Oh good, you're still there. Well, that was an interesting interlude. I am now in Luang Prabang, Laos, with a chance to grab my breath and do some laundry. China is a distant blur, so I am going to have to do something a little differently. Rather than my normal day by day, blow by blow description punctuated by photos, I am going to have to give you a review in arrears, under a series of topical headings. I will have to rely on memory for this, so it will be sketchy. I still haven't had any practice at getting photos out of the phone, so that will have to wait. As for taking photos with my phone, you can stick it! I want a camera. I know what a camera is. I can use a camera. A phone is for talking into, but apparently it can do other things. Oh yeah? For example, if I want to take a photo with my camera, first I have to make it switch on. I have a black screen with nothing else. I tap where I usually tap and nothing happens. I curse and swear. I have to take my gloves off, then repeat the above. Nothing happens. If by sheer luck I get the thing to work, I can't see what I'm photographing. I get a picture on the screen of the Earth taken from the moon. By this time, whatever I wanted to photograph has moved on, or I'm so pissed off I don't care anymore.
Anyway, in China they ban Google. So I couldn't get Internet. My laptop didn't work, my phone didn't work and so I didn't work either. Going from China to Laos was actually an improvement in many ways. I never thought I'd say that, having been to Laos previously. China is the world's biggest shitfight as far as I'm concerned, in many ways, worse than India, and I never thought I'd say that either! But that's travel for you. You think you've seen it all, then....booom! Here is a quick summary of what's been going on, before I get down to the nitty gritty.
We left Chiang Mai with Songkran still going on, but managed to escape unscathed. A quick stop at Chiang Rai to see the White Temple. It was very hot and uncomfortable in the bike gear, which was not pleasant. We crossed into Laos the next day, and rode to Luang Namptha just short of the Chinese border. The roads were dreadful, large sections of dirt, lots of traffic, mostly Chinese trucks. In a couple of places it was so dusty that visibility was down to zero, and it was very dangerous. We arrived at L.Namptha hot, dusty and cranky. By this stage, one rider had dropped his bike and was lucky not to have slid over the edge of a cliff, saved only by a randomly placed 44 gallon drum. The Chinese border crossing at Boten is the worst border crossing I have ever seen. It is a disgraceful, disorganised shambles. On the Laos side, it was pretty straight forward, then there was about 2-3 km of open ground, rutted and potholed, with clouds of dust. No signage whatsoever. Vehicles went in all directions, a total free for all, until we reached a construction site which heralded the Chinese side. They are building a casino and several high rise buildings. God only knows why. In the midst of this chaos, a lone woman valiantly sweeping the dirt with a twig broom. A job is a job!
The road to the Boten border crossing from Laos.
This is the Laos side.
Where we had quite a wait. But it was about to get worse.
This is the no man's land inbetween Laos and China.
This is approaching the Chinese side.
Some of us were less than impressed by the time we got to the Chinese side.
Then the joy of going through queue after queue of surly officials, stamps on documents, retinal scans, photographs, fingerprints. I was expecting "turn your head and cough" in Chinese at any moment. It took quite a long time to get through all this, then we headed about 40km up the road to Mengla, where we had to jump through more hoops. First, a medical, to demonstrate we were fit to drive on Chinese roads. This consisted of sitting in a waiting room, filling in a form, showing our passports and then leaving. Then to the vehicle testing station. This consisted of riding the bikes up a ramp onto a weighbridge, where a 20 year old dickhead in thongs recorded the weight of each bike, and then tested the front brake. The most pointless waste of time I think I have ever witnessed. The cost of this scam? Sorry, I meant most thorough inspection? 900USD per bike. The boundless irony of this farce would only become truly apparent later on, when we had gained some real experience of Chinese traffic, drivers and vehicles. After this we were issued with two laminated cards, one our official Chinese Drivers License, the other our official Chinese registration document for the bike. We would be required to produce these several time during our 10 days in China.
We were met at the border by Huang, our official (and compulsory) Chinese tour guide. A guy in his 30's, on an F800GS, dressed in bike gear including motocross boots. He looked the goods, but what a disappointment he turned out to be. Call it a clash of cultures between German and Chinese, I don't know, but he just didn't get on with Kay, and in the finish, kept sulking at the back of the group, and at hotels or mealtimes, vanished into thin air. The laziest drone of a guide I've ever witnessed, a total waste of space, and no help to anybody. When we left, nobody tipped him, and only a couple of the most polite in the group even bothered to say goodbye. The guy was as helpful as a crack in glass eye.
The second day out on the road in China, another rider dropped his bike. Routinely powering out of a corner, he lost the back end. Prior to this, I had noticed that the bitumen road surface was so highly polished by the volume of traffic, that it had become slippery. In addition, covered in a layer of dust, it was deadly. When I stopped the bike and my feet touched down, the soles of my boots would keep sliding. I was very concerned at this development, and feared for what would happen if it rained, but it was disturbing enough in the dry. My bike has Mitas off road tyres so I was extra concerned, but as against this, I had a pillion, so the additional weight helped plant the bike a bit better on the road, for which I was thankful. So this was the mindset in the first couple of days, like walking on eggshells.
