I wanted to wander away from the highway and spend the night in a mountain village called Sinho, off off the beaten path. The only trouble was locating the dirt track leading up into the hills. Not for the first time, I found the locals completely unhelpful. They scrutinized my map, pointing to various extraneous words, such as “Vietnam.” They gestured in the as-the-crow-flies direction toward Sinho. Most just fiddled with my brake levers. A child with a disturbing bronchial cough leaked fluids onto my handlebars. Eventually I gave up and headed to Lai Chau.
My consolation prize was an immediate 20km descent, an almost gratuitous amount of freefall. My pleasure circuits burned out after 15km, leaving me wondering about all the poor children in the world who don’t even have a 1km descent to call their own.
At lunch (brunch? It was 9:30AM), a father entered the restaurant and attempted to shove a toddler into my lap. It was meant to be a learning experience for the kid — touch the white man — but it was a bad idea all around. I don’t like most babies*, and most babies don’t like being stuffed into laps of smelly strangers. The baby started to scream and writhe. Taking a cue, I started to scream and writhe. The father retreated.
More locals entered, and familiar games ensued. They pried every moving part of my bicycle. They passed my helmet around and hilariously put it on their very own heads! They ripped the book from my hands and riffled through its pages. I was happy to resume cycling.
Soon after the road began to climb again, I met some Montagnard children. (“Montagnard” is French for “local ethnic minority.”) I chattered with them for a few minutes, showing off my gadgetry. As I biked away, they ran alongside me, easily matching my 8kph plod.
I enjoyed being surrounded by a swirl of laughing kids, all huffing on stubby legs and slapping away at the pavement in their bare feet. But I shortly realized that part of the reason I couldn’t outbike them was that they were hanging onto my rear rack. I managed to scrape them off and then sprinted away, an exertion that nearly caused my aorta to explode.
The kids cut the switchback and met me around the next turn.
Soon enough I discovered why the Dutchman had walked his bike over portions of the Northwest loop. The pavement ended, and the road became steeper and knottier than the single track I used to ride in Texas. If I’m doing less than 6kph, I thought, why not do my posterior a favor and get out of the saddle? Nevertheless, I stuck it out.
Downhills were even hairier. My proximity to the Chinese border reminded me that some people refer to an endo (as in, end over end) as a Chinese nose wheelie. With all the weight above my rear wheel, I was unlikely to endo. More likely I would pitch over sideways. I spent a while mulling which was worse.
After 9 hours and 110km, I parked my bike at Lai Chau and celebrated a magnificent ride with some fellow cyclists. I was developing a taste for hills.
* Babies of friends and relatives excepted, of course.
