The Great Wall’ker

We spent one and a half hours trying to get over the ‘Large Northern River’, but without success, so we ended up having to take a bus to a town and then a taxi to get to the other side of the river.

We started walking and soon we were close to the start of the desert stretch that would bring us to the next valley and river. We camped in the field of some farmers.

It’s getting late here in Gaotai now and we have an early start tomorrow, so I will have to write about the desert stretch when we get back here in 3-5 days time.

Thank you all for writing in the Guestbook and commenting on the pages. I appreciate all the support and funny comments and want to reply to you all. Earlier today I was at a China Mobile sales outlet and tested a Nokia to try to log in on this website. I managed to get to the login page but it wouldn’t let me enter all the way in. I will try again with a more expensive phone next time as unfortunately, I cannot get the HTC to work. The hope is to start writing daily reports from along the Great Wall!

Also, there has not been enough time to process all the pictures for the picture gallery. But in a weeks time, it will be up and running!

We will be without internet connection for the next days, but you can follow our progress on the map here.

The following day we got up and made an oatmeal breakfast with brown sugar, or red sugar as they call it in China. Oatmeal is great. Lightweight, quick to make and lots of energy.

We started walking and had a really dusty day ahead of us. The dust is hard to describe, so check these two pictures. One is of my foot stepping in to some sand or dust. The other of the dust getting between my toes. This is not traditional sand, but very finely grained sand which I call dust. It reminded me of the cement dust used to make cement which takes days to settle. Yes - it also gets anywhere and everywhere.

The dust is called loess and has blown all the way from Siberia during many Ice Ages.

As the day went on I noticed the frequent noise of jet planes high above us making their way to and from Beijing. These planes follow the Silk Route for some reason. I thought of the day I will eventually be sitting on a flight back to Norway and made a mental note to make sure to think about the people that might be treading slowly along The Great Wall.

I also noticed that the ground was full of last year’s plants. Some of them have been harvested and only 2-3 cm (an inch) of really hard stalks stick up. We are both glad we have brought extra ground sheets for our tents as I expect there will be a lot of wear and tear on them.

We ended the day by being invited to stay with some local farmers. It was fun to see how they lived and it seemed they enjoyed spending time with us too. In fact they had invited lots of friends to have a look at the foreigners so the crowd was in constant rotation.

It was a good thing we spent the night indoors because that night there was a sandstorm. It didn’t last for long but it swept sand high into the air. This sand usually takes 2-3 days to settle and makes it colder on the ground and also limits visibility.

Here comes a quick update on the last week’s events.

On Tuesday my brother and I started walking where I left off.

The area had quite a few irrigation channels to transport water from rivers and water reservoirs to the fields in the area. We stumbled upon a sheep that had fallen into one of the channels. Its hind legs were stuck in the mud at the edge. My brother and a Chinese guy tried to pull it loose, but it was firmly stuck. The Chinese guy decided he would get a spade to rescue it and we went on walking.

After about 14 km (9 miles) we got to some water and decided to spend the night there just out of site of a small village. We had just set up the tents and were chatting to each other when a local came over and sat down between the tents. He was a really nice and calm guy and my brother spoke to him for a while. He told us that there had not been a single drop of rain in 2009. We are indeed in a desert.

The night was a lot colder than expected, so the following nights we have put on all our wool to stay warm. My tent (a MSR HUBBA HP) is incredibly small! Hehe - it is great because it is VERY light weight, but since it only has about 5 cm (2 inches) of ’space’ on each side of the sleeping mattress, it feels slightly claustrophobic. I’ve got used to it already though and it is very quick and easy to set up. The small ‘footprint’ means it can be set up almost anywhere.

Many thanks for advice about emergency water supply in the form of water blisters.

So far we have not had to apply the advice. I’ve only had one blister on my right little toe, and it is under control.

To begin with we carried 5 or 6 litres of water each. As it turns out we only use about 2 litres a day, assuming that one of the meals is with a farmer or somewhere else. This makes our load 4 kg lighter.  It doesn’t sound much but is actually a fair bit.

Interestingly, despite that the province we are walking through is called Gansu Province, it has been formed by two earlier districts which were named “Gan” and “Su”. It is fed by water from the mountains and they have a good irrigation system where needed. Judging from the last time I was here, there is more water here than in many other northern provinces and it bears a direct relationship to how pleased and happy they are. One farmer said, “We have enough water, so we laugh aloud!”

Otherwise, the way we have been received has been overwhelming! Amazing really, for who are we? Just passers by. Have lost count already of the number of small and large favours we have received. Farmers inviting us to stay the night (once saving us from a sand storm), making food, helping us arrange things, driving us from nowhere to Gaotai, and going the extra mile, and driving us to the hotel. I could have continued.

Thankfully my Chinese language skills are holding out fine. I can understand a bit of the local dialect as well.

I am considering saving for a goat moustache since dry shaving the chin is not worth it.

Come to think of it, I have not had a shower since I left the UK 10 days ago. The odd thing is that I do not feel as though I need it! A face cloth seems to suffice. Might ask my brother for a second opinion. Will have one now.
Regarding hygiene, the first couple of days the ground was so dry that it had a thin layer of either a white talcum powder or the grey sandy variant. If one touches the socks, it results in a cloud of dust.