the birm*

Now that’s amazing!

“heaps of people have done it” I hear you say. Well yes, but still…

I almost met him (and dare I say, ride with him) when he stayed at some friends’ place while he was in Australia last year (or was it the year before!?). Now he’s in Tibet! In WINTER…ON A BIKE…ON HIS WAY BACK TO LONDON!!!

I can’t really do him justice…you’ll need to check out his site http://www.cyclinghomefromsiberia.com (the title says it all…). Enjoy!

“I’ll drop round, say g’day and give you a lift pass”

Sylvie, an acquaintance of mum’s who I’d put up in Newie while she was travelling in Australia (having come across from NZ where she was studying English), lives round the corner from camp at a typical alpine village. She runs a refuge/hostel in the summer. Well she popped in to say g’day and gave me the pass, which I used two days later.

The runs are so long in this country that I only lasted 7 hours on the slopes and left before the lifts closed…I guess if I’d paid for the ticket I might have stayed, but it got to the point where my muscles and feet were aching and I knew that if I kept going up I’d eventually hurt myself, since the more tired you get the less precise you become.

The snow conditions were great, especially at the top @3600m. I found heaps of fresh powder just off the runs. I was also very happy with my performance, as I hadn’t set foot on a snowboard for about 7 years (and that was only for half a day at mt Selwin…). As Sylvie said: “don’t worry, it’s just like riding a bike…you never forget…”

When right feels wrong…

You’ve probably heard “how can something that feels so right be wrong?” (often used to describe…eating cakes). Well after driving on the right/wrong side of the road the other day (I haven’t done so in 4 years), I can say “how can something which is right feel so wrong?” I must say though, that it kinda feels almost normal, except that I had to concentrate and make sure that I stayed on the right/wrong side round corners, through intersections…

I only went for the gear stick twice on the left/right side and thought to myself that there wasn’t enough room for it…I guess the right/wrong side will become the norm and hence feel right to be on the right…I wonder how long it will take for me to get used to going round the right (left) side of the car to drive…

Jetlag. You gotta love it.

I’m slowly adjusting to it but have still been waking up early (3am the first day, 4am the next and today it was 5:45 but I managed to get back to sleep after about half an hour til 7:45!). I’m also not falling asleep at 8pm, which has been nice and a bit more social. Having said that, I love that tired feeling that you can’t fight, no matter what you do!

Because it’s freezing when I get up, I’ve got dressed and been for walks around camp (up “la cheminee”, a zig-zaggy track straight up the mountain on the other side of the gully, and the “porte romaine”, an ancient archway (only half left now) built by the romans for travel on the mountainside, about 20mins up the mountain from camp).

After some very mild temperatures (15 degrees) it snowed for 2 days and is now freezing cold and beautiful white (I’m told it’s the most snow we’ve had at this altitude all winter). Needless to say the surrounding peaks are all covered with what looks like thick cream. Yum!

GET SOME

Having studied and compared genuine “Crocs” and cheap ones closely, I concluded that there appeared to be little difference between the two…except for the $45 difference in price. I thought they’d be a good purchase for France, as they could be warn as slippers or sandals. Being as light as pack of chewing gum they were an obvious choice for a weight-conscious traveller like myself.

Had I known they would be THAT good, I would have packed 2 or 3 pairs! Not only are they comfortable, warm and great as slippers, they are great to wear around outside. I’ not one to endorse or advertise products, but if you haven’t got a pair and are looking for slippers, sandals, comfy house shoes or shoes to wear fishing, river walking, kayaking, reef walking or whatever (besides playing football maybe), GET SOME!

God is good! The flight to Paris was great and they let me on with my excess baggage (again!) after some re-shuffling, some sweet talking and a smile. I slept a fair bit, ate heaps of great food, watched a few good movies and arrived to find two friends waiting for me. Laurent (an old skating friend) and Baptiste (who I went to kindergarten and primary school with) picked me up and drove me to Baptiste’s where we had a good chat and warm meal. Praise God that I all went smoothly from my luggage being let on to getting picked up.

Got up with baptiste the next day at 4am (thanks to jet lag I’d been awake since 3), had brekkie and saw him off to work. I then had a great time of reading and praying, thinking and listening to the French radio before walking to the station. It was only a short walk, but my arms almost dropped off and I couldn’t take more than 50 steps at a time (12kg on back, 5kg on front and 16kg in each hand).

At 7:30 I got the train to catch the metro to the train station, where I caught the TGV (literally “train big speed”). 3 hours later (the kms fly at 200km/hour!) I got off in Grenoble where I was met by Marc, Tom and Brenda. We had lunch in Grenoble (I’d forgotten that French shops close at lunch, so if you need to pick something up, make it before 12 or after 2!) then headed back to camp.

It was great to see camp again (and the people there obviously!). After I dropped my luggage off I got straight into it and mixed some cement! We had some dinner and I hit the sack (my winter sleeping bag which had been sent to France months ago) about 9:30pm.

This morning I slept in…til 6:30. so I got up, grabbed some warm clothes and headed up “la cheminee”, which is a zig-zaggy track straight up the mountain across the valley from camp. I made the top just before sunrise (sunrise is subjective here, I’m sitting out on the front step and the sun has only hit camp…it’s 10am) and admired the morning splendour: snow capped peaks, the golden glow of the sun coming up, frost on the ground and rivers gushing below. It’s great to be back!

