Monthly Archives: October 2013

Day 14

What a day of rest can do! That and a gently rolling landscape. We were up and on the road by 7:30 and arrived in Hepu at 2pm, almost 46 miles away. At no time did either of us feel fatigued. We even stopped for a stretch every ten miles as the precepts of slow travel dictate. A better training regimen for the mountains that we will surely come to could not have been better designed. We are getting stronger and faster but don’t feel as if we are pushing ourselves. It has been a natural progression.

Our progression was also hastened by the cool, dry weather we had today. However, we were still coated in a thick layer of dust from the road. Since our trikes are at tire height, any large vehicles that pass throw up a cloud of dust that settles on us as we pass through it. It’s a good thing we have large flags made out of neon construction vests as well as a vest strung across the back to give us increased visibility. After seeing how much attention we have attracted, we have no doubt that we are indeed very visible and have to remove our flags at lunch so we don’t draw too much of a crowd.

Our momentum only slowed when the road suddenly narrowed to a single lane, usually with very little notice. Huge pits capable of swallowing a car to its windows were marked with only a tree limb and some orange grocery bags. These constant hazards were to our advantage because it required the truckers to remain vigilant and to drive slowly. Many of the trucks that passed us did so slowly and carefully. They always make sure to honk as they approach and pass. Although I’m thankful for this, Cher and I are almost certainly going deaf from the repeated blasts. I’m beginning to feel that the trucks may not be as menacing as they appear, although we will certainly keep on eye on the road and another on the rear view mirror.

We are seeing more fields of sugarcane, oranges, bananas, dragon fruit and pineapples as we move west. This is great for tropical fruit but bad for fair skinned white men. We exhausted our first tube of sunscreen and went looking for more. We have found that sunscreen lotions are considered a beauty product and as such comes in tiny little bottles with expensive price tags. To avoid using so much sunscreen, we’ve started covering up. Our synthetic clothing has been doing a good job at keeping us cool and dry.

While Cher was using the bathroom at a gas station, I was captured by a group of “shy” Chinese teens. Eight of them piled out of tiny van like clowns out of a clown car and rushed me. They must have been planning it while inside, because their phones and cameras were at the ready and a coordinated photo attack ensued. Without asking, arms were thrown over my shoulder and around my waist while they flashed the obligatory peace sign. I joined them, reluctantly. I snapped a photo of them checking out Cher’s trike and bombing her with the usual FAQs after she returned from the bathroom.

We quickly found a hotel in another large town and quickly dispensed with our duties – unpacking, moving the bags, hauling trikes into the room, showering, sink laundry, food, reading and then bed before 8pm, as always early.

