Fuel Efficiency

This week I broke out and took myself on a 5 day cycle tour through a heat wave *heat wave echoed in high pitch* and it is probably one of the most epic *epic* journeys I have taken so far... It was well off the beaten track, I saw 5 foreigners on day 3 at a world heritage site and all of them lived in Cambodia!  I ate a lot of chicken and rice because I haven't quite mastered the words for beef and pork just yet... Also I lost my internet connection for a few days and the rudimentary map I had didn't provide much help and so I ended up relying heavily on locals to navigate around back country roads... An irony was that I navigated away from 6th century ruins that were still standing using telephone poles carrying lines that weren't working (surely they go towards the main road). So many times I was deeply gratified by the propensity of the human spirit to connect... Some of them cracked up laughing... Some of them searched my bike for a motor... Some of them clearly thought I was just crazy.... And perhaps I was! *am!* 

Physically, it is one of the most challenging 5 days that I have put myself through. I hadn't intended it that way but because I was by myself I couldn't take the risk of getting somewhere without a guest house. Maybe one in 3 townships that I stayed at were in my photocopied lonely planet guide; therefore, my 80-120km/day goal ended up being 120-160km per day through the heat! *heat wave*. I had to re-learn a few old lessons from cycle tours gone past such as always wear long sleeves, always eat a second breakfast, and always get water when you can. I carried about 3.5 litres at a time and went through about 6 litres per day of water. Still... I think that between the four meals and 6 litres of water per day I am still a lot more efficient than a motorised vehicle. That is to say $8-10/day for food and water divided 130km/day = around 8c/km of totally renewable energy usage!

For those fellow distance junkies here is a map of where I went:

For those who like pictures: