China Cycling Travelogues

Do you have a China cycling travelogue you would like to share here?
Contact us for details.

Roz Beste

Crossing China on One Wheel

Week 1

Fri 17 Dec 04 The day before...

Spent most of today sorting out last minute red-tape regarding leaving Hong Kong. Accountants, tax department, handing over my phone number to Sleiman (the guy taking over my business) etc. I arrived at the bank at 4.29pm (one minute before closing) to try to sort out my MPF and found that it requires visits to 2 more places and a wait of at least 3 weeks - I won't be doing that before I go to China then!

I finally started packing about 8pm although I had of course been sorting out bits of it for weeks - my room, to the untrained eye (i.e., anyone but me), looked the same as it always had.

Sat 18 Dec 04

About 2.30am I was still packing but decided that I was too tired to continue so I set my alarm for 5.30am and made some space on the bed for a bit of shut-eye...

Up again 3 hours later and incredibly managed to empty my room (by this time the word 'packing' would have been an exaggeration - more like 'moving' stuff en-masse to the corner of the living room my flatmates have kindly let me use while I'm in China. Claudia is moving into this room today so I need to completely empty it.

Catherine arrived on time at 7.15am for us to catch a taxi to the ferry terminal in TST for the 4-hour ferry journey to Zhao Qing. I had planned to sleep a bit on the ferry - but I didn't due to a mixture of nervousness (Did I forget anything? Do I have too much stuff with me? Will I be able to ride this unicycle? Why didn't I do more training before I left?) and excitement (6 weeks holiday with the company of some great people) and sorrow at leaving Hong Kong after 8 years especially the hiking, the choir, all the friends I've made and just when my business has started to do so well.

But Oz beckons. And the chance of a long holiday between countries and then a new life, somewhere where the weather is good, the people are friendly and don't work the long hours they do in Hong Kong. A chance to find a husband, get a dog and settle down in a country I intend to live in for a while - instead of temporary locations for 'maybe a few months', 'maybe a few years' that has been my life since I left the UK 14 years ago.

On the ferry we were already in China: wooden boats and wooden huts along the river, with people in the less-than-fashionable, less-than-clean clothes that mark them as 'mainland Chinese'.

On arrival, we decided to get cycling right away and even though we had both only had 3 hours sleep the night before we managed to get in 3.5 hours cycling and maybe 30km to a small dusty town called Lu Bu.

On leaving the ferry pier we started to experience Chinese people's reaction to the unicycle - lots of smiles, pointing, passing vehicles (including whole buses full of passengers) slowing down to take a better look. One guy ran to the edge of the road smiling and held out his hand for me to slap it as I went by (high-five style) and other people further along the road saw and did the same thing which was a lot of fun. Catherine, who was following me, said that other people who didn't get my attention but got hers, pointed to me and smiled and put their thumbs up in appreciation. Everyone was certainly very friendly!

The temperature according to an electronic thermometer board we passed was 27 degrees C today - which was hotter than we had expected but a lovely temperature to ride in.

In Lu Bu, we found a not-so-nice hotel (clean sheets and floor but dirty walls and a shared bathroom down the stairs where the shower (well, hose pipe actually) had hot water but over the smelly Chinese toilet. But at 15 Yuan each, it wasn't expensive. Catherine took it all very well, considering that this was her first experience of Chinese hotels. I promised her that they didn't get much worse than this. I hope I'm right.

Dinner was omelette, green veg and rice for 17 yuan - at least we're not breaking any budgets.

My legs didn't ache too much which is good. I enjoyed today except that I was bothered by the traffic - the constant passing of vehicles - even if they are in the next lane (there was a good, wide hard shoulder for bikes to ride on). I guess I used to quiet hikes in Hong Kong listening to the birds sing so I just need to get used to it.

I wasn't too good at mounting my unicycle today. I cheated most of the time by leaning on Catherine's shoulder. I guess I'll improve eventually. For now, I try a few times on my own and by that time there is usually quite a crowd gathered to watch so I cheat by using Catherine's shoulder or a post.

Catherine said that the speed wasn't too bad. She is on a bike and I'm worried that she would be frustrated at how slow I go - but she seemed happy enough with the speed most of the time - and only overtook me down hills (not that we really had anything more than very gentle inclines today) which I can understand would be frustrating to go at my pace.

We had an early night - both pretty shattered from our lack of sleep last night.

Sun 19th Dec 04

I woke at 7am this morning and it felt like I was in a Chinese version of 'Oliver' - the scene where he wakes up in London and all the hawkers are singing out their wares ('will you buy my red, red roses' etc) Except that I couldn't understand what they were saying and of course they weren't singing...but kind of like that.

Catherine said she slept very well - but our room only had a partition which left a 2-foot hole at the top between our room and 2 others so we could hear the TV, conversations and snoring of 2 sets of people which together with some buzzing mosquitoes kept me awake more than I would have liked.

