Jianou is a small city tucked away in the mountains of Fujian province China in the heart of tea and bamboo country. There is also some rice farming in the area but it is tea and bamboo that stokes the fires of the beast. Fujian province as a whole is home to some of the finest tea in the world.

The main reason I moved to Jianou from my previous home of Anhai was because of the access to the countryside for cycling. While there were many redeeming qualities to living in Anhai, in the end the lack of quality cycling opportunities nearly drove me mad as a hatter. So, when I decided it was necessary to move I fixed my eye firmly on the Chinese countryside. I made calls to three recruiters. On the second call I found Jianou. I had ridden through Jianou last fall while on a bike trip and remember thinking then that it looked like a nice place to live. So, after an interview, a few short negotiations, and a couple of days to consider the offer it was a done deal. I was goin’ down to the country. It felt as though fate had thrown us together.

So, far the 6 weeks that I have spent here have been great. It took a little while to shake off the inevitable ennui that followed such an exciting adventure as my summer cycling tour, but of late I am bouncing back into form. I have made some good friends with the other foreign teachers that we have here and have made friends with several local people as well. And of course, I have been enjoying the opportunity to get out and ride scenic country roads on a regular basis. I have even been invited to join one of the local bike clubs, and recently I had my first ride with them.

It was an absolute joy to meet the group early on a weekday morning for a 60k round-trip ride to Xiaoqiao.  It was a fast paced ride through the lovely countryside as we rapidly skirted by many tea plantations stapled to the steep hillsides. We grimaced with the effort of pushing our limits as we trudged to the top of some long steep climbs, and tested our nerve as we raced at speeds in excess of 60 kilometers per hour down the back sides. What a magnificent day. A great ride with new friends. There is little in life to compare to the tremendous vibe of such a simple day.

When riding in a group like that it is difficult to take many photos. I did get a few, but there were some that it was just not possible to get. Hey, no problem right? I cycled there once, I could easily go back. So, that’s what I did a few days later when I went back to photograph some of the tea terraces that we passed during our ride.

As I mentioned in the opening paragraph, tea from Fujian province is among the best teas in the world. It is also home to the most expensive tea in the world. Just about a 1-hour drive from Jianou is the tourist city of Wuyishan. Wuyishan is home to some startling karst formations but is also home to Da Hong Pao tea which sells for over $1400 for a single gram! That works out to around $10,000 for a pot of tea!! You best not waste a drop. The tea plantation that I visited doesn’t have tea anywhere near as valuable as that, but they are quality teas just the same.

When I arrived there I wandered around the trails and pathways a while as I sought to get a feel for the place. I grabbed a few early shots checked the light and made some adjustments. As I shot I wandered further from the entrance and soon found myself deeper into the hills. The peace and quiet that I found was a thing to be thoroughly enjoyed. I continued to capture images and soon found myself getting into a groove, carefully composing the images and making adjustments for exposure. The light was mostly very flat and grey with an occasional short lived burst of blue. Not a great light to work with so I deduced that my best bet for some quality shots was to try to convey the mood.

A short time later, I stumbled upon a crew harvesting leaves from a hillside. I took a couple of photos at a distance and stood back and watched as the group of three men and two women executed their duties smoothly and seamlessly.

Many people that know me probably won’t believe it when I say this, but I do struggle occasionally with shyness. Especially when it comes to bringing my camera into people’s midst to take photos of them as they go about their business. On this day I decided that I would not let that shyness deter me from getting the images that I wanted and I trudged up the steep slippery slope where they working and with a few bumbling words of Chinese to tell them who I was and why I was there I settled in to take a few photos.

The men and women that I met there were gracious and more than a little bewildered, astounded even, by my presence. They smiled and laughed as I positioned myself among the bushes to try and get the photos I wanted. When I felt that I had accomplished my goal I bid them farewell and with some smiles and a few waves I was on my way again.

I began to head for my bike to get home for lunch and get ready for a late afternoon class. I stopped for a few more shots on the way, including some of the many tombs that are dug into the hillside. Next it was onto the bike and back to the road for a quick dash home.

As I rode toward home I was struck by how great I felt after the mornings adventure. I was smiling ear-to-ear as I raced down a big hill in pursuit of lunch and a hot shower. It was so wonderful to be able to enjoy an adventure in the morning before going to work in the afternoon, and to be able to do it so close to home was he icing on the cake.

