Lijiang-Panzhihua
YUNNAN August 2007
I made 30km the first night from Lijiang - up over a hill and a little way down but it was steep, quite wet, dark, I had bad breaks and every outside bend stood on the edge of a precipice, so I decided to stop by a barn and threw down my sleeping mat and bag under the cobwebbed eves of the woodshed and slept soundly despite the rain - just enough shelter for Bino! It is always very satisfying to get a good nights sleep in conditions most people would think were squalid and would not even consider resting in.
The next morning I exercised my wrists and foot break system for two hours as I decended the steep slope to the roaring Yellow River. Over the bridge was a gentle incline - not as bad as I had feared. I cycled about 20km in the rain, stripping off to avoid getting wet clothes. The clouds were drying up when a spoke on my back wheel snapped - the second ajacent one. I was looking at it by the side of the road when a dude with a truck stopped and told me to get on. I was not against it since the road was uphill and I had been invited out of the blue. He wanted to practice his English. OK - fair deal! He took me up a giant mountain that would have taken about 4 hours to cycle up and we chatted about beer and God and rice until he dropped me in Chengshan. The third street bike-repair-man was able to save my wheel. A very crafty fella! He did not even try to take off the rear cassette - the others said they could not help because they did not have that tool - instead he just hammered the button end of the spokes flat into a hook and put them in the other way! Very sly, and it worked fine! I set off after a bit of lunch and purchasing some provisions in the local stupidmarket - namely a big packet of haferflocken (oatmeal)!
The road descended for the rest of the day. From midday I made about 60km hardly peddling at all as I wound down scenic mountain roads in the drizzle. Beautiful ride! I was getting tired however, even a small incline felt tough but I did NOT want to stop in the little town where I had thought to eat. It was alive with staring Chinese and seemed like I would not have found any quiet spot to rest the night there.
I pushed on hoping to find a quiet roadside restaurant a bit further on where I could surrepticiously camp out nearby - on the sly. The road turned uphill suddenly - uh oh! Then it really started raining and night started falling too. Things were not looking good when suddenly I saw some little bungaloes by the side of the road - no Chinese family in the country lived in houses with windows facing out. most farm houses have a huge surrounding protecting wall with all the windows facing an inner courtyard. I cycled through the pouring rain and asked if it was a hotel - yes - only 10 quai a night. OK! Ill take it. The wife cooked me cabbage and Dong Tofu (delicious - even in a soup) and I took a warm candle lit shower, dried up, changed clothes and eat! Very contented. The best hotel in the world if you ask me! Nice little hut to myself under a bamboo bush. I slept like a log in the royal bed and lingered with my book in the morning until the sun came out to dry up all the rain at 10am. I set off up another long hill - this was tough - it was about 25 km up up up but never so steep that I needed to get off and push but still hard! Especially after I had been invited to a lunch of boiled squash and pickled cabbage. Anyhow, by about 2.30pm I made it to the top with a lot of help from the euphoric and energizing Sydney Bechet CD and my new cd player, a really thoughtful and generous present to myself, thankyou Bino! From there it was down hill all the way to the next town. However, the jazz workers flag blew off the back of my bike so I had to park and walk and hitch-hike about 3km back up hill to find it wet and crushed in the middle or the road - but found!!!! Honour saved. I took a short cut crosscountry straight down hill avoiding the swerving road and then picked up my bike. By about 5pm I pulled into Da something - I had thought of stopping there but it was just too ugly looking to contemplate. Everyone was black with oil from fixing cars and there was no pretty marketplace or old builidings visible from the road so I set straight through. Soon after I came to a hill and a truck drew along side me and I motioned to request to put my bike on the back. The driver nodded. A really nice dude from Panzihua - we chatted a lot considering my terrible Chinese - he invited me to dinner and drove like a maniac over the bumpy road to Panzihua. We arrived at the town and his boss sent him on another job but the station was 30km from the centre of town so I thanked him and set off.
YUNNAN August 2007
I made 30km the first night from Lijiang - up over a hill and a little way down but it was steep, quite wet, dark, I had bad breaks and every outside bend stood on the edge of a precipice, so I decided to stop by a barn and threw down my sleeping mat and bag under the cobwebbed eves of the woodshed and slept soundly despite the rain - just enough shelter for Bino! It is always very satisfying to get a good nights sleep in conditions most people would think were squalid and would not even consider resting in.
The next morning I exercised my wrists and foot break system for two hours as I decended the steep slope to the roaring Yellow River. Over the bridge was a gentle incline - not as bad as I had feared. I cycled about 20km in the rain, stripping off to avoid getting wet clothes. The clouds were drying up when a spoke on my back wheel snapped - the second ajacent one. I was looking at it by the side of the road when a dude with a truck stopped and told me to get on. I was not against it since the road was uphill and I had been invited out of the blue. He wanted to practice his English. OK - fair deal! He took me up a giant mountain that would have taken about 4 hours to cycle up and we chatted about beer and God and rice until he dropped me in Chengshan. The third street bike-repair-man was able to save my wheel. A very crafty fella! He did not even try to take off the rear cassette - the others said they could not help because they did not have that tool - instead he just hammered the button end of the spokes flat into a hook and put them in the other way! Very sly, and it worked fine! I set off after a bit of lunch and purchasing some provisions in the local stupidmarket - namely a big packet of haferflocken (oatmeal)!
