Day #3 When It Rained Rocks

The merciless alarm went off at 4 a.m., and I couldn’t quite summon the strength to obey its urgent call. I tapped away what it wanted from me and tried to fall back asleep. Luckily, I couldn’t. It was cold. The neural revolution insisting I should get up won out, and under the cover of darkness I packed up camp. Someone was coming up from below.

I’d slept at 3,000 meters, with another 800 meters of climbing to the pass. Still a lot. Sleep had given me a bit of strength back, but I still didn’t feel great—and it only got worse as I climbed higher and higher, like Icarus.

At first light I filled up from a little stream. My fingers froze in the cold water, but I needed to drink. In the heat of the day it would’ve been perfect refreshment.

The final stretch to the top was a long series of switchbacks. I looked out into the valley. What’s the rush? It was light now, but I still waited for the sun’s rays to warm me. In the tight turns I pushed the bike; on the straights I pedaled slowly but steadily. I knew I’d get up there—it was just a matter of time.

After about three hours I reached the summit. No time to rest—that’s what descents are for. The sun was already high above the horizon, but the massif I was traversing kept it from hitting me. As soon as it did, I perked up immediately. And also couldn’t see a thing.

🧀 Like a medieval adventurer

I knew the descent well from the acclimatization ride and knew it would be easy gravel. My hands hurt from the grips, but there wasn’t much I could do about that. I just had to endure. I spotted a few tents along the road and racers just waking up. They sure slept in!

I stopped at the first bit of civilization—Kyzyl-Eshme. Not that I desperately needed anything, but I wanted a little treat. The selection in the tiny shop disappointed me. The others had already cleaned out the bread. I grabbed a few packs of biscuits and that would have to do. While I sat on the ground and uploaded the route into my Garmin in 200-kilometer segments, Marika showed up. Once again it was obvious how underprepared I was, because she told me we’d be passing through a bigger town just ahead where the shop should be better.

And she was right—in Daroot-Korgon there was even a small supermarket! In the first shop, which looked like the biggest, they had no bread—this looked bad. But the second one right next door not only had bread, it was even fresh. That’s always been my dream: bite off a chunk of bread and pair it with cheese. Like a proper medieval adventurer.

CP1 was close now; I just had to cross an endless plain. The roads weren’t always pleasant and sometimes covered in a layer of dust. I didn’t want to crash—or, heaven forbid, break another handlebar. I rode under high mountains, with little streams, creeks, and rivers flowing down from them. That meant lots of fords. Not hard, just annoying. To avoid needlessly soaked feet, I’d take off my socks, but it was terribly time-consuming.

The wind was blowing too, but thankfully in the right direction. I figured it would turn in the evening, which might actually play in my favor.

💸 A kingdom for water

The checkpoint itself sat at 3,600 meters, so there was still some climbing to do. I have to say, the acclimatization really paid off here. When I came up here during it, I was basically dead. Now I felt good and was catching racer after racer. I was just suffering from dehydration, because about 10 kilometers before the checkpoint I ran out of water.

The checkpoint was a cluster of yurts and plenty of tents. Very commercial. Water was available—for roughly €4. I was thirsty. I could’ve scooped some from the nearby stream, but seeing the amount of trash in it, I didn’t even feel like filtering. I downed that liter almost instantly.

I also got food—about €8. It was pasta with ketchup, one tomato, and a bowl of watermelon. Later, Tomáš Fabián told me they’d gotten something much better earlier, but for us in the back it was just leftovers. I guess that’s all we deserved.

The CP left a bitter aftertaste, so I stayed only briefly and hurried to Sary-Mogul to restock. The wind direction switched as expected. I remembered that during the acclimatization ride, when we’d ridden the opposite way in the evening, it blew against us. What did change was that some of the creeks had swollen. Dry socks were no more.

In the shop I bought a few Snickers bars, cheese, and bread—unfortunately not very fresh. I gave a stray cat a drink from a bottle cap and tossed her a bit of cheese. She was grateful even for that little.

🚛 It’s raining rocks

And then I made a big mistake—I pushed on. Ahead was a 160-kilometer stretch on the Pamir Highway. Don’t picture a European motorway—this one’s different, and bikes are allowed 😉, even if it’s a bit of a suicide mission. I wanted to reach Sary-Tash, after which the road climbs back into the mountains. My plan was to sleep as low as possible—around 3,100 meters in this case.

My joy about the wind was short-lived. In Sary-Mogul I turned around and had it in my face again. The breeze quickly turned into a gale—I’m exaggerating a bit, but according to Windy it was blowing 40–50 km/h, so I really had to work. I paid dearly for that flat section. And not just that. Night fell soon, and more than a few lorries passed me on that road. It was hard to judge how far behind me a vehicle was and what kind it was. In the dark on a flat straight, distance is nearly impossible to gauge. The truckers didn’t fuss about it and passed extremely close.

Only the combination of wind and trucks gave the Silk Road the feel of a true ordeal. Several were hauling gravel in open beds, and when they blasted right next to me, they blew part of their load onto me. It rained rocks. Even the road itself was full of debris of all kinds, and when a lorry rumbled through it, the stuff flew straight into my face. This was a harsh test. Had I known, I would’ve stayed in Sary-Mogul, found a hostel, because after midnight the wind was supposed to die down.

In the end I didn’t even make it to Sary-Tash. I wasn’t sure I’d find a suitable place to sleep there. And there was nothing along the highway either. But as the traffic calmed down at night, I simply rode about 300 meters off the road and slept on the plain.

I crawled into my sleeping bag at 10 p.m., happily chewing on bread. I couldn’t hear the road at all. The constant flapping of my shelter drowned it out. I planned to get up very early.