The road that leads me to Leshans is the worst I ever rode on in my life!
Bad is a compliment to the ones that first built it and then to the ones that reduced it that way.
Imagine 300 and more km of pure concrete (no iron structure in it) laid to make a road.
Then imagine to trough on it metal balls of 1 ton each.
the result......???
"the hell...!!" is all I have to say and all I could say for the 8 hours and more of hell on a bike.
My bike is a chopper, not an enduro and not really designed for extreme offroad conditions.
The road was a patch of block of concrete sticking out randomply from everywhere.
Trucks, bikes, cars (no chicken!!!) and people all going at a max speed of 20km/hr.
I am just glad it is not raining.

Some how I made it through. the bike absorbed some heavy hits and the bottom now has some visible signs. I hope all is well with the engine . I guess I will find out in the next lag.

The scenary during more than 2000 km from Shanghai changed a lot.
The west of china is greener and more welcoming. The so called development has not arrive here so deeply.
Contraddictions are more visible than ever but some of the old beautiful China is still alive.
On the way I rode through small towns that still keep the very same character of what I saw in pictures of China during the 20's and of the maoist times.
Small houses made on wood with the tipical curved chinese tiles ran along the road creating the center of town.
All houses still having some sort of shop in it and eveything still retaining the feel of the past.
Things seems not to have moved too much if not for the signs of progress always present like cocacola and the new scooters.
Everything, though, seems very quite, very serene. slow.
Beautifully slow.....
Surrealisticly all people I see are old and many still wear the mao uniform.

The west.
One of the idea behind the dam in Yizhan is to develop the west.....
scary!

[...]

[In Leshan] the main temple in the great Bhudda complex had a unique athmosfere.
Of all the many bhuddist temples I visited around China this is the only one along with one monastery in Tibet that was able to wrap me with a deep feeling of peace.
I could have stayed there forever. Just there, with the smell of incent, the river ever flowing and the presence of a strong energy.
Some say that temples , as well as churches are built on point of energy on heart.
I am not sure about all of them, but for sure this one, the one in Tibet and one I dreamed about once supposely located in india truly are.

I almost forgot about that dream.
It is like I travelled there . I was living in India when I had that dream, but I still don't know if I really went there or not.
I remember the place , every second of what happened, the faces of the holy men that spoke to me, the temple , the road to get to it, the door, the people outsite the door...
I just don't remember ever being there in reality.

Annouk could not stay longer and Chongqin became our farewell point.

On the same foggy morning that welcomed us to this very interesting city I took off.
It took me more than one hour to find my way outside the city.
As you can imagine a 30 million people city can turned out to be very big, and it turned out quite complicated to find the way out.

Averybody I asked pointed me to the highway.
Motorcicles cannot go on highways in China though, een if in this city nobody seems to know this rule.
So I ride on pass the highway entrace gate.
No barrier and nobody at the gate.
My first thought is that the highway is still under construction and so still open.

It takes only a few km for reality to struk.
A police car pulls me over on the highway. I think I am in trouble until I see the policemen laughing at me and at me being a foreigner.
I get out of it pretenting I do not understand that they were asking to see my documents and by keep asking for the way to Baojin.
The key point is always to give them a lot of respect and to look always a little stupid.

Put on the right direction by the police I ride on. Destination Leshan.
I had put Leshan on my map for the only reason that I wanted to see the biggest budda in China (actually now the biggest in the wordls after the Talibans destroied the biggest one in Afganistan not so long ago).
It starts to sound funny,.. all the biggest things in the world are starting to concentrate in China.... perhaps it's a masterplan.....

The road that leads me to Leshans is the worst I ever rode on, in my life!
Bad is a compliment to the ones that first built it and the ones that reduced it that way.
Imagine 300 and more km of pure concrete (no iron structure in it) laid to make a road.
Then imagine to trough on it metal balls of 1 ton each.
the result......???
"the hell...!!" is all I have to say and all I could say for the 8 hours and more of hell on a bike.
My bike is a chopper, not an enduro and not really designed for extreme offroad conditions.
The road was a patch of block of concrete sticking out randomply from everywhere.
Trucks, bikes, cars (no chicken!!!) and people all going at a max speed of 20km/hr.
I am just glad it is not raining.

