It is incredible how quickly the weather changed. One day I was contemplating riding in shorts, two days later I couldn't feel my toes through 2 pairs of socks. It was blowing a nor-westerly and had really turned cold. I rode a hard fought 30kms and stopped at Tianzhu. That afternoon it started to snow.
I have said from the beginning that I refuse to ride in snow. This is particularly the case when I know the road only gets higher meaning that the snow is more likely to have settled. So I boarded a bus. I have to admit I was feeling a bit pathetic as the road to the pass wasn't too bad, no big hills, and there was no snow on the road.
That was until I saw a car with a snow covered bonnet. Once we crossed the pass onto the northern side there was snow everywhere and the bus slowed to a crawl (speedo was broken - par for the course - but we can't have been doing more than 10kms/hr). At least I got an opportunity to take lots of photos out of the window.
The next day was fine and the bike and I departed unassisted. Then this morning I wake up and its snowing AGAIN. And again the road was going to get higher so I opted for motorised assistance, I am now in Zhangye. I suspect that this may be a pattern that continues all the way to Osh in Kyrgyzstan. The bonus is that from here on there are some sights to see (great wall, reclining buddha, caves...) rather than just more generic Chinese tower blocks.
For those of you that are concerned that I may be crossing China a little too quickly I'll just give you a little more info on the route. I have 2 maps to get me across China. Both to the same scale. I am almost across the first one. The second one is pretty much just Xinjiang uighur autonomous region in north-western China where I am headed. It is huge, one-sixth of China's total territory apparently. Dominated by the Taklamakan desert there isn't a direct route across it. I am hoping to take the northern route around the desert...more of that later.
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