Day 13

To begin the celebration, Cher surprised me with a card she had stowed away since Hong Kong. Instead of our daily ration of oatmeal, we went out for a lavishing 2-course breakfast: first a stew made of offal and some leafy vegetables in a thin broth. Despite much western squeamishness at liver, intestine, heart, kidneys and the like many of these have a lot of vitamins, such as vitamin C, which you don’t get in the skeletal organs. Next a rice sheet roll (much like crepe, but made with rice flour) with minced meat and an egg, covered in fresh cilantro. It was delicious. I spent the afternoon reading. We carry a Kindle and a Google Nexus Tablet. Both of them are excellent e-readers. Since we’ve started I’ve finished Don Quixote and Cher is reading the complete works of Sir Arthur Conan Doyle. Thanks to the technology, we are free from the heavy lifting of the books. I’ve since decided to call my trike Dapple, named after Sancho’s ass, due to its incredible comfort and faithfulness. Since many books are free 90 years after the death of the author, my reading has been around the late 19th and early 20th century. For anyone looking for books of adventure I recommend Don Quixote, Farthest North by Fridtjof Nansen, Roughing It by Mark Twain, and Typee and Omoo by Herman Melville, all for free! Other than updating our website and checking emails, we have also been using the Google Nexus tablet for navigating. I previously chose a route and downloaded each section of the map for the first part of our journey so we have offline access. There are some limitations to this. First we can’t get directions so we have to estimate distances. Secondly, Google maps is not very accurate in China. The information is very outdated. It gives you a good idea about the roads and general direction, but don’t depend on it for anything else. It does pin point our location when we are lost, since our tablet has satellite GPS, and it has been good enough to get us from town to town. Knowing our general heading I also carry a good old-fashioned compass so if all else fails we can continue in the correct direction, which we have used several times when the road are lacking signs. While I was leisurely reading away my birthday, Cher busied herself updating our website. Due to some technical difficulties (long story), the pictures had to be uploaded from a computer instead of the tablet. Not being able to use the computers at the internet cafes, she took advantage of the niceness of the people in this town. The receptionist offered a room with a computer for her to use free of charge. However, the computer was locked and she couldn’t upload the pictures from our SD cards. Then the receptionist offered a computer at the neighboring truck scaling business, where Cher spent a good 3 hours working on the computer while people minded their truck weighing. We were both struck by the kindness and openness of the people here. Cher told me that they have been the first bunch of people whose first question for us wasn’t “how much are the trikes?” Instead, they were more interested in our journey itself and genuinely excited for our adventure. As we were stealing their Wi-Fi in the hotel lobby, we were invited to have tea with the staff. Cher found no difficulty in small chatting with them, as they were very passionate about the town they live in. They proudly talked about their local mangrove forest, red crabs, oranges and lychee, and promised that if we come back next year during the lychee season, we will have free access to the orchard. It was what we needed, after seeing many frowny faces along the way. We also went out for dinner and had a very fatty but delicious fish cooked in a clay pot and a heaping tray of vegetables, which we washed down with two large cold beers. It’s a great change to go out to dinner, but we haven’t been exactly starving. I’m still maintaining some good insulation and haven’t suffered in the least. Our breakfast has always been oatmeal with condensed milk or soy milk powder, mine with a cup of coffee and Cher’s with a cup of green tea. For lunch we eat at road side restaurants where we get to sample the fresh vegetables and fruits that are grown locally and for dinner we have noodles with pickled vegetables and some type of protein, such as sausage, eggs, canned fish or spicy tofu. We eat many of our meals voraciously even though many of them are the same with hunger being the best sauce.

Wild wild west

B-day dinner restaurant

Our rest day was restful. Nearing our 2 week mark it’s hard to believe that we’ve planned to do this for at least a year, but sitting here content, housed and fed it’s easy to imagine that we will both celebrate at least one more birthday on our tour.

Day 12

We have spent our first and last night in our hammocks. They are neither cool when it’s hot nor warm when it’s cold. To be comfortable in a hammock you either need a constant temperature or to be a contortionist. When it’s hot during the day the hammock envelopes you and cuts off all air flow and it’s stifling and when it’s cool at night convection robs heat from your your backside and you freeze. We spent the night alternately sweating or freezing. When we got cold we wrapped up in our sleeping bags, which compressed the insulation underneath us leaving our bottom still cool and our top hot. This caused us to sweat so we also became chilled. A sleeping pad is necessary to cut down the heat loss, but managing a sleeping pad and sleeping bag in the narrow confines of a slippery hammock is beyond our flexibility, co-ordination and patience.

As terrible as it sounds I did sleep quite well only waking 3 times. Cher’s sleep was much more turbulent, as her hives broke out. Cher also brought up a good point against the usage of hammocks for outdoor living, who wants to be tightly sealed in their own filth after a day of hiking?

I had fantasies of sleeping in the hammock tied to palm trees on wind swept beaches, and being safely strung over prickly undergrowth where snakes and scorpions lurk, all the time forgetting that our tent is already snake and scorpion proof. Also there are few times when we can’t find a patch of earth big enough to put up a tent, even if we have to both squeeze into the middle. Therefore we have deemed the hammock and tarp as excess weight and will be mailing it back. That’s five less pounds that we will have to slog up mountains as gravity drags us back down.

We arrived in the town of Gaoqiaozhen in the early afternoon after a short ride. It’s a pleasant town. The townspeople’s curiosity is reserved and friendly. Cher’s itchiness continues. That coupled with the coziness of the town has compelled us to stay for a rest day, which also happens to be my birthday.

