The Simpler LIfe

As I lie here on a comfortable bed with soft white sheets, I can feel the embracing warmth coming from the radiator next to me. I also hear the distilled sound of traffic from the window and every now and then the dramatic noise of fire crackers from down the street. It is Chinese New Year today and this is day 3 in a hotel in Urumqi, a large city in the north west of China.

I don't want to be here though.

I want to be back out on the road where we're meant to be.

I was so glad to be in this amazing hotel on Thursday afternoon. Now however it's Saturday and this hotel in Urumqi couldn't feel more agonising.

It sounds so strange to be fantasising about waking back up in a tent, my sleeping bag would be covered in ice. Then Laura and I would heat up the water from flasks that had gone cold from the night before. We would drink a cup of tea as the sun would rise, then eat some sort of boiled food before packing up the tent and hitting the road.

I want to feel the pure pain when I finally warm my fingers back up in my gloves and feel the freezing air flow though my helmet while I am being stunned by the incredible scenery. I don't want to be in a warm hotel worrying about buses and trains...

One of the biggest underlying issues with being stuck in a big Chinese city is that we're blowing our budget. This is generally on sleeping and eating but we can't get a cheaper hotel because they must have a "special licence" to accept foreign guests. Hostels also tend close in the winter as we found out in Turpan earlier last week. I can only deduce that tourism reduces when it's -10 degrees Celsius. We also can't pack up and live in a tent because we have no fuel, so can't heat any water or food up.

I must exercise my ability to be  patient and just let life do its thing  and soon we will be back out on the road.

I can't wait!!

A Spanner in the Works.

When Laura and I set out for this trip we planned a few critical parts... heat, water, food. We knew that we couldn't carry them all for the whole trip so below are our tactics to solve the problems. 

In terms of food for the trip we planned to carry emergency food that would be enough for 3 days. This is in case of storms or mechanical break downs. The emergency food comprises of chicken feet, weirdly packaged fish, some pickled vegetables, rice and pasta. The idea behind these weird and wonderful delicacies is that it should be stuff that we don't really want to eat, meaning we won't eat it accidentally while hungry, it will also entice us to carry enough food or find some quickly. With our normal food we make sure we have enough for the distance between town to town, which usually means carrying another 2-3 days of food. 

We knew that we also couldn't carry enough water so we planned to always stop and camp by lakes and streams. Then we would boil water and carry some with us in flasks too. 

The last thing was fuel. We decided to buy multi fuel stoves back in Hong Kong. This is the type that you can use both gas and petrol with. We did this so that we had lots of freedom in terms of what we can use to burn. Between us we had 5 canisters of gas knowing that we would need to fill up along the way.

This is where the plan goes tits up... due to an unforeseen issue that we don't truly understand. I will try and give you the basic outline...

All of the fuel stations in this province of China have security at them. When the locals fill up their cars they have to go through a few processes. First, all of the passengers must get out of the car, then the security search the car and open every door. After they are happy, the driver must swipe a fuel card (that Laura and I don't have) before eventually being allowed to fill up with fuel. 

We have tried our best puppy dog eyes to try and get some petrol but the security guards are having none of it.

Without petrol we can't heat up ice to get water and we can't cook food either. 

You might be thinking to your self "why don't you just buy gas or white spirit and carry it with you". Unfortunately it's not that easy to get hold of, and almost every main road has police checks along it. Depending on the traffic controllers' mood, they would happily take any gas or fuel away from you meaning we would be stranded with no fuel. 

Until we solve this problem, we are stuck in a lovely warm hotel room... so it's not all bad. 

Not the China I expected

As we walk under the blue tarpaulin held up by long pieces of sun-scarred wood, we walk past an older, weathered-looking lady behind a stool with a scarf over her hair and a large jacket. She is selling some fresh vegetables. While she is beckoning customers to come and have a look at her wonderful fresh food items one thing becomes clear. This is not a style of language I ever expected to hear in China. The sounds I could hear seemed to flow more, it had less negative inflections at the end of sentences. The sound was definitely more familiar to my ears than the mix of Cantonese and Mandarin I had heard before in the Hong Hong bazaars. I would almost recognise this new language I could hear as a  European one if I didn't know where we were. 

It turns out that there is a local dialect used Xinjiang province, this is called (Urghur) 

I feel a little lost but Laura had clearly done her home work. While ordering local delicacies like a stuffed bread, she would use words like "Rach-mid" meaning "thank you" and "misleke" meaning "tasty". We can speak Mandarin to the locals however they respond more positively to Urghur.

I must say I felt like a little bit of a tourist, letting Laura talk to the locals and order our food. However for me there is no greater kick up the bum to improve than to see it for your self. So my resolution for the next few days is to learn some local language, and quickly. 

Two days on a train

As I sit in our hotel room in Guangzhou, I have images running through my mind of what a sleeper train might be like. I imagine a lovely wide carriage with our own little cabin confined to ourselves. I think of a large table in the middle and a great big window you could stare out of into the barren and unknown landscape of China.
I think my imagination might have been sightly influenced by the Harry Potter films and the wonderful Hogwarts Express.

As we get on board the train, we first head to our beds where we shall be sleeping. The beds are stacked in triple bunks and are adequate in size, even for a lanky person like me! I'm on a middle bed in one cabin and Laura is in the next cabin on a top bunk.

