Constanze
had to leave earlier than me to get her flight, so we had another “twisted”
goodbye, because I left her apartment one hour later.
Maybe, my camera wanted to transform this situation into art, because all
photos are blurred, maybe it was just because of the bad light situation.
My first stop was the International Travel Healthcare Center of Zhuhai to get a certificate for the next cargo ship passage. I need help two times to find my way, because Mr.G doesn’t show layovers, so, I wouldn’t know if I already passed the health center on my way to the ferry, my next destination. Both times, I had good luck to meet friendly people who could speak English.
At the health center, at first, I didn’t find my passport, I had put it in one of my bags apparently randomly, because even after finding it there, I wondered how it got there.
They scanned it, took a picture of me, pinned two photos on a form with that picture and sent me to a doctor. He said, he would make a health examination according to their scheme and after that I could have my certificate, but only in the next afternoon. Sending it to Shenzhen, my next address, was impossible, but I got the information that there is a similar center in Shenzhen, too.
So, I went on to the ferry. On the way, I saw the 55km bridge that connects Zhuhai to HK since last year. The construction was very expensive and additionally took the lives of 19 workers. Only 10000 vehicles are allowed every day and I didn’t try to find out it my bike could have been one of them.
At the port, I didn’t find any non-Chinese written clue to which building I should go, but it was easy to ask. There was a check-in procedure like for a border crossing, including x-ray for the luggage. The ferry was good booked, only a few seats were empty although there is a ferry every 30min.
After 1h, we landed in Shenzhen and I expected a 34km ride to Hasmik’s apartment which is still not outside the city.
Spring festival is near
Riding on a bike was between pleasant, uncomfortable, dangerous and annoying, depending on the different situations and structures. Dangerous was not the normal road traffic, there is space enough and most drivers are not speeding, it was when I was banned to the pedestrian ways /bike lanes by police. There, you had to be very careful not to crush into bikes, motorcycles and phone-blinded pedestrians and the surface could be quite bad. And annoying were big detours caused by the bike lanes that made bends to the right when I had to go straight and I had to make big detours, so, in the end, it was 39 instead of 34km.
By the way, in my statistics that say that I made 10600km so far, I only include kilometres from moving on. In Zhuhai, Constanze and I were moving around much by cycling and all in all, I would have nearly 100km extra only by the 3days in Zhuhai.
When I arrived, Hasmik’s lessor let me in and gave me the keys to her apartment. Another strange situation. Hasmik and I had contact by WeChat, talking also about things I could need, like water. I went down for some food and when I came back, a 19l “bottle” was standing in front of the apartment ?
Hasmik, staying in Yerevan, had ordered the water online by WeChat and it had been delivered so fast…