If you’ve never driven in the Ukraine, Russia, Viet Nam, China or Mexico you probably can’t understand what it’s like. The best description I can give you is mayhem. After your third or fourth near miss head-on crash, you kinda get used to it. Let’s just say that cars travel faster, swerve more, don’t worry about blinkers, blind corners or speed limits and come closer to hitting each other a lot of the time…

Anyway, we got there. It was quite cold (-5?) but the up hill walk quickly warmed us up. we got to the wall, which is kind of surreal. It’s so big and long (due to the smog we could only see a bit of it but I’m told it’s 20 000km long…) and built on mountain ridges with hills and cliffs either side.

We walked up and up past a number of towers until we reached number 12 (which is the last one you can walk to). Matt tells me that before the guards get there you can go past it and it becomes really interesting (not as well maintained and very steep). Matt jokingly asked one of the guards who collected the 200Y fine if you went further. The guards kinds took it seriously and said that they would. So Matt asked (he hasn’t changed!) if it was more of a ticket than a fine…

It was agreed that we’d talk about the price when we got back. We were warned to be careful then let through.

The wall becomes quite skinny at this point and climbs almost vertically (I felt like I was climbing up the staircase Frodo has to climb in Lord of the Rings). It was quite scary at a few places, where you kind of stepped over airy sections or round sheer corners…

We got to tower 15 and stopped there. Tower 16, which was half a km away, is the highest of that area and you can see Beijing from it on a clear day (100+ kms away). it was incredible. You really felt on top of the world and could only imagine how many thousands of people lost their lives building such a structure on such sheer slopes.

After some food, some photos and some reflections (and a friendly chat to one of the guards who’d come up to meet us to see if we were OK and cause he hadn’t been up that far), we started the not-so-fun down-climb.

We got back to the guards, who Matt talked down to 100Y each (about $17) and headed back into the valley. Once off the wall we hopped on a flying fox that looked 1km long and flew down over a lake and into the valley. For a few bucks we got yet another amazing experience and it saved us 30mins of walking downhill! What else can I say but a superb day in an amazing place with a great friend! Thanks Matt!

Well Doorbell and Bake drove me to the airport, we had some brekkie with my left over coins and cash and had a good chat. I checked in with 34kg without anything being said (praise the Lord!!). the boys said goodbye and left at about 10:45, leaving me with a few hours to walk around before boarding.

The plane was delayed, so we only boarded at 1:30 (instead of 12:20) and only got in the air by 2pm (I actually went to sleep while we were taxiing and woke up after take off, which I don’t think I’ve ever done!).

The plane trip was slow, hot, uncomfy and boring. The movies were few and of low quality and my games didn’t work. I slept a fair bit and ate/drank as much as I could (it’s amazing how good plane food and sprite tastes when you’re hungry and thirsty!).

We landed in shanghai, got off, went through customs, got back on and landed in Beijing at 12:15am. 10 minutes later I had my luggage and met Matt out the front. Twas great to see him and great to “smell” the cold (if you’ve never been to the snow or to a cold country you can’t really imagine the feeling, as Australia is usually humid. Dry cold stings your face and nose and it’s very refreshing, without being uncomfortable).

We got a taxi back to Matt and Goldie’s home, the 20^th floor of an apartment building in Beijing. Finally had a good sleep!

Today (Monday) we got up, had a great coffee (Matt’s pretty good at most things…including making good coffee!) and went for a walk. We had lunch at a weager (I dunno about the spelling) restaurant, which was taaaaaaastyyyyyyyy and incredibly cheap. We walked around some markets, caught some taxis to meet different people for different things and met up with Goldie and Isaac in the evening for some dinner at another restaurant (which cost about $4 for an amazing array of Chinese food). Beijing is pretty busy with people, bikes, cars, bikes, buses, motorbikes, taxis, trikes, bikes and trucks. So far it’s been an amazing time and great to catch up with some good friends. Tomorrow we’re off to see “the wall”…

Interesting and exciting…not really sad.

It’s kinda weird, as I’m writing this I’m “twenty thousand feet above the nation” (to quote Mike McCarthy), I’ve just spent 3 weeks with my parents, my sister and brother in law and 1 week with my first nephew. It’s been an amazing time, just hanging out with them. Now I’m on the way to Newcastle, where I’ll spend the next few days catching up with friends, packing, saying good byes, re-packing, being fare-welled by my Church and getting rid of some last pieces of stuff (my bike, a few clothes and some papers).

It’s kinda weird, I’ve just said good bye to my family, whom I love very much, but I don’t feel like crying. Don’t get me wrong, I will miss them heaps and I’ll feel like flying back home, but I’m not sad. Is it cause I know I’ll see them again? Is it cause I only see them every 6 months anyway (which means I’ll miss them in 6 months)? Is it cause I believe I’m leaving to do something my heart tells me is right?

A combination of these, I’d say. I guess these days with email, MSN, Skype or blogs it’s much easier to keep in touch and you feel closer. In any case I look forward to seeing them again, somewhere, sometime…