Around China in 100 Days

[Roadrunner]

It's about time I started a ride report about what we've been up to so far.

It's been an intense four weeks and we've had issues getting internet access so I haven't even been able to keep my own blog up to date.

Lulu and I arrived in Beijing last night and we've enjoyed one of the few rest days we've had, at least I know I have. After getting a serious dose of Chinese culture and history, and chilling out in a bar very similar to some back in New Zealand (the Bed Bar for those who know it) and getting my instant western culture fix, I'm well and truly on my way to getting my energy levels back.

So far, over the some 5200kms we've done, we've been averaging just over 220 kms per day on the bikes, with about 8 rest days over the 30 or so driving days. We're still a little behind schedule, so we've decided not to head to Haerbin, and to head into Inner Mongolia through Chengde instead. The Lifans have held up well so far, especially Lulu's bike which has been subjected to a couple of minor crashes.

I've been surprised at how well my bike handles on less-than-ideal roads. I was worried that the bumps it has gone through might dislodge some vital part of the motorcycle and we would be stranded in the middle of nowhere. I hope I continue to be surprised when I get into Inner Mongolia and Xinjiang.

We have both had our ups and downs on and off the bikes, and we are both slowly starting to find common ground regarding what we want this journey to be. It's a learning experience, and the sensory overload can be a bit much at times, but it's always worth it

[Roadrunner]

Chongqing to Zunyi, Guizhou – Day 2


We started our journey on a drizzly Chongqing day, with more fog than usual, on NanbinLu in Nanping. After only sleeping three hours the night before, Vivian and I got lost trying to get to the start point but were found by a JH600 rider from the local motorcycle club, who took us to a square of pavement where a small billboard had been erected with a big map of our route and some of the riders from the motorcycle club waiting to take a few pictures and start our trip with us.

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The going was a bit slow at first, the roads being wet and the traffic crowded. As we got out of the city the roads opened up a bit and we could enjoy some of the countryside. We were heading for Tongzi, about 200 kilometers south of Chongqing on the G210, but as we kept riding we realised that, at the speed we were going, we would get there very late at night. The group that escorted us out of Chongqing slowly thinned as they started to head back and soon we were three. Lulu got a nail in her rear tyre, so we had to find a repairman to take it off an replace it.

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We stopped at Anwen, still in Chongqing municipality, at around 11pm and quickly found some food and a place to sleep. I was very grateful to have Chinese speakers with me. I like to practice my minimal Chinese sometimes, but after a hard days riding my ability to try to be understood dramatically decreases, making me want to curl up and go to sleep in the closest corner even more.


We resolved to get up at 6.30am the next morning and be on the road by 8.30 so we could avoid driving at night. This became 7.30 and then 8. By the time we had finished breakfast and packed our bikes it was 10. Lulu had more confidence today so the going was faster until we had to stop several times to tighten the bolts on the rear wheel of Lulu’s bike which had been taken off the night before. We spent most of the day on sweeping roads on the mist covered hills of northern Guizhou, which were beautiful but quite cold. In most of the provinces in China, it’s illegal for a motorcycle to travel on the expressways, but Guizhou is one of the few exceptions so we headed to the nearest onramp to see if we could put some more road behind us. Bad idea. The vehicles that use the expressways can travel well over 150 km/h (the speed limit is more near 120 km/h), so it can be dangerous for a motorcyclist traveling at around 50km/h. Add 4 kilometer, 2 lane tunnels, and you have a slightly stressful time for a novice motorcyclist. We decided to use the national road instead.


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Our target for today was Zunyi, and we made it! It’s a little late, but we’ve sorted a room at a Lu Guan (旅馆), a budget inn owned by a small family. Lulu went for the 20 yuan option with no hot water available, and I’ve gone deluxe; the same kind of room but I pay 50% extra for a hot shower. For me, there’s no such thing as a cold shower after a hard days ride, but then I’m not as tough as Lulu.

[Roadrunner]

Zunyi-Kaili, Guizhou – Day 4


We went the wrong way and missed Guiyang completely. My trusty GPS only had the option of English OR Chinese characters, which means that I can’t read place names on the interface. I thought I would be able to get around this by using paper maps and GoogleMaps to plan my waypoints and load them in. Obviously I thought wrong.