Day 11

Oh what a sweet surprise! After fleeing the city we had a pleasant ride through the countryside. That is until we were cornered by some curious passersby. First a car stopped blocking the shoulder, and young man got out to take a picture, we stopped and waved him off, but he persisted. Next a 3 wheeled cart stopped next to him, then a scooter and a pickup truck. The more that we stayed, the more that stopped until they were blocking two thirds of the road forcing tractor trailers to veer off into oncoming traffic. Feeling more or less cornered and trapped, both Cher and I lost our temper and started yelling and tailgating a motorcycle. Soon we calmed down and felt ashamed because our conduct was perhaps even worse than those that trapped us at the first place.

If seeing us on trikes is the highlight of their day so much so that they deny their own instincts of self preservation to snap a photo while stopping in traffic, it cost us nothing to remove ourselves to a safe spot until they are satisfied. However, it is very difficult to dampen that basic instinct of fight or flight when you are trapped, even if it is by a mob armed only with mobile phones. However, we both agreed that for our own health and safety that we have to be the better selves, even if that was the 7th car that day that stopped our progress.

Just after lunch we drove by a handsome forest with very little brush between the trees. They were made for hammocks! We couldn’t pass the opportunity to try out our hammocks and tarp that we had been carrying around for the past 2 weeks, even with only 2 liters of water between the two of us. Following a dirt path we pulled off and pushed our cycles into the bushes. Hot, sweaty, thirsty, dirty, and tired we pulled in and waited for the sun to set. It was 2pm and even sitting still in the shade made us sweat. We killed out time by putting up the tarp for sun protection and debating the visibility from the road. The temperature finally dropped at sunset. We should have known this was a bad omen but weren’t hammocks made in and for the tropics?

The nightmare began as Cher’s hives broke out in the middle of the night, with dirt and sweat all sealed up in the clammy hammock. Though it was grilling during the daytime, it was chilling during the night, but not quite cold enough for down sleeping bags. As a result, half of our asses were freezing in the cold breeze where they were snuggled against the hammocks, while the other half sweated under the down sleeping bags. Cher spent her itchy night listening to me snoring away, mosquitoes buzzing around and rats squeaking under our food bag. The decision that we should abandon our hammock dream was easily made the next morning.

We didn’t even really need to camp. We have not had any problem keeping our budget of 10USD per person per day so far. We will surely be enjoying our fully air-conditioned hotel rooms without worries, if we can find one that is.

Day 10

It appears that our trend is reversing. What was once rural is now urban. We took a detour on S081 (which appeared to be S373 on Google map) from our trusty G325 to get away from the crowds.

The new S081 seems to be the renovated S373. Rewarded with a broad and smooth shoulder and less traffic we were quite proud of ourselves until arriving at an enormous bridge which only warned us that bicycles were not allowed at the entrance. The thought of backtracking was uninspiring under the searing sun. Upon a careful examination of our not so trust worthy Google map, there appeared to be a little road along the shoreline leading to a ferry pier 1 mile away at the end of old S373. We decided to give Google maps a chance to redeem itself. Following a road leading south of the bridge we passed a stadium complex under construction. Our road soon turned into overgrown sidewalk no more than 2 meters wide, which we expected to dwindle away at any moment. Surprisingly this tiny little path delivered us, as promised, to a ferry.

We disembarked right into the heart of Zhanjiang, a rather large, modern city with all the traffic of those that live there. I was a little disheartened that we were to enter another series of major urban areas after feeling relieved that we had just escaped them. Looking at Google maps it seemed that this was the case. Luckily as were fleeing the city, we found lodging at the outskirts of town and happily called it a day at 2pm.

Day 9

Finding ourselves on a bustling highway with no shoulders and nowhere to retreat, we pounded the pedals and by 1pm had already gone 30 miles. We stopped in the nearest town, Huangpo, which reminded both of us of a little Hanoi. Every type of industry was being conducted there. Stores specializing in welding, gates, hardware, solar water heating and storage, live chickens and doves and intricately woven baskets for carrying all manner of fowl. Not to mention the ubiquitous vegetable stalls, and a street dedicated to pickled garlic selling. Cher later pointed out that a “white dove con-gee” is a specialty of the village. Through and around this buzzed an exceptional amount of scooters, motorcycles and people. It was a surprising sight coming off a highway with little more than fields surrounding us to be dropped into such a busy town.

