Day 10: Our trip blocked by landslide!

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Well, this is the day that we'll probably remember the most about the whole trip. Nothing bad happened, but stuff certainly did happen. We're all safe and sound, and that's all that matters.

After a breakfast where we got to see rice noodles being made (rice and water mix brushed over a tray, then steamed) and a slight delay in leaving because the hotel was not happy with Jane's staining of a towel while drying a shirt (¥38 fee), we headed off for a 22km ride out of town. Quite pleasant, with slight rain that eventually disappeared.

We then loaded our bikes onto the truck to change to a different route because the road was apparently blocked ahead by a landslide. We had another roadside lunch of peanut butter and banana sandwiches, then went for another ride.

After 20km or so our trip was stopped by a landslide. Traffic was backed up, so we cycled ahead and found a large portion of a cliff face had fallen onto the road, including some rocks almost as large as a car. A bulldozer was already working on the pile from our side and another two from the other side.

Pedestrians were streaming around the rockfall, in some cases carrying bags in the hope of getting on a bus on the other side. After a while we realised this would take some serious time to clear so we put our bikes in the truck, hopped in the can and diverted to another route. Including a dinner stop, the trip took 6 hours! Our van driver is quite experienced and we thanked him after the trip, but there were many scary moments with difficult overtaking and many instances of animals on the road. We almost ploughed into a Ox on the road after dusk, invisible in the darkness. Luckily, we made it without incident.

The truck with our bags had waited until the rockfall was cleared and reached the hotel an hour later than we did, so diverting had been a good decision. I took the chance to watch a couple of movies on the iPad during the long journey, which caused as much bottom cramps for some people as riding on bikes!

We stayed the night in Zhongshan.

Back to normal schedule tomorrow.

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