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Instead of picking up the vehicle registration from the Lifan office in Guiyang, we asked them to send it to Kaili, where we were going to any way so we thought we could save some time.

We sped up alot when we realised Lulu’s speedometer was reading 10km/h more than she was doing, so we were making good time before we hit some really bad roadworks. We managed to get Lulu’s bike across the bridge being worked on before they totally ripped it up, leaving me stranded on the other side. I waited there for a while until I realised that I would be waiting for a very long time if I wanted to cross this bridge. I turned around, past a long line of cars and trucks to find another way around. I was lucky enough to venture up a small road which turned into a highway under contruction in pretty bad condition so I had a bit of fun in the dirt and gravel.

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We got the bikes serviced at the shop in Kaili. I would have liked to explore Kaili a bit more. There are many minority villages around this area with the chance to learn a little about another culture, but we are two days behind plan now so we can’t stop yet. Looking forward to a rest in Yangshuo, Guangxi in a couple of days.

[Roadrunner]

Kaili to Rongjiang – Day 5


We drove south from Kaili through valley filled with Miao villages. Their clothing and the architecture of their buildings is distinctly different from the Han Chinese villages that we have passed so far, and it was good to see a different part to China. Most of the women either wear cloth caps or colourful flowers in their hair, and vivid traditional clothes which stood out on the roads as we passed. Apart from the villages the riversides were terraced in paddy fields and the valley slopes covered in forest.

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The road was great until we started climbing a mountain which topped out at 1400m. We had climbed into low cloud and it was so thick that we could only see 15 metres in front of our wheels. The roads had started to get potholes and there were high winds, so the going was slow, especially when we had bus horns blaring in our ears from one side and abyssal white nothing on the other.

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We climbed down into more stunning green valleys on more potholed roads, trudging along at a steady pace until after dusk. Then the road turned into gravel and mud, in the dark, so we slowed down even more. I was surprised at how well Lulu was managing but even so, we got into our destination town of Ronjiang several hours after we planned.

[Roadrunner]

Rongjiang to Sanjiang – Day 6

Heading out of Rongjiang and onto a new national road, we expected the roads to get better. Wrong again. More corrugated roads start a breakfastless morning (we also thought we could find breakfast on the way). So it was another slow day in Guizhou, but as we got closer to Guangxi the going started to get better and we started to average around 30 km/h.
We stopped for lunch in a Dong village, who are another of the official minorities in China. While I’m used to eating with chopsticks in Chongqing, we ate sticky rice and pork chops with our hands.


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Heading into Guangxi the weather started to worsen and light rain started to fall. After two hours, things started getting rather wet and cold and, again, darkness started to creep into the sky. Before we started our trip we agreed that we shouldn’t drive at night in the countryside because it’s dangerous, with bikes and animals on the roadsides, but we have been constantly caught between towns with accomodation, so there we’ve had no other option.

So we got into Sanjiang late, exhausted again, and wet.

[Roadrunner]

Sanjiang to Guilin – Day 7

The day started off quite dry, always a good sign when your not fully waterproof driving a motorcycle. Disorganised and in a hurry, we missed the turnoff to the Chengyang wind and rain bridge on the Linxi river, and looks pretty cool in photos. We did manage to make it to the entrance to the Dragon’s Backbone rice terraces (龙的脊梁梯田) near Longsheng. Lulu stayed at the gate because it costs 60RMB to get a ticket and I drove about 10 kilometres through a beautiful valley and up the mountainside until I came to another gate. This was the gate where tourists alight from their vehicles and hand over their tickets to the ticket people to get through to the village which was another 2 kilometres or so up a long slope. As a westerner, with lots of bags to carry around, I was approached by a Yao villager who offered to take my bags for me for 20 RMB. I was shocked that a lady half my size would offer to take bags up a big hills that I have trouble carrying around on flat ground. I said “No thank you, I don’t have time”, because I didn’t. It would have taken several hours to get up and take a good look around.