There are many sayings about where your home is. Some say that home is where your heart is, or where you lay your head at night. It may be where you park it, or where you hang your hat. This afternoon, after several days of being in transit and a grand total of 6 weeks of amazing travel throughout China, I have arrived back to my little home on the 14th floor in my little city of Jian’ou. Including the love of friends and family which I carry with me everywhere I go, everything I own in this world, except for a few books in my parents’ basement and a few other odds ends scattered hither and thither, is here with me. It is where my heart is, and it is where I lay my head at night. It is where I park it, if you consider “it” a bicycle, and while I usually throw my hats in a closet rather than hang them, this is where they are, too.

I have to say, it is really nice to be back. To open closets and see so much fresh clean clothes and a washer outside to do more when I should need it? Makes me feel like a rich man. No more washing clothes in sinks with shampoo or cheap hotel soap and hanging it off the bike the next day to dry as I ride down the road. No more chronic pit smell or dubious underwear. No more shaking the sand from socks before putting them on again the next morning, or covering a rare clean pair with plastic bags to try futilely to ward off the inevitable wet feet that come with rainy days. No more of that. For now, at least. It may sound odd, but I am really going to miss that. I have already started to. I love the open road, warts and all.

I am sitting at home now with my road music playlist drifting out from my TV and I think back to all the incredible places that I was so blessed to see and visit and all of the wonderful, warm and welcoming people I met along the way. I think of all the things that I carried with me that I humped up and down many great hills and mountains, through scorching thirsty deserts, and into the face of spirit busting strong winds: a camera, phone, and laptop and their requisite chargers. Multiple changes of clothes, extra shoes, rain gear, riding gear, a hatred of wet feet, tent and sleeping bag, air mattress, cooking gear, pot and pan, stove fuel, food, water, toiletries, spare tubes, extra spokes, chain oil, tools, toilet paper, a near constant craving for a cheeseburger, patch kit, a power cell, and the undying dreams of a teenager.
But the single most important thing I brought with me is you! If it weren’t for all of you that follow along on my travels, they would be a great deal less special than they are. And I do bring you with me. All of you that look at my photos and writing, from the most casual observer to my most long standing and dedicated followers, you are with me on those roads. You are in every stroke that I make on the pedal, and you are in every word I write and every photo I take. It is you that makes VeloTramp. Without you it could not exist. And it is knowing that you are with me, that you are part of this, that provides me with motivation to get out and shoot photos on the days that I am tired and maybe don’t feel like I want to, or dig deep and find the words on days that I would otherwise be silent. And if I were alone and doing this entirely for me, it would be so easy to keep the camera in the bag on those days. It would be so easy to leave the pen hidden in my pack. But wanting to share with you these beautiful places that I am so fortunate to visit keeps me going, keeps me working.

When I rode a camel over those massive sand dunes and scampered to the top of the highest one, you were there. When I climbed the 660 steps to the top of a 700-year-old section of the Great Wall of China and gaped in wide eyed wonder at the seemingly infinite Gobi Desert below, you were there. The day that I climbed a long and steep mountain without pause and surpassed 12,000 feet of altitude and whooped with joy and beat my chest in triumph, you were there! And when I reached 2000-kilometers in distance with a rapturous shiver and quiet but beaming satisfaction and a small degree of disbelief, you were there. And on the long hot, hard day that I struggled so mightily up a great hill into the teeth of a gale that threatened to blow me off the road at times and I screamed and howled with rage and frustration at the unrelenting elements as I ran ever more perilously low on water, you were all there, helping me up that hill. And when I finally managed to reach the top of that beast and saw it laying at my feet defeated and was gifted with enough water for two or three days by many kind and generous Chinese people, and was rewarded for my efforts by a 40 kilometer stretch of downhill that was the most joyous and liberating ride of my life, you were there then, too, yelling joyously right long with me. You are always there, and I am so fortunate to have that motivating factor. I am so thankful and grateful for your kind words and encouragement. They make each memento and memory that much sweeter.

