Day 7 – Toast on the Coast
Thursday, 9th DecemberBikeShuffle: Desmonk Dekker - 007 (Shanty Town) [audio:http://shambolic.com/blog/files/2010/12/09-007-Shanty-Town.mp3|titles=007 (Shanty Town)] Trasi – 08:35Actually, I’m not quite sure where I am. Been pegging it north on the NH17 since seven this morning, passing through towns and crossing rivers like stages in a video game. I make it another 240k’s to Chaudi from here, by all accounts a sizable day. So it’s going to be less about places and more about endurance. That, and where to take a shit. Although I’m loathe to dwell on these things, it’s a simple fact. And the prospects aren’t brilliant. At least back on the coast, I’m seen as less of a freak show. The truckers that are sat in this humble hotel paid me barely a second glance. And for once, there is no crowd of guys standing around my bike, gazing at it or asking ‘how much you pay?’It's always the guys who take an interest in ‘the tourist’. Never the women. Why is that? Even in the road, where the gender imbalance is a little more redressed (as compared with places you might stop to eat – where women are always accompanied and would never initiate a conversation). But in the road, with people walking, carrying loads, goading oxen or generally going about their business, it’s always the men who look up at the sound of a different engine, or if they catch sight of the gangly freak and make eye contact, then you can be assured of a full head pivot at the very least, if not the shout or the jaw-drop that tends to happen in more remote areas. But the ladies, even if they do make eye contact, will quickly look away, either from a sense of propriety or a complete disinterest in whatever foreign thing has passed through their space. Ok, so I can test the theory now. A lady has just entered the shop with her…