Tag 98: Patchwork of rice terraces as far as the eye can see

Today we planned to cover a long distance through the mountains to reach Sapa in one day. We were really excited to ride and set off early in the morning. The day started with a beautiful expansive and quite steep mountain pass. Then we reached a high valley where rice, grown in the typical Vietnamese rice terraces, stretches as far as the eye can see. We took our time here to admire the postcard-worthy views. At the end of the valley, another mountain pass led us up high, offering a wonderful view of the entire valley. On the downhill, I slipped with my motorcycle at a low speed in a muddy puddle and destroyed my relatively new headlight (again!!). Luckily, nothing happened to me except for getting all my luggage and myself really dirty. Shortly after, the rain started getting heavier and heavier. Since we had some time pressure to reach Sapa, we didn't take a break and continued riding in the rain. The rain kept getting stronger and for about 3 hours, we rode completely soaked towards our destination. As if the rain and the cold weren't enough, 40km before reaching our destination, Jan's chain slipped off the rear sprocket and got jammed. So we went to a mechanic to get it fixed. We still had to struggle uphill for the last few kilometers. We were really freezing by now and the strong wind at the summit made us shiver on the motorcycles. Completely exhausted, we reached our hotel in Sapa after 230km. Since we had only eaten Asian food for the past 5 days, we decided to have something Western for dinner.