Dongshan to Chuxiong

Day 57 Saturday 26th September 309 km (17859 km total)

Oil leaks, tunnels & timely reminders

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A late start today.

We were just about to leave when John noticed oul dripping from his BMW, so some investigation was necessary. Despite a couple of hours work, the leak couldn't be cured cured but he judged it ok to travel.

The hotel thoughtfully brought some drinks out for us whilst we waited. 'Tiger Power' for a Tiger!

And then we were off, back up the mountain & into the nice cool air.

Of course where ther are mountains in china, there are usually tunnels ..

. Dont go into the light, Russ!!

A petrol stop brought the usual inquisative locals to see what these mas foreigners in big bikes were doing. There are usually 3 questions,

Where are you from?

Where are you going?

How much is the bike?

Then a lot of thumbs up and selfies!
 These young kids were interested in my helmet camera.

Back on the road and going over a bridge, I noticed a 'road safety' measure in the form of a kerb between the fast lane and the slow lane, not seen that one before!

Yet still further on there was a timely reminder of the risks that go with the crazy driving you see a lot in china. Classic manoevers include; - Overtaking on blind bends - Overtaking when you can clearly see something coming the otherway.

 Sometimes it doesnt work out! 

Yunnan!

 

Zhaotong to Dongshan

Day 56 Friday 25th September 322 km (17550 km total)

Rush hour delays & mountain highways

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Bad start to the day today, we exited the hotel and rode straight into the rush hour amd gridlock.
It took 90 minutes to get just a few kilometers.
We could have got through faster but on this occasion, we had to follow the guide car for the first bit and he couldnt move.

Once out though it was open roads and good ones too.

Once again the route was peppered with examples of the scale of Chinese construction, like this big bridge for the new road.

For some reason when you leave one road and enter another, the link road is often not up to the same standard as the roads eithervside, maybe its a sort of construction no mans land.

The second road had similar major constuction evident. It is interestimg that throughout this china crossing I have seen many many examples of masssive road, bridge & tunnel construction and much of it appears to be recent. China has been appluaded recently for having taken a large part of its population (400million people I believe) from below to above the povery line. Maybe having the state geneate employment by sponsoring huge construction projects is one way of doing this?

The road rose into the clouds at about 2700m, sending the temperature dropping sharply and leading to a little drizzle.

But then it was down into the valley with its warmth and greenery again, And still more bridges...

Shuifu to Zhaotong

< Day 55 Thursday 24th September 233 km (17228 km total)

A local road obstacle course with logs, falling rocks, muddy roads & waterfalls!

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So after yesterday's wasted 4 hours with China's finest, today we stuck to the provincial roads. This made for quite an entertaining, if somewhat damp, day.

Once out of the city we were treated to a riverside road full of twists & curves a nice ride for an hour or so, after which we stopped for an instant coffee (thoughtfully provided by our guide) by the roadside using my panniers as a table.

It also gave time for a quick photo, bunny ears courtesy of Russ, always there when you need him most ;-)

The next sequence of snaps show some of the obstacles we encountered on the road ....

A lorry loading bamboo poles, watch out when they swing them round the get onto the lorry as they reach right across the road!

Not sure exactly what was goung on with this next one ... A bit of lanscape gardening perhaps, but the pile of soul/muck covered half the road.

More logs, this time tree trunks ...

I dont recall a sgn warning of falling rocks, but there certainly were some - always remember to wear a helmet, though you would need an awfully big one to stop that rock!

How about some mud & water to liven things up a a bit? The traffic jam was caused by a small wagon that had got stock in a deep muddy puddle in front of the lorry.

At one pount on the opposite side of the river there were tower blocks of flats perched impossibly on the mountainside - they were still occupied dspite looking derelict. I certainly wouldnt like to live there.

More fallen rocks in our side of the river!

Judging from the state of the road, it looks like small landslips were a fairly regular occurance

The most entertaining part of the day was when we had to ride through a series of waterfalls that fell directly onto the road. 

The road surface here was cobbled, presumably to stop it being washed away. 

However, cobbles, mud & running water present quite a tricky surface when you only have two wheels, particularly when the water is also running down you neck!

Chuxiong to Dali

Day 58 Sunday 27th September 210 km (18069 km total)

Patchwork agriculture on the way to a beautiful ancient pagoda city

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A short section of highway this morning revealing Again the patchwork nature of the agriculture seen along the route. Of course with a major concrete construction running through it!

For such a massive population to feed, I had expected to see equally massive & mechanised agriculture, perhaps this exists elswehere in China but certainly not on the route I have been following.

