Each day consists of a selection of timed “predominantly singletrack, predominantly downhill” stages, linked together by “predominantly ascending untimed Liaison Stages”. Most stages begin with a minibus uplift, allowing a greater proportion of downhill riding to uphill, although the latter is still considerable, at around 1350m per day.

Compared to other enduro events, especially those like the hugely popular Megavalanche, T-P is very small – only 55 riders. However, because of the quality of the route and organisation, it attracts the very best enduro riders in the world. This year, entrants included Nico Vouilloz, Fabien Barel, Jerome Clementez, Mark Weir, Mark Beaumont, and Tracy Moseley.

Having been glued to the videos and coverage of T-P 2011 over the last week, I came to the conclusion that this race is without a doubt something that I want to ride more than any other. I can’t think of anything else that really tests the skills and abilities that real mountain biking demands more than this. It’s not enough to be a one descent wonder – you’ve got to be resilient enough to keep the focus and drive throughout seven consecutive days, and be ready to push hard downhill after riding up big steep hot hills.

Now the Nomad is built up I’ve got the perfect machine for the job. I really want to enter the 2012 event – I just need to figure out if I can really commit enough time to the preparation, and also come up with a strategy to possibly include my then wife and little daughter – perhaps they can be the support crew?!

I’ve linked the Vimeo films covering this year’s event below.

Trans Provence Day 1 from Trans-Provence on Vimeo

Trans Provence Day 2 from Trans-Provence on Vimeo

Trans Provence Day 3 from Trans-Provence on Vimeo

Trans Provence Day 4 from Trans-Provence on Vimeo

Trans Provence Day 5 from Trans-Provence on Vimeo

Trans Provence Day Six . from Trans-Provence on Vimeo

Trans Provence Day 7 from Trans-Provence on Vimeo

Trans Provence

Yesterday I finally ticked a long-held ambition – riding the Snowdon Ranger Path. Not only that, but we did it there and back in a day, which turned the whole affair into quite a full-on mission.

Up at 5am, we made it to the Ranger Station car park sometime after 11am. The blazing sunshine blasting the rest of the country was not in evidence. Instead, mist and steady drizzle. On the basis of the reputation of the trail and the mountain scenery, I had packed a variety of devices including SLR (with enormous heavy lens), helmet cam, and small camera for handheld movies. Together with a plethora of spare tubes, tools, water and lunch, my rucksac was preposterously heavy. Eliminating all of 300 grammes by leaving the small camera behind, I shouldered the load, and we set off up the hill.

The initial hill is pretty steep, and it wasn’t long before we started pushing. The new Nomad had been on a bit of a pre-trip face-stuffing-fest, acquiring a tough but heavy Mavic 729 rear wheel, and dual ply Minions front and rear. As such, it didn’t exactly levitate up the steep slope. The drizzle had stabilised, and it was pretty warm, so it didn’t take long until we looked like a pair of drowned rats. The trail towards Llanberis forked left off the Ranger Path after half an hour or so, taking the form of a trampled grassy track up a vertiginous bank. Strong calf muscles required.

The track finished at a notch east of Foel Goch, a bit over 300m vertical from where we had parked the car. I had prepared a decent picnic lunch, consisting of home-baked bagels, filled with smoked salmon and cream cheese, plus boiled eggs and carefully wrapped pickled onions. We tucked into our first helping, and admired the slightly less misty view clearing down the valley.

The decent from the notch down Telegraph Valley is long, fast, a bit loose, and punctuated with aggressively-designed stone drainage channels at regular intervals. I had taken the precaution of fitting heavy-duty rubber to my wheels to counter the threat of impact punctures, and the super tacky compound would hopefully grip the slick wet rock as well as anything. Well, it almost felt like I needn’t have bothered – the Nomad ploughed through or over every rough rocky section with serene composure. I had fitted the PUSH Industries Nomad linkage the day before, and hadn’t had time or opportunity to test it. Well, the result appeared to be as promised – very little change to the pedal-ability (when spinning anyway), but the already plush initial stroke had deepened through the travel, with a creamy, more linear sensation. The final part of the stroke is supposed to be even more of an effective mechanical preventer of bottom-out than the original linkage. Well, I had the Bottom-Out setting on the shock fully off, and didn’t feel the bike reach the end of the travel all day, so I think they’ve done a pretty amazing job.

We descended swiftly, and then cut across the valley to Hebron Station where we picked up the main Llanberis Path. This trail up the side of Snowdon has a reputation for remarkable displays of inappropriate mountain attire, and we were not disappointed. For every well-layered and properly-booted individual, there were probably two t-shirt and trainer wearers. I should point out that, at this point, the drizzle had taken a long look at itself in the mirror, pulled out a handgun a few times, and reinvented itself as cold, stinging rain. As such, the more extreme outfits that we witnessed were acknowledged with that mutual, knowing shake of the head best exemplified by staff working in outdoor shops when a customer purchases a heavily engineered lightweight carabiner specifically to attach to the outside of their rucksac. The 12 year old in tiny skirt, t-shirt and plastic slip-on shoes won yesterday’s Honorary Snowdon Flip-Flop Award.

