hebei northern province
beijing - shitai - chicheng - guyuan
biking out of beijing at dawn along chang’an jie, cutting tien’anmen gate, entrance gate to the forbidden city, from tien’anmen square, a little further on the right. in good company of humming fellow bikers – there’s enough space for all on china’s number one parade boulevard. I’ll be back.
new construction around the capital consists of pretty depressing stuff, low quality copy/paste with dorky ‘traditional’ roof details. built with the same level of detail as the average highway bridge, but advertized as the versailles of the east. very poor communities too, some gated, most lacking sidewalks and other facilities, all of them designed on cars – preferably volkswagen, “the car of the people”, the nation’s favorite (audi for party officials).
first sight of the great wall, and a crumbled section at huanhuacheng
surprisingly quickly though, only a couple of hours north of beijing, I found myself pedaling around in rural china: big trees lining fertile valleys, the one-size-fits-all brick houses, the village people, the smell of coal fires, donkeys, and the rest of the bucolic painting I would bike through over the next three days. no nature in hebei, every inch I saw of it is cultivated, every valley terraced.
whose motorcycles are these? - see the guys that are finishing the last character on the opposite hillside? it's theirs baby. the wonders of the chinese workforce - look at the picture to the right and notice the distance between the road (left) and the inscription...
chicheng middle school - the whole class sang "my heart will go on" for me...
meanwhile, on the countryside...
the great wall might never have been a waterproof protection system, at least it served as a road, a very steap one, in difficult terrain. seems like communist engineers built their roads on that tradition – hebei roads are good, well-maintained by lots of hands, but steap. before the end of the first day, I was suffering on a strenuous mountain pass. took me only a couple of switchback to discover why beijing (“northern capital”) and hebei (“northern province”) make up the northern edge of traditionally inhabited china...
looking back...
rural delight
on the mountain passes, time enough to get used to loneliness, to wish myself a buddy. in the valleys, the first alienating contacts with the chinese countrymen, more reasons to wish myself a buddy. but then, north of the northern province, well beyond the wall, suddenly the valley widens, mountains flatten out and gently roll onto the highlands. expanding horizons, no more worries, no more wishes.
a pasta marco polo with the first grasslands in sight. at the edge of the pastures of the mongols, looking forward to meet some fellow nomads...
biking out of beijing at dawn along chang’an jie, cutting tien’anmen gate, entrance gate to the forbidden city, from tien’anmen square, a little further on the right. in good company of humming fellow bikers – there’s enough space for all on china’s number one parade boulevard. I’ll be back.
new construction around the capital consists of pretty depressing stuff, low quality copy/paste with dorky ‘traditional’ roof details. built with the same level of detail as the average highway bridge, but advertized as the versailles of the east. very poor communities too, some gated, most lacking sidewalks and other facilities, all of them designed on cars – preferably volkswagen, “the car of the people”, the nation’s favorite (audi for party officials).
first sight of the great wall, and a crumbled section at huanhuacheng
surprisingly quickly though, only a couple of hours north of beijing, I found myself pedaling around in rural china: big trees lining fertile valleys, the one-size-fits-all brick houses, the village people, the smell of coal fires, donkeys, and the rest of the bucolic painting I would bike through over the next three days. no nature in hebei, every inch I saw of it is cultivated, every valley terraced.
whose motorcycles are these? - see the guys that are finishing the last character on the opposite hillside? it's theirs baby. the wonders of the chinese workforce - look at the picture to the right and notice the distance between the road (left) and the inscription...
chicheng middle school - the whole class sang "my heart will go on" for me...
meanwhile, on the countryside...
the great wall might never have been a waterproof protection system, at least it served as a road, a very steap one, in difficult terrain. seems like communist engineers built their roads on that tradition – hebei roads are good, well-maintained by lots of hands, but steap. before the end of the first day, I was suffering on a strenuous mountain pass. took me only a couple of switchback to discover why beijing (“northern capital”) and hebei (“northern province”) make up the northern edge of traditionally inhabited china...
looking back...
rural delight
on the mountain passes, time enough to get used to loneliness, to wish myself a buddy. in the valleys, the first alienating contacts with the chinese countrymen, more reasons to wish myself a buddy. but then, north of the northern province, well beyond the wall, suddenly the valley widens, mountains flatten out and gently roll onto the highlands. expanding horizons, no more worries, no more wishes.
a pasta marco polo with the first grasslands in sight. at the edge of the pastures of the mongols, looking forward to meet some fellow nomads...
posted by Jan at 01:07
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