Lingbao to Xinxiang - 450km.
After saying farewell to the very friendly team at the hotel in Lingbao it was time to continue my journey.
More relatively easy riding today with lots of cars, bikes, trucks and you name it - 3 wheelers of all descriptions. the best part of my day was spent continuing East to Zhengzhou at which point you turn left and head North up to Beijing.
A big problem riding along these roads is that you end up black with soot from the diesel fumes of the trucks.
Finding my way through Zhengzhou was the usual struggle but once I was out of town I quickly came to, and crossed the Yellow River on the G107 freeway, which fortuitously allowed motorcycles to travel on it.
Speeding North at 6.10pm and starting to look for a rest spot for the evening, I feel the Haobon losing power (not as if it has a lot to begin with). I thought this strange but thought it best not to stop there and then (in the middle of a freeway) as there was a sign saying that 2km ahead is a fuel services stop. I kept riding and then pulled into the services.
As I slow way down, something feels a little odd as the Haobon starts to sway gently from side to side and I look down to confirm the rear is flat. Fortunately the services had a tyre repair centre which was still open (for cars and trucks) and the usual helpful team of Chinese workers pulled the tyre to find a 2" nail and a totally shredded tube. Not having bike tyres and tubes in his stock of spares, the repair guy went off somewhere (into the nearest town I think) and half an hour later returned with a new tube.
Not being familiar with motorcycles I had to show him how to remove the wheel so we could replace the tube.
15 minutes later I'm back on the road and travel only another 20km or so before pulling into Xinxiang for the night.
No comments:
Post a Comment