The size of the population, and the amount of spending on infrastructure in this part of China is astounding. I imagined Yunnan would be a rural backwater, and maybe it is, in which case I never want to see the rest of the country. The number of spectacular road bridges and tunnels I have seen is mind boggling, and such a cost would bankrupt Australia. Just when you think you are out of the city, a few kilometers down the road, there is another one. And I do mean cities. Blocks of 30+ floor high rise apartments, clustered in groups of 15-20 at a time. Both finished and under construction. I didn't know there were so many tower cranes on the planet. Yet every available plot of earth has something growing on it, and by something I mean food. Rice, vegetables, nuts, bananas etc. Everywhere you look, there is somebody doing something. If they need it, they build it.
We spent 2-3 days in Tibet, which is more isolated and less populated, but it is clear the Chinese are pumping money and influence into this region, which they stole from its rightful owners in 1959, and have been busy ever since trying to prove it is theirs. And to convince the Tibetans that they really are Chinese, and that's quite a stretch. The style of the buildings and also the facial features of the locals are clearly different from Yunnan. There appears to be a lot more untouched forest on the hillsides. Also, the temperatures were a lot lower (2 deg C was the lowest readout on my bike), and the air is a lot thinner. The highest altitude we reached was around 3500 metres. I have been to 5000 metres in the past with no ill effects, but this time I had a constant headache, and was very short of breath. The effort of lugging my suitcase up 3 flights of stairs was debilitating and had me puffing like a steam train. They say it is like seasickness. Some days you get it, some you don't. Here we encountered rain for the first time, yaks for the first time, snow for the first time and ice on the road for the first time. It was kind of fun watching the two Thai guys, Noah and Tony (probably not their real names) experience cold weather. They were both rugged up like Eskimos, and for Tony it was the first time he had ever seen snow, let alone get a facefull of the stuff! In the case of the ice on the road, this was only apparent after following a truck, which broke it up and made it visible to Noah, who happened to be leading the ride at that time, and who wisely followed slowly in the truck's wheeltracks. I didn't even notice it and only found out about it later. Just as well, since I was having enough trouble in the dry! So, quite the tour. As I said to Kay, where else can you get malaria, sunstroke and frostbite on the same tour? He responded that Big Bike Tours has something for everybody!
From Tibet, we backtracked more or less the way we went up, but stopping overnight in different places. We had to endure the nightmare of the Boten border crossing again. The first night in Laos had everybody in party mode. The relief of actually leaving China was palpable amongst the whole group. We had Internet, we had decent beer (Beer Lao, whacko!) instead of the watery Chinese rubbish, we had red wine, we had food that was not floating in cooking oil, we had a hotel where the staff were actually helpful, smiling and polite. We were in a country where you could do what you like. We where in a country where whatever you did was nobody else's business. I shall expand on these themes in due course, and hopefully with some photos.
Anyway, in China they ban Google. So I couldn't get Internet. My laptop didn't work, my phone didn't work and so I didn't work either. Going from China to Laos was actually an improvement in many ways. I never thought I'd say that, having been to Laos previously. China is the world's biggest shitfight as far as I'm concerned, in many ways, worse than India, and I never thought I'd say that either! But that's travel for you. You think you've seen it all, then....booom! Here is a quick summary of what's been going on, before I get down to the nitty gritty.
We left Chiang Mai with Songkran still going on, but managed to escape unscathed. A quick stop at Chiang Rai to see the White Temple. It was very hot and uncomfortable in the bike gear, which was not pleasant. We crossed into Laos the next day, and rode to Luang Namptha just short of the Chinese border. The roads were dreadful, large sections of dirt, lots of traffic, mostly Chinese trucks. In a couple of places it was so dusty that visibility was down to zero, and it was very dangerous. We arrived at L.Namptha hot, dusty and cranky. By this stage, one rider had dropped his bike and was lucky not to have slid over the edge of a cliff, saved only by a randomly placed 44 gallon drum. The Chinese border crossing at Boten is the worst border crossing I have ever seen. It is a disgraceful, disorganised shambles. On the Laos side, it was pretty straight forward, then there was about 2-3 km of open ground, rutted and potholed, with clouds of dust. No signage whatsoever. Vehicles went in all directions, a total free for all, until we reached a construction site which heralded the Chinese side. They are building a casino and several high rise buildings. God only knows why. In the midst of this chaos, a lone woman valiantly sweeping the dirt with a twig broom. A job is a job!
The road to the Boten border crossing from Laos.
This is the Laos side.
Where we had quite a wait. But it was about to get worse.
This is the no man's land inbetween Laos and China.
This is approaching the Chinese side.
Some of us were less than impressed by the time we got to the Chinese side.
