Like flying drones over the pass road and a hammering ascent into scurrility
N 22°03'24.1'' E 103°09'19.2''
Date:
19.07.2016 until 20.07.2016
Day: 388 – 389
Country:
Vietnam
Province:
Điện Biên
Location:
Muong Lay
Latitude N:
22°03’24.1”
Longitude E:
103°09’19.2”
Daily kilometers:
65 km
Total kilometers:
17,647 km
As the crow flies:
35 km
Average speed:
17.8 km/h
Maximum speed:
54.5 km/h
Travel time:
3:13 hrs.
Soil condition:
Asphalt / gravel
Maximum height:
1.600 m
Total altitude meters:
48.603 m
Altitude meters for the day:
515 m
Sunrise:
05:34 pm
Sunset:
6:53 pm
Temperature day max:
28°C
Temperature day min:
21°C
Departure:
09:00 a.m.
Arrival time:
3:30 pm
(Photos of the diary entry can be found at the end of the text).
It poured with rain all night. It’s unfair. Some parts of the world suffer from water shortages, while here in the mountains of northern Vietnam the water falls endlessly from the sky. Even today, the monsoon clouds are eating the beautiful landscape from the skin of our Mother Earth. We pedal our heavy steeds for kilometers through a dreary, grey and wet mountain world. Only 400 meters below, at an altitude of 1,200 meters, does the fog lift and give us a view of a world that is more familiar from tales of fantasy and fairy tales. We never tire of marveling at the natural beauty, the lush green of the rice terraces, the banana plantations and the dripping jungle with rushing rivers running through it. Hairpin bend after hairpin bend into the lowlands. The narrow mountain road repeatedly hits the precipice, which is why our eyes fall into the valley. It feels as if we are flying in a drone over the winding road below us. “Wow! Breathtaking!” says Tanja, fascinated. Our e-bikes glide further and further down, deeper and deeper, so that we have to be careful not to fall into a drunken stupor during the fantastic ride. “Juhhuuuuu!”, I cheer on the 37-kilometer descent. “Not so fast!” Tanja’s call warns me. “Yes, yes, I’ll be careful,” I reply. Suddenly the rear brake no longer works properly. I stop immediately. “What’s going on?” asks Tanja, who comes to a halt behind me a few minutes later. “I need to replace my brake pads,” I reply. “What? You only did that two days ago.” “Yes, but we’ve now covered 2,500 meters of altitude,” I explain. After the short routine work, it’s time to delve deeper. We have long since left the cloud cover above us. It’s getting warmer all the time. We start to sweat. Boys riding their water buffaloes come towards us. “Hello! Hello!” they shout, waving. We take a few photos and get back in the saddle. After a 37-kilometer descent, we reach the lowlands. The subtropical temperature seems to want to cook us here. At a crossroads we meet the asphalted main road. But even this is hardly used. Not like in China. Above all, we are allowed to breathe clean air in this country. There are no coal-fired power plants, no polluted rivers. People in Vietnam don’t seem to throw away as much as in the Middle Kingdom. At least not in this region. Although many plastic bags are also used in this country, the deadly disease for our oceans and their inhabitants is apparently still under control. Vietnamese farmers often still use banana or other leaves to wrap things in.
