Sunday 22nd September With a decent breakfast inside us we left the hotel around 08:30, back on the busy A310, probably be on this road all-day, in and out of the hectic towns, following the yellow river for most of the day.
A steady ride planned for the day, we just cruised through the miles, laughing and joking as we went along, mainly telling Rylan his duties for the day, first job of the day, order the lunch. Which he done a grand job of, went for are staple diet, with a few twists, couple items we had not tried, always good to mix it up a little. We enjoyed the company in the café, they all come over for the obligatory photographs, it took us an age to leave, but all good fun, even the sterling currency out, them taking photos’ of it, very weird. As we left the café Keith had a little play in the river and pulled out a soft shell turtle possibly a (Rafetus swinhoei) or one the café had lined up for their guests.
After lunch we carried on with the steady pace, Linney had changed the route slightly, so we could get to the hotel in good time for the rugby! So we came off the 310 and hit the back roads the fun begins. First part no problem, then the road got a little bit bumpy, I dropped behind had a puncture then lost sight of them, carried on going, came to a bit of junction, turned east thought that was the best option, another puncture on the rocky road, still not sign of the others. Took stock decided to head for the 310 road again, it was a bit difficult but finally managed to locate the super highway, nothing for it pushed the fully laden bike up the incline, then over the barrier and onto the super highway. First check that I am heading the correct way (East), result yes, so just hit the highway. Unbeknown to me Keith had gone back to look for me, as I have no Chinese SIM card I can only message with a WIFI connection, so as we are all capable of looking after are self’s Keith had a look around, then got back onto the 310 road, unfortunately going in the wrong direction, ended up doing 15 miles in the wrong direction.
I knew the city we were heading for, but not the hotel, so just rode to the city, with the light fading and no WIFI signal, my plan was to get to the park that we bookmarked this morning then find the first hotel and have a beer, as I closed into the park found a hotel, booked in raided their fridge took all their beers touched base with Linney and Rylan let the know where I was and would meet them in the morning.
Though Keith was still not in, he was in contact with the boys, not a great finish to the day, but a good lesson learnt keep together, in all told Linney and Rylan did 85 miles, I did 90 miles, Keith did a massive 125 miles.
Monday 23rd September Team split in two hotels, though all sorted with the faithful social media sites, I sat in my hotel foyer and watched last nights rugby on my phone, while the rest got ready and cycled the 1.5 miles to meet me. With a few pleasantries and nods of the head, then the exchange of route details so all have the details of the intended hotel, though this is pretty difficult as it does change throughout the day. As we left the city of Sannemxia, we had the choice of the toll road (not allowed on it, but sometimes they appear to let us, or the 310, which is being worked on so very bumpy. We went for the toll road option, all in formation as we passed the barrier, the guy shouted at us we waved and pedalled through, all ok, police car passed us almost immediately and drove straight passed. On the smooth road the we started to get a decent pace going, which changed when we hit a steady climb, nothing to serious just long, went on for about 9 miles. Just as we reached the summit, trouble ahead, the traffic marshals pulled us over, we acted all innocent, though it was fairly obvious they would not let us continue on the road, though it did seem that all they wanted to do was take pictures of us, we just sat on the Armco barrier, laughing and joking. Then the police turned up, same procedure pictures of us all, then the flat bed truck turned up, bikes on the back, with us sitting against them, nothing tied on, loads of shouting and pointing, not aggressive, like always because we do not understand, they tend to shout lounder and gesticulate like mad. We had no idea where they were taking us, it ended up about a 10 mile trip to the next toll station, though to say it was dangerous to ride on the road, in my humble opinion if was far more dangerous to ride on the flat bed truck at 60 / 70 MPH, pretty good experience though and a bit of a laugh.
We said are goodbyes to the police and flatbed truck driver, then started are ride again, shame we did not gain any time, after all the fussing around, Rylan was a bit disappointed he thought they were taking us to are hotel at Luoyang. The road was not in the best condition, they were building a new road adjacent to the old road which made for difficult technical riding at some points. We stopped for lunch at a small place Chang cun zhen, met a Chinese guy who was cycling from Xi`an to Beijing, tried to have a little chat, but his English was like my Chinese, ended up just smiling and riding together for a few miles. The ride into Luoyang was difficult to say the least, it was like riding through a building site, with trucks and buses trying to sneak past you, as cranes lifted sections of the new road in to place, it was chaos. As always Linney guided us to the hotel and booked in with consummate ease, with the added bonus of cold beers from the shop inside the hotel, Rylan is getting the hang of it now.
Tuesday 24th September Nice breakfast at the hotel before we left, mixture of both East and West cultures nice to mix them up a bit, especially nice to have a hot coffee we have not seen that very often, these last few weeks. We hit the road around 08:30, straight into the same road works we had last night, the road system in Luoyang will be amazing when it is finished, however it is terrible now, it took us at least 1 ½ hours to get out of the city, going around in circles, up un paved roads dead ends all sorts of crap roads, to cap it all Rylan had his first fall on his brand new bike, then blamed me for being slow to cross the busy intersection, no damage to the bike, bit of scuffed bar tap (how will I sell this on e-bay) was hi only concern. Eventually we got onto the new road, then had a couple of hours of good riding, which put us back on track to complete the 90 odd mile ride we had planned for today.
We stopped for lunch just before the town of He luo zhen, in a tiny café just at the top of a little climb, all had a massive bowl of noddle soup, Rylan takes an age to eat it with the chop sticks, though he is getting better, not spreading the noddles around so much. After lunch we carried on the new road for about 5 miles, then a big barrier across the road closed! Linney onto the maps like a hawk think we have an option; take this little road over the mountain we should be able to re-join the road later. All nodded in agreement and started the climb, about half way up we stopped at a junction to check the maps, Rylan mad a little quip, `it like we don’t have a clue where we are` yep he is right, but nothing can go wrong. We ended up above the closed road, separated by a steep ravine, that had partially collapsed, that’s why the road was closed! We all surveyed the options, none of them looking promising, finally we settled on getting the bikes over an Armco barrier, riding down a dirt track onto the road, all down with no dramas, just two punctures for Rylan and I. Fixed them and set of past the collapsed bank, after a few miles came to another barrier, the workmen just opened it for us with a smile. Though these adventures had delayed us a little, we all treated it as a bit of a joke, riding on the closed road was fun, even went through a mile long tunnel all good fun, before we joined onto the rest of the traffic.
The ride in to Zhengzhou was an absolute pleasure, from stopping to have a bag of grapes about 15 miles out of the city centre, we rode through immaculate parks, past massive sports stadiums and busy street life culture, very impressed. The city did get really busy in the centre, but nothing we could not handle, booked into the hotel no problem, think we are now out of the tourist hotel madness, they are all keen to take us now.