The regular rocky steps make the Llanberis Path a bit of a bastard to push a bike up. It looked like it would be a fun descent though, and a few riders were picking their way down. Mostly taking it slowly and unsteadily, apart from one guy who looked like he knew what he was doing – less braking and more speed creating a smoother and more flowing style. However, the number of people on the trail would’ve put me off – dodging sullen teenagers and Liverpudlian grandmothers is not my idea of wilderness mountain biking.

We reached the summit, whereupon the wind and rain lashed with a greater ferocity, and it was clear that the decent was going to require even more care and concentration that usual. Whilst I psyched myself up for this arduous undertaking, visualising an efficient and effective style and applying it in my mind’s eye to the rocky, precipitous chutes and gullies that we had experienced on the way up, Alex reappeared with a can of lager. Apparently a group of enthusiastic walkers had carried this beer all the way up the mountain, and had decided that we were the most worthy recipients of its foamy delights. As such, we consumed it with reckless abandon. I don’t recall a can of Fosters ever tasting as good as that one did. Around the same moment, another chap appeared – long-haired, wearing shorts, two bin bags, boots without laces and small nylon Clifford Chance bag strung over his shoulders – lost, with only a biro-scribbled map and an acute lack of navigational know-how to get him down the mountain. Imagine a slightly effeminate law student shipwrecked on a rocky Norwegian island with nothing but the stuff he pinched on his last work experience placement and you get the idea.

We started off down the trail. There were a few sections towards the top that we chose to carry, mainly on account of the slick rock and various long drops either side. The start of the Ranger Track proper was a different affair though – a gentler angle, fast, but with plenty of rocky obstacles. The Nomad was quite happy to plough over it all – having spent a lot of time this year on a carbon hardtail that has to be threaded down a trail with the precision of an anally-retentive brain surgeon, this new-found liberation made the decent much more pleasurable.

The tough sections of the Ranger Trail are really really tough. It’s hard to see if there are other alternative lines when you’re already committed to another, so there might’ve been ways around sections that brought me to a squealing stop. Without recourse to near stationary trials-style riding, I can imagine that some of the bigger drop sections really need a bit of speed and commitment to clear. But they reappear with such regularity that you need to be in the right place on the trail at all times – build up a bit too much speed and hit a narrow gap, and you can say bye bye to that rear mech. It was in such fashion that Alex managed to taco his large chainring around two thirds of the way down.

Having carried all the photographic gear up the bloody hill, I barely used it, save for a few pictures towards the top of the trail. I won’t make that mistake again. I have some non-misty but dull footage of the Telegraph Valley track, and then quite a lot of howling wind / mist obscured descending of the Ranger trail. Both will need a bit of editing before appearing here.

The trail eventually begun to level, and rock was replaced with muddy puddles. It was not long before we passed the turn-off point from earlier in the ride, and all that remained was smooth singletrack that descended to the road in a series of sweeping switchbacks. Having bought a parking ticket that I had failed to position in my car (erroneously leaving in my pocket instead) I was relieved to find the car unimpounded.

A fine day out on the hills.

200km in a day is a bit of an undertaking any time of year, but when it involves getting up at 5.30am to drive to the start line of the Wye Wednesday Audax ride at Meopham in the dark, cold, pouring February rain, I think it’s quite reasonable to question your sanity. In fact, so dismal was the murky weather on the drive over that I had pretty much decided to tell the organisers I was pulling out. However, on arrival I saw a multitude of tough old guys with study audax bicycles and waterproofs of various vintages, and thought that my decision might’ve been a little hasty – so I signed on. The trouble with negativity and procrastination though it that it wastes time, and I was the second last person to set off – about 20 minutes after the first few big bunches. I also appeared to be the only person without a bar-mounted waterproof route card holder. I think a piece of A4 in a document wallet (gripped between hand and bar) is probably fine on a sunny Sunday, but in the persistent rain (which was to last all day) it was quite a job preventing it from turning to mush.

My plan then was to ride fairly hard, and try to pick up one of the earlier groups, which would allow me to sit in without having to worry too much about the nav. This course of action wasn’t quite as simple as it sounds, as the route was not especially straightforward – the logistics of planning 200km on quiet country roads necessitating a fair number of complex direction changes. Also, the route card system is excellent (and far better than a map) when you’re confident you’re on the right tack, but a bloody nightmare if you get lost. I ended up stopping at most junctions, and spent rather too much time ruminating on the improbability of ever catching anyone up at all, especially the seasoned Audaxers, some of whom rode this route every year.

But after a while I started to reel the field in. By the time I reached the outskirts of Tonbridge I’d caught a biggish bunch, mostly made up of a bunch of lunatics in shorts (there was another madman riding the event in jeans!) – using the Audax as training for a French tour. I rode with them to Laddingford, but the pace was slow and I was getting cold, so I continued the chase alone. Unfortunately I made a navigational error a few miles on which took me halfway to Horsmonden before I realised – not very clever. Again the hammer went down, and I caught the shorts brigade around Marden, from where we cruised to the first cafe stop at Staplehurst. Rather than hang around for a bacon sandwich, I procured the sticker for my brevet card, and then jumped on the back of a departing group. We followed a great back route to Tenterden, and around a mile before we arrived I jumped off the front, keen to get ahead enough to allow me to stop at my parents house (where I had dumped a couple of bottles of energy drink) and get back on the group. Alas, by the time I was on the road they were long gone, so once again I put my foot down, averaging about 20mph. I was quite concerned that these hard efforts would come back to haunt me later in the day, but decided getting to the front was more important. I caught some guys around Bilsington, and followed them into Hythe.

