The Beaten Track

If there is one thing most cyclists have in common, apart from smelly socks and tan lines on wrists and fingers, it's an unspoken yet deeply felt aversion to mass tourism. It's below them in so many ways that they couldn't even begin to list all that's wrong with it. Mentality, that's what it seems to come down to. They're travelling, don't you know, under their own steam no less. They're discovering the world on their own terms, finding meaning in out-of-the-way places that aren't listed in any of the guidebooks—nevermind that it says 'tourist' on each of their visas. Some even go so far as to avoid busy tourist hubs, tailoring their riding schedule to the state of their laundry rather than the vicinity of a major sight.

Though not wholly alien to this sentiment, I try not to let my moral superiority get in the way of taking in as much as I can of the vast array of cultural wealth that's strung along my route, even if it means queueing up in the heat or being forced to pay twenty times the regular admission fee (common practice in Pakistan). And why should I? The beauty of independent travel is that you're free to go wherever you want, and that includes staying right on the beaten track. After all, what is a visit to Verona without risking a neck hernia while gazing up at the jaw-dropping frescoes of its churches? Or an overnight stay in Bruges without getting up first thing in the morning to be crammed into a tiny canal boat along with a busload of elderly day-trippers? I did it and loved it.

Here in China, the rise of the middle class means that organised tourism is booming. Unfortunately, much of what would make a good tourist destination—historic city centres, for instance—has been knocked down in the rush to modernise. What remains is often dolled up to such a degree that it is hard to tell what has been restored and what is spanking new. Not that this really matters to the average Chinese tourist, who prefers the neat and tidy over the scruffy and dilapidated—in other words, over the way much of Europe looks.

Seems the soldiers have nipped off for a tea break

High up on the ramparts of Jiayuguan Fort, I realise that the Chinese might have a point. No need here to stare at a few weathered stones and press your mind to conjure up an image of the way it once looked. Jiayuguan Fort is real and it's as magnificent as it ever was. With its three squat towers and its double defence walls the fort sits at a location that could hardly be of greater strategic importance. This is where the Hexi Corridor, traditionally the only viable route from west to east, is at its narrowest. But the place also holds symbolic value: here, at the westernmost point of the Great Wall, ancient China ended. What lay beyond was the source of dark tales. Looking out across the wasteland through which I came, the historical significance of the fort makes itself felt in a way that few other places ever have. Scores of weary travellers before me must have heaved a sigh of relief at the sight of this fort. It signalled a return to a world of safety and civilisation.

Down in the central courtyard I get a taste of what that civilisation is about. A man with a crooked smile urges me to put on a plastic cuirass and shoot brightly coloured arrows at a couple of already badly mutilated straw puppets. Frowning, I follow the beaten track to the exit.

Buddha on a Bike

I don't want to harp on about how tough it is out here in the desert and how great the suffering, but as my days are filled with nothing but sun, sand and self-pity I'm afraid you'll have to bear with me one more time. Last week saw me make a little detour to Dunhuang, a sedate town in the southern Gobi that probably wouldn't exist if it weren't for the nearby Mogao Caves. This age-old temple complex, 'discovered' and subsequently looted by a handful of Western explorers at the turn of the last century, was once the centre of Chinese Buddhism. It's impressive as much for its dazzling murals and serene Buddha statues—some standing well over thirty metres tall—as for its sheer size: of the original thousand man-made caves some five hundred survive today. Of those I only managed to visit ten, and that took me the best part of a day.

Approaching Dunhuang

To get to Dunhuang I had to leave the main road leading to the mouth of the Hexi Corridor and cycle southwest for a day. The wind seemed to have anticipated this move: it was working against me as enthusiastically as it had on my west-east crossing of Xinjiang province. Fortunately, I had something to look forward to: a few days off, a bit of culture, something else than noodles for dinner. It also helped that there were two oasis villages along the way. In the first I gorged myself on watermelon, which is particularly good in these parts, and watched the melon vendor crack himself up with the 'romance' section of my Mandarin phrasebook. (Apart from the pretty universal 'Would you like a drink?' it has phrases such as 'You look like some cousin of mine', 'Piss off!', 'How about going to bed?', 'Don't worry, I'll do it myself', 'Easy, tiger!' and the rather anticlimactic 'You're just using me for sex'.)

