As I passed numerous villages the next day, I noticed that like the gers of Mongolia, all the front doors of the Chinese houses all pointed south without exception. So much so that I could reliably tell which direction I was walking by the orientation of the houses. Another odd thing I noticed was that many of the houses had neither windows nor openings of any description on their northern side. This meant that if I walked past a village on my right hand side, I was never spotted. Personally I would have thought that after all the years of past invasions by Mongolia from the north that they would want to see if anyone was coming from the direction of their oldest enemy. The villages themselves were occasionally alive with the sound of the village PA system playing traditional music, while the voices of the mobile fruit’n’veg trucks blared on a loudspeaker on repeat calling out what they had for sale. In between the recorded voices music was often played featuring from a Chinese hip hop band or Justin Bieber.
Unfortunately most of the villages I passed were abandoned or on the verge of it. The number of buildings bordered up quite often outweighed the number of occupied homes. I managed to have a little peak in one of the empty houses. It didnt seem that long ago that these homes had been vacated and I wondered what was it that made the families here up and leave.
It was the shepherds who were proving to be my main source of contact in the Chinese countryside, the villagers being more sceptical and afraid of me. I guess the shepherds lived a more lonely life and enjoyed talking to someone other than their sheep. By midday I decided to take a detour on my detour by choosing to head for a tiny road that wasn't on my map. I had a rough idea where I wanted to go marked on the GPS but it was just points on a blank page, the GPS’ map did not actually show any topographic details or roads. I asked a few passing locals who all contradicted each other with regards to the route I wanted to take would get me where I wanted to go. In the end I went with my heart and followed a small road south. Even if I was wrong it didn’t really matter as I had plenty of time to correct a wrong turn and
backtrack if necessary. The road passed through a quite little village which soon led to a quite dirt track. The road often veered off to the left or right so the compass was always close to hand to confirm I was heading in the right direction at least. I eventually ended up in a field that where the track ended with nothing but hilly countryside all round me. An older woman and her young teenage son who had previously overtaken me on a bike earlier where now working in a field nearby. The couple spotted me and must have thought I was the oddest thing they had ever seen. I was checking my map when the young guy approached and asked where I was going. I explained where I wanted to go and that my next plan was to literally go cross country through the empty fields. He and his mother didn’t think it was a good idea, but both admitted that they did not know what was on the other side of the hill. The mother suggested an alternative route to which the son insisted that he would walk with me till we reached another road that would get me to my next destination. The mother also came along for the stroll leaving her gardening work behind. Before long I was back on a proper track again and thanked them for their help. They were pretty convinced I had another 800km to go to Beijing (where as I had calculated that I had less than half that to go) which made me wonder about their knowledge of the local geography and that perhaps my cross country shortcut might have worked after all. Either way, I was grateful for their help and bid them farewell.
backtrack if necessary. The road passed through a quite little village which soon led to a quite dirt track. The road often veered off to the left or right so the compass was always close to hand to confirm I was heading in the right direction at least. I eventually ended up in a field that where the track ended with nothing but hilly countryside all round me. An older woman and her young teenage son who had previously overtaken me on a bike earlier where now working in a field nearby. The couple spotted me and must have thought I was the oddest thing they had ever seen. I was checking my map when the young guy approached and asked where I was going. I explained where I wanted to go and that my next plan was to literally go cross country through the empty fields. He and his mother didn’t think it was a good idea, but both admitted that they did not know what was on the other side of the hill. The mother suggested an alternative route to which the son insisted that he would walk with me till we reached another road that would get me to my next destination. The mother also came along for the stroll leaving her gardening work behind. Before long I was back on a proper track again and thanked them for their help. They were pretty convinced I had another 800km to go to Beijing (where as I had calculated that I had less than half that to go) which made me wonder about their knowledge of the local geography and that perhaps my cross country shortcut might have worked after all. Either way, I was grateful for their help and bid them farewell.
The next 10 kilometers was a boring affair as I walked a long a concrete road surrounded by endless cabbage fields and a huge solar panel farm taking up about 30 acres. I crossed under the two motorways that lay in my way and quickly found myself back on a small country road. A particular nasty storm was brewing with loud thunder and lightning bolts drawing closer and louder every minute. Along the way I helped out a farmer and his son push their tractor that had got stuck.. The cultivated fields often needed extensive irrigation during the summer and so the farmers themselves ften installed their own irrigation systems. This particular family had managed to drag half a kilometer of pipe up their field and just had a dozen meters to go before their tractor started losing traction under the weight of the pipe. After an intensive 10 minutes of shoving and making manly grunting noises, we got the old tractor back on the move again. In return for my help the pair confirmed I was on the right track. Not long afterwards I managed to get my tent up under the shade of some small trees located on a junction between two dirt roads. At this stage I didn’t really care where I camped and doubted that any one was going to bother me once the storm kicked in. Fortunately the powers that be gave me just enough time to cook my dinner, brew a coffee and slip into the tent before the deluge began, where I laid back and listened to one of my favourite sounds - rain pelting off a tent when I'm warm and dry inside. Success!