Today ought not to have been a short day. However, I did something that made my bad leg so very unhappy that a mid-day codeine was required¹. Although there have been times that I've ridden my bike while medicated, those times mostly² haven't involved either technical terrain or traffic.

As I knew from 2018 that the road past Cedi would be both technical (a steep downhill torn up by trucks) and have traffic (the aforementioned trucks), I decided to stop very very early. I later displayed some poor decision making skills³ so it's probably a good thing that I decided not to risk it.

Started the morning off by attempting to disassemble the door lock from my side of the door using my multi-tool. Given that the power tools and the big hammer would eventually be brought out, I think it's likely that the door was never going to be non-destructively opened but I didn't really have too much of a chance as, once I was heard attempting to get out, they joined in in helping me get out, and I retreated to the far corner of the room so as not to be hit by random flying bits of metal.

This was followed by a local donut type bread (donut shaped even!) dipped in the blueberry jam I bought back on the first pass through Ningxia and coffee in the market.

Knowing what I had ahead of me for the day, I probably should have stocked up better on road food, but I still had plenty enough packaged sausages and hard boiled eggs to make a good meal of savory oatmeal past the end of the day's only climb and just before the turn-off.

It was a very pretty road made that much prettier by it having been a quagmired mess of construction when I came by three years ago. I even managed to get pictures of many of the same things seen in a different perspective.

Back in a heavily Muslim area of China, the propaganda slogans have turned from "let's jointly build a moderately prosperous society in all respects" to "all ethnic groups should harmoniously join hands". Which is not to say that there aren't also rural poverty alleviation slogans and old birth control policy murals and new "extravagant waste is bad" slogans, just the there's a lot more of the "Be Happy! Be Harmonious!" stuff that kind of gets under my skin.

The petrol station where I eat lunch (and also where I see a flamboyantly gay man⁴ pull up on a tractor) even has anti-terrorism notices of the "see something, say something" sort and that really gets under my skin. Like, maybe if you weren't using Cultural Revolution type techniques on people for being too Muslim you wouldn't be having problems with the Muslim ethnicities? Hmmm?

Cross back into Gansu, find the Grottoes from three years ago that had just had a landslide at the time three years ago, discover that absolutely no work whatsoever has been done on stabilizing them, manage to climb up to within about 5 feet of where I'd be able to look inside, and slide back down the loose scree leaving all kinds of bruises up and down my legs and butt before unceremoniously limping back towards my bike. I probably didn't injure myself on the climb or the fall. I was stiff and sore and unhappy but I wasn't injured until I was most of the way back to my bike.

The best footing for climbing back from the scrubby pines down into the field my bike was in involved a spot where someone had left one of the largest human turds I've ever seen. Like, if it weren't for the decaying toilet paper, I'd have a hard time believing it was human. All the other spots had barbed wire so I could only climb down from there and while I managed not to step in it, it was a close call with a jarringly bad thumpingly hard landing. On top of my slide down the slope, my leg was now quite thoroughly fucked.

Perhaps the rest of the day really was sunny and bright and warm and incredibly beautiful. My pictures certainly seem to indicate that it was. Its just that once I've been medicated, I no longer fully trust the information my own brain gives me.

Nearing the town of Hexi, already back in Gansu, a police van coming the other direction started following me, eventually asked me some questions when I stopped to ask if they were following me for a reason, continued following me, were asked to stop following me, and were then treated to my being exceptionally slow and distraction prone until they drove off. Later seen parked ahead of me, I totally didn't stop in a temple for 30 minutes to hide and make them think they'd lost me.

As a result, when I made the decision to start the evening with the Police instead of with a hotel, I really wasn't expecting the extremely laid back attitude of not having any problems at all with a foreigner. And if the hotel they decided I should go to was the most expensive in town, it was still only 90y and the room had a great view.

¹ A midday frantic emptying stuff on the ground by the side of the road because neither of the actually quite clever and eminently reasonable places where I had put my stash were the places I initially looked.

² There was this one time involving both Tramadol and a recreational quantity of codeine that confirmed that I make exceptionally piss poor decisions on Tramadol and should never have it given to me outside of a controlled situation that is controlled by someone else (like a hospital room).

³ The police made a comment about understanding my being tired after a long day (nearly 30km!) and I responded stiffly that I wasn't tired in the slightest merely on a controlled substance that's nearly impossible to legally acquire in China. Then I had to explain that I had, in fact, acquired it legally. I don't think they particularly cared, but still not the wisest move.

⁴ I'm not saying he wasn't just coincidentally wearing his wife's beribboned straw hat instead of something more manly. Just that he sashayed while he walked, and had a very metrosexual flowered shirt on.