The cafe stop at Hythe was too good an opportunity to miss, and egg and chips and a mug of tea were very welcome. Not only that, all the leaders were there too. I joined a group that got away towards the front – two seasoned Audaxers including the event organiser Tim Jackson. Both were very well prepared, and with mudguards looked like they’d been out for a five minute blast. I on the other hand looked like a filthy drowned rat. The rain picked up again, and the ride over to Wye was pretty grim. The bunch grew as we picked up a couple of the leaders who had slowed, and pressed on to Marden for another checkpoint. From there the route winded north, and the terrain got quite hilly. I was expecting my somewhat excessive speed towards the start to cause problems, but I had kept fairly well-fuelled all day, and I still felt quite fresh. Alas, it got darker and darker towards the finish, and my front light was still plugged into the recharging cord where I had forgotten about it that morning. I followed the others in the dark, and 2 miles from the finish got a puncture. I considered walking, but in the end relented and changed the tube. I couldn’t find the culprit in the tyre though, and was not relishing the prospect of the final distance with only a rear light. Thankfully, one of the bunch popped back with a spare. We were within 200m of the finish when the wheel went again, and that time I did decide to limp over the line. Even so, the majority of the 43 starters were behind us, and I justifiably awarded myself a pat on the back.

The next local 200km Audax is the Man of Kent on Sunday 27 March. Hopefully it’ll be a little drier…

The last competitive biking event I did was (I think) the Dusk till Dawn 12hr enduro at Bedgebury in September 2009. I didn’t actually do too badly, especially considering that I’d been out of action for most of the summer thanks to a broken hand, sustained downhilling at Cannock. Not only that – most of the solo riders were riding svelte carbon race bikes, whilst I was on a 30something pound Whyte 46, replete with Fox 36 forks that had been stuck on 160mm till the week before the race.

Yes, 15th out of 41. And that was with a 2hr nap in the middle. I missed the event last year, but if they’re running it in 2011 then I’ll be there.

Having ridden the South Downs National Park Audax on Sunday (a tough event with some 20% climbs thrown in along with over 2000m of total ascent) I’ve decided to try to plan some more events for this year. I have aspirations both on the road and off it, and with a baby due in April I think organisation is going to be key.

I’m already booked in for the Hell of the Ashdown at the end of February, which will be followed shortly by the Puncheur Sportive. I rode most of the hills in the former back in the autumn of 2010 – the climbs were challenging but not particularly cruel. The Puncheur is quite a different animal I think – a fairly fast rolling sportive, and hopefully I can record a decent time. There is also the Wye Wednesday audax in the week running up to Hell – a not particularly hilly 200k ride that I quite fancy, weather permitting.

Another 200k in March – the Man of Kent audax. I’d also like to get up to North Wales around then for a crack at the Snowdon Rangers Track / Llanberis trail combo (before the post-Easter weekend voluntary ban comes into play), plus a route we recce’d in 2009 north of Capel Curig.

In April there should be a few TTs here and there, where I will hopefully be rolling out the completed Project Lo Pro. Having only ridden 10s up to this point (and spectacularly uneventfully) I am planning to try all the distances up to 12 hour this year. Also in April are the Tour of the Weald and the Wiggle Ups and Downs MTB sportive at Dorking.

In May there’s the San Fairy Ann Sportive that follows a great Kent and Sussex route. Not long after is the South Downs 100 and the Eastbourne Sportive.

June I’m keeping fairly free – it would be nice to escape for a few more mountainous challenges around then – maybe a trip to the Lakes, and also the Peak District. There’s an ESCA 100 mile TT on the 26th that I quite fancy before…

2nd July – La Marmotte. The biggie. I don’t want that to become the focus for the whole season though, as I have no idea how it’s going to go. Fingers crossed. I had previously thought about riding the Megavalanche the following weekend, but I think that idea is now shelved for a variety of reasons that include self-preservation and a desire to pursue a slightly more adventurous attitude where Alpine riding is concerned. I’m hoping to get back out to the Alps later in the summer for something more All Mountain in flavour.

The Kent 12hr TT takes place on 4th September, which annoyingly is the same date as the nearest Southern XC round at Pippingford. Shortly after that is the Afan round of the SixSixOne Gravity Enduro. I really fancy doing that – it should be a decent opportunity to see how my fitness stacks up against my mountain biking technique and speed downhill.

The last idea in the calendar is L’Eroica, which I’ve been planning to do for a few years now. Maybe Jess and the small child can be persuaded to come out to Gaiole in Chianti to see lots of tough Italians in wooly cycling gear riding crazily-geared bikes on the strada bianca.

Audax
Hell of the Ashdown
Puncheur
Tour of the Weald
Wiggle Ups and Downs
San Fairy Ann
South Downs 100
Eastbourne Sportive
Southern XC
Gravity Enduro
L’Eroica

With the weather forecast showing little sign of anything other than freezing conditions, snow and sleet I am not terribly confident about covering the distance. Particularly as my mountain bikes are both out of action, and so a backup plan of riding up and down the South Downs Way would appear to be out of the question.

