We are well and truly out of Tibetan areas now; no more yaks roaming the roads, the days are warm with 20’s and low 30’s temperatures, and the roads resemble Australian countryside riding.

Today was a “distance day”, and we travelled about 1/3 of the way to Xi’an which is our next major destination (and where Kiat and I will part, and I’ll continue on to Central Asia).

Today’s route in blue

We have gotten into a bit of a routine: breakfast at 8am, set off at 9am, and lunch at around 1pm, dinner around 7pm and repeat.

Lunch (delicious and only like 10 yuan!)

For some reason, our maps sent Kiat and I on different routes. He was directed towards highways, whereas I travelled country roads and small towns. To pass the time, I put on a podcast (latest episode of Acquired), and powered on.

Someone taking their very young daughter for a ride…(and the daughter was carrying her helmet instead of wearing it?!)

The main stop we had planned was Zhaohua Ancient Town, which is supposed to be a well preserved village from the Three Kingdoms era. When we arrived at the entrance, someone was waving us down (we ignored him and continued to the parking lot). And everything seemed a bit strange:

• there were very very few other tourists (maybe 10 vehicles total were around)
• generally there were a lack of people around (staff etc)
• it was confusing what the tourist attraction actually was. We took a look inside, in case there was a chance to stay in some old but beautiful/interesting hotels, but it was eerily quiet and the interior architecture was mostly modern concrete + what looked like old style roofing.

Zhaohua “Ancient” Town

Easy decision to continue on! We rode on to the next town over, a small town of ~2 million population, to stay at the “James Joyce Coffeetel” chain. Not a fancy hotel by any means, but this hotel makes it a point to keep gooseneck kettles in its rooms which is a big plus for coffee making!

Walking street dinner (so yummy)

I have seen far too many middle aged men do this

Interesting electrical setup; 4 car batteries hooked to an AC/DC converter I think?

Tomorrow; somewhere between Hanzhong and Xi’an!

Some stats:

• 374 KMs traveled
• 12.3L fuel added
• 2 unique interactions
• 30g coffee consumed

Altitude map of today’s ride

Route to date