Some how I made it through. the bike absorbed some heavy hits and the bottom now has some visible signs. I hope all is well with the engine . I guess I will find out in the next lag.

The scenary during more than 2000 km from Shanghai changed a lot.
The west of china is greener and more welcoming. The so called development has not arrive here so deeply.
Contraddictions are more visible than ever but some of the old beautiful China is still alive.
On the way I rode through small towns that still keep the very same character of what I saw in pictures of China during the 20's and of the maoist times.
Small houses made on wood with the tipical curved chinese tiles ran along the road creating the center of town.
All houses still having some sort of shop in it and eveything still retaining the feel of the past.
Things seems not to have moved too much if not for the signs of progress always present like cocacola and the new scooters.
Everything, though, seems very quite, very serene. slow.
Beautifully slow.....
Surrealisticly all people I see are old and many still wear the mao uniform.

The west.
One of the idea behind the dam in Yizhan is to develop the west.....
scary!

Too bad I had no time to enjoy the ride due to the roads.
At sunset I was truly happy to get to Leshan. The guide gives me a good hint for the hotel and after a long shower I crash.

This is how I looked when i reached the hotel.....

image

The next day it was a wonderful day.
the view of the big budda was beautiful and I anjoided an afternoon of buddist contempleations.
The main temple in the great Bhudda complex had a unique athmosfere.
Of all the many bhuddist temples I visited around China this is the only one along with one monastery in Tibet that was able to wrap me with a deep feeling of peace.
I could have stayed there forever. Just there, with the smell of incent, the river ever flowing and the presence of a strong energy.
Some say that temples , as well as churches are built on point of energy on heart.
I am not sure about all of them, but for sure this one, the one in Tibet and one I dreamed about once supposely located in india truly are.

I almost forgot about that dream.
It is like I travelled there . I was living in India when I had that dream, but I still don't know if I really went there or not.
I remember the place , every second of what happened, the faces of the holy men that spoke to me, the temple , the road to get to it, the door, the people outsite the door...
I just don't remember ever being there in reality.

At 30km from Leshan is Emeishan, one of the holiest mountains in China.
Along the road that leads to the golden temple on the pick at 3600 mtrs from sea level there are many other temples.
This is a place of pilgrimage like the central temple in Lhasa.
I am still not sure if to go there the next day.
This stop might take a couple of days and a lot of climbing.... I might leave it for another time.

From here, or there, i will go to Chendu: a key point in my map!!!!
I will be trilled to get therte. Chendu represent for me 1/3 ofthe way across China and getting there some how on schedule makes me feel very good.
From Chendu I will head north to cross the Gebi desert toward Kashgar.....

sqm..
Restless Travellers

Oggi arrivato in Leshan dopo un po' di peripezie e trovo nella mia posta un sacco di sorprese.
un sacco di belle sorprese.
trovo e ritrovo amici.
e trovo parole che mi fanno pensare, e che mi fanno rivedere il volto diei miei amici in italia.

amici.
che parola strana.
che parola unica.

di amici se ne ha tanti.
e tanti dicono di esserti amico. ma poi non ci sono mai.
o non li si sente per anni.
tutti un po' incasinati nei propri affari, rimaniamo distanti e silenziosi.
il silenzio puo' durare tanto, ma i ricordi continuano a dirti che gli amici sono la' e che se un giorno ti fai vivo saranno felici di sentirti.

e' stato per me un grosso piacere ricevere i messaggi dei miei amici.
le loro parole di sorpresa, di ammirazione, di amicizia.
ed il sapere che stanno viaggiando con me.

in mezzo a mille cinesi, tuti a giocare in rete in questo internet cafe' lacrime sono scese sul mio viso.
felice.

grazie a tutti.
sqm..

the cruise will take 2 days to Chonqing.
We get thickes only on 3rd class (the lowest) and for two days we share a 4 bed cabin with up to 9 people at one time: smokers, players, screamers, families, kids and chickens!!!
At one point I find the whole situation just beautiful and at the least entertaining.

