Day 80
Final day!
Very very hot 40 deg.
Visited Great Wall of China. Incredible piece of engineering, built over 2000 year period to keep out the "Mongolian Hoardes"
Evening theatre performance of Kung Fu spectacular, very impressive.
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Finneas Fogg and Michael Palin both went round the world in 80 days, 2/3 of the world is enough for me!
It has been a terrific adventure with the best aspects being the spectacular scenery, the bikes, they are the surely the best way to do a trip like this, and the friends one makes on the way.
The downsides, the first has to be the complete lack of roads and basic facilities in some regions, also the extreems of weather, the rains, the snow, the dust and in China the severe pollution.
I have collected a few bruises and lost two stones in weight, but it has been worth it!
Thankyou to anyone who is still reading this Blog, to Ronnie Auld for making it all look right and a big thankyou to everyone who has donated to Carlisle Hospice at Home.
Looking forward to getting home again.
Cherrio. The End.

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Day 79
Beijing to Tanggu. (Container Port)
108 miles
Hot 39 deg. Clear skies at first.
Another early start. We allow two hours to prepare for the days ride. To avoid theft everything has to be locked inside the bike paniers overnight and then re strapped on in the mornings, we put our clothing on after breakfast to avoid overheating!
Rode to the huge Dock complex and said fairwell to the bikes for five weeks as they are packed into containers for their trip home.
Returned to Beijing on the 205 mph Bullet train.
Gala Peking Duck Dinner at night, we all were given our extreemly hard earned Tee Shirts, a good evening.

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Day 78
Baoding to Beijing.
115 miles
Cool morning, hot by mid-day 38 deg.
Left hotel 8.30 for final ride into Beijing. Got permission to use the Motorway from some govt. Official who has a bike himself!
Amazing reception at BMW Motorrad China, lunch plus various speeches and gifts.
Met Mrs Cowen again after 78 days, needless to say very pleased to see her again.
Spent the rest if the afternoon catching up on family and other news.
Supper out at a lakeside restaurant, not very good. As a result of the olympics Bejing has got rid of a lot of "city villages" with their smaller cafe style bistros so prices and choices are now just like any other international city.

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Day 78
Baoding to Beijing.
115 miles
Cool morning, hot by mid-day 38 deg.
Left hotel 8.30 for final ride into Beijing. Got permission to use the Motorway from some govt. Official who has a bike himself!
Amazing reception at BMW Motorrad China, lunch plus various speeches and gifts.
Met Mrs Cowen again after 78 days, needless to say very pleased to see her again.
Spent the rest if the afternoon catching up on family and other news.
Supper out at a lakeside restaurant, not very good. As a result of the olympics Bejing has got rid of a lot of "city villages" with their smaller cafe style bistros so prices and choices are now just like any other international city.

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Day 77
Handan to Baoding
212 miles
Coolish 25 deg overcast and heavy rain
Visibility very poor all morning. Everywhere there are factories putting smoke into the atmophere, it can't be very long before the Chinese authorities decide something has to be done about their polution problems. It's worse than the London smog of the 1950's and has to be having an effect on the nations health.
As we get nearer to Beijing everything gets more like home, buildings have an international look and are better finished, there are more European cars, roads are better, sometimes with up to 10 traffic lanes although the average Chinese road user, maybe a farmer with the single cylinder tractor, still has a mind of his own!
Evening meeting covered bike shipping and tips! The end really is near now.

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Day 76
Luoyang to Handan.
249 miles
Morning hot 39 deg then monsoon rain
Day started as usual with houses, factories and workshops but then we seemed to spend the rest of the day on tree lined roads. One could begin to envisage what rural China might have been like 40 years ago. Lots of trees, terraced productive fields and many people in small villages. Of course feeding 1.3 Billion people still requires a lot of people.
We experienced monsoon rain for the first time in the afternoon. The water just "drops" from the sky, roads become flooded and slippery. It is too hot to put raingear on so we just get very very wet! But saves washing!

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Day 75
Xi'an to Luoyang.
258 miles
Hot, reached 40 deg.
Very hot, even on a bike, we try and drink lots of water but even it's warm!, although we open all the vents on the suits the air is so hot when it passes through our clothes it doesn't cool us down!
When we weren't going through cities the farming looked good. Harvest is over here, straw is being moved all over the place and the farmers are drying their grain by spreading it out on the roadsides! All other crops look well.
We are told this part of China is experiencing a draught. Rivers are certsinly empty. Seems odd when their current floods are so near.
Slight tummy problem! Hope better in the morning!

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Day 75
Xi'an to Luoyang.
258 miles
Hot, reached 40 deg.
Very hot, even on a bike, we try and drink lots of water but even it's warm!, although we open all the vents on the suits the air is so hot when it passes through our clothes it doesn't cool us down!
When we weren't going through cities the farming looked good. Harvest is over here, straw is being moved all over the place and the farmers are drying their grain by spreading it out on the roadsides! All other crops look well.
We are told this part of China is experiencing a draught. Rivers are certsinly empty. Seems odd when their current floods are so near.
Slight tummy problem! Hope better in the morning!

Sent from my iPhone

Day 74
Visit to The Terra-cotta Army.
Overcast day as usual, up to 32 deg.
Today was one of the highlights of our visit to China as we went to see Qin Shihuang's Mausoleum which dates from the Quin Dynasty, 206 BC.
There are over 7000 terra-cotta Warriors, and Horses which were only discovered in 1974 by local farmers. Today some 2500 figures have been restored, they are all different, like a real army. All very impressive
Whilst the Museum is as usual huge, 3 halls built over the partially restored pits, due to international pressure no more reconstruction is to take place until Chinese restoration methods improve.

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