However, I am prepared to brave the elements to some degree, and will give the challenge my best shot.

Motivation is paramount when such endeavours are concerned. As with the 100 Hours of Turbo Challenge, I thought this wintry escapade also deserved some impassioned prose. As such, I have again modified and muddled up a far greater poem for your amusement. Stick it on the fridge, on the inside of your front door. Or even on your bars in place of Pamela Anderson. And enjoy…

Cold cruel roads of Winter

Once more unto the breach, dear friends, once more;
And shut that door, lest Queen cries shrill about the draught.
On rest days there’s nothing so becomes a man
As modest stillness and humility:
But when the blast of wind blows in our ears,
Then imitate the action of the Badger;
Stiffen the sinews, summon up the blood,
Disguise fair nature with hard-favour’d rage;
Then lend the eye a terrible aspect.

Don the armour of the road,
That magick darkened eyeglass to defend ‘gainst Rain and Sun,
Padded codpiece set in stretch’ed Hose of Lycra,
Hat of Rapha, Ruff of Silk, and Softshell Cloak upon the shoulder.
Now set the teeth and stretch the nostril wide,
Hold hard the ‘drops and put the power down
Through gaily coloured Speedplays. On, on, you noblest English.
Whose blood is (mostly) free from physick potions!

Assuming thou hast refused strange meat from foreign lands,
Dishonour not your butcher; now attest
Your wattage, fueled by well-brew’d tea and lemon drizzle cake;
Good cause to conquer men of grosser blood,
And teach them how to war. And you, good Roadmen,
Whose limbs were forged on English lanes, show us here
Your mettle, and the metal of your steed; let us swear
That you are worth your training; which I doubt not;
For there is none of you so mean and base,
That hath not noble lustre in your eyes.

I see you stand like good Sir Chris upon the track,
Straining upon the start. The ride’s away:
Follow your spirit, and upon this charge
Cry ‘God for Harry, England, and Saint George!’

Click here to download a high resolution PDF of the poem

Alas, it is at this point in the tale that the story goes hazy, as the previous post was pretty much where I got to when writing this up for the first time before I managed to lose the aforementioned expedition diary. Everything from this point on is based on what is in my head rather than what is down on paper.

We quit Tisa at the crack of dawn. The paranoia had reached epic proportions, with the fiendish barking of the Cerberesque hound outside the window getting more murderous by the minute. For around two hours we were utterly convinced that someone was planning to feed us to this monster. We packed our stuff in the manner of convicts preparing for escape. The guesthouse guy then started banging on the door (in front of which Alex had dragged the wardrobe – for our own protection) and started wailing about the police. We thrust some rupees into his grubby hands, and hotfooted it.

It was a lovely morning, but we chose to ignore such irrelevances and concentrated on putting as much distance between us and the man and his dog. The previously undisclosed subject of a number of, let us say, unconventional cigarettes that we had shared with him the previous evening combined with the continued psychological attrition of the past few days, dodgy officials, paralytic maniacs, and the continued effects of reading William Dalrymple’s Age of Kali were in retrospect mainly to blame for our distressed mental state, but even so there was definitely something up, and so we employed every little bead of wisdom gleaned from years of studying the works of the great McNab to effect a successful getaway. It’s rather difficult to become the “grey man” when you are 6ft2 on a bicycle with red tyres and travelling with a bearded chimp, so we focused on “putting in the angles” between us and our hypothetical pursuers.

The plan must’ve worked, because no-one ever caught us up, and our faces never appeared on any wanted posters. The road to Chamba was hot and dusty, and we managed to make a number of navigational errors that turned the day into an even hotter and longer one. For a lengthy section we found ourselves pedalling up a painful incline in the midday sun, and we had barely drunk anything all day. We crawled into the next village parched to put it mildly. Luckily there was a water pump next to the road, and we were about to tuck in when the chaingang working on the road (a relatively cheerful bunch considering the unpleasant labour that they were being forced to endure – namely hitting big chunks of rock with hammers to turn them into smaller chunks of rock, in that same midday sun) were awarded a short break, and so this jolly group of thieves and murderers (I suppose they could’ve been tax evaders or found they had some competition for their source of refreshment. In the end we joined forces, with mutual pumping and filling of containers.

The rest of the ride was less eventful (apart from a puncture – one of very few on the trip – thank you Michelin), and culminated in another tough climb in sweltering heat into Chamba. We hadn’t planned or even investigated where we would stay. Bearing in mind that it had been some days since we have enjoyed even an ounce of luxury, what with the truck stop, Killar, Sach Pass hovel and the Murderous Dog Pound, we were well up for splashing out. And so when we saw a neatly printed sign advertising Hotel City Heart, we made up our minds on the spot.

As I recall, we looked fucking appalling. Filthy, sweat-stained AND soaked clothes, fetid kit hanging from bikes and sacks – you get the picture. So when we walked into the hotel reception we weren’t necessarily expecting to be welcomed with open arms. But bizarrely enough, both the hotel staff and the members of the wedding party that was going on inside seemed to be, if not delighted, then certainly perfectly amiable about the arrival of two such rancid guests.

