The road that leads me to Leshans is the worst I ever rode on in my life!
Bad is a compliment to the ones that first built it and then to the ones that reduced it that way.
Imagine 300 and more km of pure concrete (no iron structure in it) laid to make a road.
Then imagine to trough on it metal balls of 1 ton each.
the result......???
"the hell...!!" is all I have to say and all I could say for the 8 hours and more of hell on a bike.
My bike is a chopper, not an enduro and not really designed for extreme offroad conditions.
The road was a patch of block of concrete sticking out randomply from everywhere.
Trucks, bikes, cars (no chicken!!!) and people all going at a max speed of 20km/hr.
I am just glad it is not raining.

Some how I made it through. the bike absorbed some heavy hits and the bottom now has some visible signs. I hope all is well with the engine . I guess I will find out in the next lag.

The scenary during more than 2000 km from Shanghai changed a lot.
The west of china is greener and more welcoming. The so called development has not arrive here so deeply.
Contraddictions are more visible than ever but some of the old beautiful China is still alive.
On the way I rode through small towns that still keep the very same character of what I saw in pictures of China during the 20's and of the maoist times.
Small houses made on wood with the tipical curved chinese tiles ran along the road creating the center of town.
All houses still having some sort of shop in it and eveything still retaining the feel of the past.
Things seems not to have moved too much if not for the signs of progress always present like cocacola and the new scooters.
Everything, though, seems very quite, very serene. slow.
Beautifully slow.....
Surrealisticly all people I see are old and many still wear the mao uniform.

The west.
One of the idea behind the dam in Yizhan is to develop the west.....
scary!

[...]

[In Leshan] the main temple in the great Bhudda complex had a unique athmosfere.
Of all the many bhuddist temples I visited around China this is the only one along with one monastery in Tibet that was able to wrap me with a deep feeling of peace.
I could have stayed there forever. Just there, with the smell of incent, the river ever flowing and the presence of a strong energy.
Some say that temples , as well as churches are built on point of energy on heart.
I am not sure about all of them, but for sure this one, the one in Tibet and one I dreamed about once supposely located in india truly are.

I almost forgot about that dream.
It is like I travelled there . I was living in India when I had that dream, but I still don't know if I really went there or not.
I remember the place , every second of what happened, the faces of the holy men that spoke to me, the temple , the road to get to it, the door, the people outsite the door...
I just don't remember ever being there in reality.

Annouk could not stay longer and Chongqin became our farewell point.

On the same foggy morning that welcomed us to this very interesting city I took off.
It took me more than one hour to find my way outside the city.
As you can imagine a 30 million people city can turned out to be very big, and it turned out quite complicated to find the way out.

Averybody I asked pointed me to the highway.
Motorcicles cannot go on highways in China though, een if in this city nobody seems to know this rule.
So I ride on pass the highway entrace gate.
No barrier and nobody at the gate.
My first thought is that the highway is still under construction and so still open.

It takes only a few km for reality to struk.
A police car pulls me over on the highway. I think I am in trouble until I see the policemen laughing at me and at me being a foreigner.
I get out of it pretenting I do not understand that they were asking to see my documents and by keep asking for the way to Baojin.
The key point is always to give them a lot of respect and to look always a little stupid.

Put on the right direction by the police I ride on. Destination Leshan.
I had put Leshan on my map for the only reason that I wanted to see the biggest budda in China (actually now the biggest in the wordls after the Talibans destroied the biggest one in Afganistan not so long ago).
It starts to sound funny,.. all the biggest things in the world are starting to concentrate in China.... perhaps it's a masterplan.....

The road that leads me to Leshans is the worst I ever rode on, in my life!
Bad is a compliment to the ones that first built it and the ones that reduced it that way.
Imagine 300 and more km of pure concrete (no iron structure in it) laid to make a road.
Then imagine to trough on it metal balls of 1 ton each.
the result......???
"the hell...!!" is all I have to say and all I could say for the 8 hours and more of hell on a bike.
My bike is a chopper, not an enduro and not really designed for extreme offroad conditions.
The road was a patch of block of concrete sticking out randomply from everywhere.
Trucks, bikes, cars (no chicken!!!) and people all going at a max speed of 20km/hr.
I am just glad it is not raining.

Some how I made it through. the bike absorbed some heavy hits and the bottom now has some visible signs. I hope all is well with the engine . I guess I will find out in the next lag.

The scenary during more than 2000 km from Shanghai changed a lot.
The west of china is greener and more welcoming. The so called development has not arrive here so deeply.
Contraddictions are more visible than ever but some of the old beautiful China is still alive.
On the way I rode through small towns that still keep the very same character of what I saw in pictures of China during the 20's and of the maoist times.
Small houses made on wood with the tipical curved chinese tiles ran along the road creating the center of town.
All houses still having some sort of shop in it and eveything still retaining the feel of the past.
Things seems not to have moved too much if not for the signs of progress always present like cocacola and the new scooters.
Everything, though, seems very quite, very serene. slow.
Beautifully slow.....
Surrealisticly all people I see are old and many still wear the mao uniform.

The west.
One of the idea behind the dam in Yizhan is to develop the west.....
scary!

Too bad I had no time to enjoy the ride due to the roads.
At sunset I was truly happy to get to Leshan. The guide gives me a good hint for the hotel and after a long shower I crash.

This is how I looked when i reached the hotel.....

image

The next day it was a wonderful day.
the view of the big budda was beautiful and I anjoided an afternoon of buddist contempleations.
The main temple in the great Bhudda complex had a unique athmosfere.
Of all the many bhuddist temples I visited around China this is the only one along with one monastery in Tibet that was able to wrap me with a deep feeling of peace.
I could have stayed there forever. Just there, with the smell of incent, the river ever flowing and the presence of a strong energy.
Some say that temples , as well as churches are built on point of energy on heart.
I am not sure about all of them, but for sure this one, the one in Tibet and one I dreamed about once supposely located in india truly are.

I almost forgot about that dream.
It is like I travelled there . I was living in India when I had that dream, but I still don't know if I really went there or not.
I remember the place , every second of what happened, the faces of the holy men that spoke to me, the temple , the road to get to it, the door, the people outsite the door...
I just don't remember ever being there in reality.

At 30km from Leshan is Emeishan, one of the holiest mountains in China.
Along the road that leads to the golden temple on the pick at 3600 mtrs from sea level there are many other temples.
This is a place of pilgrimage like the central temple in Lhasa.
I am still not sure if to go there the next day.
This stop might take a couple of days and a lot of climbing.... I might leave it for another time.

From here, or there, i will go to Chendu: a key point in my map!!!!
I will be trilled to get therte. Chendu represent for me 1/3 ofthe way across China and getting there some how on schedule makes me feel very good.
From Chendu I will head north to cross the Gebi desert toward Kashgar.....

sqm..
Restless Travellers