Along the way Jacob, one of the crew, has been taking video footage of us riding. He’s also been interviewing a number of the participants, including me, and he put together this rather impressive little video. The other person talking…
Welcome to Uzbekistan (stage 70)
Today was another of those slightly surreal days Someone: “What did you do today?” Me: “Went for a ride on my bike” Someone: “Cool, where’d you go?” Me: “Oh you know, Uzbekistan” On ‘paper’ today looked a pretty easy day,…
Dripping hot in Dushanbe (rest day)
I didn’t manage to sleep in as much as I’d have liked to as I woke up starving just before 0700 and couldn’t get back to sleep after that. The hotel breakfast was fine, but they only had instant coffee…
Downhill to Dushanbe (stage 69)
Slower start, quick downhill to tunnel, fast convoy through tunnel, 10km of awesome downhill (top speed 77.8 km/h), long climb (Grant and I dropped Will), descent to lunch, even better descent (30km in 50min), crazy traffic, car wash, into hotel by…
Climbing till the end (stage 68)
Out of town, no police check, tail wind, downhill, castle in the wrong place, big climb to lunch, roadside butchery, fall at railway lines, old airport, wrong distance, boy being brakes on the cart, long climb, Grant at coke stop,…
An unexpected hotel (stage 67)
Good road to begin, much more pavement than expected, sections of new pavement even once gravel started, construction impressive, short walk in steep dusty area, lunch, have a hotel for tonight, continue climbing on better construction road, initial descent awful,…
Heading for the truck stop (stage 66)
Started out not bad, nice town at 31km, road got much (much, much) worse before the pavement began, bridge that had been moved, waterfall shower, truck stop so much better then envisaged (one of the best campsites we’ve had), fresh…
Off to the beach (stage 65)
We were back to 0500 breakfast this morning which meant it was still completely dark as we were getting up and getting organised – not my favourite way to start any day! For the first 20km the road wasn’t too…
Follow the river (stage 64)
So I managed to get a decent night’s sleep without needing to climb the stairway to heaven (well the toilet actually) which made this morning considerably better than yesterday morning. While and I was feeling somewhat better I wasn’t really…
Rest day in Khorog (rest day)
Arrrggghhhhh…!!! Awake at 0330 because I’ve got a runny bottom again! And it turns out I’m not the only one, by the end of the day there were eight of us who were unwell. As a consequence my plans for…