A Journey by Bicycle through Europe, Siberia, Mongolia & China

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Saturday, 11^th December 2004
Shanghai
Total kms so far:

think I miss being saddle sore.

I've been in Shanghai six weeks now. I've taken the bike out for a few
spins round town, but nothing really to stretch the spokes. The first
time I went out, my bike was stolen. AGAIN. This wasn't quite a
re-runof the Great Mongolian Bike Robbery though - no horses were
involved this time around, so far as I know. And, thankfully, a
sharp-eyed security guard spotted what was going on and gave chase;
the thief dropped the bike and ran. (No, I wasn't asleep in my tent at
the time, either...)

Shanghai was supposed to be the end of the line for me, but on Sunday
I'll be getting back in the saddle, southbound for Hong Kong.

I clocked up 18,000 km getting to Shanghai from Exeter - a shade under
the 20,000 km I'd estimated before leaving home. That's only 10% out,
not bad really when you consider that my pre-departure guessnwas based
on measuring the straight-line distance of around 10,000 km and
multiplying by an arbitrary "road-wiggliness factor" of 2.

Still, I'm 2,000 km short, and the ride down to Hong Kong should just
about take me up to the 20,000 target.

Having said all that though, the kilometer counting is just an excuse
really. The truth of the matter is that I'm not really comfortable
sitting in one place. Unless it's a saddle, of course. Shanghai is a
hell of a place, but the lures of the open road, the steady cycling
routine, the daily tracing of minute progress across the map, have
become irresistable.

Some things will take a bit of getting used to again, like setting off
in the morning never knowing where I'll be sleeping in the evening.
Until I got to China, camping out was never much of a problem, but in
eastern China finding an empty patch of land is a pretty rare treat,
so I'm having to be a bit more imaginative in finding sleep-spots.
Most hotels are priced way beyond my budget, but sometimes they have
sprawling gardens in which I can hide away and pitch my tent for the
night.

While riding my bicycle half way across the world, I've come to
appreciate the wonderful feeling of freedom that you can get from
doing something very basic: moving.

For this part of the ride, I've teamed up with two charities based in
Shanghai to help raise funds for people in China who suffer from
disabilities which make moving difficult, and whose freedom is, in
consequence, often severely restricted.

One is the Wheelchair Foundation's China Office. Their mission is very
simple: to provide wheelchairs to people in China who need them but
who cannot afford to buy their own.

(Web link - www.wheelchairfoundation.org)

The second is the CereCare Wellness Centre, which provides therapy and
education to young children who have cerebral palsy. The treatment the
children receive is designed to enable them eventually to get into
mainstream schools.

(Web link: www.zhikang.net)

Both these charities do wonderful work and have made huge differences
to many people's lives. In the next few weeks I hope I will have the
opportunity to tell you more about these organsiations and the work
they do. They have both been inspirations to me.

See photos for this month