The Great Guangdong Adventure

**Serpentza** · 05-10-2011, 05:13 AM

This is the first time Shenzhen's unofficial motorcycle club went for a proper bike trip.

CIMG4869 by SerpentZA, on Flickr

The plan: Leave Shenzhen early morning on the 1st of May, take the most scenic and twisty route possible to a town located on the border of Hunan, set up base camp (hopefully meet up with ChinaV and Rich) and from there we would spend a few days riding through the mountains enjoying the scenery before heading back to Shenzhen (okay so it wasn't really that well planned, but that was the gist of it).

First we needed a route, and who better to ask than ChinaV, the man with all the answers :)

Here's the route we got:

ggdamap by SerpentZA, on Flickr

We bodged together a gps mount and a few usb chargers with some late night drunken soldering and last minute fitment, but it did the job, we all met the day before up at our mountain lockup and set about checking the bikes and readying them for the trip.

CIMG4735 by SerpentZA, on Flickr

a bike trip in China (or anywhere for that matter) is all about preparation, you need plenty of spares and plenty of tools.

You have to expect that things will go wrong, so you must prepare for any possible eventuality.

It's much easier when travelling in a group as you can spread the load between however many bikes there are (tools and spares are heavy and take up a lot of space). Here are the bikes:

CIMG4745 by SerpentZA, on Flickr

From left to right:
My QM200GY (seen in the MCM logo) which has been ridden through China umpteen times, still going strong after a little TLC was ready to hit the road again, Martin's beast, the 250cc made to order over the internet no name brand bike which was quite the monster (size wise), Tom's Qingi Zhongshen Hybrid 125cc with a 250cc engine welded into the frame using dodgey engine mounts (one of which almost fell off), surprisingly the quickest of the three.

We left Sunday morning at 6:30am (mainly to avoid any run ins with traffic police, the streets are swarming with them due to the Universiade). Once outside Shenzhen (we went out via yantian past dameisha) we stopped for breakfast.

A lot of Southern China is unfortunately an urban wasteland, dull, dusty, busy, dirty and dangerous with people, trucks, cars and bikes everywhere. We would have to endure these conditions for a few hours before we broke free into the countryside.

CIMG4740 by SerpentZA, on Flickr

All of a sudden it was like we'd stepped into motorcycle paradise, long twisty treelined roads with almost no traffic, beautiful green rice paddies and mountains surrounding us as we opened up our engines, Tom in the lead with his GPS and street tyres (helps on the twisties), Me on the QM200 in the middle (carrying a passenger and lots of luggage), growing ever more confident and familiar with the bike (this is the first time I've ridden it any distance other than to the local bike shop and back), and Martin wrestling with the beast bringing up the rear (he's on tiptoes riding that thing, but somehow manages to control and tame it).

CIMG4788 by SerpentZA, on Flickr

Here's a picture we took on the side of a mountain around about the halfway mark.

Left to right: Tom, Winston, Martin

Coming soon: Paradise didn't last long, the weather and roads didn't quite play nice...

**ChinaV** · 05-10-2011, 05:21 AM

Oh boy, a Guangdong ride report

and I'm not in it...yet.

More please sir

I've got to stop cleaning my chain and get my holiday trip report done.

Cheers!
ChinaV

**felix** · 05-10-2011, 08:47 AM

Haha, looks like this is going somewhere interesting! Amazing to the MCM whore (your bike) back on the road again. Talk about hard-to-kill!

Keep it coming please!

**moilami** · 05-10-2011, 09:30 AM

This should be fun and interesting.

**Serpentza** · 05-11-2011, 08:48 AM

Where we left off, Winston, Tom, Martin and the beer girl (Winston's passenger and fiance) were enjoying some beautiful scenery and humming along nice long twisty mountain roads in the countryside.....

CIMG4763 by SerpentZA, on Flickr

We were somewhere near Heyuan, winding around a big lake / reservoir which was incredible... however, paradise wouldn't last long, we started to hit patches of light rain... which to be honest can be really nice and refreshing.. but not when taking fast corners on knobbly tyres, the roads became a little slicker, and there were more than one "whoa that was close" moments as my drum brakes on the QM200 became lubricated by the rain (and the cheap shit brake shoes didn't help), however all that experience falling off bikes in my youth and a good dose of luck kept me from falling, and we all fared well.