The road descended for the rest of the day. From midday I made about 60km hardly peddling at all as I wound down scenic mountain roads in the drizzle. Beautiful ride! I was getting tired however, even a small incline felt tough but I did NOT want to stop in the little town where I had thought to eat. It was alive with staring Chinese and seemed like I would not have found any quiet spot to rest the night there.
I pushed on hoping to find a quiet roadside restaurant a bit further on where I could surrepticiously camp out nearby - on the sly. The road turned uphill suddenly - uh oh! Then it really started raining and night started falling too. Things were not looking good when suddenly I saw some little bungaloes by the side of the road - no Chinese family in the country lived in houses with windows facing out. most farm houses have a huge surrounding protecting wall with all the windows facing an inner courtyard. I cycled through the pouring rain and asked if it was a hotel - yes - only 10 quai a night. OK! Ill take it. The wife cooked me cabbage and Dong Tofu (delicious - even in a soup) and I took a warm candle lit shower, dried up, changed clothes and eat! Very contented. The best hotel in the world if you ask me! Nice little hut to myself under a bamboo bush. I slept like a log in the royal bed and lingered with my book in the morning until the sun came out to dry up all the rain at 10am. I set off up another long hill - this was tough - it was about 25 km up up up but never so steep that I needed to get off and push but still hard! Especially after I had been invited to a lunch of boiled squash and pickled cabbage. Anyhow, by about 2.30pm I made it to the top with a lot of help from the euphoric and energizing Sydney Bechet CD and my new cd player, a really thoughtful and generous present to myself, thankyou Bino! From there it was down hill all the way to the next town. However, the jazz workers flag blew off the back of my bike so I had to park and walk and hitch-hike about 3km back up hill to find it wet and crushed in the middle or the road - but found!!!! Honour saved. I took a short cut crosscountry straight down hill avoiding the swerving road and then picked up my bike. By about 5pm I pulled into Da something - I had thought of stopping there but it was just too ugly looking to contemplate. Everyone was black with oil from fixing cars and there was no pretty marketplace or old builidings visible from the road so I set straight through. Soon after I came to a hill and a truck drew along side me and I motioned to request to put my bike on the back. The driver nodded. A really nice dude from Panzihua - we chatted a lot considering my terrible Chinese - he invited me to dinner and drove like a maniac over the bumpy road to Panzihua. We arrived at the town and his boss sent him on another job but the station was 30km from the centre of town so I thanked him and set off.
It was an easy enough ride - along side the steaming fast muddy river - the Yangze I believe! Wow - even going down hill full speed, I was just keeping up with the speed of the spanking watercourse. I bought a corn on the cob and some water melon and that empowered me! I pumped with renewed energy and the nightfall did not make any difference because Panzihua seemed to spread into several different towns all along the river - all with wild 18 century looking smoke stacks choaking out smoke and even flames. I liked it! Like Karl Marx Stadt in its heyday or the Rhurgebiet or Chemnitz, Sheffield, Nottingham or the Black Hill country backy in the day! Eye opening if you could risk the soot! Everything was black and dirty - probably enhanced by the evening misty clouds. On the cycle ride to the station I met a few wierdos: one motorcyclists trailed me for about 15 km - that is a long time on a cycle!!! I think he came to the restaurant I eventually eat at near the station and stared at me as I eat but i am not sure because he did not have his helmet or goggles on. Anyhow, I read and drank tea until staring-mjan left and then pulled into the yard of a block of flats full of exercise machines. I warmed down, twisting, shaking, wiggling and pushing on each machine as I brushed my teeth then I set up my sleeping bag under a MaJong shelter and tried to sleep. Too much tea and some mosquitos messed things up and then it rained very hard - eventually I moved the camp to a better position and made the mosquito net nice and big and got some good sleep before dawn.
At dawn the Shuffler came and made a few laps of me. An old guy who did slowmo moonwalking - shuffling around me without seemingly moving anything except his slow eyelids. That made me feel it was time to wake up - I did not want to turn into a Kaaba for every pensioner in the block and I wanted to get to the station to see if there was a morning train. I was not even sure I could put my bike on ANY train so when I had packed up and arrived at the station and found there was not only a train but a spare seat for that afternoon AND posibility to put my bike on it, all for 80 yuan (8 euros) I was quite delighted!
I had everything done by 9am and went to get some breakfast after which I visited the market. Quite an assembly of grizzly meat on display. I watched one man pick frogs out of a sack. The frogs were so big that when they perched on the palm of your hand there was not much space left. Here is the grizzly bit so I wont make too much of it: the dude then slit their insides down from the mouth to the but and pulled out their guts. I think they were dead then - he chopped off their heads and sold them for a pretty penny! Nearby there were very very ragged locals selling mango seeds! I saw one dog like lady, whose boobs were almost revealed behind her shredded shirt, slit the seed with somekind of metal blade and gobble up something inside. They looked quite poor!
I could have still used a coffee but finding a cuppa here is as hard as finding a man to sell you fresh headless frog or mango seeds in London so I collapsed in this internet site. It has been a good last few days but I will be happy to see the others in Chengdu!
lots of love
jimbino
xxx
boats in Panzhihua, all the rest of the pics are in Lijiang.
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