On a side trip to the Chinese border, we came across this truck stop.
It was an unexpected treat to be able to sit indoors, out of the wind.
There we also polished off some ‘real food’ instead of having to resort to our cache of ramen noodles.
“Hello!, where you going?”
“To the moon!” we laughed while pointing upwards.
The highway passes through a variety of landscapes; from the high deserts of Ladakh all the way to Rampur’s lush green valleys.
Arriving in Samode, the townspeople directed us towards a palace.
At the entrance, a doorman invited Paul inside while Grace stayed with the bikes.
A couple of minutes later, Paul returned grinning. “It’s a hotel, and I’ve just booked us a room!”
The Sambhar circuit house was built by the British in the 1880’s. Portraits of earlier occupants and former Indian leaders grace its walls.
The house is now run by Sambhar Salts Ltd. Yet the elderly caretaker still can recall preparing food for Captain and Mrs. Bunting.
The monkey clamoured over our bikes then stopped to stare at his image in the mirror. We tried to scare him away, but with no success. Instead, he managed to break off Paul’s mirror and run off with it. Paul gave chase and was able to get it back.
“You’re a lucky man,” the hotel manager declared. “Monkeys are fascinated by seeing their reflection. We have a parking lot guard whose job it is to scare them away from car mirrors. Yet he can’t run as fast as you.”
School’s out for the day, or is it?
As soon as the kids came across us, out came their workbooks. We duly admired their drawings and written lessons.
It was a good chance to practice their English and they weren’t going to miss it.
In Tanzania, cheap guesthouses have everything a cyclist needs: a bed, mosquito net, shared bathroom and a bar full of beer.
Some owners go a step further by decorating the walls, placing a couch or even fetching a Chipsi Maya for you.
There is a sense of camaraderie between cyclists; we always check out each other’s bikes, want to know where the other is going and we all struggle up hills.
Since the locals rode single speeds, they couldn’t keep up with us on steeper inclines.
Some of them were fearless and ended catching up via hair-raising descents.
But for others – they hit a bump, crashed and ‘nose-dived’ across the road.
So out came our first aid kit to help patch up their bloodied face, elbows and knees.
Whoosh, whoosh, whoosh as the boda bodas (bicycle taxis) darted back and forth carrying their passengers to and from shopping, school, and work.
The chauffeurs were intent on getting to their destination while the passengers – they didn’t seem to have a care in the world.
To attract customers, chauffeurs adorn their bikes with a hodge-podge of reflectors and mirrors.
They even bring in specialists who paint Malawi’s boda bodas with uplifting clichés, religious sayings and even Rambo images.
African taxi chauffeurs hang out together, smiling at female passersby and listening to the radios that are attached to their handlebars.
They don’t always relax. They can pedal furiously when the need arises, even with the added burden of a ‘big African mama’ on their back seat.
Ah, Coca-cola. That cold sugar rush after a long hot day. It’s the addiction of Western touring cyclists in East Africa.
