day 8: 固城 (gucheng) - 保定 (baoding) = 39,3km

I got help today, and I needed it badly:

Waking up in that sub-zero hotel room in 固城, 朱辉 came up with an idea: “Why don’t we just walk all the way to Baoding - today?” he asked me.

“Well, because it’s 35km to Baoding, we’ll never make it!”

朱辉 thought for a while: “It’s not about the distance - your bag is too heavy! We’ll put it on the bike and push it to Baoding. That way you can get your camera fixed as soon as tomorrow!”

Said and done:

There’s the backpack on my friend’s bicycle. I thought we would at least share the burden by taking turns pushing the bike, but 朱辉 only watched me push for a miserable half hour while he was amusing himself taking bird pictures:

(I actually like this picture quite a lot) - then he insisted on steering the backpack/bike all the way to Baoding by himself, navigating through taxis and police cars, fruit stands and construction vehicles, while I was behind him trying to keep up; my feet were killing me.

In the end we really made it to Baoding, and I gotta say it’s really all due to 朱辉:

I would see him in the distance pushing the bike, and I would just follow him and try to keep up. My feet would say stop! - but I would answer shut up, we’ve got to follow 朱辉!

It was nightfall before we entered Baoding, but we made it - and then help from Beijing arrived:

My neighbor and very good friend 小黑 (xiaohei): I give him a call today right before Baoding and say: “Man, I’m fucked, one of my lenses is broken, is there any way I can get it to Beijing to get it fixed?”

And the dude gets in his car with his friends 浩子 (haozi) and momo and comes down to Baoding right away to save me and my messed up camera - now that is awesome, isn’t it?

朱辉，小黑，浩子，momo，羽凌旭：

今天帮助我的朋友们：我要在这里再表达一下我对你们的感谢！你们今天给我的帮助我永远不会忘记的！这个徒步回国的计划是我的梦想，我已经想了很久，但是也不是每一个可能性我都能考虑到的，再说也不是每一个问题我都能自己一个人解决掉的。但是关键不是梦想，不是我能做到我的梦想我才能觉得自己幸福。我的幸福是有你们这些朋友，是你们让我觉得幸福！虽然我知道不要那么客气的，但是我还是想向你们说：非常感谢！！

Soundtrack: Wu-Tang Clan - “Da Mystery Of Chessboxin’”

—total: 184km