Black Boogers and Shaolin Priests, A Day on the New Silk Route Bike Tour

Half Way up Songshan Mountain, a Prayer Tree Glows Against the Early Morning Monochrome Landscape

Right now I am wearing gloves in my hotel room just outside Dengfeng, China. The 70 CNY ($10) hotel we’ve chosen for the tour might be lacking a few of the finer things (like heat) but it does have one advantage, it is located 300 meters from the gate of the famous Shaolin Temple, birthplace of KungFu.   

I’m here scouting the new route of the 2012 Silk Route Bike Tour.  In 2012 the tour will run East to West (a much better direction. It will start in Shanghai and finish in Istanbul.  

Fortunately for us when we bike through here on tour in 2012 the weather will be warm so the heat will not be a problem.  And the hotel is not without its charms.  It is run by a very nice Chinese family and has hot showers and internet.  The restaurant downstairs serves a wicked stir fired rabbit, complete with paws and face  (it’s surprisingly hard to eat a rabbit when you’re looking at its cooked face).  

Why do Monks and Priests Always put their temples at the top of a Mountain?

Songshan Temple

The ride into Dengfeng will be a long one, about 150 km with a few good hills to finish the day (I know how much riders just love it when camp is at the top of a long climb).  The Temple is surrounded by mountains, a welcome relief from the rest of eastern china, which has been pathetically flat thus far.  The Shaolin Temple is very close to the hotel so riders will have plenty of time to visit it in the morning before our short ride of 60 km to our rest day in Luoyang, China.

Figuring I could see the Shaolin Temple when I return on tour in 2012, I took some time to climb to another nearby attraction, the Songshan Temple.  The hotel owner told me it was difficult to get to but really that only made we want to do it more.  In my experience the more difficult something is to get to, the more rewarding the experience usually is. 

Long Way Down, you can just see the outline of the steps below

Stair Master

A six kilometer long flight of stairs leads to the temple.  It was tough.  My guide dropped off after about 2 kms of climbing.  I told him I would only go a little further then come back, but I think we both new I was lying.  I wanted to reach the top.  

After about 3 kms the route begins to hug the mountain side, dip under rock ledges and cross some impressive gorges.   I felt a little like Frodo climbing to Mordor, save for the big fiery eye at the top. I was alone on the steps at seven in the morning and for two hours I climbed without seeing or hearing anyone but the wind and birds (a real treat after two weeks in China, which is never quiet).  

At the top the temple was under renovation.  The grounds were full of stone cutters and carpenters hard at work in the chill air.  The temple itself was pretty impressive.  But more impressive were these guys:

In the video it’s hard to see, but what you are witnessing is a group of about 15 men trying to drag what must be a 500 kg brass bell up to the top of the mountain.  And all the while that they are trying to heave this thing up one step at a time other men are passing them with 50 kg sacks of sand on their heads!  Made me feel a little silly for being winded at all.  

Thick Dust Coated Everything in Gao Zhou

500 Yards of Foulness

Before reaching Dengfeng riders will have to cycle through the city of Gao Zhou. Gao Zhou is perhaps one of the dirtiest cities I have ever visited in my life.  The streets were muddy and the air was filled with cement and coal dust from a half dozen mines and factories that surround the city.  Everything was coated in a thick grey layer of dust. The landscape had been stripped bare in China’s search for resources to build the infrastructure to support 20% of the world’s population.  


The dry air, mixed with all that dust gives you some pretty epic boogers.  (I'll spare you a photo of that!)

But riding through the city will only take an hour or so and soon the mountains that surround the Temples near Dengfeng come into view and the road improves.    You climb into the mountains past centuries old temples and parks and up to the Shaolin Temple where a giant statue of a monk greets you and humbles you.  All in all, I think it will be a pretty good day of riding.  

More Pics: 

Pagoda Forest

Lots of these scary guys around... Raaahahagggghhhh!

Yum!  

Some Light Traffic 

Not sure where this was, some out of the way temple in the middle of nowhere (the best kind)

The Temple Air was filled with Incense

House of 500 Buddhas. I didn't Count them, but there were a lot.  Each One was Unique as well.  

Just a cool little Moon Gate 

What next?

So everyone wants to know how long I'll be gone. It's a question I don't have an easy answer for. I'd like to come back at the end of the summer, remodel my brothers bath, see you guys, and race a bit (for Atomic, of course). But there are several options:

The tiring option:
Jan 10th - May 09th 2009 - TdA, Visit Zambia, fly to Paris, May 31 to July 18 - Orient Express, back to Paris watch TdF, July 26th - Nov 12th 2009 - Silk Route, Dec 2009 Fly to Charlotte, Jan - May 2010 TdA again. July - Dec 2010 Vuelta Sudamerica.