Nice scenery on the route to Dali

And as we enter the outskirts of the town, a glimpse of the old city walls.

And a right turn down a narrow city street in search of the hotel.

Dali Ancient City can be dated back to 1382 during the Ming Dynasty and was a gateway to the Silk Road in Southwest China. Originally it had a wall length of 6 kilometers, a height of 7.5 meters and a thickness of 6 meters. There were four city gates facing west, east, north and south, upon which sat a gate tower. Four further towers were also placed at the four corners of the city. Today only the city base & some renovated/reconstructed parts remain, though it was a bery pretty and relaxing place to spend the late afternoon.

See for yourselves.

Leshan to Shuifu

Day 54 Wednesday 23rd September 193 km (16995 km total)

On camera with the boys in blue!

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It had to happen sooner or later I suppose. This grey area we were exploting regarding whether motorcycles are allowed into the toll roads or not, finally moved into black & white.

The guide's direction has always been, if we need to do a lot of miles the toll road is better. He says it is not reallly clear of big bikes are allowed on or not, there is a law that says they are but it has not been widely implemented and as there are so few big bikes around, it has never really been clarified either.

So the toll booths are not equipped for bikes, so the only way is to sneak around the barrier, but in some cases they wont let you, in others they turn a blind eye and yet others they even open a side gate for you. The guide had said that once through though, you would be ok, they won't chase you. Today we found out that was not always the case.

The day started with the guide escorting us to the toll gate at the start of the expressway and then waving us to sneak down the side of the lorries. The first 3 bikes got though unscathed (I was number 3) but the four following ones were subject to much gesticulating and shouting from the toll gate staff.

However we thought nothing of it and carried on, splitting again into the now standard pattern of a leading 3 (including me) with the remaining 4 some distance behind and the guide car behind them.

After about an hour, the three of us had a lead of around 20 minutes or so and were coming up to the first exit since our entry (which we did not plan to take) when we saw a police jeep parked provocatively at the apex of the junction

Thinking this was a speed check, we ensured we wern't speeding and carried in. As we drew level though the policeman started waving at us, so we waved back! We found out later they were trying to get us to stop!
 

A few miles down the road we saw red & blue flashing lights in our mirrors & other traffic making way for the advancing police car.   We were within the speed limit and so carried on.  Unsure if they were after us or not.

Anyway they caught up with Russ, who was a couple of hundred meters behind me and made him stop. John & I stopped briefly around the next bend, conferred & decided to go the 2km to the next service area, stop there, contact Russ & the guide to see what was happening & wait for the others.

Russ said he had been escorted off the expressway and then left alone, no other problem. The guide said he would go and get Russ & then try and get him back on & we should carry on. However we decided to wait for the others at the service area to avoid the group becoming too fragmented.

We were attracting the usual attention at the service ara, lost of people looking at the bikes, thumbs up, chatting away to us in Chinese & wanting photos taken with us and the bikes.

Then a police car turned up & the friendly officers joined in, but must also have radioed to base, as a few minutes later we had 3 police cars there and were being told in friendly sign language to follow them. We politely declined & tried to explain we were a tour group and needed to wait for our team members & the guide. We eventually got him on the phone and let them sort it out between them.

Then a film crew arrived! - along with a senior policeman (number 2 in the region apparently) We weren't sure where this was all leading , but it all seemed friendly enough.

We never found out exactly what was going on but I suspect the senior policeman had seized in the opportunity for a bit of police PR and wanted to show how the friendly & professional chinese police force had rescued some foreign travellers who had accidentally strayed into the tollroad, & helped them find the correct way! ... Or somethimg like that.

So on camera we each had to sit down and have our passports examined and explain who we were & what journey we were undertaking. The senior policeman then seemed to make some sort of public statement to camera and then it was all smiles, selfies, handshakes and we were told to follow two of the police cars in single file on our bikes.

They took us back onto the toll road and south for 30 minutes, off at the exit then north for an hour and a half (due to traffic) until we found Russ at the side of the road and then they waved took some more photos & left us.

The whole episode had taken almost 4 hours and we were only a third of the way through our riding journey for the day. After a brief discussion with the guide we decided to stop for the night at the next town, which would cost us a day in the planned itinerary, but better than riding 3 hours in the dark on poor local roads.

So we headed along the local road by the river for an hour to the nearest town. The hotel was built literally on the river bank with a slightly scary vewi out of my 26th floor room if you looked straight down to the fast flowing river.

The popular saying for tonight was "its all part of the adventure!"