We once again attempted to gain access to the internet, but we were denied because we don’t have a Mainland Chinese ID card. The internet access is regulated by a censoring device which works with only the newest Chinese identity cards. The regulation aims to prevent under-aged teens using the internet cafes, as they are believed to be the culprits of a decrease in productivity. Never did the law-makers nor us expect this to be a problem for foreign travelers as evidenced by the amount of locals taking my picture while we were strolling around town.

We have pass through such a variety of towns everyday and we are able to get a better feel for them as we go. One thing I’ve noticed is the receptivity or openness of many of the faces we encounter. Since I understand nothing of what is said to me, I spend a lot of time reading faces and body language. One thing immediately noticeable in this town was the amount stares without the normal friendly curiosity. Many people stared from far off and when we looked directly at them fled. As my cheery self, I tried to greet people who stared at me but none returned my smile and hellos. We are often followed by people smirking or waving, but once we got in this town, I noticed someone in my mirror following at a distance even as we made a circuitous route looking for a suitable hotel. There were also numerous groups of teens just hanging about, and it was 1pm on a Monday. Despite the numerous businesses here, the population is still greater than the demand of the job market.

Day 8

Where is Cher?

Finally our first rest day and as Cher pointed out even office workers get 2 days off per week. We only peddled a half-day and what we are doing can hardly be called work, a rest day is always welcomed. After spending the better part of the day typing up our last 7 days we located an “internet cafe,” in what looked like an abandoned industrial building. Following a set of trash-riddled steps along a concrete corridor, we found the owners sitting behind a counter in complete darkness. We soon found out the power just went out in this half of the neighborhood a few minutes ago. We had to wait another day to upload our adventures. I spent the second half of the day maintaining the trikes. Using the Chinese version of WD-40 I degreased and lubed the chains. Our drive train should last at least 8,000 miles, maybe more depending on how often we keep the grit from sanding down the parts. After 7 incredibly dusty days and starting from a state of extreme cleanliness, everything was black and caked. I’ve found that using a synthetic wet lubricant is the best, even though they have the tendency to attract dirt. The dry lubricants wear out too quickly and don’t dispel water quite as well. Focusing on Cher’s trike I found her rear derailleur was sticking and after disassembling the cable and housing I discovered her cable completely rusted. Oh sweet preparation! thankfully I brought a spare and without incident was able to disassemble her twist grip and replace the cable, after clearing her cable housing of rust with the degreaser and lubing it. I’m guessing that due to the vertical position of the twist grip and the small hole for the cable end at the base of the grip, that during our numerous rain storms in Taiwan that water was able to drip through the hole and was funneled into the cable housing. A small piece of duct tape over the hole fixes this. We have finally adjusted to the travelling pace. We can peddle all day without having to stop repeatedly to tighten this or adjust that, which we did 4 to 5 times a day during our first 5 days. With this in mind I’ve gone over the trikes testing every single nut and bolt to ensure they are tight. Our bodies are also running well and haven’t had any aches or pains worth mentioning. Trikes truly are comfort machines and we feel that we have chosen wisely, despite the constant curiosity they draw.

Not much of a rest day since we spent the entire day from 6am till 9pm working. However, this has been our normal schedule. We usually stir at 6 am and we are in bed by 8pm. Having had plenty of exercise everyday, our sleep is usually sound. That with our home-cooked healthy meals, and a budget which doesn’t leave room for nights out drinking and partying, this is going to be a healthy life-style.

Day 7

Woke up fully rested at 5am and started packing before the rooster’s crow. We were eager to get back on the road without the hassle of cooking breakfast and packing in front of a crowd of spectators. It is nerve wracking to have a crowd watching your every move. No wonder the pandas don’t breed in the zoo. After packing in the dark we were ready to go by 6am and after thanking our host we departed. We stopped near a construction site behind a sand dune and cooked our oatmeal breakfast. Despite our efforts in going stealth, we still received a curious visitor as we were about to eat. Cher politely answered the normal questions: no it’s not electric powered, you have to pedal; yes it has 3 wheels; we are from Hong Kong and going to Vietnam. However, she drew a line at the question “what are you eating?” We had decided that on the subject of curiosity, we could not possibly satisfy everyone, so we would have to make some boundaries. First we won’t discuss how much our things cost. Second we have a no touch rule. This is a grey area but curiosity at one point turns into harrassment.