Last night was not the most ideal sleeping conditions. I ended up sharing with a lovely local lady, who unfortunately was snoring quite abruptly near my ear all night.  Then after she had had a wonderful sleep, she decided at 6am to stop snoring and turn the light on instead, only to look at the time I presume. I'm pretty sure I could have told her that as she had kept me awake for the previous 3 hours.  I'm not sure that her and I shall become friends after all.

At opposite side of the carriage there are two fold out seats and a small table situated by a large window. The seating is not the most comforting on the buttocks however they do enable me and Laura to stare out of the window while drinking an unequivocal amount of tea and coffee.

So all being said, its not all bad.
As we look out at the deserts, mountains and blue skies from our window to the world, we know that we shall soon be on our journey in subzero temperatures. I think I may long for the days of sitting on a plank of wood while having my shoulder brushed by half the population of China and drinking a cup of tea.

I'm not sure I'm quite built internally to be locked in a cabin for 48 hours. I can only think that I feel like a dog in the back of a car, longing to just run in the fields that I can see all around me.

On the other hand, Laura seems to be dealing with the journey astonishingly better than me, her positive attitude always shines through. I wonder how she is so relaxed and can only deduce that her experience of these long tedious journeys have taught her to appreciate the time to reflect on other matters, like where we are going on the bikes.

But for a newbie to all this travel, I just cant wait to get on my bike and be in the fresh air!

Post 1, Made it to China!!

(Blog post) day 1 of the trip...

Today was an eventful day in the history of both me and Laura as well as of course the two bikes Jess (my bike) and montiy (Laura's bike).
We rode of into the sunset; Well when I say sun set it was drizzly, miserable and wet also, when i say road I actually mean pushed the heavy lumps of metal up a super steep hill and then rode down an equally steep hill on the other side. All the while trying not to crash into poor on passers by who were quietly making there way to work. I felt like i might have been riding a particularly frisky horse who seemed to be interested in every thing but going in a straight line. Eventually we arrived into yung she wan where we popped the bikes on the ferry.
Pheww.
Laura and I land in the central area of Hong Kong, its an iconic area full of huge sky scrapers like man made mountains sitting peacefully in the sky. Our next step is to head to the bus stop where we will be going to Guangzhou. That was remarkably easy the bus only had 15ish people on, also next to no luggage. so a quick spin of the handle bars and 12 bags of equipment later, were off!
As we pull up to the border one and a half hours later its a quick re-assemble of the bikes and a wonder into boarder control finds us in a little pickle. Generally speaking walk through border controls aren't designed with great lumbersome bikes in mind so when giving the passport officer my documents i was pleasantly surprised for him to say "your name Arron?" I replied "that is correct " with a smile on my face. His next question was "will your bike fit through?" Looking at the awkward 's' bend next to him. I said "we will find out" now with an even bigger grin finding the hole experience hilarious. So with laura grabbing the front an me man handling the rear we squeeze it though and out the other side. The hole experience was quite hysterical and was some of the most fun i have had crossing a border in a little while.
On the other side was a different matter entirely we managed to find our bus but this time it was packed full of people and leaving in 11 minuets. How we got our bikes on was a blur to me i just whipped wheels off and moved numerous suit cases around to make room then crammed our bikes in. Laura even had to undo her pannier rack on the back just so the door would shut.
But safe to say were here now and in a nice hotel with collected train tickets life is beautiful. We will catch our train on the 18th and just have to drop our bikes off tomorrow to get them in the cargo area.

Easy right?

The Plan

Like all good films our story starts with two seeming odinary people who decide to do something extraordinary. A cycling trip was decided

_{A classic film montage of shopping for random items had to be done first then Once our two heros have succeeded in buying all the items they required  it was time...}

_{for the cheesy photo...}

We all know that they will go through trials and tribulations, which will hopefully make them better people however I can only speculate that for now. I'll try and keep you updated on that as we go so we can really find out. 

Their route 

      The black lines are where we will have to take trains and the red is what we will cycle. This is due to only being able to have          30 day visa for China, Kazakstan and Russia

But a treat for me today, a cheeky surfing session. The last time in water in a long time I presume.

Strange for an original white water kayaker to say that...

Just Say YES!

Just because you have a plan in where your life is heading means you should stick to it. Does it? After all you might not even have a plan.

I’m not encouraging you to leave your long term partner or quit your job but I do think that you should say “yes” more often. Especially to things that are easy to say no to. Here’s an example.

You’re on a ferry with a friend you have just met 2 weeks previously and you are both doing the same job for 3 months. While on the way to an island in Hong Kong to go surfing, you get chatting and realise you share lots common. They then proceed to tell you an idea they had, an adventure in mind. They want to cycle from china back to the UK they think they know a vague route. It would be great to do it with someone but if not, would most likely do it on the own.

Then I said “yes”, “I will do it with you”

Plans on hold, money invested and a tunnel like vison on my goal home on a bike!

What was I thinking I could have said no “good luck with that”.

And yet…

Here I am in January in Hong Kong with 5 days till we leave for china. I’m so excited!!

I have a bike, a tent and a sleeping bag that goes to -50celcius amongst other things.

So were ready.

I think.

I’m nervous though.

She's ready to go but doesn't have a name yet!!

My first post

I have done blogs before but never kept them up. This year turns a new leaf for me in many ways, I hope you as the reader enjoy my exploits and adventures and it inspires you to have your own adventure, what ever that maybe !!

Me and my buddy in the Philippians in December, on an adventure of a life time.