Gone worldseeing 2

Leaving Xi’an early in the morning, heading to Chengdu, the capital of the Sichuan region:

Superb wraps for breakfast:

Our bikes, now with even less weight!

Mountains appearing in the distance:

Noodles for lunch:

Climbing some mountains:

Entering the Heihe reservoir area near Mazhao:

This road ends here. After some discussions with the locals, we found out that there was a huge landslide, and the road was completely destroyed. They also told us, that there is a small walking path over the mountain, leading back to the street.

We decided that it was too late to tackle the mountain in the evening, so we slept next to the gate, and started carrying our bikes up the mountain the next morning:

The path went on over pretty steep stairs, for about 2km. Carrying the bicycles up was extremely exhausting. It took us half the day.

Phew, we made it to the small temple at the top!

Time to go down!

On our way down, we met this cyclist from Chengdu, going in the opposite direction to reach Xi’an:

Halfway down, the road surface was really good again:

We can alrady see the road in the distance:

Back on track!

Looking back, we could get a view of the huge landslide that destroyed the road. No wonder the road has been closed for over a year:

The landscape in this area was absolutely amazing, and because of the landslide there was almost no traffic, so we had the road all to ourself:

When we arrived at a hotel in a small village that evening, we found out that we were in a special permit military area, and that we were not allowed to be there at all. Whoops. The police demanded that we go back out of the village, before we could continue on our route the next day, so that’s what we did.

Chilling a few days in Foping, a small town in the mountains:

On the road again:

Market in Yangzhou:

Scooters with umbrellas:

Food street:

Butchers display meat on the street in this region:

Impromptu market on the main road:

Lunch:

Hanzhong:

0m?

Rice fields:

Beautiful scenery:

More rice fields:

When the main road was blocked because of construction work, we decided to take a smaller road going along the G5 expressway:

At the beginning the road was perfect:

Getting worse:

After this sign (it says something about landslides) it was just bumpy dirt road with lots of potholes for the next 80km:

This nice man invited us for tea into his pharmacy:

Beautiful scenery:

Very bad roads:

Bumpy:

Waiting for the rain to pass:

The sun is shining again:

Thanks for the reminder, we know by know that we can not cycle the Expressway:

More potholes:

Arriving in Ningqiang:

After a very rough day, cycling 120km over very bad roads, we arrived in the city center when it was already dark. We asked a woman working in a cellphone shop for a hotel. She was super nice, took us to a hotel and organized everything. That was incredibly helpful, because we were very very exhausted and just wanted to eat something and sleep. The hotel owner then took us to a restaurant and even ordered for us. Perfect!

Moving on:

Entering Sichuan province:

Lunch:

The beautiful mountains of Sichuan:

Guangyuan:

There are now a few hours of heavy rain every day. We just find the next shelter, and wait for it to pass. Bonus points if the shelter is a supermarket or restaurant!

Year of the dog!

More beautiful mountains:

Quack, quack!

Pomelos!

Some AAAA tourist attraction:

Seal of approval:

We stopped for the funny signs:

Melon, chili, rice and corn fields nicely aligned: