Day 9: Bad Luck Part 2

Woke up today feeling good and fresh. Check out from the hotel and begin on my journey.



Like the past few days, the ride brought me through mountains and numerous villages.



This time round, I saw another interesting sight. Many of the households have tons of sweetcorns tied in this manner. I wonder why.



Another has tons of it like these on the ground. Dont tell me somebody ate it last night. It was too much to be eaten. My best guess was it was hung up in the sun to be dried and then it were puck out one by one to be sold as dried corns.



Just as I was enjoying the ride, I ran into a road block. "What? A roadblock in such a small village? ", I asked myself. Thankfully they did not make things difficult for me. It was just a routine check and this roadblock was setup only because something happened here few days ago.



The road got alittle bad after the roadblock. It was rocky but I still tried to go as fast as I could. This resulted in a puncture, my first puncture ever in all my rides so far. I used to carry a tyre repair kit with me in my past rides but not this time round. So all that I can do is to ride very slowly to the next town which is not too far away. Then there, I had my tyre patched.



Trying to figure out where the puncture is.



This is the typical type of shop where I have my lunch and dinner.



Today is a very hot day and so hot that I decided to stop in a small village to get a drink.



While drinking, I wonder how far more I need to travel today.



After resting awhile, I decided to carry on but the girl in the shop kept telling me to sit down and rest awhile more. I guess this is the typical Yunnan people's kind gesture. This is not the first time someone tells me this. Anyway, I need to go to the toilet before I moved on and so she pointed me to the direction of this.



Just let me share with you my interesting encounter in this toilet. It is true of what you heard that some toilets in China do not have doors. You basically just release whatever you need to, whether soild or liquid, into a drain like long hole. There are no flushing systems and so you can see whatever the prevoius few persons had released. But in this toilet, there is something else. I can see maggots crawling everywhere in that long hole. I wonder how long had the previous released materials had been lefted there. Then as I released my liquid into the drain and onto the maggots, flies started to fly out. Interesting isn't it? HAHAHA....

Not long after I rode off, I heard a funny sound coming from the rear of my bike and soon after I saw this.





My chain came off. Well, how unlucky I am right? First a puncture, then a loose chain that came off. Luckily I had brought along some tools. I fixed back the chian and rode slowly for about over 10km before I hit the next village. But one thing I did not managed to fix back well was the chain guard. And so I tied it to my foot peg and moved off.



Once in the village, I searched for a bike shop and I managed to find one.



I got myself a new chain and Hey look, they are wearing suits and changing my chain. You will never get to see that in Singapore.



The view of this small village.



While they worked on my bike, let's see what do they have here for sales.



After that was fixed, I prayed hard that nothing will happen again and begin to make my way to Dali. Before I left, they too ask me to sit down and rest awhile more before leaving. I love to but these fixing has already taken up much of my riding time. So I left. Along the way, I passed by many farms and for the first time I see so many scarecrows in a single field. From far they really look like people working in the fields. So I guess it works.



Finally after another few hours of ride, I reach Dali City. But the attractions are all in the Old Town and so I still have a short distance more to cover. Along the way from the city to the old town I passed by a Goddness of Mercy Temple.



And then finally DALI OLD TOWN. YES!!!



After so many days of hard riding, I am finally here. At the main enterance. It was such a great feeling to have reach here.



This is the hostel I stayed at. Nice and cosy.





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