CAMPING & LANGZHOU

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CAMPING: IN THE MIDDLE OF NOWHERE CHINA



Distance: 142 Kms SubT. 2177 Kms Bal 10,314 Kms Road Condition: mostly good

Weather: sunny, blue sky, white puffy clouds. Cooler. Good for riding.

Time in Saddle: 7 hrs Av Speed: av. 20 kph. Av Cadence. Rpm

Elevation: 1980 m (x4) up; 2000 m ( x2.5)

Calories burned : E 6000

A great sleep, perhaps in contemplation of tonight's camp. Ate a nourishing breakfast supermarket bought, yogurt drink, banana, apricots, bun with jam, watermelon. Made riding much more comfortable.

It was a heavy hills day, but taken at my own pace, it was quite comfortable. Rode alone most of the day, which was enjoyable as directions were straight forward, also allowed more toilet, drink and photo stops. The scenery was great, terraced hillsides, ready for planting, with long views without smog, largely devoid of tooting trucks, although many local buses. People were friendly. Saw many crofters caring for their sheep and/or goats.

Plenty of fast downhills over good roads.

Arrived in good time and good order. Erected tent without issue, and then went and ate a tasty vegetable soup. The camp is a harvested field. After soup returned for a bird bath to remove the road grit and dust. 4 days on the trot of camping should prove interesting!!!

A long afternoon looms. As it turned out , not so long. Tent refinements, etc wasted much time. Cycled into town looking for a cold beer but came up short, all hot. Ice creams looked as though they had melted then refrozen so passed.

Camp dinner was very tasting Indian Curry, Rice and Potato.

Turned in on sunset- 9.15. Shortly after the wind started and light rain began. I think the first time since arriving in China.



LANGZHOU:

Distance: 129 Kms SubT. 2306 Kms Bal 10,185 Kms Road Condition: country roads. 40% badly potholed, broken surface road.

Weather: sunny, blue sky, white puffy clouds. Cooler. Good for riding, heat in afternoon.

Time in Saddle: 6.5 hrs Av Speed: av. 20 kph. Av Cadence. Rpm

Elevation: 2600 m

Calories burned : E 5825

Today we cycled to LANGSHOU, a large Chinese city of 2.5 million, mostly Han featured Chinese people. Very different to local people seen in the country regions, who have a wider facial feature, strong in appearance, and friendlier. The city is very large and looks recently settled by the Han Chinese in the past few years. Especially important around voting time.

Apparently this is a mining town, most notably coal. On route saw many large power line infrastructure which must emanate from the power stations, presumably powered by coal, nearby to the city. Surprising little pollution here today, so saw beautiful blue sky, even the moon this evening. Very western cosmopolitan city with the usual large department stores and speciality stores. Clearly the city is wealthy which conflicts with the surrounding countryside.

The route today was long and fairly tiring. Maybe we are all just tired from long, climbing days and disturbed sleep on our first camping night. The first hill was 2600 metres of straight up. Afterwards hills were more minor in elevation. We had some exhilarating downhills. The flat roads were severely damaged, potholed and tiring to ride, due to battling large potholes, some 3 feet in diameter and 18 inches deep.

On arrival, sat and did little for a while before a local city wander. Ate tasty, fiery Chinese dishes for dinner. Am noticing far more chili and garlic in the cooking. Also at lunch today we had a nourishing potato curry, which helped power the legs.

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Comments

[Georgie]

That kitchen looks so clean! Eating there again tonight?