Twice today we’ve put our boundaries into practice. I snapped my fingers and gave a dissaproving look at 2 separate people, one turning the steering, the other turning the pedals. Afterwards they looked from afar or at least respectfully and even warned others not to touch after they turned up. It’s working and now we can eat in peace without having to worry about someone poking into our bags.

We had dreams of camping on a beach and followed a sign that promised “Romantic Coast” which is 16km away on a detour. Oh la la! It might be a rest day! As we peddled down the road, we soon found out that the coast is owned by a company, fenced in, and guarded by men in camo uniforms. The “Romantic Coast” costs 50 RMB per person to enter and they don’t want anyone stealing it. We dismissed it and moved on enduring the searing afternoon sun. Wanting to get some rest for our legs, we decided to have a rest day. After arriving n Dianbai, a blooming town outside of Maoming, we found a cheap hotel close to a market, grocery shop and an internet cafe and settled in for some blogging, sink laundry, air conditioning, spam and egg cooking, and trike maintenance. And of course, 2 delicious, cold, wheat beers to celebrate the successful completion of our first week of slow travel.

Gourmet chef in his natural environment

Day 6

With little sleep we had a long hot day. 34-35 degrees all day. We were hoping to reach Maoming, and thought that we were near after Cher read a sign that said, “Welcome to Maoming, Enjoy Our Safety Avenue.” As the sun was quickly going down, we hoped to find a hotel in town to catch up with the lost sleep, and Cher had already began fantasizing about a hot shower. However, after asking how far Maoming was, Cher learned it was still 70 kms away. Which means, we wouldn’t be able to enjoy their long “safety avenue” for another 2 days. Cher was very dissapointed to learn we would have to stay next to a noisy road and mosquito filled rice fields. I was equally dissapointed but didn’t let on in my attempt at manliness, and my cheery resolve only made Cher more annoyed.

After checking that we couldn’t be seen from the road, we decided to cook first and set up camp just after sunset. A passing farmer stopped and told Cher it wasn’t a good place to stay, assuring us that it was not dangerous, but just too many mosquitoes and too “wild”. He invited us to stay in the village. At first we declined but after some discussion we took him up on the invite. He patiently waited for us to collect our scattered cooking gear, and walked us to the village as he carried a large tree limb on his shoulder. He struck me as the ideal image of a farmer, polite, sturdy, with a straw hat, sandals, and a constant smile of amusement revealing white teeth.

As I watched Cher cycling next to him I was struck by the contrast. I realized how odd we must appear to everyone we passed and felt a twinge of shame for my frustration with their curiosity. Our trikes, and everything we own contain more modern technology than he was likely to come in contact with in a lifetime. We were from the future. True he wasn’t by any means living in the past and he owned modern luxuries such as a water heater, a washing machine and a mobile phone, but nonetheless the contrast was extreme. We are sanitizing water with a UV light pen and have a stove that fits in your pocket. Our 3-person tent is waterproof and can be set up in 2 minutes. In many ways even though we chose not to carry many modern conveniences, our way of life has arleady been branded by the modern world we live in.

We set up our tents in front of his house and soon the entire village had gathered and were curiously observing our tents and deciphering the mechanics of our trikes with their hands held respectfully behind their backs. Many were amazed by the mesh screen of our tent, which was not surprising since they go without screens in their windows. It was an event. Each of us took turns entertaining the crowd while the other took a hot shower in the house. It was a small price to pay for such hospitality. Cher answered questions such as “don’t you have anything else to do other than travelling?” as wandering around is considered a lack of ambition by the standards of industrious Chinese rural culture. I posed and hammed it up giving peace signs with the teenagers while they snapped shots with their mobiles. I asked if anyone had e-mail, and was given a physical address to mail pictures. This little adventure was a much needed reminder of the goodness of people after a few frustrating days.

