12 provinces in 8 days

**futianshenzhen** · 09-09-2013, 02:19 PM

Here's the RR from last month's ride, I finished off every province on the mainland apart from Tibet. I wasn't expecting much from the eastern part of China but it surprised me with just how awful it was. If I hadn't have zigged inland to visit the Guoliang tunnels as per Motokai's suggestion then the whole trip would've been a bust!

Anyway the whole thing was more about knocking off provinces and in that regard it was a success. Provinces/municipalities covered:

Heilongjiang
Jilin
Liaoning
Hebei
Beijing
Tianjing
Henan
Shandong
Jiangsu
Anhui
Zhejiang
Shanghai

Here's the route...

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This RR follows on from 'hohhot - harbin' from a couple of months back when I left the bike at the yingang office in Harbin.

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There she is...

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...safe and sound in the back of a bike warehouse in Harbin

**futianshenzhen** · 09-09-2013, 02:35 PM

6 August

Arrived at a very pikey hotel in Harbin at 1 am last night. My windowless undergound bunker stank of mould but only set me back 50 quai so no complaints really.

I arrived at the shop at 9.15 to find that the exhaust bracket hadn't been fixed and the chain runner hadn't been replaced. Neither of these annoyances would stop me getting underway but the guy who'd replaced the chain had taken too many links out and it was completely solid on the bike. Luckily I still had my chain repair kit from the numerous roadside repairs on the last trip so after half an hour of banging about I was ready to go. Unfortunately the bike then took a while to get going and just when it was beginning to splutter into life the battery ran out of juice and I had no choice but to push it to the nearest bike shop. After about one kilometre I got seriously bored of pushing the thing and ended up getting towed by a 3 wheeler. The first mechanic refused to even look at it because it was water cooled but I found another one who rigged up an ebike battery and she fired right up. I finally left at 12.30 which wasn't all that bad but a lot later than planned.

Because googlemaps only seems to let you adjust and save pedestrian routes it often tries to take me on very scenic detours which can sometimes be a nice surprise but more often a pain in the arse. This one, around Yushu, was the mother of all fuck ups and I became totally and inescapably stuck in some of the gloupiest mud i've ever encountered. I eventually collapsed in the dirt with my heart rate going at a million miles an hour and came to with a cold sensation in my outstretched right hand. A teenage farmer had taken pity on me and was pressing an ice lolley into the palm of my hand! A crowd soon gathered and between us we got the bike extracted and turned round after they'd explained there was absolutely no point into trying to push on. I rode back the way id came and lost control trying to gun it through another muddy patch about 300 metres down the track. I can't begin to explain how knackered I was but I managed to right the bike before collapsing again. This time the locals fetched one of those giant rotivator type tractor things and 4 of them put the bike on a trailer. To my shame I was too exhausted to help. The dropped me out of the danger zone and try as I might they wouldn't accept the redback I was waving around. Great folk.

After that I made good time to Jiaohe, a lot of the scenery was like the south of France. Arrived 6 pm and found one of the cleanest and most well organised bike shops i've ever seen where I bought new mirrors and rewelded the sidestand.*

315 kms
It all started so well! Then not so much...

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**futianshenzhen** · 09-09-2013, 02:45 PM

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Shortly before getting very stuck

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My new pals

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lifting the bike onto the trailer

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Nice bike shop in Jiahe

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**futianshenzhen** · 09-09-2013, 03:28 PM

7

Left 7.40
My mate Tits Paul suggested a detour to Dandong to piss into North Korea off a half destroyed bridge so off I went! I flew through more frenchesque countryside in Jilin, then Liaoning with the roadside lined with (maybe) wild flowers. Lots of nice twisties with dull straights in between then the heavens opened in the mountains before Kuandian. The lightening was only 2 seconds away at the highest pass and I was bricking it!

Arrived Dandong at 6, went straight to the river separating China and the DPRK and it was full of swimmers! Definitely not what I was expecting! My first thought was they were gonna get picked off by snipers but there were so many it must've been an organised event. The bike hadn't been running very well so I set off to find a bike shop. A young dude on a mini crosser rode up next to me and gave me the thumbs up so I took the opportunity to ask for directions and like a true champion he offered to escort me to his local shop. Unfortunately they were just shutting and the hotels nearby had no parking but the boss offered to store the bike inside and said we could get cracking in the morning. They were a really nice bunch and we were chatting for a while about bikes and suitable hotels. Crosser dude said the one next door was safe because lots of Japanese and Koreans stayed there. I innocently asked whether they were North or South Koreans and he said of course only South because North Koreans were nuts and would shoot people – he then mimed a sub machine gun just in case the meaning wasn't clear. I'd kinda thought that relations would be better than that on the border town but obviously not!

715 today, 1030 total

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Tunnel

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Awww flowers

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My first thought was they were wild but later I saw some farmers tending them so maybe not...

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liaoning/French scenery

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Actually this part of the trip was OK compared to what was to come but still distinctly average compared to other parts of China. And you know that if i'm taking photos of flowers there's not a lot else going on!

**futianshenzhen** · 09-09-2013, 03:41 PM

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Keep digging sunshine!

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Pretty much the last place you'd expect to see swimmers

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The Chinese promenade

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The DPRK - this was maximum zoom on my puny compact but I don't think I missed much!

**bikerdoc** · 09-09-2013, 11:06 PM

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Originally Posted by futianshenzhen

Keep digging sunshine!

At least they're consistent..!

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Originally Posted by futianshenzhen

The DPRK - this was maximum zoom on my puny compact but I don't think I missed much!

Probably fake anyways, besides that fog is likely fake too, a whole lot of little smoke machines running there little rings off delivering the expected smoke screen veil of secrecy... got to keep up appearances!

**futianshenzhen** · 09-10-2013, 01:14 AM

Haha Bikerdoc...very true I'm sure!

**futianshenzhen** · 09-10-2013, 01:31 AM

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My filthy filter

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Nasty looking carb, probably due to using dodgy petrol stations. Sorry ChinaV you did tell me so

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You can see the snapped exhuast bracket on the right. I made 2 the same then matey welded them together for hopefully double the strength

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The mechanic hard at work cleaning the carb in the pouring rain

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The footpeg mounting point which supports the exhaust had snapped, almost certainly due to the exhaust being held on with wire for 2000 kms and wagging about over the bumps. The mechanic's father took it off to get welded somewhere as it's ali...

8th

7 am at bike shop with muscles still aching from the mud madness. Unfortunately there was no new chain runner anywhere in Dandong but we repaired the broken exhaust bracket, cleaned the carb and air filter and I was away at 9.20 despite the boss protesting that the rain was too heavy to ride.

After 2 hours of rain it dried off then turned red hot by 1 pm so I was down to boots, football shorts and body armour. Quite the dashing fellow!

The first couple of hundred kms were nice - then shite, built up, beat up, busy bollocks through by far the worst smog i've ever encountered, a proper pea souper!

Bike ran great all day, no more missing and backfiring, the carb and filter were filthy. I stopped at a dozen shops and no-one sold chain runners. Make sure you order before you leave on long trips!

Arrived Suizhong 7pm. 560 today, 1590 total

**futianshenzhen** · 09-10-2013, 02:21 AM

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I turned off the road looking for a spot to have lunch...

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...and found this nice little bridge

**futianshenzhen** · 09-10-2013, 03:13 AM

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I was buying great tinned fish and russian sausages to keep me going through the day - one of the perks of the north

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My chain runner bodge - amazingly it held