Day: June 14, 2006

The road continues to undulate!

0km – 1901m
25km – 1704m
65km – 2052m
76,8km – 1830m

The profile remains rough and the scenery as idyllic as ever in the sunshine.  Serge is feeling more fatigued today; consequently, he is moving slowly.

At the 30th kilometer, he entered the city of Huining, which is crossed by the Zuli He River (an affluent of the Yellow River), which is almost dry.  Water is a worry here and in spite of all the terraced crops, we can see no trace of irrigation.  They depend on rain or water brought in containers.

Highway 312 is the only road and it weaves in and out of steep mountains and small gorges.  Accumulations of materials indicate the preparation of huge construction sites for the building of a highway.  Leaving the city of Huining, Serge walked with a group of young children on their way home.  He looked like a happy school kid himself.  He was very impressed by one of the little girls, who couldn’t have been more than 8 or 9 and who asked him in English where he was from. Just as impressive were the 18 trucks of bee hives that Serge saw go by and which he meticulously counted.  However, he did not count the dozens of bee hives on the roadside, next to which families of villagers live in a tent.

Serge started another climb at about the 60th kilometer and he had to draw on what little energy he had left.  He arrived at our camp at 18H40.  Installed on a platform of earth strewn with straw, 4 women and a man were exhausting themselves  making bales of straw by hand in the age-old manner (see photo).  For them, the day began at 7H30 and will stop at 20H30, with a pause for lunch.

This evening, Serge was interviewed by a Parisian journalist (Aujourd’hui en France) for an article that will appear Friday.  Nothing was said on the subject of the France-Switzerland soccer match which was a draw.  This result hasn’t demoralized our troops, who remain confident that Sunday’s match against Korea will end better.  Thomas just mentioned that yesterday he didn’t wear his N°10 jersey.  Obviously, it didn’t bring them luck.
 
There are many foot paths which are not for hikers: they enable the farmers, villagers and school children to go from one village to another.  Below our camp, Daniel and Thomas watched a young fellow who was in some difficulty: the three cartons that he was carrying on his baggage rack kept falling off.  In no time at all our two helpers became Sherpas and climbed a few kilometers with him.  When they returned night had fallen (it’s dark by 21H00) and they had no torch to guide them after their trek to the farm house.  This kind of thing makes for unforgettable memories!