Day 5

More city and highway insanity today, as the provincial road S356 turned into national road N325. Surprisingly, this toll road allows motorcycles, bicycles (and other human powered vehicles such as tricycles) and pedestrians. Hence, we had women with babies walking into traffic, motorcycles going against traffic in the bicycle lane and scooters jockeying for position at traffic lights. Unfortunately we chose the most direct route in order to get to our climbing destinations in the right season. However, the most direct also has the most traffic. We’ll have to choose more rural routes in the future. Not sure if the dust and chaos are worth the 2 or 3 weeks it would save.

We’ve stopped responding to the multiple hellos, hi’s and stares. As much as I would naively like to spread good will, it’s just too much and too dangerous. A trick I soon learned is that when people are tailing us dangerously close, once I wave them on, they will pass by and stop endangering us with their curiosity.

Cher found a little dirt trail along S356 and at 100 yards in there was a secluded flat spot with very few signs of human traffic except some livestock hoof prints. Plus there was a clean stream running down the hillside, this was a perfect spot to camp. To access the spot we had to push our trikes up a rugged, steep, wet hill. Cher insisted on riding and toppled over into a ditch with her trike on top of her. Pinned down in a wet ditch with her feet over her head I rushed over to free her and thankfully she found the incident more entertaining than horrifying.

After setting up our tent we saw a woman harvesting wild plants with a wicker basket, possibly for livestock. She didn’t even raise her eyes as she passed our camp site. Which as Cher pointed out was for the best. If she wanted to chat we might have ended up with an entire village of curious onlookers or a few stealthy plunderers. So whether she feared us or was shy, it was good that she didn’t take any notice of our wild camp. After a great shower in the clear stream, we settled in clean and fed as the temperature began to drop for perfect sleeping conditions.

After only 2 hours of sleep, I was awoken by hives everywhere tender. After many break-outs, I could only find relief by kneeling and propping my torso up with my head. Cher tended my itchy bumps but it wasn’t long before they spread and I was smearing the rest of the tube of anti-itch ointment all over myself for the next 8 hours. I slept only two hours and with my constant movement Cher got only slightly more. Looking forward to a nice cold shower soon.

Day 4

We peddled a beautiful stretch today. A well shaded road, lined with trees and beyond them verdant green rice fields. There was actual grass instead of heaps of garbage along the shoulder. We had to stop several times for maintenance and adjustments. Bumpy roads and loads on the trikes shook the bolts loose and rattled anything not fully secured. While we stopped, we were visited by a slender old man, probably in his 70’s riding an equally old bicycle. Although there wasn’t a speck of paint on the bike, it was well oiled and maintained. The old man was nice enough to agree to pose for pictures and demonstrate his riding. After telling him that we came from Hong Kong, he told us it was as good as himself going to Hong Kong as his pictures will travel back to Hong Kong with us.

Shortly after leaving this peaceful clean road, we entered a town uncharacteristically strewn with garbage and grim faces. Despite thinking this was a bad place to stop, we stopped to get groceries. As usual, Cher went into the store and I waited outside to guard the trikes. As usual, a crowd gathered, but this crowd was not polite. Their curiosity was forceful and intrusive and there weren’t any smiles. An older man with alcohol on his breath began poking our bags and I waved him off, yet he did it again. I made clear signs that I didn’t want him touching our things, then a 3rd time he tried to pull back the top of a bag, and I foolishly reached over and opened his mobile phone holder on his hip trying to teach him a lesson. I could have escalated the situation and had an angry mob or a fist fight instead of an annoying old man as Cher pointed out. Cher came out just in time to make our quick escape through the crowd, which only reluctantly gave way to avoid being bumped into. We both promised to trust our instincts and to avoid stopping in any sinister looking areas, and I had to promise to keep my cool.