The rest of the stay in Chamba revolved around creative beard modification, beer drinking, consumption of curry and appreciation of WWF wrestling, and as such any thoughts about continuing on our bikes to Dharamsala were temporarily shelved. And then permanently shelved. We decided to finish the trip as we had started it – by commissioning a truck and a driver.

We did so, and our man picked us and the bikes up and delivered us to McLoed Ganj, the uppermost section of Dharamsala. Here we continued our enjoyable eating and drinking frenzy, with one sole excursion into the mountains on our bikes. Cut short as I recall by the adherence of some shit to Alex’s bike and the subsequent mobile stench causing a reduction in enthusiasm.

And after another day or two, another vehicle was summoned, and that man (a total and utter menace, overtaking fiend, and very nearly the cold blooded murderer of two British cycle tourists) drove us south to Delhi. This journey was painful, terrifying, and delayed by an actual murder (two villages having a feud, one decided to kill someone from the other village and dump the body in the middle of the motorway – nice work guys) but we eventually reached Delhi. Where the driver finally managed to do what he had nearly managed all day – knock a nice chap off his motorbike.

We were reunited with our bike bags at chez Sanjay, and within a matter of hours our plane was in the sky and the adventure was over.

Woke up feeling quite refreshed – a lot better than we expected actually. Useless dhaba direction man even made us a cup of tea.  We wandered down the hill in a different direction to the previous evening and lo and behold – a row of shops and a smart restaurant and guesthouse!  Bastards – unbelievable.  We had eggs and chilli for breakfast, and planned an easy day of errands. 

After breakfast we wandered down to where we’d seen some jeeps the night before.  A big swarthy looking guy pointed out the route down to the bridge at the bottom of the valley. Beyond this was the road up to the Sach Pass.  We asked him if he could organise a jeep to take us down for a recce, and he said that he would “arrange” it. 

Five minutes later a jeep did indeed appear. It was piloted by a pair of teenage chancers.  Guy said rs200, kids said rs400. We said rs300 – off we went.  The driver was a cunt. He kept taking his hands off the wheel and looking back over his shoulder at us. We were also fairly certain that his tyres were completely bald – probably as bald as his genitals.  His mate, wearing a sun visor and black sunglasses was also a cunt. We did our best to ignore them.

We lost a lot of altitude very quickly, and although the bridge didn’t look a long way away we must have driven for 20km backwards and forwards along loads of hairpins.  When we got to the bottom they turned the jeep around and, to our amazement and intense irritation decided to fill the jeep up with a group of locals who had managed to negotiate turning our jeep trip into some kind of magical mystery tour.  When we had finally dropped off all these people around Killar we asked the driver to take us back up to the guesthouse.  He muttered something about more money, and when we arrived he tried to squeeze us for more.  I let rip and they drove off in a cloud of diesel smoke.

Spent the afternoon playing chess and then went back to the restaurant for mutton curry, chapattis and beer.  We had heard that the other road out of Killar (not the one we had arrive on or the one that climbed south over the Sach Pass) led to a particularly dangerous district near the Pakistani border, where all sorts of banditry and terrorism we going on.  The other customers in the restaurant did look pretty shady, but fortunately their interest in us seem to be amused curiosity rather than as potential organ doners.

When we got back to the guesthouse we spent quite a while filtering water and preparing for the big push.  The climb up the Sach Pass was going to be long and unrelenting, and we wanted to be as well-prepared as possible.

Woke at 6am.  Chai and biscuits for breakfast. Alex had attached the video camera to his handlebars with gaffa tape and zip-ties – we were planning to film the much-anticipated descent to the bridge, although we’d not had much opportunity to test the filming system.  The route down was great fun though – we soon overtook a jeep, and pushed on faster and faster.  Then Alex wiped out on a sandy hairpin and landed on the video camera. Whoops.

After crossing the bridge at the bottom of the valley we found ourselves in a cool forest, and pushed the bikes up through the trees. Before long, some kind of mystic Indian woman appeared, wearing quite an ornate outfit, and walking a dog. She muttered something and then scampered up the path.  Some moments later Alex spotted a monkey. I didn’t believe him, but then another one appeared on the path in front.  A big muscular monkey. He didn’t bare his teeth, and seemed to be curious rather than overtly aggressive. As we walked on we saw more and more of them – swinging through the trees above us.  Why do TV presenters always look so relaxed with monkeys? They’re too hyperactive, clever and potentially vicious to ignore I reckon. I got quite freaked out.

The path climbed higher, and after a couple of hours we were out of the forest.  It was very difficult to work out where the pass actually was – we seemed to be climbing up the side of a valley, but further ahead another ridge intersected our route, and we couldn’t see past. After a lunch stop at a deserted road workers hut we continued to climb, and when we got round the ridge we saw the route climbing torturously up the side of a very steep face. We thought that the pass would be at the top of this.