CIMG4761 by SerpentZA, on Flickr

Things were however about to get a little more interesting, the roads suddenly turned to absolute shyte, landslides and mud covered the roads, and either the roads were under heavy repair or still under construction, either way we were now riding through slick, soft clay-like mud filled with water and very dangerous (especially to Tom's bike which is an on-roader and Martin's inexperience on the dirt), this part was taken slowly with everyone having near falls due to either losing grip on the front or rear wheel trying to negotiate the shitty terrain. (sorry too busy riding to get pics).

CIMG4757 by SerpentZA, on Flickr

once at the bottom of the mountain we were greeted with what has to be one of the worst roads in Guangdong, basically mud filled pot holes between bits of broken concrete, rocks and whatever remained of dirt and tar roads, this lasted for a few KMS, and was also being used by large trucks carrying construction material.... while the other two were cursing and taking it slowly I saw this as an opportunity to put my knobblies to use... about 20 minutes later and with a very angry (I don't understand why she didn't enjoy all the air and muddy splashes) passenger later I stood dripping with mud from head to toe on a tar road waiting for the others to arrive.

Our bikes were caked in mud (as were our clothes and luggage), and almost as an answer to this, the heavens opened up and we got a free shower all the way to our destination...

CIMG4768 by SerpentZA, on Flickr

We'd been advised to push on all the way to Xinfeng before stopping for the night so that we could take in the sights of the Chinese "Grand Canyon" the next day, and so we did.

The way we figured it we'd traveled somewhere between 350~400kms after having left at 6:30am and arriving at our destination at 5pm, we finally found a hotel with available rooms, did some quick bike maintenance (martin and I got our bikes cleaned) and we headed out for a well deserved drink... what an interesting drink that was...

CIMG4770 by SerpentZA, on Flickr

Sitting outside under a gazebo, lightning flashed about us and thunder struck as torrential rain poured down.. still we stayed put with waitresses running out with our beers getting drenched and their umbrellas getting blown away.. it was quite an experience (I got lots of video footage, I'll post links as soon as they're up on youtube).

Next on the Great Guangdong Adventure.. we hit more amazing roads, make emergency petrol plans, hit small technical issues and meet ChinaV...... stay tuned.

**felix** · 05-11-2011, 09:28 AM

tuned.

**moilami** · 05-11-2011, 10:15 AM

More beer

**Serpentza** · 03-26-2013, 06:48 AM

Just a reminder that now isn't the time to.be riding

SHENZHEN police detained a Russian expatriate accused of drunkenly driving an electric bike Friday night near The Peninsula estate in Shekou, Nanshan District, as part of a coordinated action that led to confiscations of more than 4,000 illegal electric bikes across the city.****Police didn’t release the Russian man’s name but said yesterday a blood test showed his blood-alcohol level reached 99.2 mg per 100 ml, exceeding the legal limit of 80 mg per 100 ml.****Police said the man was the first expat caught by police since this month’s start of a 100-day crackdown on electric bike and motorcycle violations. The Russian could face one to six months in jail, police said.****Also in Shekou during Friday’s sweep, a Hong Kong man was fined and had his electric bike impounded because it exceeded national standards for speed and weight.****Police impounded 920 motorcycles and 4,134 illegal electric bikes across Shenzhen from Friday through Sunday. Sixty-eight drivers were detained for driving motorcycles, which are banned in the city; conducting illegal taxi services; or for violently resisting police.****Shenzhen banned motorcycles in most parts of the city in 1997 and placed restrictions on e-bikes that fail to meet national standards in April 2012.****People caught operating a motorcycle can be detained for up to 15 days and fined 2,000 yuan (US$319). People caught operating e-bikes for business purposes two or more times also can be detained, for five to 10 days.****Drivers of electric bikes that fail to meet national standards — no more than 20 kilometers an hour in speed or 40 kilograms in weight — will be fined 1,000 yuan and have their bikes impounded. Fines will be doubled for drivers of illegal electric bikes who carry passengers.****Police said there are about 500,000 electric bikes in Shenzhen and 80 percent of them exceed national standards. E-bike drivers are frequently involved in traffic accidents, with crashes leading to at least 46 deaths in the city so far this year.****

**TB-Racing** · 03-26-2013, 07:15 AM

Originally Posted by Serpentza

Just a reminder that now isn't the time to.be riding
SHENZHEN police detained a Russian expatriate accused of drunkenly driving an electric bike Friday night near The Peninsula estate in Shekou, Nanshan District....

Got a link to the newspaper article by any chance???