For months now, each has been pedalling, alone, through sun, wind, rain, and snow, climbing mountains, crossing plains, and loading his bike onto boats to float across minor seas. Now, on a Sunday morning in August, they soldier down an unpaved Soviet road that never seems to bend. The only sound is tyres crunching on gravel; and now and then, the lonely roar of a truck hurrying between two somewheres.
The earth spins. The sun rises. Long shadows shrink into puddles of shade beneath their spinning wheels. From dawn to dusk, in every direction, the landscape looks the same.
The only thing that changes is the angle of the sun.
Then, through the shimmering heat, a blur appears on their common horizon and gradually comes into focus: a simple white box of a building on the edge of the dusty road. Next to it, a metal shipping container marked by a hand-painted word, Translation: chai khana, a teahouse, where travellers can find water, food and shade. The nearest city, on the Caspian Sea, is 380km away.
Here, under a noon Kazak sun, two sagas, by chance, eclipse.
The American is tall, 1.8m-odd, 90kg, smiling through the scraggly beard of a traveler who hasn’t seen a shower in days. He is 27 years old.
The Brit is shorter, 65kg, smiling through a blue bandana and a slightly darker beard. He is 26 years old.
“What the hell are you doing here?” says the American.
“What the hell are you doing here?” says the Brit.
This story is from the September/October 2020 edition of Bicycling South Africa.
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This story is from the September/October 2020 edition of Bicycling South Africa.
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