January 17th

January 17, 2023

north from Sanyi

Last night I couldn't get any TV channels that I wanted and after downing my IPA and chatting to Debbie on the room's phone, it was not even ten when hit the sack. Soon after cramp in both adductors got me goaning and tossing around in acute pain. As soon as I bent my legs it kicked in, so I slept with them straight, under two duvets to help keep myself warm.

Going to bed early had me thinking I'd be on the road at around dawn, but it's almost 8:00 when I draw back the curtains and see it's all grey again outside. Debbie said it would be. She also told me there was an email from the main ceramics museum, where I'm curating an exhibition that opens soon. She read out me the message, which asked for a reply that day - yesterday. Obviously that didn't happen (I don't have any online access with me). They need me to proof the text printed on the back of the invitation cards, as well as a poster...

Card for the exhibition I'm curating that opens just after Chinese New Year (Feb. 3rd)

The guy manning reception this morning asks if I want breakfast, but I tell him I've opted out. He kindly offers me a bottle of water, but I already have one from my room. He wishes me a good journey. Cheers.

Only a minute after the panniers get clipped on in the hotel lobby, my bike is leaning against a wall outside the 85°C coffee shop while I pop into the adjacent 7-Eleven for one of their microwaved blueberry bagels that are a bit rubbery. They're still better fare than what's served in the hotel.

The youngster taking orders in 85°C seems a bit miserable, while I feel surprisingly chipper. Although yesterday certainly went pear-shaped, today, despite the chilly weather, feels like a fresh start and my planned route offers redemption or sorts.

Looking out over Sanyi from my 8th floor room at about 8:00

Outside the coffee shop with a blueberry bagel from 7-Eleven (traffic cone for g)

Butcher's in Sanyi directly opposite the 85°C coffee shop

Riding west off the 13 (Now using Debbie's old Carradice saddlebag)

Route 13 is quiet. It's not rush hour and Sanyi likely doesn't have one anway. The route bisects the town into east and west and after a few minutes cycling due north, I make a left to ride west and start climbing on a road that doesn't really go anywhere to speak of. A screenshot shows a Buddhist temple up in the hills, but my route takes me along lanes that cars probably don't use.

I make a couple of turns and the road becomes narrow and then a lane. There's a right to make and when I get to where I think it is, a farmer is driving down from his house in a blue truck and tells me the concrete path he's on isn't the way and gestures for me to keep going.

The lane soon passes a few more farms, then bends and starts to climb and gets steep so I walk. My jacket comes off near the top, then shortly after the concrete path ends at a rudimentary home standing vacant. That's probably 20 minutes wasted, plus a bunch of energy.

After taking a photo of a stack of split bamboo that the absent owner likely uses as firewood, I keep a sharp look out for the turn on the way back and eventually find it. It's also steep and formed of roughly tamped concrete, and sure enough once I've pushed my bike about 100 metres, it leads past the top entrance to the farm I passed earlier.

Edited screenshot of my planned route west off the 13 - where a lane forks & loops around a farm

This correct route seems to have been forgotten about by practically everyone. Looking at the leaves scattered over the surface, only motor scooters have been this way, and even then not very many, and not for a while. I keep to the centre, as the edges look to be slippery with moss covering large areas and if I fell here it could be a while before anyone came along.

There are sections too hard to pedal up. At one fork it's not clear where to go, but a few Chinese characters scrawled on a wall are the same ones as those for the temple on my screenshot, and an arrow points left, so that's where I head.

The very top part is hard to walk up and the concrete is so broken that it's unclear if this is still the correct way, but it's going in the general direction and once I start descending - slowly, with my brakes on - certain sections become familiar from Street View. The Google guy deserves a medal.

My compass comes in handy a few times and eventually I reach the temple compound, which looks well maintained and seems to have had a lot of money spent on it. A new-ish road leads past it and takes me slightly higher.

The track takes me through a bamboo grove

Ceramic containers about 20" tall originally made for storing rice wine

There's nobody around. I thought there would be tourists out and about today. With there being no cars on the wide road, it makes me wonder if the Skywalk that's top of today's itinerary is actually open. Maybe the thing that's got me to slog my way up here is now derelict and out of use? We'll soon see.

After passing a parking area, a walking path goes on forever. Well, for over a kilometre, which would a decent walk for most drivers. The path drops down and eventually a blue-painted metal structure appears and my wheels roll onto a short concrete bridge incorporating a viewing platform.

It's a really good vantage point and I clamber up some steps and set my camera to take multimple shots as I scroll from left to right. It stitches them together in a jiffy, but it's obvious where some of the joints are - basically where metal railings run horizontally. It'll do.

A minute later comes the actual Skywalk, which is a suspension bridge. For some reason I thought it would be a glass-bottomed walkway, which are in vogue here right now. There's only me, but no doubt come the holiday weekend it'll be heaving.

A mulitiple-shot panorama using the camera's inbuilt function

The email from the museum has been bothering me and made me rethink the trip. The plan had been to ride north to the city of Miaoli today, or even further, then get a train home, but I'm now considering getting to the next place with a station and seeing what the departures are - ones that accept bikes. Tongluo is small town not very far away and it's basically all downhill from here. You get my thinking.

There's a massive construction project underway at the end of the walking path. It seems to be a factory of some sort - one without any windows. Scores of construction works are milling around and heading for a break, so I ask one about the route to Miaoli and he points where to go. The road network is new and has clearly been built for this new factory, or whatever it is.

It's pretty much fresh tarmac for a while, then I reach the edge of Tonguo and soon find the train station. The ticket clerk says there's a train north leaving at 12:30. The clock says it's now only 11:45, which gives me time for lunch in a nearby 7-Eleven. The train will arrive in Zhongli just before 2:00, which means there'll be time to reply to the museum's email before the staff call it a day.

Red couplets for Chinese New Year on doors near the train station in Tongluo

Beside a street in Tongluo (these would soon be stolen in the UK)

Waiting on Platform 2 for the 12:30 train north

She was like this for the whole 90-minute journey

The train journey is 90 minutes and I have a seat. Oddly enough there's no space for bikes, so mine stands right in front of me and luckily the train isn't very busy. The other passengers are glued to their phones and with it being a commuter service, there are lots of stops.

It's a 15-miute ride home and it's a good job I'm back early as the text on the poster has six basic punctuation errors that need correcting. My contact at the museum gets and email and a phone call from me to confirm the corrections. Done.

My thinking is to return to part of the route and complete the bit towards the end that I missed out on riding today/tomorrow. It may also involve a train ride. Hopefully the weather improves. Getting chilled isn't very nice.

Today's ride: 30 km (19 miles)
Total: 2,232 km (1,386 miles)

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