Such lightheartedness seemed forever out of reach when I rode out of Dunhuang a few days later. I was cycling east on a narrow connecting road, and as the last houses disappeared behind me I noticed that the wind had turned yet again. And not only that. It seemed as though it too had taken a few days off, only to return nastier than ever before. Now a grit-laden gale, it took great pleasure in keeping my speed in the single digits and forcing me at times to ride with my eyes closed.

'What have I done to deserve this?' I groaned. 'Is this a case of bad karma?' I racked my brain but couldn't think of anything inappropriate I may have said or done on my tour of the Magao Caves. Torturing small animals or extorting money from poor old grannies aren't pleasures I usually indulge in, so what could it be? Bad luck? But is that possible? What are the odds of having to face a headwind every single day regardless of the direction I happen to be travelling in? Or is this how the human mind works? Could it be that we like to make a big deal out of unfavourable circumstances and simply fail to register those instances when the planets are aligned correctly and we get what we want without having to exert ourselves too much?

Melon vendor with a taste for the lurid

It didn't take me very long to realise that the way I usually deal with windy days—taking it out on lorry drivers who like to lean on their horn while overtaking me—wouldn't get me very far this time. For one, there was hardly any traffic on this back road. Moreover, the wind was so strong that it would be foolish to take a hand off the handlebar just to give the finger to a lorry driver with the mental capabilities of a six-year-old. I made a quick evaluation of the situation. Between Dunhuang and Guazhou, the next town on this road, there would most likely be nothing at all in the way of basic conveniences: no oasis villages, no settlements, no service stations. Without so much as a wall or a clump of trees to provide shelter it would be impossible to pitch my tent. And water... I shuddered to think of it. Even with the eight litres I was carrying I would have to ration myself.

As the day progressed the wind showed no sign of abating. I genuinely felt sorry for myself, which only made it worse. Then I thought of all those monks responsible for the marvel that is the Magao Caves. When they first started hacking away at the cliffside, they had no idea that their little project would evolve into one of the greatest artistic accomplishments of all time, that 1600 years later people from all over the world would throng to see the fruit of their labour. 'Just think of all the effort that must have gone into the creation of a single cave,' I told myself. The hammer and chisel, the oil lamps, the desert heat, the perseverance it took to cover wall after wall with thousands of near-identical miniature portraits of the Buddha. And then, when one cave was finished, they would move on to the next. And then to another. And another. And they kept at it for years, for decades, for centuries. Generation after generation, dynasty after dynasty.

'What is a day of pain in the face of such determination and sacrifice?' I asked myself. I divided the remaining hundred-or-so kilometres in a thousand units, using the little stone markers on the roadside to measure my progress. One marker for each cave. 'Now, the trick is to relinquish all desire for things of the world,' I lectured myself on the little I know of Buddhism. 'The pain you're currently experiencing stems from a longing for something you don't have. Forget about shade, forget about cold showers and the sound of clinking ice cubes. You should even forget about ever reaching Guazhou. Just focus on the next stone marker.'

Still, that was easier said than done. A hundred metres is a lot when the wind is giving its best to get you airbound. The on-board entertainment was pretty poor, too—I suspect that a few grains of sand messed up the intricate mechanism of my mental jukebox (see previous post). All I could do was count the pedal strokes. One-two-three-four-five-six-seven-eight, one-two-three-four-five-six-seven-eight. Over and over again, marker after marker. This actually proved to be quite effective. The counting induced a kind of semitrance that prevented me from spending energy on anything but pushing the pedals.

Two-thirds through the day my attempt at meditation in motion was crudely interrupted by something that appeared on the horizon. It was like the classic mirage you get in cartoons. It started with a fleck of grey shimmering in the heat, which as I drew closer took on the unmistakable outline of a petrol station. I instantly forgot about having to let go of the base cravings of the self and allowed myself to be swept away by heavenly images of cold-drinks fridges hopping around in air-conditioned rooms.

