Gideon's bike life - Genesis, Graham Weigh, Cinelli, Land Shark & Ritchey

Whoops forgot to continue my Vietnam story, I'll pick up from where I left off as have other bike updates to cover.

It was on our fifth day of proper riding that the heat really started to hit us. Had an oddly clear morning - normally were hazy due to the mugginess - which we can probably put down to the warmth. Had a climb first thing which was blissfully quiet, but we soon got caught up with moped riders which grew tiresome quite quickly. At one rest stop on a hairpin it was absolutely heaving with western tourists on bikes all across the road, making it quite hard for the HGV to squeeze through (though of course it did).

In the afternoon we left the loop & the drop in tourists on mopeds gave us great delight. The area we were now in was a sharp contrast to what we'd left - certainly feeling a lot poorer. Houses would be made of bits of wood, people were wearing donated clothes & lots working in the fields in the heat. The temperature became a real battle for us at this point, & with it being 38C in the shade, a two & a half mile climb had me waiting at the top for almost an hour. Thank goodness for the availability of refreshments basically everywhere. We took the opportunity to do a shorter day in terms of distance, but the heat meant that it still took longer than some of the hillier days.

Continuing the theme, the next day was another scorcher. We set off early to try & beat it but respite didn't last long. The night before we'd replanned our route a little to avoid heading into a desolate looking area, as with the temperatures we figured it could be pretty dangerous - one of us was showing signs of heat stroke towards the end of the previous day. Of course, with routes planned off-the-cuff relying on Komoot, it ended up having a 10% gravel climb in the middle. I quite enjoyed this tbh (great descent), but not everyone is such a fan of the rough stuff. We lost one of our friends for over two hours & started to get pretty worried - trying in vain to ask a local moped rider if he's seen him (quite the language barrier). Eventually he did turn up though, he'd gone into what he described as battery saving mode & had decided to take it slowly & walk to keep his body temp down. Probably a more sensible approach than mine which was to ride hard until I found a shop to cool down in.

That night we struggled to find food - all the places we found were judged a little too high risk, or simply didn't have anything which they specified on their menus (a common theme). All went to bed a little hungry & uncomfortably hot due to poor air con. We knew that the next day would be easier on the miles though, so it gave us some respite.

A week into our trip, we had a frankly painful thirty miles to cover to Ba Bể nature reserve -where we'd be having a rest day. The temperatures had risen again & I don't think anyone was enjoying riding at this point. We did however find an air conditioned café & discovered the local iced coffee was pretty good - was quite hard to leave that place. To avoid more miles, we got a boat across the lake to our hotel which also offered some slightly cooler breeze off the water - amazing. We'd spend the next day cruising around the lake on a boat, exploring a huge cave, visiting a temple & generally chilling (though not in a literal sense) - always nice to have a little bit of time off the bike on a trip to get a feel for an area, & it was a beautiful nature park.

Photos:

1. An example of one of the poorer shops we visited. The line between where people lived & did business all across the country was very blurred. Even in Hanoi you'd go to the bathroom in a bar & there'd be someeone's toothbrush in there. In this place their bed was in the corner, just behind their shop's shelves, with a scraggy chicken wandering about. Still had Wi-Fi though.
   
2. Rubbish being burnt at the side of the road. A common sight, & consistent with their air pollution concerns (seemingly none).
   
3. Windy gravel descent from our ad-hoc route.
   
4. Exploring caves by boat.
   
5. First temple we'd seen. We saw surprisingly little religion in the north, my (uninformed) theory being that the collectivism of communism kind of takes that role in society.
   

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