Today was insane. I left around 730 and stumbled upon my first limestone giant about 10 minutes later. And after that it was just beautifull view after beautifull view. Truly amazing.
I rode about 117km today and had about 1700 meters of elevatiaon gain, which meant I had to do a lot of climbing. Luckily the roads were not to steap and I’m carrying not to much weight, so the climbs were not to hard. I don’t necessarily like riding my bike up hill, because in general it’s quite tiring. But in someway its just incredibly gratifying. Its like your brain produces some kind of substance that makes a nice view much more satisfying after you had to do some physical effort to be able to see that view. So despite all the physical strain, I’ve been enjoying myself for the most part of the day.
That’s right: for the most part. Normally after you climb a hill you are rewarded with a nice view, followed by a nice descent. Not today though. True, the views were there, but during my 2nd long climb I encountered a pretty abominable road. Riding up was not to hard, but the ascent was followed by a 600 meter descent over some 18km or so. I think I did the descent about as fast as the climb, which is obviously not very fast. Let’s just say that hitting my brakes for more or less the entire 18km was not very nice, resulting in cramped hands and strained arms. During the last 20km I just couldn’t hold my handlebars anymore, making these kms into quite struggle. Who ever could have known that a descent could be more tiring than the climb itsself?
In the end I reached my final destination for today. After checking into the hotel I took a very long showers and had a feast on some noodles!
Three days, 309 km. Tomorrow I will reach the waterfalls!
10 minutes into the ride: Mountains!
And where there are mountains, there’s road up...
And the road up provides nice vistas.
Lunch time.
And after lunch it was mountains combined with sunny weather!
And a very poor road up... and down :-(
But the climb was worth it...
And the descent wasn’t very nice, but it was worth it too.
Just look at this!
And this! Cycling up a mountain is just so grattifying...
And cycling down a mountain is the reward (but only if you have smooth asfalt and proper brake pads).
At the end of the day I was racing the setting sun.
But I was in time for dinner :-)
Elevation