Then the joy of going through queue after queue of surly officials, stamps on documents, retinal scans, photographs, fingerprints. I was expecting "turn your head and cough" in Chinese at any moment. It took quite a long time to get through all this, then we headed about 40km up the road to Mengla, where we had to jump through more hoops. First, a medical, to demonstrate we were fit to drive on Chinese roads. This consisted of sitting in a waiting room, filling in a form, showing our passports and then leaving. Then to the vehicle testing station. This consisted of riding the bikes up a ramp onto a weighbridge, where a 20 year old dickhead in thongs recorded the weight of each bike, and then tested the front brake. The most pointless waste of time I think I have ever witnessed. The cost of this scam? Sorry, I meant most thorough inspection? 900USD per bike. The boundless irony of this farce would only become truly apparent later on, when we had gained some real experience of Chinese traffic, drivers and vehicles. After this we were issued with two laminated cards, one our official Chinese Drivers License, the other our official Chinese registration document for the bike. We would be required to produce these several time during our 10 days in China.
We were met at the border by Huang, our official (and compulsory) Chinese tour guide. A guy in his 30's, on an F800GS, dressed in bike gear including motocross boots. He looked the goods, but what a disappointment he turned out to be. Call it a clash of cultures between German and Chinese, I don't know, but he just didn't get on with Kay, and in the finish, kept sulking at the back of the group, and at hotels or mealtimes, vanished into thin air. The laziest drone of a guide I've ever witnessed, a total waste of space, and no help to anybody. When we left, nobody tipped him, and only a couple of the most polite in the group even bothered to say goodbye. The guy was as helpful as a crack in glass eye.
The second day out on the road in China, another rider dropped his bike. Routinely powering out of a corner, he lost the back end. Prior to this, I had noticed that the bitumen road surface was so highly polished by the volume of traffic, that it had become slippery. In addition, covered in a layer of dust, it was deadly. When I stopped the bike and my feet touched down, the soles of my boots would keep sliding. I was very concerned at this development, and feared for what would happen if it rained, but it was disturbing enough in the dry. My bike has Mitas off road tyres so I was extra concerned, but as against this, I had a pillion, so the additional weight helped plant the bike a bit better on the road, for which I was thankful. So this was the mindset in the first couple of days, like walking on eggshells.
The size of the population, and the amount of spending on infrastructure in this part of China is astounding. I imagined Yunnan would be a rural backwater, and maybe it is, in which case I never want to see the rest of the country. The number of spectacular road bridges and tunnels I have seen is mind boggling, and such a cost would bankrupt Australia. Just when you think you are out of the city, a few kilometers down the road, there is another one. And I do mean cities. Blocks of 30+ floor high rise apartments, clustered in groups of 15-20 at a time. Both finished and under construction. I didn't know there were so many tower cranes on the planet. Yet every available plot of earth has something growing on it, and by something I mean food. Rice, vegetables, nuts, bananas etc. Everywhere you look, there is somebody doing something. If they need it, they build it.
We spent 2-3 days in Tibet, which is more isolated and less populated, but it is clear the Chinese are pumping money and influence into this region, which they stole from its rightful owners in 1959, and have been busy ever since trying to prove it is theirs. And to convince the Tibetans that they really are Chinese, and that's quite a stretch. The style of the buildings and also the facial features of the locals are clearly different from Yunnan. There appears to be a lot more untouched forest on the hillsides. Also, the temperatures were a lot lower (2 deg C was the lowest readout on my bike), and the air is a lot thinner. The highest altitude we reached was around 3500 metres. I have been to 5000 metres in the past with no ill effects, but this time I had a constant headache, and was very short of breath. The effort of lugging my suitcase up 3 flights of stairs was debilitating and had me puffing like a steam train. They say it is like seasickness. Some days you get it, some you don't. Here we encountered rain for the first time, yaks for the first time, snow for the first time and ice on the road for the first time. It was kind of fun watching the two Thai guys, Noah and Tony (probably not their real names) experience cold weather. They were both rugged up like Eskimos, and for Tony it was the first time he had ever seen snow, let alone get a facefull of the stuff! In the case of the ice on the road, this was only apparent after following a truck, which broke it up and made it visible to Noah, who happened to be leading the ride at that time, and who wisely followed slowly in the truck's wheeltracks. I didn't even notice it and only found out about it later. Just as well, since I was having enough trouble in the dry! So, quite the tour. As I said to Kay, where else can you get malaria, sunstroke and frostbite on the same tour? He responded that Big Bike Tours has something for everybody!
From Tibet, we backtracked more or less the way we went up, but stopping overnight in different places. We had to endure the nightmare of the Boten border crossing again. The first night in Laos had everybody in party mode. The relief of actually leaving China was palpable amongst the whole group. We had Internet, we had decent beer (Beer Lao, whacko!) instead of the watery Chinese rubbish, we had red wine, we had food that was not floating in cooking oil, we had a hotel where the staff were actually helpful, smiling and polite. We were in a country where you could do what you like. We where in a country where whatever you did was nobody else's business. I shall expand on these themes in due course, and hopefully with some photos.