At six am 2 days later we arrive in Chonqing: a metropoly built around the river with a population of 30 milion.
Considering that it counts so many people (this is 1/2 of italy!) I find Chonqing a very nice city and not as crowded as shanghai often feels.
To get the bike out of the boat becomes the first real worry.
Our ship dock besides another ship which is doked to the peer.
The bike is on the opposite side of the boat so we have to cross 2 boats before we can load it on the rail system being built to climb the 50 mtrs to the top of the hill.

[....]

When we finally arrive with the bike on the peer Annouk is not there. The baggages are not there, and the boat close the peer is leaving.
Ready to jump on the leaving boat I just have the time to see that also our boat already undocked and is pushing away....
what the hell is wrong with these people!!!!!!!

Left Wuhan in a gloomy day, as usual I headed towards west...

My compass does not work. Well, I am not sure, but it indicates South-East all the times... and, even if this makes me feel good since this is the direrction I have to go, I know it is not the case... all the times!

At the hotel a driver gave me indications how to get on the right road and so I go.
After not so long rain starts again and this time heavier than the day before.
The sky is darker than usual and I know this is not going to stop.
I ride on and on and the rain with me for as long as I carry on, and at almost sunset I reach the doors of Yizhan.
Yizhan is an industrial city recently getting a lot of attentions for the huge dam being built not far away from it.

At my arrival into the city i was sort of welcomed by a group of moto taxi drivers. All very nice and extremely courious of my whereabouts.
One of them decides to make some money and escorts me around to check a few hotels.
Clearly his standards turned out to be quite far from mine. Not that I am fuzzy, but the two hotels he showed me had lobbies as dark as a carbon mine could be.
After checking on my guide I pint point an hotel that seems a good choice. Re ride on for a good 30 minutes. I never so such a long city! Growing along the shores of the river, it is very long and narrow and really seems neverending.

The hotel is a very simple tipical chinese hotel. The girls at the doors are nasty and unpolite, the guards very nice and curious about the bike and here ..... there was also a car wash!

In the past 50km to yizhan rain stopped, but wet roads and all the rain during the day made me very tired.
On the bac kof the hotel, under a cluody sky i decide to wash my bike as well.
The car wash is composed of 2 guys, some pipes for the water and a room built on the corner of that hotel's backyard.
By the time I unload all the bags and I am ready to have the bike washed the usual crowd has gathered around me.
The guards are actually very nice and take care to keep the onlookers away from the bike so that the washing could take place.
Both the washing guys decide to take care of business and I help them along and one of them starts talking to me in a mix chinese/english.
He never spoke to a foreigner before and he is quite exited and eager to get to talk to me.
We sort of exchange the basic information and he doesn't want to charge me anything for the washing.
He just asks me if I want to go out with him and his girlfriend that evening.
I smile and agree to the proposal.

About 10 kg of mud were stuck all over the bike! Bad roads and lots of water had trown mud on each corner of the bike and of the poor teddy bear. (my only travelling companion).
The security decides that the bike cannot stay outside for the nite and they find a place inside the hotel's boiling room.
I was happy of the arrangment even if I have to say I got a little worried about the fact that if the boiling room would blow up the bike would go with it as well!

Avening falls and by the time I make it to the room rain reaches Yizhan.
After 3 days of rain I am in no mood to go on the next day under the rain and I decide that if it rains I will stay in yizhan for a day.

So it went.
When I woke up at 6am the following morning rain was knocking at the windows.
The nite before I went to visit Xiao Wuan at the car wash and told him I was tired.
We renewed the appointment for the next day, so i went down to get him out of bed.
the room in the corner of the backyard is the car wash, his office, storage for detergents and tools to clean cars and home to him and his friend.
He jumps out of bed in seconds and some how decides he will take the day off to go around the city with me.
Under the rain he takes me around motorcicle shops to find handle gloves (this is a chinese invention unfortunately not yet known in italy) and waterproof boot covers.
Shopping is succesfull and i decide to invest also in a air drier. Not too much to dry my air but to dry all the staff that gets wet and that I have to wash along the way.

Riding under the rain is not fun even if sometimes can give you some mystical moments.
I tried to prepare my equipment and the bike the best I could.
Of all the enanchments the ones that turned to be so far the most useful I could think of have been the elongation of the edges of my riding pants to cover most of the shoes and the frame that has proven to be so far very good and flexible.

