March 16, 2007
To Nanjan: drier landscape
We sleep well in the dusty room, under a thick heavy comforter and between our own "clean" sheets, that we snap together and use as liner to our sleeping bags that are zipped together. We rise at first light and half an hour later we are on the road again.
The first 20km are all uphill, some sections very gradual some parts are steep! The scenery is very nice again, the river sometimes far below us in its narrow canyon, terraces with gardens and red adobe houses everywhere. When we finally reach the high point at about 2100 meters, we have another lunch.
People carrying huge loads on their backs walk past. The downhill doesn't last very long and we climb back onto a ridge and follow it for awhile. In the north and west we can see a high mountain ridge, but no snow (yet). Then a long downhill to Nanjian, we can see the city at the bottom of a valley from a long distance.
The landscape has changed on this side of the pass, the soil is yellow instead of red and there are far fewer terraces with gardens but pine trees and eucalyptus. It feels drier.
We find a hotel, carry our stuff up to a room and clean up. It's only 11am. First stop is an internet café to check up on our email, then we walk until we find the market where we buy some take out Chinese food. The choice is not as good as the last couple of days. We rest awhile then venture out again to shop for some supplies for tomorrow. Our lunch was filling enough to last us, we eat potato chips for dinner.
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Today's ride: 40 km (25 miles)
Total: 6,848 km (4,253 miles)
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