This clearly was a test, and as the building grew larger so did the realisation that I had flunked it. It was a petrol station all right, but one that was still under construction. No cold-drinks fridges here but stacks of building materials. No air-conditioned rooms but concrete boxes with paneless windows. I stopped, lay down on the floor and listened to the wind soughing through the empty shell. Then everything grew dark.

There is no yin without yang, no day without night, no heaven without hell, no beginning without end. Twelve hours after leaving Dunhuang I reached Guazhou (or Melon Town in English). And though I can't profess to have made much progress in terms of enlightenment, some kind of nirvana awaited me there.

It didn't take me long to find the town's budget hotel, but it soon transpired that the place didn't have police permission to accommodate foreigners. Acting on a hunch I decided to try my luck at a four-star affair across the street. As I walked through the revolving doors I felt horribly out of place. This was clearly the swankiest establishment for miles around—all crystal chandeliers and bellboys pushing around gleaming luggage trolleys—and I wasn't particularly looking or smelling my best. Nevertheless, the staff seemed delighted to see me. I was offered tea, and before I got a chance to frown at their rack rates I was offered a room for little more than what I usually spend at budget hotels. 'You are very important person,' said the smiley receptionist. 'Where are you from?' 'Holland,' I replied. 'Very beautiful,' she said. 'What, Holland?' 'No, you.' And my chapped lips cracked as I smiled my first real smile of the day.

How did I ever manage without this?

And it didn't end just there. I was doused with more tea, the manager came down to say hello and suddenly it was decided that only a deluxe room would be good enough for me. 'You are very important person,' the receptionist told me again. 'You are first foreign guest.'

When I entered the room I was close to tears. Chinese hotel beds usually consist of a piece of hardboard on legs with a stained duvet masquerading as a mattress. What I found was quite the opposite. From the thick rugs to the upholstered armchairs and the fluffy towels in the bathroom, everything oozed delightful decadence. There was a flatscreen TV, air conditioning, complimentary mineral water and, my favourite item, a tartan sleeve for the remote control. 'So much for relinquishing all desire for things of the world,' I thought as I stepped under the rain shower.

Spiritual enlightenment through purity of mind—the idea rather appeals to me, but I'm afraid I'm just too much of a sucker for life's little luxuries to really make it work.

Double-Dipping in the Desert

'Why am I doing this to myself?' It's a question that's reared its ugly head a thousand times over the last couple of weeks. Because the truth is: cycling hasn't been a whole lot of fun since I left Kashgar. Of course, I knew that my little excursion through the Taklamakan Desert wouldn't exactly be a walk in the park. That's how it goes with deserts: they tend to be pretty unforgiving places. In fact, the name Taklamakan is Uyghur for 'enter but do not come out,' and even today, despite the brand-new strip of tarmac that cuts through this godforsaken wilderness, that's precisely what will happen if you're not careful. Conditions here are so harsh that most of what you think and do during a day is directly related to survival. Water gets you a long way in that respect, and it's become a bit of an obsession. Before Kashgar I never carried more than 2.25 litres at a time. I've now cranked my water-carrying capacity up to 8 litres, and I never miss out on an opportunity to top up my depleted reserves, even if it means stopping to buy a single pint-sized bottle.

The long and not-so-winding road

However, the hardest part of traversing the Taklamakan Desert is not the lack of water, nor the heat, not even the ferocious headwinds that seem bent on blowing me back to Kashgar. It's the mind-numbing monotony of it all. Whoever designed the Taklamakan took a fancy to the no-frills approach. Unlike Iran, there are no rippled sand dunes to gasp at, no mud-brick villages and crumbling caravanserais to explore. It's grey and pebbly—the kind of greyness and pebbliness that tends to lose its charm after a day or two. Other than the black beetles scurrying around my feet during breaks and the lorries that roar by when I'm back on the road there is hardly anything for the eye to cling to. The little human life there is caters to the needs of people on four wheels: a petrol station every 200 kilometres or so, a layby where truckers gather to buy noodles from a man in a shack.