That's way to much travel, but possible. I thought I'd only be in the Peace Corps for a year and look how that turned out.

The less tiring option:
I could always cut option 1 short and come home in August, work for the winter and head back to Africa in 2010. This option may or may not involve me selling the house and moving to Charlotte.

A likely option:
Jan - May 09 TdA, Visit Zambia, fly home in June, Remodel my bro's bath, July 20th - Dec 10th Vuelta Sudamerica, Jan 2010 - TdA again.

That's still a lot of travel but I get a few weeks at home in between tours. Nice.

My least Favorite Option:
Jan to May 2009 TdA, hate it, or they hate me, visit Zambia, stop in Paris to watch the TdF, come home and figure out something else to do. Most likely sell the house and move to Charlotte. Start the business up there and flip houses with my brother until I have enough passive income to try something like this again.

It's my least favorite because I really want this job to work out. I certainly could not complain about getting to travel in Africa, visit old friends in Zambia, watch the TdF and be home in time for my brother's birthday. Moving to Charlotte and spending more time with my brother and sister would be awesome.

Long Term
Ideally, after I've done all the tours with TdA, I'd like to settle in and focus only on Africa. I'd like to help build support structures for the tour that can be run by locals and that locals can profit from. I'd like to expand the aid component of the tour and develop relationships with other organizations like, BikeTown Africa, Kiva, and others. I'd like to figure out how to have tour participants be hosted by local communities, instead of us camping isolated and by ourselves. I'd like to try and not to have to use giant overland vehicles to support the tour.

These are huge challenges and I will certainly not understand how to address them in the first 4 months. So first I've got to get the first tour under my belt, watch and listen and see how things go.

I need your advice

Click here for an informative news story from the BBC about why aid to Africa has not helped make significant improvements. I believe one of the best ways to avoid the problems associated with donor aid is microfinance. And a great way to provide micro loans to deserving people is to work with these guys.

The company I work for, Tour D' Afrique, currently has a small aid component that I hope to help grow over the next few years. They are a pretty progressive bunch:

This year they are trying to be carbon neutral by supporting an Ethiopian group that plants trees. The TdA will sponsor 5000 trees this year. The volunteer organization that facilitates the tree planting is called DevXchange. Reading about them on their website it seems to me they have their heads and hearts in the right place.

The TdA also believes stongly in promoting bike use, in having a positive impact on the towns and villages they travel through, and in helping the participants in the tour filter their experiences to better understand the economic, social, political and cultural complexities of the countries they visit.

Many of the tour's participants raise money to support the Tour d' Afrique Foundation or a charity of their choice. Since 2002 the TdA and its riders have donated 700 bikes to health clubs in Africa and raised over 3/4 of a million dollars for various charities. That's nothing compared to a Christian Childrens Fund or World Vision but the impact is much more focused and personal. I think this make it better.


I'm Soliciting your Advice:
Especially from those of you who have or do live in Africa. I would like to explore the possibiltiy of supporting a couple of groups next year. Please send me the contact info of groups or individuals you think could beniefit from a relationship with TdA foundation. I would like to visit them this year in the hopes of developing a relationship with next years tour.

Hurdles

So I got my Sudanese Visa this week. Only took 3 weeks to get, which is a relief. It's very disconcerting to mail your passport along with $150 to the embassy of a country that, let's face it, has not overly impressed anyone with their ability to govern. But everything went smooth. Just goes to show you.

Now all I need is my Ethiopian Visa. I can't apply for it until after Thanksgiving because the visa is only good for 3 months and I won't be entering Ethiopia until February 3rd and leaving on Feb 24th. If I apply now it will expire before I get out of the country.

After that there is really nothing left to do except finish a 5 week bath remodel in 3 weeks, fix my roof, stop my basement from flooding, finish remodeling my own bath, finish remodeling my office, paint my kitchen, kitchen cabinets and living room, rent my house, schedule online bill payments so everything gets paid while I'm gone, put a new drive train on the poprad, say good bye to friends, pack up all my belongings for storage, pack for the trip, drive my truck and trailer to Charlotte (brother's house), celebrate xmas, drive ot DC to celebrate New Years, and Fly to Cairo. Oh, and before all that, I need to get my biz takes done.

No problem.

Gear

Note: This post turned out to be me thinking out loud, kind of willy nilly. Some people might find some of it useful or interesting, but I would guess not many. I started this post mostly cause I wanted an excuse to post a picture of the police sniper bike above. Mission Accomplished. Read on at your own peril.