The addition of handle gloves and bootcovers will make for the missing parts.
It is mid day, Xiao Wuan and I have a quick bite and then I suggest to go see the new dam.
The biggest dam in the world.
A project that employees 30,000 workers and that when complete will create a lake of about 500 km long all the way to Chonqing.
Leaving aside the details of what happened in the 1 hour trip to get there the image of the dam under construction was impressive.
It is big and most of all once again it reflect the determination and ability of the Chinese to conceptualise and undergo massive construction project.
The dam is just under construction for a few years but the base structure is already terminated.

Back to Yizhan I tell Xiao Wang that i would like to go and find an internet cafe'. but he insists that we had dinner first.....
To my surprised he treated me for a dinner in his "home". He ordered 3 dishes and the rise, he cleaned the little table and prepared 3 chairs for me , him and the other guy.
I was very impressed by this and I could see the pride in his eyes.

During the day I wonder what to do the next day , when..... while driving along the river on the way to the dam I see a cargo ship on the river.
"Xiao Wuang, can i put my bike on a boat and go to Chonqing?", I ask.
After some research and a visit to the cargo port all was set.
If needed I had to go there the next morning at 7 and the guy at the port will take of care of the deal......
I could not see the boat he referred to but i sort of trusted the guy.

That day Annouk decides to fly to Yizhan to join me for the following 3 days.
Riding on to chonqing and eventually to Leshan is the idea, even if we both know that if rain persist boat will be the choice.
I am happy she arrives.

The next morning it rains.
The boat becomes the choice not to spend another day in Yizhan and to keep my schedule.
My visa to pakistan will expire at the end of may.

Arrived at the peers we find out the boat is a passenger boat. Mr zhang, the guy organizing the whole thing bribes the guy on the boat and we hire a few porters to get the bike on.
This is a passenger boat with no access designed for cars , motorcicles or anything with weels......
but in china miracles do happens....like when we had to get it off at destination.

the cruise will take 2 days to Chonqing.
We get thickes only on 3rd class (the lowest) and for two days we share a 4 bed cabin with up to 9 people at one time: smokers, players, screamers, families, kids and chickens!!!
.. and it was very cold too!!!

image

At one point I find the whole situation just beautiful and at the least entertaining.

At six am 2 days later we arrive in Chonqing: a metropoly built around the river with a population of 30 milion.
Considering that it counts so many people (this is 1/2 of italy!) I find Chonqing a very nice city and not as crowded as shanghai often feels.
To get the bike out of the boat becomes the first real worry.
Our ship dock besides another ship which is doked to the peer.
The bike is on the opposite side of the boat so we have to cross 2 boats before we can load it on the rail system being built to climb the 50 mtrs to the top of the hill.

loading an unloading of boat in china can be very chaotic and very fast. In a few minutes everybody is gone and the captain is in a rush to leave.
I am sitting on the bike now 1/2 a way along the side of where I had it.
the idea is to take it to the front and then some how all teh way around and up!
we hire 4 porters. they claim they can do it.
the bike is really heavy. I still don't see how this cn happen.....

Armed with banboo stick and nylon ropes here they go. I set the ropes in the key point and 2 on each side lift it.
"Magic!" , as I often say in China.

image

While we move the bike over obstacles, anchors, across the other boat and of the the stairs Annouk take care of taking photos of the process and of offloading the baggages.

When we finally arrive with the bike on the peer Annouk is not there. The baggages are not there, and the boat close the peer is leaving.
Ready to jump on the leaving boat I just have the time to see that also our boat already undocked and is pushing away....
What the hell is wrong with these people!!!!!!!

I start screaming at the guys who let the boat and I force them to show me where the boat is going.
"There." they say. "farther down the river where the gas stations are...."
I cannot see it.

Thank to technology and to mobile phones Annouk and I meet some time later. She is waiting on the edge of the road with all the baggages and helmets. I am happily riding along the city with no helmets in the sunny, foggy early morning.....

the two days boat made the trik. Rain seems to have faided for the time being and I did not lose two precious days.

sqm..
Restless Travellers

Time seems to become lighter and less and less important.
At my 4th day of trip I reached Wuhan, another huge metropoli somewhere on my way.
Not much to see here apart from the frenetic life of China getting richer and richer every minute.