Being exposed to this kind of emptiness for days on end does funny things to your mind. Desperate to fill the void, it dredges up half-forgotten conversations, faces from the past—almost anything will do. I don't know how many times I've roamed the streets of my hometown, sat down again in my old room, reenacted all those awkward scenes that come with first love. I've made lists of all the vegetables I can think of (in Dutch, English and Spanish) and of the kids I went to school with (name and surname). I've gone back to the first section of this trip, trying to think of all the places where I spent the night. (I keep getting lost after Saint-Pierre-de-Cernières.) I've X-rayed my conscience, analysed my shortcomings, walked the roads not taken. Once you start there's no stopping.

This qualifies as a village on my map

When I grow tired of these games I switch on my mental jukebox. Of course, I could also take out my very real iPod Classic, which holds every song I own, but, being a masochist, I feel that real music would smooth the edges of an experience that's meant to be rough. Besides, I promised my grandmother not to listen to music while cycling, and it's bad form to break promises made to grandmothers. My mental jukebox sometimes shows me bits from my favourite TV-series. The mere thought of Seinfeld's George Costanza defiantly double-dipping his tortilla chips is enough to have me chuckling like an idiot. But most of the time it simply sticks to music. There is a drawback, though. I don't always get a say in what's playing. The Girl from Ipanema can suddenly segue into a Bach cantata, and then, just when I'm humming along contentedly, a radio jingle bursts in: 'Liever Kips-leverworst dan gewone leverworst, papapapapapapapaaaaa!' Another gripe is that it's not very strong on lyrics, so a song usually ends before it's properly begun: 'Roxanne / You don't have to put on the red light / Those days are over / You don't have to something something to the night.'

Before you start thinking that I may be losing it, let me tell you that these hundreds and hundreds of kilometres of emptiness have led to one or two moments of lucidity as well. When I'm not mulling over the past or fiddling with my mental jukebox I'm often dreaming of what lies ahead. Beijing is just around the corner, I realised the other day. The end of my trip... 'Hurrah!' my behind chimed in. 'No more saddle sore!' The rest of me also seemed pretty pleased at the prospect of wrapping it up. To be honest, I'm actively looking forward to my return, to be reunited with those I love, and I'm not saying that just because the past few weeks have been so challenging. If anything, life after this trip will be just as challenging, albeit in different ways. What it comes down to is that I'm eager to move on, to find out what else I can get out of this short life. And all it took was a ride across the desert to figure that out.

An Afternoon on Venus

'Stop, stop, stop!' my body screams. 'Push on, push on, push on!' my mind commands. I check my bike computer. Forty-eight degrees Celsius, another thirty kilometres to go. As the former figure rises steadily, the latter simply refuses to show a significant drop. Once again I give in to my body's desperate call for a break. I prop up my bike against a low cement wall and take a swig from the bottle of peach juice I've been keeping in the back pocket of my cycling jersey. It's vile. The sun has heated it up so much that 'refreshing' isn't the first word that comes to mind.

It's a day of extremes, and a very strange one at that. I'm crossing the Turpan Depression, which at 154 metres below sea level ranks as the third-lowest place on earth. That may sound exciting, but the funny thing about depressions is that there isn't a whole lot to see. They're not like mountains, which are visible from afar and can only be conquered with a great deal of effort. Conquering a depression requires no effort whatsoever. It's just a matter of cruising down and, well, that's it. The staying-alive bit that follows is where the real challenge lies.

Add a bit of water and grapes even grow in hell

It's hard to describe the heat that dominates life in the Turpan Depression. As long as you stay in your air-conditioned hotel room it's just about bearable, but out in the desert it doesn't take more than a minute to realise that you really shouldn't be there. It isn't so much the power of the sun that's overwhelming. Rather, every little thing around you seems to be radiating a heat of its own. The sand, the rocks, the mean little shrubs: they're all out to roast you alive. The relentless winds that sweep across the depression seem to be coming from a gigantic blow-dryer just beyond the horizon, parching your throat and eyes, turning the sweat on your skin into a crust of salt. Here in the Turpan Depression I realise that until now I've never experienced real heat. It feels extraterrestial, like an afternoon on Venus. It's heat redefined.

I crawl back on the bike and, slightly delirious by now, frantically swat at a question that keeps buzzing around my head: if crossing the place nearly kills me, what will it be like to climb back to the rim of this furnace?