We discovered mandarin oranges today. I was worried about not eating enough fruit - but oranges and bananas are on sale everywhere at the side of the road and taste great. They are all different shapes and sizes (not the standard one-size you find in supermarkets) and look like someone just picked them in their back yard - delicious.

I'm starting to get knee-pad tan lines - not very sexy!

We had a choice between 40km and 65km today and went for the former. We arrived about 4.20pm in a town which on the map looked like it would be a dusty town like last night, but turned out to be a beautiful riverside spot (well, in comparison) and even better, we managed to find a really nice hotel - almost new - 30 yuan each per night - white sheets, real pillows, white fluffy towels in the en-suite bathroom - so much better than last night.

Mon 20 Dec 04

Got up at 6.30am this morning - when it was still dark so we could get an early start to the day. We made great time - the stone km markers seemed to fly by. We made our destination Yuenan, 62km away, by 3.30pm but decided to have the day off in Wuzhou - a further 40km away so we caught a bus the rest of the way. We need to make up some time to get to Yangshuo in time for Catherine to catch her flight. We will have a day off in Wuzhou tomorrow which my saddle area will really appreciate - I was in a lot of pain today.

At the bus station, Catherine took my unicycle as I went up to the counter to enquire about a bus to Wuzhou and if it would take our wheels. The lady behind the counter asked how many bicycles we had and I proudly answered in my best mandarin: 'one and a half'. She looked up at me strangely. 'Look' I said, pointing behind me. She stood up to peer through the grilled ticket window at Catherine who smiled obligingly....

My legs still feel fine although I have a slight ache in my knees - not sure why. We had a couple of mild slopes today - but nothing you could describe as an actual hill. That is about to change of course - our next section is very hilly - which will be interesting.

Our bus took a vehicular ferry across the river. I hadn't noticed that on the map - I thought there was a bridge so if we had tried to cycle it I would have been a bit puzzled.

In Wuzhou we found a nice 3-star hotel 'Wu Feng' Hotel to stay in. I had a bit of a headache in the evening and threw up my noodle dinner but I'm sure I'll be fine tomorrow.

Tues 21 Dec 04

Rest day in Wuzhou. Our hotel comes with a buffet breakfast served in the 'Western Restaurant'. Catherine got all excited at this prospect, dreaming of breakfast cereal, baked beans on toast, hash browns, fruit salad, pancakes etc. I tried to play down her expectations as I had a feeling that reality wouldn't manage to match up but Catherine's logic was that if they have a western restaurant and a Chinese restaurant, then surely there would be a western-style buffet in the former.

Well they certainly hadn't misled us about the buffet part - there was a very large selection of items on 2 long tables. Unfortunately, 'western' is not how you would have described any of it. There were dim sum type dishes in wooden steam baskets, various Chinese pastries - both savoury and sweet, congee and strange-looking deep fried stuff, noodles and rice. Nothing a westerner would have eaten for breakfast - but it wasn't too bad as free breakfasts go - we both ate something.

I managed to find an internet cafe for 1.5 yuan per hour - how they make any money at that price is incredible.

Wuzhou has really changed since I first came here about 10 years ago. It has been completely revamped and all the old buildings fixed up and repainted. It is really beautiful now. Apparently, it was a trade city rivalling Hong Kong at one time and has a lot of foreign influence in the architecture: beautiful covered archways at the bottom of the buildings. I'd highly recommend it as a city in China to visit.

We were followed home by a man after dinner. Not sure of his motives but he was definitely following us because we stopped a few times to look at things and so did he. He may have wanted to practice his English although he didn't seem quite the type, or he may have thought it was dangerous for 2 female tourists to walk home at 8pm and thought he'd protect us, or he may have been bored and curious. Or of course, he could have wanted to mug us. Anyway we stayed on busy streets and lost him just before reaching our hotel.

Wed 22 Dec 04

Our first day of hills. Luckily my memory of it being all up-hill was wrong. We seemed to be doing as much down as up - but we can't have been because we rose steadily through the hills over the day.

On our first hill, the Chinese guy in front of us got off his bike at the first sign of a gradient and started pushing - not a good example to set. We overtook him but soon had to follow suit and get off.

The gradients are not too bad generally - really a fitness issue for me not a unicycle skill problem. But I have to admit to a fair amount of walking. Downhills were better, I've been trying to use my brake. I'm squeezing it gently and I think I'm using it - although it could just be psychology. I know that if I put it on fully, I'll just fall off - which has happened to me once today already. I'll keep working on it.

While my brake skills may be improving, my mounting isn't. It's tiring in the hills and it's much easier to lean on Catherine's shoulder to mount. Not sure what Roger is going to think if he arrives and I still can't free-mount in 2.5 weeks.

I taught Catherine some more Chinese yesterday (she seems to pick it up really easily) and she has been trying it out when people come up to her while she's waiting for me (she, of course comes down the hills on her bike much faster than me so has been doing quite a bit of waiting today). The crowds seem to be quite well entertained by the time I arrive.

