Tingri . We rode through traditional villages of amazed Tibetans . Their children ran beside us , shouting , obviously not an often-seen occurrence . The track was really trail riding at times with many streams to cross and short , sharp rises . It took 3 hours to do the 90 km and we crossed another pass at 4,916 metres . We were hoping for more height , but the map was wrong . Stefan dropped it once and Dudley had a few more “ offs ” then gave it away so Naresh hopped aboard to ride .
A fast flat plain was on the other side as we cruised into New Tingri for the night . A couple of extremely broad French smiles greeted us .
We find out that the French couple were making short films for TV France to supplement their trip . They want to know whether it was OK to film us . I ’ m not sure if we ever became famous in France but it was a lot of fun posing it up for the next couple of days as we rode back and forth past the vehicles while they were filming .
The following day was Melbourne Cup Day and nowhere to place a bet ,
so settled for the dirt roads all the way to the border . The views were stunning as we rode to Nyalum for the night where we sat around a cow pat heater shared with the owners ’ family .
We woke before 6am aiming to start the road work section to Zhangbu before it was closed at our end at 8am . The progress was slow for the first few hours until the sun came up at 8am .
We could now see the enormity of the task ahead of the road workers . Parts of the mountain was near vertical , and the workers hung from ropes while chipping away . Very little technology , and near to no workplace safety .
We stopped a few times to marvel at the steepness and what we had achieved in riding up this track a few days ago in the dark .
Reaching Zhangbu on the border we checked into our lodgings for a late breakfast . As we were a day ahead we had to wait until the following day to cross the border . It meant a day of exploring the town and relaxing .
Suffice to say customs were in fine form and accused us of not having some appropriate paperwork . When it was explained that it was their problem as they had let us in without the paperwork it descended into a Mexican standoff . We went off and had lunch while they had a meeting and then went back and pushed the bikes through , miraculously everything was stamped , all in just six hours !
We hadn ’ t had a decent wash for a few days , so it was a quick shower and into the sauna . We were back in Nepal and the land of Khukri rum ; the drinks waiter served drinks in the sauna . A couple of drinks turned into a couple of hours drinking , alternating between the sauna and plunge pool .
And so , it had been a slow and late start the following day . Partly due to the night before and partly due to the realisation it was the last day of our adventure .
Three hours back to Kathmandu , and we hit the city peak hour . We were smiling .
A couple of days later we landed at Melbourne airport , and we were still smiling . SM
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