
Oh my...was it cold this morning. I almost felt like I was getting ready for a days skiing, too bad it was my bike instead of a nice pair of Salomon carve skies, but all rugged up we took off in the cold. After 10kms we turned off to the right as we were heading to Dunhuang which is off the mainroad and can you believe it for the first time we got a tailwind after all those days of the pestering headwind. We so deserved it.. and you realise then what a difference it makes to a days cycling. It was fun again as I hardly had to move my pedals to go 28km per hour. In the afternoon the wind turned slightly so we had to do some work but were still going fast enough. We moved into a snowstorm, then saw ten camels being tight up behind a motor cycle that was moving quite fast..poor creatures! The desert turned fertile, with irrigation systems and cotton fields. I arrived into town at a reasonable hour, the temperature was nice and needed a cold beer to cool down. Dunhuang looks like a nice town, nicest we have seen since arriving to China...and after 840kms on the bike we have two rest days here.. time to relax!
Comments
Thanks
Thank you again for a lovely update. You look well and happy. Lekker humor, mooie verhalen.
Ik geniet!
xxx