After more hours we started to get a bit concerned about how much further it was going to be.  We passed a waterfall which had a lot of dead wood scattered either side.  Thinking this would be useful for making a fire if we had to bivvy, we strapped as much as we could to the bikes and pushed on.  After a couple more hours we reached a mini plateau, which looked like a very derelict expedition base camp.  There were collapsing stone huts, some with tarpaulins stretched over the roofs.  And a yellow digger. And three men, who turned out to be working on the road. We said hello and signalled to a hut, asking if we could sleep there. They enthusiastically agreed and helped us organise our stuff, light a fire (with some diesel that they poured out for us) and even cooked some boiled eggs.  There were some very menacing clouds gathering over the mountain tops, and we were sure it was going to be a cold night. After putting on all our clothes and gulping down a dinner of instant noodles, we climbed into our sleeping bags and failed to sleep for most of the night.

It would be disingenuous to say that I woke up, as I had been awake for the hours before I finally decided to engage my brain and defrost my body. Alex has been nearer the fire, on account of his inferior sleeping bag. We both looked a mess, but at least we weren’t covered in snow.

More eggs together with coffee, biscuits and almonds improved the mood.  We learned from our friends that there was another 12 – 14km to the top of the pass, and after packing up off we went.

The road took the form of sinuous, looping hairpins. We met some road workers who must have been dropped up there by jeep earlier on. They looked quite menacing as they strolled down towards us, brandishing lump hammers.  There was a bit of a stand-off, before we slipped through and continued on our way. Hours passed and we pushed over a false summit – beyond this the road got rockier, and huge glaciers appeared on either side. We eventually summited, and as we did so a jeep arrived at the top from the other direction.  The jeep was full of guys who had driven up from Chamba – they were very enthusiastic, taking our photos and then wandering off to pray by the shrine before setting off back home again.

The downhill looked awesome, and it was. Fast, steep and rocky, and I really went for it, with Alex videoing. We overtook the jeep, which was picking its way down pretty slowly, maintaining our record of overtaking every vehicle we encountered on off-road downhills.

Eventually we got to a very scrappy little village. Some unpleasant-looking bloke told us that it was a police checkpoint, although I wasn’t convinced. We couldn’t see anyone in uniform, but in the end relented – Alex climbed up to his tent, while I held the bikes. A very drunk man came over and started trying to talk to me, and I tried hard not to offend him while Alex did the business with our passports above.

Further down the hill three guys who were wearing some sort of brown uniform stopped us. One was clutching a big, sharp rock. Again, we escaped. The descent carried on for miles and miles, and it slowly got dark. We kept our eyes open for guesthouses, but none appeared. After riding in darkness for some time, we found ourselves in a village called Tisa. There were quite a few shops, and some friendly people. There was apparently a government guesthouse down the hill, so we went to investigate. It was a big building, but there didn’t seem to be much going on.  A guy opened the door and we had great problems signalling our request for a place to sleep. After quite a lot of confusion he showed us into a dirty room with cigarette burns over all the furniture and smoke hanging thick in the air. I think it was his room. Anyway, he seemed to be happy for us to stay, so we dumped the kit and then went off to buy some beer up the road whilst he cooked for us.  We got quite pissed, and then he started to freak us out, talking about the police coming early in the morning, and how we might need to pay him extra. We got quite paranoid, and our paranoia was exacerbated by the sound of a very nasty sounding dog, which growled outside our window all night.

A bicycle journey continued…

The following day was very lazy. We rose very late and headed back to the Tashi Deleg for breakfast. Alex had garlic toast with his eggs. His horridness knows no bounds. We spent the day alternating between sitting in the sun and watching TV. And drinking beer. I finally managed to beat Alex at chess, albeit with the usual Simon handicap. He had also run low on money, so the bank of Goldman Styler was established and an unsecured loan granted to Mr Neame, temporary resident of Keylong.

Day twelve - We woke up very early when a car alarm went off outside. After a dawn breakfast of rather too many bananas, we eventually managed to get all our shit together and by the time we were on the road it must have been 8 o’clock.

The road out of Keylong was a very long and shady downhill, and out of the sun with the air temperature still pretty cold we ended up donning multiple layers.  This road carried on south to the Rohtang Pass and then Manali, but we soon broke off on a road west towards Tindi which would hopefully deliver us to the foot of the Sach Pass in a few days time.

The road to Tindi was superb, with a good surface, stunning views, fine mountain pastures and tasty-looking cows. The Glade Plug-In Mountain Pine aroma was still in the air.

We stopped at Thirot for chai, and then Udaipur for lunch, after about 5 hours on the road.  Udaipur was a lot less magnificent than its Rajasthani namesake, but it was still quite an experience.  It was quite clear to us that this valley was a lot less travelled than the Leh-Manali route. We were far more of a curiosity here, and the bikes got even more attention than we did.  The lunch wasn’t bad – a decent amount of rice and dhal and vegetables, which we washed down with a remarkably fluorescent orange drink. I felt quite energised in a slightly unnatural way, but it had a very different effect on Alex, who fell asleep under a tree.

The road from Udaipur to Tindi was quite different to what we had experienced earlier in the day.  The hills got bigger and steeper, and the road twisted torturously with scattered rocks everywhere and plenty of flooded sections.  I think it was one of the best trails that I’d ever ridden.

