Wu Ming, Ma’erkang, Rang Tang, and more…

Yesterday was a challenging day. It started easily enough with a breakfast in Wenchuan and a great ride through the Chinese mountains headed toward Seda (it’s pronounced “Seh-Dah”) but by late afternoon the skies opened and it poured cats and dogs.   Couple that with roughly 60 miles on dirt, lots of detours around washed-out roads, and a long, long day, and I was just too tired to write or post last night.  This morning wasn’t much better.  It rained all night and it was cold.  My Olympia raingear does a better job holding rainwater in than it does keeping the rain out, and when you put all of that together, you have a pretty good feel for what yesterday afternoon and this morning were like.   But the sights and the riding…folks, it’s the adventure of a lifetime.

We had breakfast at a sidewalk café in Wenchuan yesterday morning.  The food over here has been incredible.   It is so much better than the Chinese food we have in the United States.   Every meal is a feast (more on that later).   Yesterday morning’s breakfast allowed me to photograph the people wandering by.   Here are just two…

After breakfast we were on the road.  Here’s a shot from the saddle of my RX3.   That’s Joe Gresh in front of me, the guy who writes the Motorcyclist magazine “Cranked” column.

Check out Master Sergeant Zuo and Mr. Tso at a rest stop.   These guys are fun to be around.

Here’s a shot of my bike at a fuel stop.  You might think it looked dirty yesterday.  You should see it today.  On our ride on that long dirt road in the rain, we went through mud puddles that were a good foot deep.  I named my bike “the Yellow Submarine.”

Joe Gresh at lunch in Ma’erkang.  That’s Fu Ren (it’s pronounced Foo Zhen) behind him.

We were headed into Tibetan Buddhist country.  This was my last shot before it started raining.  I guess I should have got some shots of that weather, but I had enough on my hands just keeping the bike up.

It is incredibly remote in the parts of China we rode through yesterday and today.   At the end of the day yesterday, we were cold, wet, and beat.  It was raining, the temperature was plummeting at our 9000-ft altitude, and we were nearly out of gas.   We finally found a hotel in little village outside of Seda.  We had dinner at this little hole in the wall place next door.   Remember the scene in Raiders of the Lost Ark when Indiana Jones entered the bar to hook up with his former girlfriend?   That’s what this place reminded me of.  It was great.

We entered the Tibetan Buddhist village of Wu Ming this morning.  It was a scene out of a dream.   I didn’t get great shots because it was raining so hard, but I will remember this place for the rest of my life.   What an experience!

By the way, that little village you see above is 3700 meters above sea level.  It was an incredible experience.  I’ve never seen anything like this.

Here’s a cool shot of a guy on a diesel tractor.  I waved to him when he went by.

This young lady was hanging around where we ate lunch.  I asked if I could take a picture and she shook her head no, but then she relented…

The people in this area are ethnically different than the other Chinese people I have seen.   Tracy, our interpreter, explained to me that people of Tibetan descent live in China.

The rain stopped around 1:00 p.m. today, and at one of our stops I grabbed this photo of the northern China countryside.

Here are a few more photos from this afternoon….this one is of the bikes parked in a Buddhist village.

My bike next to some Buddhist artwork…

…and yours truly with a Buddhist monk…

One of the grand surprises on this trip has been the cuisine.  I’ve been to China many times, but I’ve never traveled like this.   The guys we are riding with have this uncanny ability to find wonderful restaurants.

The Chinese know how to eat.  Every meal is a feast.   They don’t serve everything all at once (the restaurant brings dishes out as they prepare them), and our lunches and dinners have been tremendous fun.  At our dinner this evening, we had all 15 members of our expedition present.  I counted the dishes the restaurant brought out…there were 14 separate dishes and a huge bowl of rice.

I shot the above photo about midway through our meal.   We were served several more dishes in addition to those you see above.   The Chinese know how to prepare a dish, too…even plain stuff is exceptional.

Check out the spicy chicken…

I’ll bet you’ve never seen potatoes prepared like this…

After another great dinner, I stuck my head in the kitchen and the chef allowed me to snap this photo…

So we’re in a town called Rang Tang (it’s pronounced “ZhongTon”), the bikes are parked out front, and I’m about ready to call it a night.   One more thing, and that’s a quick update to give you an idea of where we are…

We’ve ridden about 750 miles so far.   It’s been great.  Stay tuned…there’s much more to follow here on the blog, and there will be a lot more in Riding China.