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All the way, fine drizzle seeped into my golves and boots and started to make me very cold, so I thought it would be a good idea to take my gloves off because surely it would be better than soaking wet gloves. Shivering and shaking a couple of hours later I realised my assumption was wrong. So while I was putting on extra layers of clothing Lulu rode ahead, thinking I would catch up, but she stopped in a small town to buy some waterproof boots and a didn’t see her bike as I drove past, so we got separated. I waited for an hour in the cold, wet, dark waiting for her to catch up, worrying about whether she would crash on the wet tarmac.

Just outside Guilin we stopped at the first guest house we saw.

[flightway]

I like this forum very much. Really very informative.

[lightend]

just another quick note to say i am reading and finding it great, keep up the good work :-D

[Roadrunner]

Hohhot – Day 41

I had another sleep in again while I slowly recovered from the night before. Lulu and I decided to go to the local market and the museum in the early afternoon. The museum idea was quickly squashed when Lulu realised that the museum was closed. Then followed some intense discussion about whether or not we should stay in Hohhot another day. I really didn’t want to give up one of the precious few rest-days we had left, and she really, really, really wanted to see the museum (the captions and information of which turned out to be only in Chinese). I relented on the agreement that she wouldn’t protest if we drove on harder for the next couple of days. Apparently, she appreciates cities more than I do, where I enjoy country riding much more.

We weren’t sure whether motorcycles were allowed inside Hohhot, but we had been told it was fine. As I drove up to a set of traffic lights with Lulu on the back, a policeman in sunglasses sauntered up to us in the middle of the road and told me to get off, took my keys, and told me to walk my bike through the intersection to park on the other side. Looking for my license, I realised that I had left it at the apartment. My bike is too big for Lulu to drive, so I had to walk back and get the papers, which took an hour or so out of our day. It was a right pain in the ass, and I made a mental note to always have my license with me. At least he didn’t give us a fine. At first I thought he pulled me over because I was the only motorcycle on the road, but he appeared to be one of the several policemen manning a traffic control station, pulling over taxis and trucks as well.

The markets were underwhelming. We were looking for handicrafts and a few quality gifts, but most of the things we came across were outrageously expensive, or made in factories in Tianjin, the kind of stuff you can find on Taobao. A trifle disappointed, we drove back to Jennie’s house where she had planned a pot luck dinner with the local English teachers (I forgot to bring food), drinks (I brought beer though) and poker (which I failed miserably at). Lulu went to sleep early again, and she was out cold when I checked her room.

I met a New Zealander at the party, Katie, who had been to India recently and we swapped some stories (after I gave up on poker) and absorbed each other’s accent.
After everyone decided to call it quits on the poker, we all headed out to KTV which was a little strange to see only expats at what is traditionally a Chinese pasttime. Another good night out in Hohhot.

[Roadrunner]

Hohhot to Xiashihao – Day 42

We were up early-ish and I was keen to get going. Jennie was heading off to a bowling alley with some of the friends I had met the night before.



Lulu went to see the museum which we had waited an extra day to see, and I looked after the packed bikes (which couldn’t be locked so someone needed to be there to look after our things) and read some Emerson because there was no secure parking at the parking lot.

Lulu had asked Maria in Shanghai to send us some WangBaoBao (chemical hot packs) so that we could drive comfortably in the cold weather we anticipated we would come across. Maria sent them to the Half the Sky centre in Hohhot, so that’s where we visited next, but it took us a while to find. I saw some Muslim influence on the architecture of some of the buildings, and I started to feel the effect of the ancient silk road.

As we got out of the city, Lulu had a go at me for not stopping at the Wangfu (palace) that she saw (but I didn’t). The sun was very low on the horizon, so keeping her temper in check, we got going back up into the mountains that separate the lowlands from the steppes, heading for Guyang.








After 100 kilometers or so, when it started getting dark and we knew we wouldn’t make it to Guyang, we started looking for places to stay. No towns and no choices, we were soon competing with trucks and their high beams for space on the country road.






Another 60 kilometers and we found a small town which seemed to exist solely from the food and accommodation that long distance truckers need on a long country road.
We stumbled around in the dark and chanced upon a small, grubby, but entirely adequate room with no shower for 40 kuai for the night.