However, the day’s enjoyment was spoilt by the evening’s search for accommodation.  We got to a insalubrious truckstop in the general vicinity of Tindi.  A local guy suggested that we head up the road to the village where we would find a guesthouse.  The road climbed sharply for a couple of kilometres before we reached a downhill to an impressive suspension bridge.  We crossed this and were pushing the bikes uphill towards the village when we met a family out for an evening stroll.  “No guesthouse here” they said, in a friendly but quite firm way.  We debated whether or not to believe them.  I thought that there were various reasons why they might be fibbing, but in the end we reluctantly turned around and tramped back to the truck stop.

In the intervening period it had got dark and quite a few trucks were parked up alongside a row of shacks.  We asked about food and accommodation and a Sikh guy who was travelling with a couple of dodgy-looking drivers pointed to a group of people who were sitting on plastic chairs next to a rather run-down shack.  He then proceeded to question us about electronic equipment, offering to buy anything we were carrying. His drivers were looking enviously at the bikes.  We managed to eat our fill, evacuate our bowels around the corner in the acre or so of wasteground that seemed to double as the truckstop restrooms, and then drag all our stuff into the shed-like thing that we had managed to rent for the night.  We piled up the gear and bikes (including Alex’s ingenious handlebar-mounted bog roll) alongside the bench bed things and then tried to secure the door as well as you can secure a wood-framed tarpaulin.

Just as we were dropping off there was a noise at the door, and the smell of cheap Indian whisky drifted across the room, accompanied by the Sikh and his chums. They lit up some noxious smelling cigarettes and then talked loudly into the early hours.

Luckily, my fears were not realised in the night – my arse was intact and none of our stuff had been stolen. Our breakfast was two oily chapattis with lime pickle – surprisingly hard to stomach early in the morning. While we were munching and gagging we met an engineer on his way back from Sach Khas. He had been working on a major hydroelectric project and told us that if we were running late we could stay at his home. He even wrote a note to his minions confirming this generous offer.

The road to from Tindi was OK.  Up and down, with a pretty shitty surface, but stunning scenery.  More hardcore than the previous day without doubt.  The downhills were especially good.  There was a very big and aggressive looking dog at the first little village, so we got off and pushed the bikes past which he decided was an acceptable option and as a result decided not to savage us.  A sparkling Timotei waterfall provided water (which we filtered) and a cold shower.

We stopped at a Dhaba for lunch, which I’m pretty sure was the one we’d seen on Cass Gilbert’s website some weeks before.  Delicious rice, dhal and tea.  I think we must have said “hello” to more than 300 people before lunch.

After many more miles we eventually saw Killar in the distance – a long way away and up a very big hill.  The road was very sandy, punctuated with large rocks, so we pushed most of the way up.  Amazingly trucks were also threading their way up the road, and there was only just enough room.  With a precipitous drop inches away from the outside tyres it must have been quite a hair-raising drive.  Anyway, the hill went on for ages, and despite the spectacular situation we were getting quite tired.

Eventually we reached Killar. It was a shithole.  Or more accurately, a shit trench.  We asked directions to a guesthouse, and were met with a great variety of blank expressions.  Killar was built on the side of a big hill. We arrived at the bottom, and went on a very irritating wild goose chase from bottom to top. Meanwhile it was getting dark. Eventually we reached a helipad at the top of town, and no guesthouse. We flagged down a jeep, and the driver told us to follow him back down the hill. I did – with no lights.  Alex got left behind, but somehow managed to work out the right route. The guesthouse wasn’t particularly welcoming – we shouted and knocked on doors, and after some time a man popped his head out, looked at us quizzically, and then fucked off again.  Another man who could barely communicate then appeared, made some strange motions, and then showed us to a reasonable if overpriced room.

They then told us that there was a dhaba down the road, so off we went. Nothing. Came back livid. The bloke started demanding to know if we had a reservation or not. We managed to restrain ourselves, and returned to the room for a biscuit and some water, and then bed.

The shed turned out to be a wooden box covered with a tarpaulin. Still, it was Sarchu’s answer to the Lanesborough as far as we were concerned. It was freezing cold, and the solitary candle that served as a heater didn’t seem to be making a lot of difference. The ensuing chill, combined with a pervasive sense of lethargy persuaded us to see if we could continue the hitchbiking theme a bit further. Alex went on a recruitment mission, and soon returned announcing that he had found a driver and a pair of paramilitary chaps who would be happy to transport us all the way to Jispa. It turned out that they were Indo-Chinese border police who had spent the previous months wandering around in the snow on the Tibetan border looking for VCR smugglers. Whilst the Tibetan border didn’t have the same terrorism / bombing / shelling problems as the Pakistani border, it more than made up for it with avalanches and rockfall. They were on their way home, and they looked like they needed a rest.

The journey took most of the day. The road was pretty terrible, but the company was good. They insisted on buying us lunch, and we wobbled back to the truck stuffed full of the usual dhal, rice and chapatti combo. The landscape was mostly the rocky, barren, Death Valley-esque mixture for most of the journey, but as we crested the final pass of the day we saw a far more Alpine panorama in the distance. Annoyingly, the road from the pass to Jispa was entirely downhill, and we should have really biked it.

It took a while to track down our hotel (not that there were a lot of hotels) but when we did we were presented with a winning combination of separate beds (what joy), a flushing loo, a shower, running water, and cold beers. These were followed with more cold beers, while we watched some fairly talented Tibetans play cricket. After that, food, followed by drunken analysis, followed by bed. Like, real beds, with sheets and blankets and stuff.

