After cycling most of the day yesterday we arrived in a small town with no parks. All of the open land was filled with rice paddies. We ended up cycling past the local elementary school. We stopped in and the deputy principal was incredibly welcoming. We ended up camping  in a school last night. We had our best nights sleep so far in the tent.

This morning we headed off early as the school opened at 7am.  Robert was also very keen to get on the road as the girls at the school were literally screaming when they saw him. I think they had him confused with Justin Bieber again.

We knew we were cycling uphill all day today but we had planned out a route that followed a river so the gradient was not too bad. In a moment of utter stupidity we decided as a group to go via a short cut. The short cut made the overall trip 10km shorter but we ended up climbing 800 meters in 1.6 km. That is 1 meter climb for every 2 meters travelled. As you can imagine we ended up having to dismount and push. It was not fun.

The road also deteriorated to a point that it was a goat track. Check out the stairs on the building in the photo. I don’t think it has been used in a while.

After 2 and a half hours we reached the top of the mountain. Who would build a road over the top of a mountain, literally.

We did find a pool of water in a gorge that the boys could not go past. They climbed down the gorge for a quick swim. I can not post the photo of them swimming as someone was naked. (not me for once).

After an enormous day we climbed over 1000 meters and finally arrived at another elementary school. They are happy for us to stay but they want us to talk to the kids in the morning. Robert is not happy. Photo to come.