| Ujung Gesting to Cidaun | |||||
| Date: | 11-09-2014 | Time: | 07:23 h | Σ Time: | 124:44 h |
| Distance: | 141 km | Σ km: | 2567 km | Temp: | 21/36 °C |
| Up: | 1265 m | Σ Up: | 26331 m | Calories: | 3225 kcal |
| Down: | 1250 m | Σ Down: | 26217 m | Σ kcal: | 57364 kcal |
| Conditions: | A tough one. It was said that the road conditions weren’t good, which turned out to be the case for a major part of the day. But what made it more difficult was the strong blowing headwind, all day long. | ||||
The all day blowing headwind from east and the mostly bad road conditions made it a long riding day. However very quiet and scenic once we left the main road and turned into the coconut and gum tree fields. The temperatures felt really comfortable. From km 40 to 105 the road was really bad; loose gravel and rocks required full concentration at every second. However I could play out my ‘joker card’, the full suspension mode of my MTB made me ride the rocks like a Cadillac. I really enjoyed the roughness and difficulty of the ride. Cristiano wasn’t wrong when he announced the bad road conditions during the briefing, the night before. What he did not mention was, that we are riding eastwards and the wind is constantly blowing into our faces. This slowed down progress dramatically and made riding an all day and exhausting fight. Only a few of us made it to the next camp.
Lunch was setup at a nice place in the woods, where a local was boiling palm zap to make sugar and serving us fresh coconuts.
Tomorrow is another ‘killer’ stage: just 71 km, but a constant climb to 1800 m from sea level. I hope that the rest day that we have on Sep 14., will give me enough time to post photos and special reports.
