The amount of pictures I took doesn’t reflect how much I liked the country. Laos was simply beautiful.
Laos
January 23rd, 2012
China: Beijing to Dali
November 7th, 2011My third time in China I took quite a lot the train and buses. On my way I visited some major tourist spots. Usually they were crowded by chinese tourists, foreign tourists were in minority. I did just some cycling in the south of China.
Mongolia
August 24th, 2011After two weeks in Ulaanbaatar I left the city for a five weeks round trip in Central Mongolia. Theremore distance I had to Ulaanbaatar therefore less traffic was on the road. After one week I had a bit bad luck. The bottom bracket axle broke again and the spare one didn’t fit with the cone to adjust the bearings. People tried to help me but it was simply not possible. So I had to take a jeep back to Kharkorin to find a solution. Luckely right next to the guesthouse was a craftsman who could help me. Unfortunately a truck driver who wanted to help me before took the cover. So I cycled from then on with open and loose bearings but most importent I could cycle. Though Mongolia is called the land of blue sky I had quite a lot of rain showers. Almost every second day there was a storm. Sometimes I was lucky and the storm missed me, sometimes not. All in all I had a good time and enjoyed the wide countryside.
In Mongolia I met more cyclists than in any country before. Among others there were Emma and Justin on the way to New Zealand and Liz and Chris cycling to England.
From Zamyn-Uud to Ulaanbaatar
July 15th, 2011Because you can’t cross the border by bicycle I had to load my bicycle and luggage on a private jeep. Of course this wasn’t free of charge. I payed ten dollars. There are loads of Mongolians crossing the border. They go for shopping in China and return fully loaded or overloaded.
Zamyn-Uud has about two tarmaced roads but they finish at the end of the town and a multilane dirt road starts. The first day I was sometimes really unsure if this is the road to Ulaanbaatar. Sometimes you see building places for a new road. From Choir on the road was good again but small.
Many times I saw dark clouds and rain at the horizon. So the desert was fairly green. Sometimes after heavy rain there were many paddles to avoid on the road. One day I didn’t cycle at all because there were rain showers all day.
From Tianjin to Erenhot
July 15th, 2011My second time in China was rather short. I only made a break in Beijing to organize the visa for Mongolia. In Beijing itself I visited only a few places. The sky was mainly grey. Nowadays there are much more cars than bicycle in the city but it is still easy to cycle around on the cycling lanes. From Beijing to Erenhot the landscape was slowly changing from forested mountain to flat grass and rock desert landscape.
South Korea
July 15th, 2011First I thought I will cross South Korea in about two weeks from Busan to Seoul. At the end I stayed five weeks but I could had stayed easily longer. Nice countryside and enthusiastic people. When I liked to made a reservation for the ferry to China on the tourist information I got a flyer for Wwoofing from a French tourist. I changed my mind quickly and arranged a stay for one week on the farm Ariland.
Japan
July 15th, 2011The ferry from Shanghai to Osaka was a 48 hours trip. The first night was not so pleasant because of the rough see. For the first couple of days I could stay by a family who did cycling tours in the past. It was hard to made my mind up where I like to go. On the day I left Osaka a strong wind was blowing from south, so I decided to go north, direction Tokyo.
I made quite a few detours and sightseeing stops on the way. It took me about three weeks to reach Tokyo. Just in time for the earthquake. Till I saw the pictures in the newspaper next morning I thought it was just a normal earthquake as they happen in Japan.
Going further north was not a good idea anymore so I went over the mountains westwards to Matsumoto before going to the south of Japan.
On the way to Shanghai and Shanghai
April 22nd, 2011
Wuhan
January 24th, 2011In fact I was just lacy in Wuhan. It was snowing twice. In the morning it is hard to leave the warm bed. But it is worth it to get up just for walking to the next noodle place and get some “hot dry noodles” the specialty of Wuhan. The first picture shows the Yangtze river which goes through Wuhan. Picture number two seems to be a leisure activity and on the third one are some housemates.
From Xi’an to Wuhan
January 24th, 2011The first one and a half day I cycled with Magnus. I met him in the Youth Hostel in Xi’an. The road led us to a long uphill up to 2000m. There was still some snow sometimes on the road from previous days and a sledge would had been more appropriate. It was most of the time cold but bearable.