Leaving Tonling this morning i didn't know what to expect.

My 2nd day of riding has been a up and down of rain and very very bad roads.
After I left houzhou 3 days ago I headed to Tongling to find out after 100k that there were to cities that souded just the same: Tonling and Tonli.
For the ones that speak chinese it might sound quite funny. For someone like me, for whom chinese is still a bit of a mistery it turned out to be a nightmare.

Time seems to become lighter and less and less important.
At my 4th day of trip I reached Wuhan, another huge metropoli somewhere on my way.
Not much to see here apart from the frenetic life of China getting richer and richer every minute.

Leaving Tonling this morning i didn't know what to expect.

My 2nd day of riding has been a up and down of rain and very very bad roads.
After I left houzhou 3 days ago I headed to Tongling to find out after 100k that there were to cities that souded just the same: Tonling and Tonli.
For the ones that speak chinese it might sound quite funny. For someone like me, for whom chinese is still a bit of a mistery it turned out to be a nightmare.

After leaving Houzhou I rode on the illusion of a beautiful state road and a fairly good day. destination Tonling.......
The main reference point was a city called Wuhu: well marked on the map it is supposed to be a middle size city and therefore be connected by fairly good roads.
...however, after about 50 km the road disappeared under my weels.

A little puzzled in front of the only intersection in front of me I ask for some direction and the crowd gathered around me says that the only way to wuhu is on the right.... and they all advise me NOT to go there with a motorcicle.

I am not sure if they meant it or not. All i know is that for the next 50k I find myself totally off road full of mud and pot holes. Truks, cars, motorcicles (yes, them as well....) 3 weelers , dogs, people and so on crowling as they could in the effort to cross this fantomatic hill...
In the meantime rain starts and at that point stopping was not even an option.
Once on the other side of the hill (quite high and long hill!) I reached an intersection... and .. surprise, a new road.
I mean new because it was not marked on my map and seemed to lead directly to Tonlling without going to Wuhu.
I choose to go that way and try to ride on a little faster.
After one hour ride not seeing anymore direction and with the rain becoming heavier I decide to stop at a gas station to ask and to rest a little.
At first the couple looked at me like I just felt from Mars. This is indeed not unusual for a foreneir in China, but what struck me it was her.
The lady: an older woman thet could be the mother of the guy that looks at me intensively. Her look was not couriosity, but worry.
After a few minutes, and a few approaches like someone in the jungle trying to approach a tiger of a strange animal of whom she does not know the reactions, she offers me some tea and a sofa chair (yes, a sofa chair) to sit on.
I smile, very happy to have a place where to rest and a hot cup of green tea, while i wonder what to do next.
I am very tired and it is now about 3pm.
According to the guy Tonli is 2km back, Tonling is 20 ahead. The rain does not seems to stop and the lady offers me to eat and sleep at the gas station for the night.
Even if i really appreciate her offer and even if I really consider this as an option I decide to ride on and o reach destination.

In the room of the hotel I just have to time to blow up (it caught on fire!) the air drier the hotel landed while trying to dry my shoes... (yes, because Timberlands AIN'T WATERPROOFFFFFF!!!) then it was darkness, outside the hotel and inside me.

I closed my eyes happy to have a roof on my head.

The next morning it was the same grey sky.... the same ... grey.. gloomy... sky.
When I opened the first eye at 6am it was too cold and seemngly still too nasty to even consider to take off.
Around 7.30 when also my second eye opened I noticed it was grey, but not rainy.
Once downstairs someone's driver was very nice and wrote me in chinese the names on the cities on my way. (I only have a map in english, yes, no chihese manes on it, and this makes the whole project a littel more complicated. thank good though there are a lot of nice people in China: always surprised to see someone like me arriving they are usually happy to help)

Not even after 15 minutes after i take off the rain starts again.
No turning back.
Today is one of my longest lags. I did not want to think about it and just rode on.
If it hadn't been for the rain the ride would have been very nice. The roads were quite smppth and for a long part quite curvy. a good ride for a sunny day....

