Bouncing by bike from Bern to Beijing
Turning onto the narrow Kyrgyz road, we thought the shaking, rattling and rolling would soon be over. As it turned out, we often struggled to hold onto our bikes.
I waved goodbye to the Swiss capital Bern back in April, aiming to pedal to its Chinese equivalent. Joined by my friend Samuel in Turkey, we’re now on the final leg of the 14,000-kilometre adventure and hope to arrive in Beijing some time next month.
Our trip has gone through Italy, the Balkans, Turkey, Iran and many other countries (click on the map for the route), but Kyrgyzstan really took a toll on us.
The country might be incredibly beautiful – there was hardly a square metre that we didn’t enjoy – but the infrastructure was so minimal and the roads so rudimentary that our one-month stay became a real challenge.
We spent more than a week on gravel roads, and there was hardly any choice of what to eat – a serious problem when you’re so dependent on food.
Many towns had neither shops nor restaurants. Often the only thing to be found on shelves between vast quantities of alcohol were dry biscuits and perhaps a variety of rice. The result was meagre and often unsatisfying meals.
Equally punishing was the altitude, the topography and the cold nights.
Last week we were cycling mostly between 2,000 and 4,000 metres above sea level and had to negotiate quite a few passes, the most recent of which took my breath away. Literally.
At night the mercury often plummets below zero and we were glad to have good-quality clothing and gear.
Lust for luxury
The low-pressure area which drenched us near the Chinese border lowered our spirits too. We craved anything that was even remotely luxurious: a warm shower, a bed, pizza, a massage – or simply just doing nothing and drinking a coffee.
Fortunately the Chinese city of Kashgar – whose population of about 350,000 is roughly the same as Zurich, although not so dense – was in range. We wanted to get there as soon as possible.
We managed this and spoiled ourselves for a few days with good food and loads of sleep.
It never ceases to amaze us how different neighbouring countries can be. Medium-sized conurbations in Kyrgyzstan often involve loosely arranged houses – there’s no discernable town centre and everything is quiet and sleepy.
The country has a surface area of 200,000 square kilometres but is populated by fewer than 5.5 million people. Switzerland, by contrast, has 7.8 million people squeezed into a fifth of the size.
But in the first large Chinese settlement we came across we were drowning in an ocean of neon signs – the construction boom and consumerism were plain to see.
Another world
Kyrgyzstan is practically another world, but our memories remain vivid. Of all the Central Asia countries we visited, it seems to have been the most influenced by the Russians.
There’s the widespread Cyrillic script and language, but also the drinking habits. Whenever we passed through an idyllic village at noon, the chances were good that several drunk men would be stumbling around and babbling after us.
It’s not easy to explain this, but one major factor could well be the low alcohol prices.
One bottle of high-percentage schnapps costs 70 Kyrgyz som – about SFr1.50 ($1.60). Food, as I’ve said, isn’t easy to come across in rural areas, but you’ll never go thirsty – alcohol, and lots of it, can be found virtually everywhere.
Even if our journey through Kyrgyzstan was often gruelling, we can look back on so many positives from our one-month stay.
The landscape was stunning. We’ve seldom been so close to nature and felt it so intensely as in Kyrgyzstan.
What’s more, the uncomfortable moments reminded us of the value of luxury and how lucky we can consider ourselves to live in an affluent country such as Switzerland.
Julian Zahnd, 26, comes from Bern. He graduated in politics and history in 2010.
His passions include music, sport and travelling, above all by bike. He has already cycled Zagreb-Tirana (with Samuel Anrig) and Granada-Bern.
Samuel Anrig, 27, has just graduated in geography from Bern University.
A love of freedom, ecology and sport resulted in Julian Zahnd’s decision to bicycle from Bern to Beijing.
In Samsun, a Black Sea port on the north coast of Turkey, he was joined by his friend Samuel Anrig, who accompanied him for the rest of the trip.
Zahnd left the Swiss capital on April 27, 2011. His route took him through Italy into the Balkans, then countries including Iran, Turkmenistan, Kyrgyzstan and finally China.
The 14,000km route follows long stretches of the Silk Road, a network of interlinking trade routes that connected East, South, and Western Asia with the Mediterranean and Europe, as well as parts of North and East Africa.
Zahnd and Anrig aim to cover around 100km a day to reach their goal in November.
(Adapted from German by Thomas Stephens)
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