It took us a day to get our bikes properly serviced and now they are fit for fight for the remaining distance to Bangkok. We don’t carry the tools needed to service the hubs and bearings ourselves so we’ll let someone take a look at them in about 3000 kilometers.

Whilst staying in Hami we started to discuss and investigate routes for the remaining distance through China and came to a couple of conclusions.

First conclusion was that we need to get rid of some of our baggage. We emptied our panniers and put everything in three piles – needed – maybe needed – absolutely not needed items. Then we packed most of the not needed and maybe needed things and sent to Bangkok. Wew also threw away some stuff. The box that went to Thailand weighs 3.5 kg and the bag we throw away maybe 2 kg so now we have plenty of room in our panniers.

So what did items did we get rid of?

We have two sets of off bike clothes and only kept one. Gloves, rain gear and warm fleece sweaters were all sent to Bangkok.

We knew it would be hard to find good quality spare parts in Georgia, Azerbaijan and the central asian republics so we carried a lot of extra wires, housing, nuts and bolts, chains and even a bottom bracket. In China there are good bike shops everywhere so we left all that at the hotel and hopefully someone will take care of it because the things are good and in working condition.

Are we brave or stupid to get rid of our rain gear and sweaters when we plan to ride some high altitude roads?

We don’t know – future will prove it was a good decision, but we reason that if it gets cold we can buy a new sweater. They actually produce such things here in this country… 😉 And we have kept the jackets that Klättermusen kindly sponsored us with. They are made of tightly wowen cotton and can take a lot of rain before we get will wet and they are much more ventilating than the goretex jackets sent home.

With bikes serviced and panniers a lot lighter we feel we are ready for the journey through China.

Next conclusion was that we also have run into a problem regarding our visas. They are valid until October 10 and we expect to be around Chengdu by then. It is usually possible to extend visas with 30 days and that is what we have counted on. One problem is that when it is time to apply for extension we will be in the middle of the ”Golden week” (october 1-7) when China closes down and every one goes away on holiday. We suspect that this applies to the guys at the visa extension office too.

Another problem is that China introduced a new legislation on September 1st and the rumours say that it will be more difficult to get extensions after this change. Beside this our passports (we have two each) with the chinese visas will have a too short remaining validity (lacks two weeks) when it is time to renew the visa which may, or may not, cause us a problem.

We have been resting safely in the thought that we would have no visa related problems left, but when we discovered this we decided to stay yet another day in Hami to investigate everything and make back up plans. The backup plan is to combine a few rest days with a visa run to Hong Kong, which is a city we have planned to visit some time anyway.

Everything takes very long time in China since most communication needs to be done through translation apps in smartphones (these apps are good, but still need to be worked on… 😉 ) and it took us one day to get the bikes serviced, one day to go through what to send home, locate the post office and once there get the staff to understand what we wanted. Then we spent half of the third day in Hami googleing the internet for visa related information and info about our coming route.

Our visa situation and the knowledge that we still have around 1000 km of desert to ride we had to make a decision. If we want to ride all the way it has to be on the shortest and maybe not most interesting roads. We prefer mountains to deserts 10 days in a week and there are lots of desert and mountains ahead. Since we have seen a lot of desert already we decided to press FF (fast forward on a tape recorder if you remember those relics from the 80:s) and take a bus to cover the distance we couldn’t cycle when we stayed in Hami.

Buying a ticket wasn’t simple at all. First we spent two hours in the hotel’s reception trying to ask the front desk staff about how train tickets are bought in China. Then one of the staff got in a car and followed us to the train ticket office only to find out that tickets that day were sold out. We then continued to the bus station and bought tickets to Guazhou 450 km away.

We wouldn’t have been able to sort this out ourselves and we are very grateful to the lady at the hotel who helped us securing tickets.

Somebody knocked on the door to the hotel room yesterday night. It turned out to be the man on the MTB who took us out for dinner the first night in Hami. He came to say good bye and had his son Wang Yudo with him. The boy is only 11 and wanted to practise his English, which is already good for his age. We spent a few hours looking at photos from places we have visited before they left.

When we arrived at the bus station in the morning our MTB friend was there to help us find the right bus and talk to the driver to accept carrying our bikes. It was very kind of him to turn up to do this and we are very grateful since it saved us a lot of headache.

I am writing this post on the bus. Our bikes and panniers are stored in the cargo hold below us and are hopefully enjoying the company of a live sheep in a sack and a box of mice that was loaded at the first stop after leaving Hami.

I have not been too happy about having to cheat and go by bus, but when I see the boring sandy landscape outside the window that we have seen so much of already, I am happy that we skip this part and now I look forward to riding in green surroundings and climbing steep hills in central China……