but !!!! what the hell is a chicken doing in the very middle of the street!!!!!!!!
....
...
...
..
.
.
.
.
bloody chickens!!
.
.
.
....
.
.
After about 240 km I reach a city called susong (or something like this) the name of this city almost became a mirage. I kep seeing the signs, but I seemed never to arrive.
On the way the scenery was not vey exiting. A lot of very ugly chiese houses along the roads. Most of them new, they witness part of the new China today. They represent the next step for the new Chinese middle classin being able to own their home. From how the houses look it is clear that the priority is not appearance, but just to build it somehow to have a roof on the head and a block of bricks on the land. All they are after all is indeed a blok of bricks since most of the houses are not finished and they alook from the outside like a naked wall of bricks.

I ride on for a little more until i see the sign: Wuhan 240 km.
240 km!!!
It is now 2pm. It does not stop raining and I am 1/2 way. For a moment I consider to find an hotel and stop for the night.
This time I stop to ask a police man. Usually not a good idea in china, this time he was the only one around. He turned to be also very nice and he wrote me a new map. A new, apparently faster way to reach destination.
Just the time to get the info, a few xie xie (thank you) and i took off as fast as I could after the police men started to ask me info on my registration, plate and so on.

Further down the road I stop at a gas station and some how i decide to carry on to the next city. According to the new map I have another 140 km to go. I start to be tired. Riding with rain is no fun. Before I leave I change my socks and insert inside my shoes (which are still not waterproof!! ) some plasic bags.
The trick does it and I ride on with dry feet.
Town after town they are one smaller than the other.
The road though improves a lot allowing me to keep an everage speed on 100k. The rains slows down and the ride becoeme easier.

what the hell!!! another chicken's doing in the middle of the road....!!!
...
...
..
what is wrong with chicken in China!!!
..
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.

.
.
.

I keep riding for a little while...

What is that!
Feathers?
They are all over the road...
.
.
.
.
.... that's another chicken!
still in the middle of the road!!
.
.
.
.it's smashed!
..
.
.
.
.
.
...... morons......

At 6.00 pm I am on the outskirt of Wuhan. Like happened a few times the nice and wide road suddenly stops in front of a pile of mud supporting a huge billboard of chinese propaganda!
No more signs, only 5 direction.
I have to try 4 of them before I was reassured I was on the right way.
After 508 km i stop at an hotel after a day of rain avoiding dogs and chickens on the road.
When I mark the km on my schedule I notice with some pride that the km calculation that i made with pencil and ruler based on my map is as accurate as a gps! lets hope it will be as accurate for the rest of the trip.

The doormen at the hotel was kind anough to show me to an internet cafe. China never stops to surprise me.
We go together on the back road into a maze of dingy and dark halleys. It rains again and all is very dark. A red sign at the end of one of the hallyes indicates something the guy points at. It is in Chinese. I have no idea what it means. I tell the guy let go see. For a moment I have the feeling he understood I wanted to get a massage.....

On the second floor of this little house a huge room full on computers opens to my eyes.
"cool!!!!!" was all I could say.
The conneciton is faster than in Shanghai and here i am, leaving you some notes.

hopefully tomorrow will not rain anymore. Here it is now 9 pm and i don't know where to go buy an air dryier.

tired but happy
sqm..

ps:
The first day of the trip the "Shanghai red devils" rode with me for 1/2 the first lag.
I appreciated a lot their coming. At the time of our last "salut" I had to go left, they had to go right.
Standing there with Annouk I saw them off.
One by one they waved me goodbey riding off on their bikes. I felt empty for a long moment......
somehow I knew this was the very beginnig of the trip and that the devils were not there to suport me from there on.

I arrived at the first destination and spent a day resting and setting up several things on the bike that i could not do while in Shanghai.

image

today i also had time to sew the Restless Travelleres and Instancabili Viaggiatori patches on the bags and jacket.

image

Tomorrow the next lag.

There are many things i would like to write after the first day...
I will have more time later on.

For now i leave you with a sentence that Vittorio reminded me about....

"A journey of a thousand miles begins with a single step".