So to each and every one of you that follow along in any way great or small, my sincerest thanks for your contribution to my endeavors. It just wouldn’t be the same without you.
Until next time 

The ride out of Lanzhou was a silky smooth transition of leg over leg as I pushed my way up the gradual but insistent incline. I felt strong as I pushed my heavy laden bike up the narrow byway to National Highway G309 at which point I took a sharp turn to the west and headed toward Yongjing County. But a funny thing happened along the way. Suddenly, almost inexplicably, I felt short of breath in a way that was a little alarming. I am in better shape than this, I thought to myself. Am I sick or something? I had a touch of a cold but nothing that would account for the level of struggle that I was having. I didn’t know it at the time, but for the first time in my life I was experiencing the effects of altitude.

In my time riding in China I have deduced that there are certain characteristics of “National Highway” level roads. Typically, they are wide, well traveled and busy roads that have a good to excellent surface, occasionally have long hills but of a reasonable pitch, and they can generally sustain speeds of 70 to 90 kilometers per hour. This road was none of those things. It was a long narrow traverse up an endless series of slow and difficult climbs with a surface that became more broken the deeper into the region I got.

I should have known it right from the start when the opening stretch of the highway was a woe begotten thing that more resembled the well worn entry to a lumber yard or back country auto wrecker than that of a highway. A few hundred yards and the road improved into something that better mimicked other national routes that I have ridden. And almost immediately the incredibly steep climbs began, and with them came the panting and gasping, and heaving of chest. Am I having a heart attack or something? Onset of emphysema? Tuberculosis? What the hell is wrong with me?

I struggled to the top of that first climb and was given a slight reprieve. I was still going up but at a much more reasonable pitch. At just the moment I felt I was catching my breath and started to think that maybe the rest wouldn’t be so bad, I took a turn and had standing before me an even longer and steeper climb than the first one. I made it better than half way to the top and then I did something I usually only do to take pictures. I stepped off.

I pushed myself as hard as I could. I was gulping like a fish out of water, my heart was pounding, and my chest expanded to levels it may have never reached before. But I couldn’t catch my breath. So I stopped. And I pushed the bike up the hill. I can’t remember the last time I did that. I kept this up throughout the day: riding as much as I could, and pushing the bike when I couldn’t. It was frustrating. At times I looked at the hills that defeated me and was disgusted by what I saw. I have climbed hundreds and hundreds of hills much more difficult than some of what I saw that day and had no issue. What is wrong? Is this cold actually a lung infection or something? No. It was the altitude.

In my preparation for this trip I looked carefully at many things: possible routes, equipment, bike prep, clothing. Altitude was one thing I never gave much thought to. I have been able to deduce that prior to this trip the highest altitude I have ever cycled at is a measly 2500 feet. When I set out from Lanzhou I was already at nearly 5000 feet. After a few hours of riding nearly all up hill I was getting into altitudes that were in the neighborhood of 8000 feet, occasionally exceeding that number. This is the altitude, give or take a few hundred meters depending on the individual, that altitude sickness can begin. Some symptoms of altitude sickness include a breathlessness that can make you feel old and terribly out of shape, along with some dizziness, nausea, loss of appetite, and rapid pulse. Fortunately, I didn’t get the nausea or dizziness but I sure had the others. I had learned many years ago, or thought I had learned, that those effects didn’t start until between 11 and 12 thousand feet. Add in the ill effects of a cold and 30+ degree temperatures and it made for some difficult times over the next two days. But they were worth it.

As much as I struggled, as much as I wished I had chosen a different route, as much as I cursed the heat and the dust and the broken road and the fumes of passing trucks, there was no way I could turn back once I caught a glimpse of the beautiful mountain terraces that were hidden deep within those mountains. It was like discovering a hidden paradise. The hillsides were a tapestry of interwoven shapes and colors each more beautiful than the last. The effort, determination, and the time that it took to create these plots must be incredible. During the rare times when I was able to ride at my leisure and enjoy the experience it was a sense of awe that I carried with me. What a prize to find this.

Late in the second day I finally escaped the clutch of the mountains that I thought would never let me go. I swept down effortlessly into a deep and narrow valley at the bottom of which I intersected with a much improved highway. I camped on the edge of a farmer’s field as I had the first night in the mountains. The one difference was that the night at altitude was quite chilly while down in the valley was so warm that I slept in t-shirt and shorts on top of my sleeping bag.

The third day was a relatively easy 45 kilometers than ended with an incredibly rewarding 20 kilometer downhill into Yongjing County and a small city on the banks of the Yellow River. It is a good place to rest up and recuperate from this cold I have. Shortly I will be back on the road. Now is when the work must begin in earnest. For I have a long way to go and only so much time to get there.