Tibet Day 13 - Tingri to LaLung Pass

Thurs - Oct 26 - 2006 4300m-4800m

77kms Riding Time 5hours:27mins

The dogs were out in full force last night, the well known tibetan wild dogs who love to bark, fight, near tents. I still slept well, but many others didnt it turned out. As we started out on another frosty morning, the peaks of Everest and Cho Oyu sent us off. My achilles is at its worse today, stayed stiff and cold for at least 10k, and didnt get much better the whole day. I started dead last, and kept a slow steady pace, trying to get warm, but my feet were numb all morning til I massaged them to life at lunch. Eventually I joined up with Chris, Nick, Mike, and Terry and we rode in to lunch by 1130am for a siesta and food.

The afternoon ride from 1:15 went uphill, the whole way. LaLung Pass is a beast, over 5000metres yet again, but it couldnt be as bad as Lakpa the other day that broke my spirit completely. Decided to leave nothing in the tank today since tomorrow we were told is an 'easy' day, and the start of the ultimate downhill.

The pass turned out to be one of the toughest. The freezing headwind at times sucked, and a few false summits werent fun at all. Chris was the only one in front of me at his steady Jan Ullrich like pace, and I just kept my own pace. Unfortunately my gas ran out just before the summit, suddenly I became dizzy, a little disoriented, and swerved to a stop on the bank edge. Thankfully Dr.Nick was right behind me (note:always have a doctor riding behind you if you try to blow yourself up). He made sure I was good to go after a Snickers break. He swears that the two snicker diet is the way to go on this kindof trip, so Im taking his word for it. The downhill into our camp wasnt too long, but sweet nonetheless. We were all pretty blasted (4 of us, Terry was on his way though) by the time we got there for some Masala tea and crackers. Terry rolled in looking utterly screwed, and I remembered I had told him Id give him a Snickers bar today...but we hadnt ridden together it turned out. I forced one on him and he was revived in no time.

Its our last night camping tonight. The chef somehow made a massive thank you cake, its amazing the things that they can make here in their little cook tent. One last night in the tents, our tenth night camping in all. Not sure why, but Ill miss it.