Community: Real Life

Sand and handstands


Ants and Jo

Taxi for two from Bangkok to Brighton? Ants Bolingbroke-Kent and Jo Huxter aim to cross 12 countries by tuk-tuk, and raise £50,000 for Mind.
Entry: 10
Date: 09/07/2006

Ants and Jo are reaching the end of their trek through China - so they frolic in some dunes to celebrate.

Dunhguang, Gansu Province

Jo writes...

We have cracked China! During the first week it was a real mental and physical struggle having to deal with the long hours, heavy traffic and terrible roads. Now we are heading west, driving longer distances and coping with it well. We will be leaving China in another week, but would happily stay for longer to explore the remote northwestern provinces. Tomorrow we will hit the 7000km marker and we are making good progress and keeping to our schedule.

Today was our first real day off i.e. no hanging around to extend our visas. Around midday we went into town and I delivered my films to get developed. The climate here is very hot and dry. It's very good for sunbathing, but not for charging around sightseeing. We relaxed under a tree and had a light lunch and some tea. I am now so used to Chinese tea that I think it will be strange to go back to English tea and I never thought I would say that.

"[Ants] then celebrated by doing handstands, before we descended at full speed on sand toboggans."

In the evening, we headed to the 300 metre high sand dunes to the south of town. I have never seen such huge sand dunes before and they were really fantastic. They would have been even better had they not been quite so 'touristified'. We had to pay an entrance fee, money for our camel ride (too hard to walk up a steep sand dune as Ants later discovered), money to go sand tobogganing, money to go quad biking and then more cash when the quad bike dudes asked for a tip (cheeky monkeys). Still, we had a great time, got covered in sand and enjoyed having the spirit and energy to just be tourists and unwind.

Our guide, Jack, and I climbed a sand dune using wooden steps. Ants, however, decided to be adventurous and climb the dune itself. Two steps forward and one step back - it looked exhausting and we were glad that we had accessed the dunes on the back of our camels. Jack challenged Ants to climb the whole way and if she did he would buy her 500g of raisins and 500g of lemons. This was enough for Ants to stagger up the dune puffing and panting to claim her prize. She then celebrated by doing handstands, before we descended at full speed on sand toboggans.


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