Today’s Distance / 今日の走行距離：46.14km
Time on bike / 走行時間：3h 55m
Average speed / 平均速度：11.7km/h
Total distance to date / 現在までの積算距離：972.2km
Today began early. About 2am to be exact. My stomach woke me up with cramps, and my bowels were screaming for the loo. I passed two lots of fairly loose ones before my stomach decided it was time to bring whatever it could find in my stomach up and out my mouth. By that time there was nothing to bring up, so I had three very unpleasant dry reches.
Mild stomach cramps and diarrhea have lasted all day, however they seem to have died down in the last few hours (it is now 8pm). Lack of apetite continues however, although that could be contributed in part to the fact that all people eat around here is noodles. The lack of variation doesn’t exactly do wonders for my appetite.
The cause of all this mayhem is unknown. I ate the following yesterday:
– Pork steamed buns and rice porrage
– Some trailmix of dried fruits and nuts
– Mutton fried rice with tea
– Half a honeydew watermelon
– Two packets of instant noodles
– Some more trailmix
Apart from the tea that came with lunch, I only drank bottled water.
Some possibilities:
– I do remember while eating the melon, part of the unwashed skin went into my mouth.
– I haven’t been too vigilant with washing my hands before eating. Perhaps my dirty hands contributed to it.
Basically, the fact that I could not eat much at all today made today a generally unpleasant day of riding. I had a three hour sleep in the middle of the day after lunch because I was feeling crook. After that it was all uphill through a very narrow gully. Nowhere to relieve my angry bowels.
Houxia is an interesting town though, as has been most of the area that I have cycled through today. I must have taken a wrong turn somewhere and therefore ended up on a small rural road through farming land. It was like stepping back in time with clay brick houses and little children (some only seemed five or six) leading cows through the fields.
Houxia is a friendly town right in the middle of the mountains. It’s existance is due only to the massive dirty industry that they have here. I’m not sure exactly what is being made, however there is a building that looks like a foundry building and a big coal powered power generation station.
Hi Rob, I'm reading this on the 26th of Aug, hope you're better by now! You reminded me of a story a friend told me once… He was travelling somewhere, can't remember where, maybe India, and got a tummy bug, severe diarrhea. He had to travel on a bus/train, and despite feeling grotty, managed to fall asleep for a bit. Upon waking up at his stop, discovered that he had had an accident of the liquid brown variety – oh no! what should he do? Certainly didn't want to stand up… So being a good kiwi with plenty of ingenuity, he removed his bootlaces and tied them firmly around the legs of his shorts to prevent any leakage, and in this fashion was able to make it to his accommodation for the night, and have a bit of a cleanup. Fun and games! Hope you don't get sick again. See you, jean (malc's sister)