Silk Road Complete

We haven’t even finished cycling through China but Trevor has already declared this country his worst.  For me, it is definitely in contention for bottom spot.  The people here do not know how to drive and they can be quite obnoxious.  The spitting and snot flying out of their noses is very disgusting to watch.  Plus the staring can get annoying.  I like to think I don’t curse much but I am venting around the clock at the drivers and at times pedestrians for their idiotic moves.  No one obeys traffic signs or traffic lights.  They just do whatever they please.  Trevor commented the only thing they are good at it in this country is creating traffic jams.  They also love to cut us off.  Countless times every day we are cut off by dumbasses who do not watch what is coming their way, they just go without thinking.  The thing though that really annoys both of us is the horn.  I would love to take their horns and stick them up where the sun don’t shine because it is deafening and really unnecessary.  If you know how to drive, you don’t need to rely on that stupid horn.  They blast their horns at the sight of any moving object and some just honk just for the sake of honking.  It must be music to their ears.

Anyway, since leaving Yumen it has been tough times yet again with cold conditions.  Out of Yumen we cycled on icy roads.  The roads also have been crap as we have had quite a few punctures. 

Happy to say we are now in Xian, which means the end of the Silk Road for us.  Now we can beeline it south and hopefully toward warmer climes!

Free food on the side of the road!  Not sure how all these onions became scattered on the side of the road but I thought maybe I could find a few good onions.  Unfortunately they weren’t all that great so I decided best not to risk getting sick. 

We had a string of days where we were hassled with constant flat tires.  With the increase in flat tires, Trevor decided to put one of his China made tires he purchased in Urumqi to use.  Already it has had two flats.

An ecstatic me at about 3000m above sea level!  We had a few passes (the other just shy of 2600m) to cover which previously worried both of us due to the chance of being hit with snow.  We played it safe and stopped at towns just before the passes and checked weather reports.  Very glad it worked out and we didn’t get stuck anywhere. 

A useless sign.  Another useless thing in China is the traffic police who just stand at intersections pretending to direct traffic.  I don’t see what good they are doing.  If you have half a brain you should know green means go and red means stop.  Then again, not all understand that.

A pleased me in Lanzhou after getting the first and hopefully last visa extension.  It will be close but I am optimistic we can get to Laos in time.  If not, then it means another extension which would involve more waiting around.  We had to wait about four days in Lanzhou and didn’t do much at all but sit in a hotel room and eat fattening pastries, tasty mandarins and drink delicious red date milk.  The day we arrived in Lanzhou we thought was going to be easy given we made it there around midday but it turned out to be a long day.  The process of finding accommodation is very frustrating.  It took us forever to find the youth hostel and when we did find it we were turned away as they do not accept foreigners now.  So pissed and perturbed we set off around chaotic Lanzhou trying to find a binguan.  We went to many places only to be turned away yet again or find out the binguan is no more.  Seemed like the ones that did accept foreigners were of course the priciest.  That is always the case.  It was getting dark and we were running out of ideas and were about to give up and go to one of the expensive hotels when this lady approached us clearly wanting to practice her English on us helped us find a cheap binguan nearby. 

After Lanzhou the terrain sure changed.  Nice not being in the desert anymore that is for sure!  

We had another day of snow and it was a bit tough at times.  Really hope this is the last we have seen of snow on this trip now. 

The border region around Gansu and Shaanxi made for some nice scenery.  Unfortunately the many mountains meant many ups and downs.  There were many tunnels though which I have a love/hate relationship with.  Nice that they allow us to avoid climbing more hills but going through them can be a bit scary at times.  Some are well over a kilometer and aren’t very well lit.  As such, we really pedal hard to get through them as quickly as possible. 

The first Mao statue we have come across in China.  I am sure it won’t be the last.

Trevor said prior to the trip he doesn’t care much about the route we take but did have one request that we hit two antipodal cities, basically cities that are diametrically opposite to one another on the Earth’s surface.  So, here he is at Drum Tower in the center of the city walls of Xian.  The other antipodal city we now need to hit is Santiago, Chile.  Or at least that is what we used to think.  I just did some research and it appears they aren’t exact antipodal cities.  Trevor wants to be spot on so now it looks like we will be cycling somewhere southwest of Santiago when the time comes hopefully next year.