Always Forward 25/03/11: Mojiang to Gangzhueng 99.33km

Nice weather we're having

We were up a bit earlier despite the calls through the night to our room asking if we needed a massage before they just asked out right if we wanted a girl. During a breakfast of noodles (it was one of 4 bowls of noodles I had today) it began to rain, only a little though but it was quite chilly. Regardless we set off and the rain gradually got heavier, the temperature dropped as low as 9C at one point. It was a shame the weather was so poor because for once the road wasn’t too bad and we felt we could have covered some ground today.  Just before we had gone up our first climb there was the sound of thunder, a smart person would have gone back to the town which was only 5minutes down the hill for shelter but me and Loon just put our waterproofs on, manned up and got on with it. 

It really wasn’t pleasant riding, there was a strong cold wind that when we would round corners would send a shiver right through our body.

The rain thankfully did stop and things were much more pleasant, the road got worse which made the 20km downhill a bumpy one. We came across a hot spring, with the cold weather it would have warmed us right up but neither of us could bear the thought of when we are done and drying ourselves off in the bitter cold however there was a group who had set up a cards table in the hot river and were sat there playing cards while keeping warm. When we hit the bottom of the hill we were down to 450m, the lowest we have been at for quite some time and when we went to the next town we were back to 800m but again neither of us can recall the last time we stayed anywhere under 1000m!

Gangzhueng seemed a dirty square old China town, not a lot going on here but I’m sure Chinas wealth will reach it and things will build up and develop. As for my food expenditure today I didn’t pay more than 3 Yuan (30p) for any meal except the rice, I still don’t understand how Chinese people survive, things are so cheap but again I’m not complaining.