After several more dusty, dirty roadside towns we started down a stretch of highway without a shoulder and had to pull off into the gravel and garbage to avoid tractor trailers with no room to go around us. Tired and dusty we entered Yangjiang at around 4pm and stopped at a hotel. Cher asked for a room at a cheap motel and just as we brought the trikes in, we were refused because they didn’t have a scanner for foreign id’s. We were directed to a hotel twice as expensive that had a scanner, but we found out that the hotel couldn’t accept foreigners because their scanner stopped working. As we were pulling out, Cher asked another staff member who just came out to take our pictures if we can stay, she guaranteed to take us if we had our marriage certificate or if we took 2 rooms. After some pressing by Cher and asserting that she would call the police herself, the scanner magically worked and we were able to get a room. I’ve learned that the scanning of IDs is a way to ensure surveillance of foreign visitors. The regulation is more strictly enforced in large cities, and some small cities.

We had a place that we could have camped earlier in the day at just 25 miles but decided to press on. When we reached Yangjiang it was too late to risk getting caught on a dangerous highway as it was getting dark. As a result, we were forced to stay in an expensive hotel in Yangjiang. We have to remember that we aren’t in a rush and to take the opportunity to stop when it presents itself.

Day 3

I slept horribly. Guanghaizhen had a stressed feeling. There were very few smiling faces, however there were plenty of idle young men hanging about, just waiting for any stimulus. There was banging and shouting all night long inside the hotel, and then at 2 am the hammering started. It has the distinct sound of metal on metal and it was vibrating the walls. I thought someone was trying to break our locks on the trikes we stored on the first floor so I ran downstairs to check and everything was ok. If I hope to get any sleep I’ll start storing them in the room.

We started at 8am and it was mercifully cool today. The further we progressed, the more rural it became. We are finally beginning to feel as if we are breaking away from the gravity of big cities. Now instead of cars and trucks, we have begun to see tractors and bicycles. Buildings and exhaust fumes have given way to fields, trees and cool breezes. S365 is serene. A wide shoulder and very little traffic. However, we were still harassed by curious drivers.

A car stopped in front of us blocking the shoulder and part of the road, expecting us to pass so he could get a good look at us. For safety concerns, we decided to wait behind it instead of riding into the oncoming traffic. A second later a pickup truck going the opposite way began to swerve wildly across both lanes before gaining control. Our first thought was that it was a flat. We then realized the pickup truck hit a dog curious about the car on the other side of the road. We are quite strange, but I hope their curiosity isn’t terminal for either of us.

We got to take another ferry today. Cher found out that we might have to wait for at least an hour for high tide to come so the ferry could dock. However, as soon as the ferry came in, a young passenger hurriedly waved us on and with just the three of us, the ferry departed without any delay. We soon found out that the young man was on his way to see his seriously ill father in the next town, and had paid 200 RMB for the immediate departure. He was kind enough to let us share the ferry ride.

As we had decided to cook our meals, we stopped at a little town to buy groceries. I waited outside to guard the trikes, while Cher went in. In 2 minutes I was surrounded by 20 people, blocking the street and crowding the market entrance. Cher heard a worker in the store yelling to her friend, “Come quick, there’s a foreigner outside.” Not sure how to respond I gave them the wide foreigner smile and decided to take a video so I could be a voyeur of the voyeurs. Unsettled by the camera some began to disperse. One young man encouraged by the camera wanted photos with me and a photo in the trike. Since I was holding his brand new I-phone 5 I let him take a seat. I-phones are definitely more common than foreigners.

We decided to camp tonight. We searched around some villages and were chased out by 3 dogs doing their job. Later we found our perfect spot – a dam overlooking rice fields and small villages on one side, and a lake on the other. Cher had the opportunity to practice her small chat skills, since we needed to ask for permission from the dam care takers to camp on there. As we were settling down for the night, a duck hunter came with a gun as long as the man was tall. The hunter wore an electronic duck caller clipped to his waste that called out a randomly generated series of quacks, a social quack then an annoyed quack and finally an encouraging quack. Squatting five feet from where we sat, he settled in and waited. As night fell a duck flew overhead and he took a shot. His gun, a flint lock, popular during the 1800’s went off with a shower of sparks. The curious duck was lucky as the hunter missed, but the duck was dumb enough to come back again against the warning of the gun shot. Lucky for the bird, the hunter’s gun took a long time to reload. The hunting went on until at least midnight.