The following day was a lazy one.  Rose late and spent the morning washing clothes and cleaning cement dust off the bikes – clearly one of the unfortunate side effects of hitchbiking.  Alex then went off to explore the riverbed whilst I cleaned my cameras and wondered if I might have brought too many rolls of film.

We then went for a cruise down the road towards Keylong.  Riding baggage-less was something of a revelation.  The road was in a terrible state, but the views were superb, and the green-ish valley was a good antidote to the Martian landscape of Ladakh. There were some road workers along the route, chipping away at boulders and looking pretty miserable.  In fact, I reckon road building in India would certainly make the top 3 most unpleasant jobs in the world. Alex had also noted a woman earlier on who was collecting bundles of wood from one of the fields near the hotel.  She gathered it into a huge bundle, and then tied it together, lay down on top and then rolled forward, hoisting it all up and onto her back.  This usually took a few goes. She then hobbled off up the road, and it must have been an hour until she arrived back for the next batch.

We sped on down the road, looking for some trails off the side, but didn’t really find anything suitable.  Virtually all the land seemed to have things growing or living on it, and we didn’t want to upset any farmers. After a while we reached a little village with a shop that furnished us with a couple of Cokes. Then back to the hotel to pack and play beer-fuelled Simon handicap chess.

The evening meal was fairly amusing as a large group of Russians had appeared.  They were apparently politicians on some kind of tour, and were led by a pair of ferocious looking shaven-headed ex Spetsnaz types. The scarier of the two looked like he was hewn out of solid granite.  We named him Sergei. They didn’t quite know what to make of us, and by the time they’d stuffed their faces with curry and consumed gallons of vodka from their apparently never-ending supply I don’t think they knew what to make of each other either. 

Rose at about 8am.  The Israelis were having mechanical problems – faulty fuel pipes, wobbly handlebars and a puncture.  Alex and I decided that the hitch biking idea was such a good one that we thought we should really carry it over for another day.  He managed to track down a driver, who looked a bit suspicious to me – a thin, weasel-like character with a face that said “don’t believe a word I say”.  He had an accomplice who appeared to be an affable simpleton.  We loaded the bikes onto the roof of the truck, and were quickly ushered inside.  We then convinced ourselves that the bikes were being quietly unloaded into another truck so a stealth mission was undertaken to check.  They were still attached…

The bridge out of Pang towards the Lachalang La had unfortunately collapsed.  There was a queue of trucks waiting next to the fairly fast flowing river, and two trucks were in the river and not moving anywhere fast.  After some unintelligible conversation with the others, our driver took a run up and managed to get through.  It was at least three feet deep, and quite a lot of the river managed to find its way up through the dashboard.  Quite impressive, though we didn’t tell him that. 

The road up to the top was long, bumpy and quite treacherous.  After a number of stomach churning manoeuvres we finally made it.  By this point we had decided that the driver and his dumb accomplice were serious chancers and up to no good.  They had started off agreeing to our fairly paltry offer of payment, but as we had risen higher up the pass they had started to make comments about how great it was of them to give us a lift.  I reluctantly gave the driver 400rs, and Alex gave his mate 50.  They drove off in a cloud of dust.

According to my intel, we would drop from the Lachalang La to Whisky Nullah, and then climb about 50m to the Naleeka Pass, before dropping down the Gata Loops to Sarchu. The dropping down to Whisky Nullah was fine, but the “50m climb” turned into 400m or so of total hell on Earth – knackered road, very steep, very hot, bursting lungs, and lots of trucks passing which seemed to be emitting something akin to VX.  Oh, and there was a savage wind as we got nearer the top. When we made it we tucked into our packed lunch of chappatis and dhal, which resulted in a different but equally unwelcome savage wind. The decent was great fun though – very fast, thanks to our methane afterburners.  The Gata Loops are a series of 21 huge (and I do mean huge) hairpins. There were rocky, sandy trails cutting come of the corners, which we decided to venture down. It was thus that we overtook the Israeli bikers.  We didn’t just cruise past – we tore past them at incredible speed.  We both thought this extremely impressive.

However, at the bottom the road levelled out and then started to gently climb.  This was somewhat unexpected, as I was expecting the downhill to take us all the way to Sarchu.  On we pushed nevertheless. The bikers overtook us. The sun started to go down. Still a long way to go. I started to feel the pain – all I could do was try to keep some sort of rhythm and let my oxygen-deprived imagination conjure up something pleasantly erotic. Alex (who had spent weeks in the army being subjected to similarly unpleasant night marches) seemed to be feeling ok, judging by his shit jokes.

At about 10km to go we started pushing as it was a bit too dark to ride. Then we decided to try riding again. And then, again, we decided against this course of action. We got slower and slower. Or rather, I got slower and slower…

Eventually we stumbled into Sarchu. We found the tent that the Israelis were staying in, and there was an adjoining shed into which we crawled inside with the bikes. Executive Suite #2.  No en-suite, but the air conditioning was working overtime. I could barely function, so we called room service and then arranged the bedroom. The manager looked blank when we asked for an alarm call, a copy of the Guardian and continental breakfast with fresh grapefruit juice and a pair of Illy espressos. He won’t be getting any AA rosettes methinks…