Shock And Awe 1

krolesh
May 10, 2024
6 min read

And so, it was time for the next leg of my little journey - time to begin my long traverse across the vast arid lands of central and northwestern China.

If you look at the map, the circle in the middle with the little bike is my location, Lanzhou, which is close to the centre of northern China.

The Kazakhstani border, however, is the big red star, all the way over in the top left corner. And that's where I'm headed.

Looks bloody far doesn't it. Probably because it is.

Ah well, the journey is the destination innit. One pedal at a time.

I must say that after a week of getting around without my bike, I was definitely ready to get back on it.

But on the morning I'd planned to leave Lanzhou I woke up feeling a bit off, with a slightly runny nose and a headache, not sure exactly why. It wasn't ideal.

But I left anyway, and as I pedalled off from the centre of the city, I felt excited, with no idea whatsoever of what mindblowing vagabondal adventures lay in store for me.

All I knew was that whatever was coming would be completely different from anything my mind could possibly conjure up.

Such is the beauty of travel.

Loading Bewdy outside my hotel, behind this guy's unflinchable smile.

As I headed up the Yellow River Valley, upstream, the vast expanse of high rise apartments and residential and shopping developments of the Greater Lanzhou area seemed to last for an eternity. The city of Lanzhou morphed into the city of Qilihe, and then into the city of Anning, and then the city of Xigu. It appeared endless.

The sometimes easy (and sometimes tricky) long long ride through a tamed concrete jungle..

It was really jaw dropping to see the extent of new development in the area.

It took me two whole hours to finally get into the bush.

But my minor roads were still within cooee of the expressway, or railway line, or high-speed rail track. At least for part of the day.

I wouldn't drink from here. Not even after filtering with my portable water filter. The water was a shitty brown, who knows what factories are around.

Only a narrow, stony shoulder for lone cyclists. I stayed on the bitumen, and veered off whenever I needed to. The drivers were pretty good, except occasionally when overtaking other vehicles as they came towards me in the opposite direction. I had to veer off the road sometimes.

I found a cheap hotel in a town called Zhongchuan, and, before I knew it, was staying way up in one of those highrises I've just been complaining about.

The whole area has another name, New Lanzhou, there's a brand new airport, and the area is a centre for the petrochemical industry. I didn't know any of that until I got there.

There was a pussycat with a tomato on its head on my toilet seat. How random.

I'd like to wear this lampshade. Not exactly sure where, but I was thinking maybe on my butt, sorta like a cute bunnytail. Soft and cuddly, but with plenty of space for Chinese dinner leftovers to escape. Are the feathers browner near the middle, or is that just my sicko imagination?

What to do tonight then, if I can't pornograph? Oh well, back to spending hours writing and reading and playing guitar and uploading pics, as usual.

Just as well I love it.

I had a lovely chat with this guy and his wife, and then played with their son for awhile. They were all so cute, and so incredibly curious of me, to the point where they were even videoing me eating my noodles. Go figure. I deliberately slurped loudly as I ate, because that's what they all do, and I really wanted to fit in.

People video me all over the place here. But as a celebrity I'm now quite used to it. Such are the trials and tribulations of fame. People video me in shops just going about my business. Wives or husbands will video me chatting to their spouses using my translation app. Teens will video me as I walk down the street, as they say hello and I say hello back and smile obligingly at their phones.

Or people will video me while they pretend not to.

It's gonna be so hard to be anonymous again.

Well, actually, no it's not.

Sunset over the expressway.

Petrochemicalled

Today was tough. I woke still feeling crap and headchey, but I wanted to ride anyway. I didn't feel like sticking around, somehow, but wanted a long dose of fresh air and some exercise.

So I packed up and left, and immediately found myself riding straight into a cold and hugely powerful headwind.

Great. Just what the doctor didn't order.

And then, to add more joy to my morning, for the next three hours or so I rode through a flat industrial soulless hell realm, on hugely wide empty roads, sometimes leading to nowhere, literally. Massive big roads would just stop, at some wall or barrier, or just in a heap of sand, and I'd be forced to retreat, or find some track heading in the rough direction I wanted to go.

All the while struggling against a strong and unrelenting wind.

I passed huge factories, massive industrial complexes, and the remains of quaint villages that had been partially or fully demolished to make way for more industry, either now, or at some time in the future.

And the weirdest thing was, I hardly saw a living soul in the whole place. Human, animal, or spiritual..

It was all a little hard to take, in my pained state of body.

Company offices

Cold roads, flat fields

The cutest school buses

A still-standing village

Colour coordinated spring blossoms

Nothingness

At least they left the temple standing, on the right.

Pipe art

To add to my so-far beautiful day, a major road that I'd planned on taking tirned out to be permanently closed, and they were building a huge petroleum processing plant where it used to be. Thanks guys. So that meant I had to turn around and take about a 20 km detour to get to another road that was heading to where I wanted to go.

I mean 20 kms is fine on a bike. It's less than an hour's ride when it's all still and flat. But with a brutal cold headwind, and a brutal cold headache, it wasn't exactly what I wanted at that particular moment.

Even the birds have flyed

Then, for Buddha's sake, the detour I'd been forced to take, a four lane road, which Baidu maps had suggested for me, suddenly ended in this.

Again, I had to go back, and then I veered off onto a dirt track, eventually leading me to a real village that, surprisingly, hadn't been ghosted.

Where is everyone?

A small burst of colour! I started to feel better after that.

A banner built by some water company, singing its own praises. Note the flapping flags. After this point I finally, finally!, got to have that beast of a cold wind behind me for awhile.

Things were looking up.

The scenery then became really quite beautiful, and that had absolutely nothing to do with the fact that I had the wind behind me, and that my headache had eased a little.

Did it?

And there was still virtually no one on the road to see all that beauty.

Except me.

Storks get around

I was heading down, this guy was heading up. He obviously didn't have a nice low gear like me.

Huge eroded creek

These hills chequered past

That's a farm down there. Don't ask me what happens when it rains.

My first glimpse of my destination, Yongdeng.

I got to a hotel, and was desperate to lie down, after a ride of maybe 80 tough kilometres that felt like 180. It was a Friday. The little boy inside me really hoped that when I entered the lift the next day I'd see Saturday's carpet.

The simple pleasures.