Getting into China was quite an undertaking for TWBR and we were excited to get finally get in. However, given the shear size of China and the amount of time we had been granted to get through it, we knew we were in for some long days on the road. As expected, driving in China has been an interesting experience and after about two weeks here, Steve and I are really feeling fatigued.
On top of having to cover a lot of miles, the road conditions in China further inject a healthy dose of frustration into the daily drive and basically ensure that you are not going to get anywhere fast. China is in the process of a massive highway building campaign and plans to have a majority of the major provincial capitals linked by expressways in time for the 2008 Olympics in Beijing. This is good news for Chinese motorists, and when you do find yourself on completed sections of the expressway, you are treated to some of the best roads anywhere in the world. However, because China is spending so much money and energy on these new expressways, they are letting all of the other "non-essential" roads fall apart. As a result, the current main roads linking cities and provinces are downright deplorable. In fact, I can say with complete confidence that pound for pound, China has the worst roads we have driven on during this expedition thus far and if it isn’t the lack of road maintenance that will leave your vehicle needing some maintenance of its own, mother nature seems to have a real knack for wreaking havoc on Chinese roads.
On the road again…
Sounds like a bad place to park
They were not kidding
When you do find yourself on the roads, and in many cases calling them roads is a generous moniker, China manages to jam the knife in your back a little bit deeper by charging tolls. Driving on pretty much every "improved" road in China comes at a cost and in some cases, toll booths may be as close together as one kilometer… that’s right, we recently drove a grand total of three minutes between toll gates on one stretch of road in Henan province. Given how bad some of the roads were, they should have been paying us for the wear and tear on the Toyotas… already two flat tires… but alas, we have already spent about 2,000 Yuan ($300) on road tolls and have another 1,500 miles or so to go.
At this point it seemed like we had been through 229 toll booths
Quite the growing collection of toll receipts
For write-off purposes if they can understand it
I am usually not into supporting cultural stereotypes, but to make matters worse, Chinese drivers are the worst. Driving in other countries in SE Asia proved to challenging at times, but China has completely honed in my defensive driving skills as it is downright dangerous here. Drivers in China are generally unaware of anyone or anything else on the road besides themselves and typically pull out onto a major road from a side street or alleyway without even a glance to see if doing so might include them in the 400 or so people who die on Chinese roads each day. Traffic laws are rarely followed even in front of traffic cops who are more likely to issue you a parking ticket rather than one for speeding or reckless driving. In China, drivers feel it is necessary to have their bright lights on when approaching oncoming traffic on a two-lane road at night even in a well lit urban area and the striping on the road seems to only be there for aesthetic purposes as no one really maintains their lane and purposefully seem to put their own life and the lives of a minivan full of young Chinese female gymnasts in peril.
Don’t even ask
I said don’t ask
Better him than me I guess
There do come to pass from time to time points when you think you have achieved a degree of solace by reaching a completed expressway, however, the victory is short-lived as truck drivers ignore laws prohibiting them from occupying the fast lane and collude with trucks in the slow lane to equally drive about 25 kmh side by side in a 120kmh zone. Back home we call this move a "Chinese Roadblock…" I guess you just call it a roadblock here. We also recently acquired a nice new $1,000 dent on the Thundra thanks to a guy on a moped who thought it would be appropriate to make a left hand turn directly into the passenger door of the truck.
You should see the other guy’s ride
Even when you make it to the expressway, they decide to close it sometimes
These guys ensure the expressway is anything but
As you can see, there are just a few variables preventing us from making it across China in a safe and efficient manner. Since crossing the border from Laos, we have covered a little over 2,400 miles (3,800 kilometers) and it has taken us about 65 hours of actual drive time behind the wheel to do so. That works out to an average speed of 37 mph (59 kmh) and we are only about 2/3 of the way through. Since most of the driving here in China is white knuckle driving, I am looking forward to the vast open stretches of nothing we can look forward to in Mongolia. Even if the roads are bad, which will probably be the case, there will definitely be a lot less people on them. Don’t get me wrong, the people here are amazing, but since we spend a lot of time behind the wheel, you tend to get a somewhat jaded view of that aspect of China.
