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Fantastic thread so far, keep it up!
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Fair enough, I've been lame. We're now in Hanoi, after riding through Korea and having a thoroughly unfortunate time in China.
First, Korea. I really, really liked Korea. It didn't have any wow moment, or fantastic landscapes, or incredible highlights (oh, the food!). Even trying to find some pics to post below I cannot find anything that looks so good as it felt being there. But I look back at it so fondly, we had a great time. For all my love of Japan, sometimes I was a bit frustrated with the cultural difference, especially when I felt I could do with a tiny bit of flexibility or proactivity on their side. In Korea we quickly witnessed the might of the old permed ladies. If you want anything done, or need a quick favour, or didn't find what you wanted on the menu, or can't understand what button you should press, all it's required is a quick ¯_(ツ)_/¯ to a permed lady and she'll make stuff happen. I love them. I want a world parliament made of 100% Korean permed ladies.
The food is amazing, the vegetables are super fresh and delicious. I love the multitude of tiny dishes and the spicy seasoning. Korean countryside people seemed to be always singing or having a merry time in groups, or we just noticed that more coming from Japan where you see a number of lone elderly people pottering about. We mostly slept in love hotels, some of them were truly luxurious for the price.
Our intention was to cycle from Busan to Seoul via the 4 rivers path. It's a whole thing, you buy a stamp passport with a map and ride collecting stamps at checkpoints on the way. The route is almost entirely on cycle paths, mostly in great condition. Cycling paradise, if you like cycling on a segregated path like, forever. This might be heresy, but we don't like cycling paths. The Korean route sounded great but it was implemented by their hidro/river/energy/dam/something government ministry, and for some reason they thought people would be super excited in seeing dams and bridges, instead of people, farms, villages, shops, and restaurants. We were feeling a bit guilty in not enjoying this immense privilege of crossing a country on a cycling road, and we met cyclists that travelled from Europe to Korea just to do that and were loving it (go figure). But well, we met this Korean guy at one more damned dam, and having ridden across the whole country he said 'well, this here is boring, you just see river'. We were SO relieved, it was great to have someone local confirming our impression. He told us to jump on a bus and go to the Northeast coast, pointed out roads we couldn't take and the ones we shouldn't miss, so off we went to ride around barbed wire beaches fending off North Korean defectors. It was a beautiful area, South Korea has great beaches, and we camped at the surfers village. Good times.
From there we crossed to Seoul, a few days hanging out and cleaning the bike, getting all ready to China. We were feeling a bit eery, to be honest.
(I'm ashamed of how shit the pics look, but not gonna bother retouching and making them all nice. You better believe they look great on instagram)
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Love this thread, both the writing and the photos, have been waiting for updates since Japan.
S. Korea looks great (pics remind me of Taiwan a bit).
China is amazing, sure you'll love it. -
In cycling terms, China was almost a total write-off. We arrived in Qingdao (aka Tsingtao), and took a train to Beijing. We decided early on we wanted to focus our cycling in Yunnan and Sichuan, taking the mountains to the Tibetan plateau between Lijiang and Chengdu, so we took a slow sleeper train to Kunming (44h!) and onwards to Dali, where we'd start cycling North. Which we did.
The road was a bit sketchy, and for the first time ever I felt scared of riding. We had an incident with a truck forcing us off the road that left me shaking a bit. It wasn't fun. We knew things would get better further up the road, and we needed a couple of days on the road to get used to it after a couple of weeks in cities, ferries, and trains. But then on the third day on the road my girlfriend's back went to shit, and we couldn't ride for another 15 or 20 days. I won't bore you with details (herniated disc plus sciatic), if anyone ever fell ill on a trip you'll know how frustrating and plan-wrecking it can get, not to mention the pain she was in.
So we moved around in buses or minivans, trying to be in a good place to tackle the road when she was feeling better, but we didn't know how long that'd take and eventually we had to understand we wouldn't be riding in China this time. We sent the bike to a kind warmshowers host in Kunming, and took the train to Guilin so we could see something else. It was ok but we were not having a ton of fun, in honesty. We didn't particularly like being in China, we suspect it's not related to the injury or frustration because we were already feeling a bit unsettled anyway.
The good thing is that we'll have the chance to change our perception when we come back. Our route goes through the Stans, and the way to get there from South East Asia is back into China, when we can hopefully go to the plateau in Sichuan. We're incredibly lucky to have a second shot at it, and I'd really like to like China (and the Chinese) next time.
Anyway, we decided we needed a change and crossed into Vietnam. We were not even sure we were coming this way, our focus was in Laos and Thailand, but I couldn't resist the lure of the name Hanoi. I'm a total sucker for names (Vladivostok, Istanbul, Montevideo, Sarajevo, Nairobi, Samarkand, Odessa, Cartagena, Kashgar, oh, the list goes on – yes, I have a list). Saigon and Hanoi are full of romance for me, so we came to check it out. That's where I am now, and I like it a lot.
We resume cycling next week, to the countryside of Vietnam and into Laos.
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sure you'll love it
Erm, perhaps
Ah. I see.
My wife spent 3 days in a small hospital in Yangshuo/Guilin with severe food poisoning when we went. The landscape is beautiful though.
Enjoy Vietnam and Laos...
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Shit, really? This one was grim, man. I was hoping Laos would be all quiet and tranquil. Though the noticeable small number of roads on gps kind of says it all, I guess. It's 'fun' to look at the profiles of the roads as soon as you enter Laos as well. Hilly, to say the least.
Did you camp then?
Heldring
ElGato
Tijs
Howard
jdp
Ndeipi
vpCogworks
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About
Asia on a tandem
Posted by
@ough
Hi there, we based some of it on japancycling, but went off the route around the second week. Some of our highlights are not there: western shore of lake Biwa, Tsunoshima, and the coast northeast of Tsuruga. Make sure you go to the alps, it's absolutely wonderful. Kusatsu is another highlight I'd definitely recommend. Oh, and do the Shimanami Kaido.
Most of our navigation was on Osmand maps, and we used maps.me very occasionally to check for shops and whatever. Google maps was much more useful though. Buy a tourist SIM card at a Bic Camera if you need data, otherwise there's plenty of free wifi around.
Convenience shops are convenient but more expensive than supermarkets. Try to always plan a supermarket stop for lunch, food is cheap (for Japanese standards) and it's impersonal enough so you can sit down for a bit and charge your devices without anyone bothering you.
Campsites are fairly basic and sometimes far from shops, so plan ahead. We found some beautiful ones, just make sure they'll be open. Or not, just show up and pitch your tent, I find it very unlikely you'll be troubled. Alternatively sleep at michi-no-ekis, these are roadside stations that sell local produce and have wifi and toilets. They open late and close early (6pm ish), so you can pitch your tent somewhere unobtrusive without too much worry. Sometimes we slept on the floor or inside tables, if there was a lobby open.
Hope it helps, pm if you want to chat more.
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