For some time now, we have been cycling through the fertile, wide valley of the Sông Đà, which has its source in the Chinese province of Yunnan and flows into the Red River after 800 km. “I thought Sông Đà meant Black River?” asks Tanja. “So what?” “The river is yellow-brown and not black, isn’t it?” “It’s probably because of all the rain recently. The floods have taken a lot of soil with them,” I reply. We cross a new bridge that takes us over a branch of the Sông Đà. A little deeper into the gorge, we discover the remains of the old bridge, which has since collapsed. “Have you seen the sign?” I ask Tanja. “Yes, it looks like a classy place. I think we should take a closer look at the hotel,” she replies, which is why we cross another bridge that takes us to the other side of the Black River. In the corner of my eye I spot a dilapidated signpost and slam on the brakes. An arrow points to a narrow, very steep mountain road, the surface of which is partly cracked. “Doesn’t look inviting somehow,” I say. “I don’t think the hotel is still in operation as broken as the sign and the street look to me,” Tanja suspects. “Hm, I don’t know,” I think and ask a woman who is just passing by on her moped if there is a hotel up there in the mountains. “Vâng đó là một khách sạn!” (Yes, there is a hotel) we understand. “It’s far too steep for us. We’ll never get up there on our bikes. Let’s keep going. Maybe we’ll find somewhere else to stay for the night in that village up ahead,” Tanja ponders. As I hesitate, she adds: “And if the hotel up there is closed, we’ll have to turn back. Don’t be angry with me, but the road is far too dangerous. I’m not going up there.” “I’ll unhitch the trailer and scout out the route and the supposed hotel for us. Maybe it’s quite nice up there and if there are buses coming up, we can manage that too. You can wait here until then,” I suggest and put my plans into action. Although I’m now pedaling without a trailer in third gear and in turbo mode, my thighs are pumping up so much that I think they could burst at any moment. Then, after a long bend, I reach a small parking lot. I park my bike and look up a steep staircase. A billboard with the oversized letters Hote is emblazoned on the building. The L apparently fell out some time ago and has not been replaced. “Hm, doesn’t look good,” I mumble and head into an open building opposite the parking lot. In fact, I am greeted by a tastefully and elegantly furnished hotel lobby. “Hello, hello there! Is anyone there?” I call out. Footsteps approach from inside. A young man greets me courteously. “Is the hotel open?” I ask. “Yes, of course!” I’m pleased to hear. After I ask if I can see one of the rooms, the apparently only employee shows me around the huge complex. As we pass a large, clean swimming pool, I can’t believe my eyes. Then I enter a dark room that smells of mold and mildew. “Not good,” I say. “The luxury rooms cost 500,000 dong (€19.85) including breakfast,” apologizes the young Vietnamese man. “Good, then please show me one of your best rooms.” A little later, when I look directly onto the pool from the second floor of a clean and spacious room and I can negotiate the price down by 100,000 dong (€3.97), I agree without knowing how I’m going to get the trailers up here.
“It’s a fantastic room and there’s a huge swimming pool just for us,” I enthuse as I jet down to Tanja’s again. “And how are we supposed to get the trailers up there?” she wants to know. “First, I’ll drive your trailer up while you wait down here with Aaci. Then I’ll come back and take Ajaci on the leash to pull his empty trailer up.” “And I can manage to pedal my bike up there with my luggage?” “Just riding the bike up without a trailer but with saddlebags is no problem,” I promise.
Euphoric, I click Tanja’s heavy trailer onto my bike and start pedaling. “Good luck!” Tanja calls after me. After just a hundred meters, I don’t think I can go any further. I shift into first gear and continue to hammer my bike upwards at full power. As this is already my second trip to the hotel, my thigh muscles are totally over-acidified. Cramps are looming, but with the extreme incline I realize that I won’t have a second attempt after a stop. Although I left the saddlebags in the lobby, this ascent is an inhuman feat of strength. My lungs rattle so much that I wouldn’t be surprised if they suddenly lay bleeding and twitching on the rough road surface in front of me. “Uuuuaaahhhh! Don’t give up!” I shout at myself, motivating myself. I make it around the bend and see the small parking lot. Only 50 meters left, 30 meters. “Yes!” I shout, completely out of breath and panting loudly as my bike comes to a halt in front of the run-down lobby. Five minutes later I have recovered to some extent, uncouple the trailer and let my buck roll down to Tanja again to fetch Ajaci and his trailer.
The third ascent is less strenuous than expected. Tanja also pedals her bike up the approximately one kilometer long, steep hotel ascent without much difficulty. After a breather, we unload Tanja’s bike and the trailers and have to carry all our luggage up a steep flight of forty steps. From there, we go up to the second floor of the building. Once we have stowed everything away in the room after an endless amount of time, we tear off our clothes, put on our bathing suits, jump in the shower and then into the pool. “Yes! Yes! Yes!” I cheer and puff like a walrus. “Ha, ha, ha. What a great feeling to be rewarded like this after the hard journey!” Tanja cheers. As the only guests at the large resort, we are now splashing around in a huge swimming pool in the middle of the mountains of northern Vietnam, surrounded by palm trees in a setting that is hard to describe. The situation is so bizarre and crazy that we can’t stop laughing with happiness.
In the evening, we leave our beautiful, air-conditioned room and climb down the many steps to be the only guests in the dining room, which was once built for large events. On our way through the lobby, our gaze falls on a couple of huge preserving jars. “Are those snakes in there?” asks Tanja. “Actually, they’ve put some cobras in there,” I reply. Well, what if they don’t cook them into our dinner?” jokes Tanja…
If you would like to find out more about our adventures, you can find our books under this link.
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