All posts by WanderCyclist

Ellen says that the people of ChiFeng are wonderful. Everyone has been more than willing to help her from telling her where get the best things to eat, to helping her adjust her derailleur. Everyone should stop by the Giant store in ChiFeng.

After logging in a grueling day of 225 kms through the mountains and the rain, Ellen is taking 2 days rest in Chi Feng, Inner Mongolia.

Big thank you to all the sponsors for help making this happen! Soma, Mountain Hardware, Nikon, Swerve, Roll:, Chian’s Sprocket, SimpleMap, Wren, and to all the individuals as well. You guys are all awesome.

Ellen Says:
“I’ve conquered China’s natural line of defense. Been riding with Lao Jiang who is from Inner Mongolia for the past 2 days – through the rain and northwestern mountains. Lao Zhang doesn’t speak a word of English and has a very thick Beijing accent. Now in Chengde.”

Ellen met Lao Zhang while climbing up a torturous climb. What made it worse was that she felt her chain “slipping.” So she started walking her bike because something was wrong. all of a sudden, a man on a mountain bike with plastic bags bungeed to the rear rack is riding besides her. He motions for her to ride with him and Ellen does. But 5 minutes later, Ellen’s chain snaps! Ellen and Lao Zhang spends the next 15 minutes fixing her bike in the rain and getting it in working condition. Ellen forgot to bring a chain breaker, so it was very serendipitous that Lao Zhang came when he did.

“Lao Zhang was my little Buddha for 3-4 days.  We were also riding in the rain for 2 of those days.”

The bracket that holds Ellen’s bar bag broke a few days ago. She got it tig welded up at an auto-body shop for free with the help of a new friend. But 2 days later the bracket snapped again. So goodbye bar bag. But she says she likes riding without the bar bag since she can see more of the road.

Ellen left Tianjin yesterday and headed northeast. She was out in the middle of nowhere, but rolled into a little town at 8 pm. After negotiations with the owner of a little hotel, she was able to get a room. But she was told she had to leave at 11:30 pm! Apparently this hotel wasn’t allowed to let foreigners stay and they were going to get in trouble or something. So Ellen left and basically had nowhere to go. She road to the next town (which the hotel people told her to go to), but couldn’t’ find and hotels there. So at 1:30 am, she found a patch of grass to lay down on and slept for an hour and a half. Needless to say, she took today easy and rode for half a day and got a hotel for some much needed sleep.

Ellen has these rules of the road to share.

Stay out of brown frown towns. In doubt – are there abandoned blue trucks – if so, keep moving. Don’t talk to men unless they look to have a western influence, know some English, or are accompanied by a woman. Stop your bike when drunk motorcycle men are following and harassing you.

Ellen says

I think it’s funny that the town last night is called “really old town,” I’ll stay away from places with “really old” in the name. I rode away from that place faster than I rode in.

I don’t really know where Ellen is right now. When I asked her, she said “Out in the middle of Nowhere.” She’s been staying in little courtyard rooms houses lately. These places operate as a guesthouse and charge anywhere from 20-40 rmb. That’s about $3-$6. It more of a glorified campsite. Anyways, she says this.

I rode with a college student this morning for about 45 minutes. He had a mountain bike. It’s so much easier to keep a fast pace with someone else. We were going at 26km/h but I stopped to take a photo and he went on. I’m also taking photos of all these weird ass rooms I’m staying in. The lady that runs the place gave me a bucket to piss and poo in. Ugh. And I could smell natural gas all night. I’m seriously getting stuck in David Lynch movies and I wake up confused as to where I am.

One of the joys of touring is that you can basically eat whatever you want and not gain any weight. In order to cram in the calories that Ellen needs she’s been eating cheeseburgers every once in awhile. Yes, Ellen is vegetarian, but since it’s not always easy to get vegetarian food in rural China, she’s eating whatever. Plus, most everything in China has a bit of pork in it, be it big chunks of pork or cooked in pork fat. What she has also been eating while on rest breaks is peanut butter. High in sugar and calories, which makes a great pick me up on the road. But peanut butter can be expensive in China. Mostly, she’s been eating Chinese food. You can get a plate of stir fried greens, or a meat dish for 5-8 rmb in small family restaurants. With the current conversion rate of 6.8 rmb to the dollar, that’s less than a dollar a plate if you’re just eating veggies.