What to bring. Hmmm. 7000 miles, 10 days in hotel, 90 days camping, Touring S. Africa and Zambia afterwards. Maybe going on to ride from Paris to Bejing after that. A few criteria come to mind:
1) Utility - everything needs to have more than one use
2) Cost - almost anything I bring could be ruined or broken
3) Durability - I'd rather it didn't get ruined or break
4)

Here's the list:
Bike:
Poprad with 32 hole open pros and ultegra hubs. Nitto seatpost, thompson stem, alum bar and Ultegra group. Some really cool Specialized touring tires - 38 mm with a ton of tread. Negetive tread design and inflatable to 85 psi. They are folding but weigh a ton. My goal is zero flat tires on the trip and these babies are my secret weapon. I'm gonna bring an extra set of tires, jsut dome 32mm michelin mud2's, they pack pretty small and it might be nice to have a more fun set up every once in a while.

The real big bike question for me is pedals. If I bring clipless pedals I have to bring special shoes. Plus that's two things that can't be replaced if they break. But is riding 80 miles a day on flat pedals, especially with loaded panniers, a good idea? I don't know, I've never tried it.

Spare parts: I'm counting on most people to bring way to many spare parts and be able to buy them before they fly home.
2 tubes, 1 patch kits - TdA recommends 5 patch kits and 5 spare tubes - WTF?
Spare Tires - two 32 mm CX tires
1 brake and 1 gear cable.
extra spokes
brake pads - 3 pair
tool kit and pump
I'm thinking about bringing a rear thumbshifter or bar end shifter. Just in case the STI goes wonky on me.
bike lock, it's actually a snowboard lock
Extra saddle. Learned my lesson at Fools Gold.
extra bar tape
extra cycle computer - I guess these get stolen by kids a lot. makes sense.
bell - omage to cliffy,

Clothes - yep I'm bringing clothes. I'm pretty sure they sell clothes in Africa so I'm not that worried about it. Some cold weather clothes and some hot weather clothes. 2 or 3 sets. Of course clothes do present a real opportunity to show people you don't know too well how cool you are. I think I can accomplish this with my "Evolution Kills" and "I feel Pretty" tshirts. There appropirately sacastic and obscure. They really shout "I'm smarter than you but at least I have a sense of humor about it". I am definitely bringing my Joes Tshirt and of course my Atomic Jersey. Again the big issue is shoes. Also whether or not to bring lycra bike shorts or just wear regular shorts, it's that whole utility thing. Plus I look funny enough just being a white guy riding his bike thru africa, do I really need a superhero outfit to add to the spectacle? The upside is they don't take up much room and my regular shorts don't smell like ass at the end of the day. I guess I'll bring a couple pair

I am also debating whether or not to wear a helmet. Riding on dirt roads with no real extreme "hey y'all watch this" opportunities I'm not sure it's needed. I'm sure it's required as a matter of policy but... I just hate to lug it over there and not use it. I never used one in the peace corps and they threatened to thow you out if you got caught without it.

Camping,
Tent, sleeping bag, bag liner, foam pad, Head lamp, bowl, spoon, cup, tent stake hammer, 8 ft of rope, groudn cloth - all the usual stuff. Thought about tarping it to save space and wt. but then I thought - mozzies and snakes and scorpians... oh my.

misc.
ipod with Swahili, Spanish and French audio lessons that I will probably never listen to, and some music and podcasts, I wish I hadn't sold my freakin shortwave on ebay last year.
Camera and extra storage cards.
two books - Africa, Biography of a Continent and Shock Doctrine by Naomie Cline.
medical stuff: immodium, contacts, advil, chamois creme, sunscreen, salt pills, larium (maybe),
misc toiletries of course.

I bagged the idea of carrying Binos and a bird book, I'm just gonna make up a bunch of cool birds to tell Cliff I saw. Cliff if you want I can just give you the list in advance and save some time. I am gonna carry a 8x21 monocular that I've had laying around for a while.

What to carry it all in?
Airlines want to charge you for everything bigger than a fanny pack and any luggage I bring has to be carried with me on the trip. So I'm thinking about filling my panniers and then putting them in a cheap cloth bag I can give away or pack. Bike goes in a cardboard box. I'm not sure if I can fit a bike with front and rear racks in a biek box but I will soon find out. I have front and rear panniers but I'm thinking about only using teh front, maybe I should just get off my butt and load the panniers to see how much room there is.... yep.

Free Range Chicken

38 days til I leave Tallahassee. 45 days until I leave the country. If things go the way I want I may not return for a while, if ever. But things don't always go the way I want.

I'm not terribly happy to be leaving friends and a community that I love behind but for a while now I've been wrestling with the idea that I need to be doing something else with my life and since that something has not come to me I must go in search of it.

Over the next 45 days I'll try use this blog to document my preparations for, and thoughts about, the Tour d" Afrique . After that I'll use it to share my experiences as I travel from Cairo to Capetown by bike.