day 258: 布隆吉 (bulongji) - 双塔 (shuangta)= 32,8km

We had spent the night in a small private home that was acustomed to taking in guests over night:

Then we headed north, leaving the winding country roads and the green behind.

…diving head-first into the heat and into the dust.

The only thing interesting out there were some weird earth formations:

I figured some of them might have even been buildings once:

There was the occasional modern-day grave in the middle of it all:

Oh, and the road sucked big time, by the way:

50% was just a dirt track like in the picture above, and the other half was melted tar:

Yes, melted.

It gave our tires and shoes a whole new look though - brand-spanking new!

…

There was supposed to be this rather large lake next to the road, but we never really got close enough to see it:

It was too hot to venture off the road anyhow.

We had lunch somewhere:

And then we turned heads.

Turned heads?

How do I explain this… both Shrek and Prince Charming will know what I’m talking about: people turn their heads to look at you, either because you’re so pretty (the prince) or because you’re so…special (the other one). Anyways, people will turn their heads to get a good look.

…and they will most likely forget about anything else that might be ahead:

“Something’s wrong with my vehicle!” the driver had said after almost crashing off the bridge.

Yeah right!

The only thing we didn’t know: were we Prince Charming or were we the other one?

…

The rest of the way was just some more melted tar:

When we finally came to a little settlement, we almost lost hope because it looked so deserted:

There were people though, and a friendly shopkeeper gave us some water and let us stay in his house:

Was this an indicator that we were indeed more like Prince Charming than we were like Shrek?

…but now I’ve come to notice a considerable amount of body fat visibly hanging out over my waist in the picture above…

Maybe we were both, one Prince Charming and one Shrek.

Robozwerg says:

“I think it was the hottest and darkest night I’ve ever had in my life.”

Soundtrack: Queen - “Flash”

—total: 3392,3km