bike ride- 18 miles of saddle soreness!

OK, now that the Tokyo trip blogs are done, i can try to catch up to the present!   Let's jump to last Saturday...   Perhaps my most ambitious biking trip to date!

Basically after my last group biking trip to Tai Mei Tuk,  I wanted to go further into the Pat Sin Leng Country Park (八仙嶺郊野公園) - past Plover Dam, all the way through the park and then back to the KCR line at Fanling...  it would look something like this:

Routemap is here: http://www.gmap-pedometer.com/?r=2050078

Wow, I'm glad I didn't make that routemap before I tried it... cause if I knew it was 18 miles, I may not have had the guts to do it....   

Well since you're reading this, I made it in one piece...   Here's another route map, with mile markers and labels:

Note the aptly named 'Incline of Death' that happens at about the 5-3/4 mile mark...

Right after you get past the Plover Dam,  the road goes up a hill... then that hill gets steeper and steeper.  I shifted down to the lowest gear and tried to keep going but after a few minutes I ultimately wussed out and had to stop and walk the last 50m or so...

when I got to the top I realized how bad it was - a 1:10 grade hill = 10%,  and if it really was ONLY 400m, that still means a verticle change of 40m (= about a 10 story building).

How bad is a 10% grade? I found this definition of hill steepness from this website:

10% grade, anyone who is not a fit and frequent rider is off their bike walking -- and anyone who is not a racer is reaching for all the extra power they've got. I guess that means I am not a fit and frequent rider  (well I did make it most of the way....)  After I stopped and caught my breath and finished half of my water,  I kept going and I was hoping that that would be the worst hill I'd have to climb...  luckily, it was...

There's no bike path here, but luckily it was late in the afternoon so there were almost no cars.  I stopped a few times to enjoy the scenery of Plover resevior... 

Almost reminded me of the Pacific Northwest...   there are a lot of BBQ grills and picnic tables spread along the way too.  We should do a picnic up here (on a weekday maybe).

After a few miles (and some nice downhill cruising), you exit on the north side of the park and towards the Sha Tau Kok ( 沙頭角) area... its real rural HK here...  rice fields, marshland, etc. 

These ponds were for fish farms i think...  nice scenery though...

This is actually really close to the border with China.  But access to the town and border crossing is controlled by the border police, so unless you have a residency permit or you're on an official border crossing bus, you can't get too close, so instead I turned west and headed back to Fanling.

I don't remember the name of this village, but there were a few really old school houses still there mixed in with the newer houses... if you zoom in on that picture you may notice the shirtless guy and the mobile phone repeaters...

This nice grassland is the view from their houses though... not bad. 

I'm hoping to go biking again on Sunday... the question is, where should I go now?  I'm thinking about Saikung...