Oshpitality 2

We slept like drunk babies, with no one admitting the next morning whether or not they'd heard any snoring during the night.

Kurt showing me how tall he wants to be

The scenery was drop dead gorgeous again the next day.

Let alone the riders

It doesn't get any better than this

Saltlick

We chatted for awhile with these sweet boys. No smartphones in their pockets.

We stopped for a drink in a little town called Nookat, and asked about somewhere to stay, but there was nowhere, so we decided to camp further up the road. It was a really interesting town, and was totally bustling around the market area.

A couple of friendly young women came to chat in English. That's pretty unusual in these parts, as the women in this particular region tend to not speak to men in public so much. One of them handed me her 2 year old boy to hold for awhile, but he looked pretty unsure about the whole dubious arrangement, biting his lip a couple of times to stop himself crying.

I must say I miss having little kids around.

Eventually we headed up the road

There's a lot of these cars around, screeching and rattling past

Eventually we reached a place called Peshchera Gorge. It was late afternoon, and a whole crew of locals had gone there for a swim after work, just like the boys would do on the north coast in Oz.

It's a very different scene to Oz though. In Oz the lads would go down with a carton of tinnies, and drink their way through them pretty quickly, getting more and more raucous as time goes on. Here they turn up with the same hotted-up cars, but the lads are brandishing watermelons, which they devour like hungry boars, and then throw each other in the raging river like teenagers.

It's cute.

I guess some of them were actually teenagers.

Eventually everyone left, which was our cue to set up camp. It was beautiful.

Again.

The next day we faced a rough and tough climb first thing. I started quite a way behind those guys and knocked back a kind offer of a lift from some truck drivers close to the bottom. We all had to push part of the way, as the road was steep, rough, and sandy in parts. Darina got a lift from the truck guys further up the road, to the top of the pass.

Good morning! Welcome to the world of cycle touring.

Looking back

The downhill was quite slow too, as happens when the road is so rocky and rough.

Eventually the valley started to green up, and we rolled into cute little townships and farming settlements.

Very elaborate bus stops, all glassed in. Wish they'd spent the money on the road instead.

The small settlement of Mangyt. We stopped for lunch, a cool drink, and to tape my glasses, the frame of which had snapped the day before. Cheap and nasty.