-- Confucius

My story, briefly, starts after my graduation from the University of Florence in Italy. Already at that time a force inside me has brought me to look beyond the borders of my town and of Italy. I didn't have a specific direction to look at, perhaps it was just towards the unknown, but it was surely far where I was looking.

This force became desire and made me live in several countries and continents: from New York, Boston, Columbus - Ohio, to India and now to Shanghai, China.

I never understood how certain desires are born and how my nature brings me to want to live in the world, where the world is my home and I am his guest and explorer. I accept and follow my instinct because I recognize that traveling is for me, life itself.

Crossing China we will go through the silk road visiting the cities of Leshan, Xiahe (perhaps Xi抋n), Dunhuang and so on across the Gobi desert to the border region of Xinjiang until we will reach Kashgar: the last mythical outpost city on the Chinese silk road. From there we will enter the Karakorum mountain that will lead us to Pakistan through the Karakorum highway.

Built on a colossal joint project that saw Chinese and Pakistani alike working and dying together for a common cause, the Karakorum highway goes from Kashgar to Islamabad covering its highest point at the Khunjerab Pass at 4700 meters on the border between China and Pakistan.

Gilgit, Kamila, Taxila and Quetta will be only some of our stops in Pakistan. We will visit cities like Rawalpindi and Peshwara: two cities that once upon a time were the doors of culture and commerce between Central Asia and South Asia, today unfortunately publicized only for current political events.

Passing through Quetta we will go towards Iran that still holds all the beauty of the Persians and the influence of the Assyro-Babylonians.

Before reaching Tehran we will stop in mythical cities like Ban, Persepolis and Esfahan where we will be able to witness the very much alive Persian culture. This is a unique opportunity to visit this country not as a tourist but as a traveler, in contact with the people, their customs, witnessing the changes that are even happening there, in this modern cradle of the past.

A long stop will be dedicated to Persepolis, a mystical city that, almost forgotten in the folds of the past, is today still there to witness its past richness of culture and beauty; a symbol confirming how this heritage is not dead, but still lives in what once upon a time was called Persia.

This testimony will have its peak in Tehran, capital symbol of an Islamic modernism that wants to open to the world to show once again its splendor and its glamour of ancient customs still alive in what in the west we call postmodern age.

Tabric will take us on the road to Turkey, Empire of the Ottomans and today one of the most intriguing and fascinating places touching Europe. Dagi, Mersin, Ankara and Istanbul will be only some of the stops we will make before crossing the Bosphorus on the way to Alexandroupolis in Greece.

Greece, with its ancient city-states and its modern European life, mixed with the relaxation of the Mediterranean life and culture, will be our door to the heart of the Roman Empire.

After about 130 days of traveling, 18,000 km covered across 5 countries we will be on the doorstep of Italy, now not too far from my hometown, Lavagna (Genova) with a few more weeks left to explore the myriad of corners witnessing the past of the glorious Romans and the reality of medieval towns that are still part of Italy抯 daily life.

This is a trip to understand that perhaps it is true that all is relative, relative to life itself and to the people that live it in each of their realities. A trip to understand that perhaps real problems are not only the ones that we see in our comfortable developed world, but that they are, in a more realistic scale, the ones that, at the end, tie the people of these countries to their very existence.

This is a trip that was born in me and that slowly I saw connected to the reality of other people I know.

A dream, the will of wanting to do it and, one day, the simplicity of having said, 搕his is the time?

A trip that I wanted to share with people who, like me, have the passion for traveling. People for whom traveling is not a hobby, a status symbol, or an escape, but is a way of being; for whom traveling is part of them, if not life in itself.

So I started sharing this idea talking to friends, gathering their emotions, their expression of surprise, their worried eyes, and the signs of fear in front of what many judge as madness.

Then I thought I could to more if I could also share my emotions and this unique experience through the pictures I take, and using my ability to catch on film the moments, the smiles, the situations and the emotions, seeing sometimes what others don抰 see in the diverse cultures and people I will meet.

The ideas are many, the images and the story will surely be unique.

But most of all it will be the opportunity to share this with others.

My plan is to start from Shanghai in mid-April of 2002.

Stefano

Restless Travellers.