Back on familiar ground

My room last night didn't have air conditioning, and it never really cooled down. At least not indoors, because outside it was certainly a few degrees cooler. So when I set off at 6:44 a.m., the combination of the cool morning air and the breeze from cycling felt wonderfully refreshing, making up for the cooling I had somewhat missed during the night.

I didn't even need an alarm clock, because at 5:50 a.m. a rooster started crowing every 10 to 20 seconds. Fortunately, I had managed to go to bed early yesterday, so I woke up feeling well rested.

After just a few kilometers, I decided not to follow Amap (the Chinese equivalent of Google Maps) for once and instead took a shortcut. Riding in a triangle didn't seem to make much sense, so I saved almost ten kilometers. The road wasn't closed at all, at least not from the direction I came. At the end of the shortcut there actually was a roadblock, but I could easily ride through the gaps between the traffic cones.

After that section of good road with hardly any traffic came the complete opposite. The road surface was poor, there was barely any shoulder, and there were lots of trucks. Twice I rode past very long lines of trucks: once they were queuing at a weigh station, and once a long construction site allowed motorized traffic to pass in only one direction at a time. On my bicycle, however, I didn't have to stop. It's really flexible here, completely unlike what I experienced in Austria, where I had to make a huge detour because of just 150 meters of closed road. That memory had already resurfaced yesterday from the back of my mind.

The bad road soon came to an end, and once again there was plenty of space along the side for people like me. Before long, however, the road was closed again. As I rode through, I made sure that I was allowed to pass, and the construction worker there shouted after me to confirm that I could.

Once again I had many kilometers of road entirely to myself, but then I finally reached a larger construction site where a new bridge was being built. Passing it wasn't a problem thanks to a small detour. The road surface was now very rough, which took a bit of the fun out of the descent. Still, that's really a luxury problem, because I was making excellent progress.

I had already noticed it on the map several kilometers earlier, and soon I was riding alongside the Yellow River. Then a strange feeling came over me: I know this place, I kept saying to myself. Surely it couldn't be possible for there to be two identical distinctive bridges and the same unique viewing platform in an amusement park? And indeed, as Jiabin later confirmed, we had visited that park in July 2024. So I had now cycled all the way to a place in China that I had already been to before. An overwhelming sense of joy washed over me. I had arrived on familiar ground!

The final kilometers into the city were often shaded by trees, which greatly reduced the perceived heat. Riding became genuinely pleasant and no longer felt hot at all. At 12:39 p.m.—less than six hours after setting off—I arrived at my hotel. I had also taken two short breaks during that time.

That left me with the entire afternoon to recover. This time I also had an air-conditioned room, and I used the opportunity to get a haircut as well, which will surely make the coming days feel a little cooler too.

By the way: collecting litter can also be done with cheerful music.