We usually use the side of the road as a toilet. Catherine has just triumphantly announced that nobody in China has yet seen her backside as she is always careful to risk life and limb to climb down a cliff-side to hide herself. My backside however has no doubt been seen on a number of occasions as I figure that they've seen it all before.

We stayed in a very small town 20km on from Dao Shui today. Dao Shui was our original destination but we arrived there at 1pm so decided to press on a bit further. This town probably wasn't quite as nice - but was comfortable enough. We did 50km in the hills today - an excellent result.

Thurs 23 Dec 04

Today it suddenly turned cold. Until now we've been in shorts and t-shirts and still been warm - but today, I still wore shorts but wore a fleece jacket (which I left open) all day too. The hills were more sustained today which meant a lot of walking and was pretty slow going.

Catherine got a puncture about 2.30pm and when she eventually caught up with me we decided to take a bus the final 10km to our destination Tai Ping - we had still managed to cycle/walk 35km today so wasn't a bad result. A bus came along and agreed to take us and the wheels for 2 yuan each, about 30 seconds after making the decision to catch one - so no problem there.

I woke up this morning with a cold - sore-throat and runny nose which I'm not happy about - I virtually never catch colds. My view is that there are cold and flu germs around most of the time but you only 'catch' them if your immune system is not good. But I guess my sudden increase in physical activity and lack of sleep the night before we started might have contributed to my immune system not being in peak form. I found a chemist and some '12-hour' flu capsules with some English writing. They asked if I wanted to buy the whole box (11 yuan for a standard blister pack of 10 tablets) or tablet by tablet. An interesting concept for a poor country but I went for the whole box anyway - old habits die hard.

Having a cold meant that I wasn't in such a good mood to wave to people or speak as the crowds formed round us. I feigned incomprehension a few times. But it's hard to stay in a bad mood for long when people are so happy to see you - the vehicles that pass with drivers and passengers with wide smiles and thumbs up signs - and the adults and kids alike along the road who shout appreciatively and wave - you have to smile back really.

We had a look at Catherine's inner tube at the hotel but couldn't see a puncture - it could just be a very slow puncture she hadn't noticed before. We bought a spare inner tube but it has a valve that my pump can't connect to (although on the other hand every Chinese pump can connect to) so we didn't fit it in the end. Catherine will carry my pump tomorrow (she didn't have one today) and use if as necessary.

There's very loud Karaoke outside the hotel window tonight - they must be freezing. It's probably dropped to around 15 degrees C. Maybe that's why it sounds so bad - hope it doesn't go too late.

Fri 24 Dec 04

After steamed buns and hot soybean milk for breakfast, I noticed that Catherine's handlebars were loose. It needed an allen key of a size I didn't have so we had to wait a little for the first shops to open to buy one.

Handlebars fixed, we started off - but after only 10 minutes, Catherine had another bike problem. I'm not good at explaining it in English, let alone in Chinese but the gist of it was that when she pushed the pedals, the wheels didn't move. We hiked back into town to find a repair shop. This wasn't difficult - it seems that the most popular type of shop on the outskirts of any town is a motorbike repair shop - and they'll generally look at bikes too.

By the time we arrived the problem had magically fixed itself so the guy shrugged his shoulders and said 'no problem'. We cycled off and it happened again almost immediately. This time we went a bit further to a bicycle repair shop. However, the guy here was so overwhelmed by the 50-strong crowd that was watching him (and of course it was working again at this point) that he wasn't much help either. We found 'the best bicycle mechanic in town' where the guy spent longer looking at the problem - I was better at explaining it in Mandarin by now too. He oiled the gears - but since he couldn't see the problem either that was about as much as he could do.

By now we had lost 2 hours cycling time and were absolutely freezing cold. So we decided to take a bus further along the route so we could warm up on the bus before starting again.

The next 50km on the bus were pretty flat but we were glad we hadn't ridden it as they were resurfacing and rerouting the road - the surface was often gravelly or muddy and frequently it was difficult to see whether you were supposed to use the new section or the old section running parallel to it - often you could use either but sometimes one or the other ended in a precipitous drop - there didn't ever appear to be any signs.

We stayed on the bus until its destination in LiPu which would give us a 40km ride into YangShuo tomorrow - Christmas day and Catherine's last riding day. The bus did not allow us to warm up however, instead we froze. I put on every layer I had to hand - about 5 on top and 2 layers on my legs but still couldn't feel my toes when I got off the bus. Catherine had fewer clothes and was shivering uncontrollably when we arrived. We went to the first hotel we saw - opposite the bus station and stayed in the room for a few hours trying to warm up.

We went into town later and found some hats to wear. The hotel receptionist said that the temperature was 2-5 degrees C - no wonder we were cold. I asked if it ever dropped below zero - but she assured me that this was the coldest it ever got to and it never drops below zero - thank goodness for that!

previous | next

Top of Page