Tires (days 3 and 4)
By admin. Filed in Uncategorized |
The morning after the storm, things had pretty much cleared up. I changed my tire in the morning and rolled out of camp to find my new tube flat in the first km. Doh!
I couldn’t find the leak, so I decided to put the old tube back in since it had a much slower leak. I did find a hole in it and patched it. Then when I installed it, the pump broke another valve stem off. This put me dead last for the day, and the sweeps (Sharita and Michelle) soon came up to assist. I ended up with Michelle’s spare tube in my tire, as the police (we still have somewhat of an escort through Egypt) found a hole in my other tube, which we patched.
That got me through the day. Once I got into camp and tried to return a tube to Michelle, I couldn’t find my bag of narrow tubes. I could switch tires and use a different size, but my tires are on the roof of the truck and inaccessible until our next rest day.
The scenery is very gentle rolling hills, with not a single living thing to be seen anywhere. Oil rigs and stinky gas flares periodically break up the emptiness. The roads are clear, with tons of debris scattered along the sides from traffic mishaps that were never cleaned up. New hotels under construction stretch for miles, begging the question whether news of the global economy has reached Egypt yet.
Day four has been a fantastic day. I got a bit of a late start out of camp since I had completely unpacked my locker looking for the tubes. Even so, it was a short day. Only 90km. Easy rolling through the same scenery as before. I finished by 12:30. We have a few communal hotel rooms we can use for the showers. Some riders have opted for their own rooms. The rest of us are camped on the beach. I went for a swim and it was lovely. The extra time also meant we could maintain our bikes and do our Internet business.
Thursday, January 21st 2010 at 14:03 |
Great to follow you like this! Good job with the site, and I like the way you tell your story!