April 22, 2007
To Namse Zampa: two more nototious towns to get through
We were lucky yesterday afternoon with the brief sunny spell that allowed us to dry our tent and most of our other wet gear that we used on Serkhyam La. The clouds increase again in the afternoon, shortly after we finish our instant noodles dinner it starts to get wet again.
First there's a brief spell of hail, then rain that gradually increases into a down pour. We read until it gets too dark to see the lines without our headlamps, we need to consider conserving battery power. It's about 8pm, then we fall asleep. It is nice and warm in our zipped together sleeping bags and the short thin thermarests augmented by our windproof jackets at the foot end and surprisingly comfortable. Patrick wakes up often though during the night, we have to get up early this morning. Every time it seems to be raining harder.
We can hear the small river that flows about 20 meters away. Patrick worries that we could be in its flood plain... Nothing happens except that the small alarm clock starts beeping at 5:20am. It is pitch dark and rain still ticks on our tent, but not nearly as loud as earlier this night. Time to get going and get past the final two hotspots: the cities of Nyingchi and Bayi.
Patrick gets out of the tent first. Rachel packs inside the tent, all the stuff items, and passes out to Patrick. We manage to keep stuff reasonably dry, except for the tent which is soaked by the time we have the rainfly off and the inner tent folded. At 6am, we are all packed up and we push our bikes up the muddy logging road back to the paved road. Patrick's headlight does not burn very bright anymore, the spare batteries don't help either. So Rachel leads us down the hill, Patrick's light is enough to illuminate Rachel's reflectors so he can follow. We ride down the middle of the road, following the broken white line.
About 5 km more downhill and we enter the small city of Nyingchi. We pass right by the notorious police station but it is too early for any activity there. We have arrived in a wide river plain and start following this river to the much larger city of Baji about 18 km away. It is getting light now and our headlights can come off, the rain has eased too. We pass through large areas of plastic greenhouses and the road is lined with Willow trees.
On the outskirts of Baji, we see many people commuting to work on bicycles. Hope we are not too late! Baji has no checkpoint but a reported heavy PSB presence with a "bad" reputation regarding catching permit less foreign cyclists.
Word is that when you make it past here you'll make it to Lhasa.
We pedal forth, keep our heads down and after about 5km get past the urban center: Patrick thinks we made it! We stop, fix a hot cup of coffee and eat some hot cereal and brush our teeth. It is still a cold, damp day, but at least it is not raining anymore. Our goal today is Bepa, a small town with some reported "basic" guesthouses at about 85km from last nights campsite.
The cycling is not too hard today; a few minor hills but mostly flat road upstream the slow flowing river. We reach Bepa just after noon and find only one guesthouse; it does not look good.... We have lunch at a restaurant and decide to go on another 20 km to another small town at the junction to Draksum Tso, a very scenic lake lauded by the Chinese as a "AAAA" tourist destination. That does not bode well.... The Chinese have a tendency to easily create tourist traps and charge a good amount to see it. This, together with the grey skies make us decide not to visit the lake.
We find a "basic" room above a restaurant in the town. It is actually two rooms accessed through one door. Concrete floors one room with two cots, the other has five. It is spacious though and we can spread out all our stuff to dry...again. In the afternoon a strong cold wind picks up. We try to eat at the restaurant we sleep above, but their prices seem outlandish so we walk down the street to a small Muslim restaurant where we have a nice dish of square noodles with broth and vegetables and a dish of cold spiced meat.
Just as we return back to our room and decide we better sleep in our own sleeping bags under the questionable comforters, the wind pushes in a rainstorm that turns into another downpour during the night.
Good to be inside tonight!
Today's ride: 105 km (65 miles)
Total: 8,359 km (5,191 miles)
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