Arriving in Shenzhen at lunch time, it took us only all day to get to Hong Kong. Thanks to the bikes it wasn’t too far to get to the border (maybe 10 oder 15k?) but I wanted to have a last lunch in China and finish off the mangos I bought in Zhaoqing the day before.
And I was reluctant. I didn’t want to leave China. So we were loitering in front of the big border building for a bit.
Getting through went smoothly without any hassle – and then we took a wrong turn. A turn I thought that was impossible. We were outside. I was convinced that there is no outside. There is only the metro to get out.
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Excursus: The non-existing-exit
Two and half years ago I arrived in Shenzhen for the first time and asked on the Hong Kong side for the exit – I was determined to cycle. But was told by the tourist information lady “You can’t go outside. There is no exit. You can only take the metro.” I was frustrated but since she was very firm on this being the only option – I sucked it up and pushed my bike to the metro. (This is actually one of my favourite stories of my Shanghai-Singapore-bicycle tour.) And that’s were it got hilarious. I was told, I could not take the metro with my _BI_cycle.
So I was stuck. I could not go back to mainland China for not having a visa. I could not exit the border station as there was no exit. And I could not take the metro which was the only way out towards Hong Kong where I could get a visa to go back to China…
I did the only sensible thing that was to do at a situation like this – and started laughing.
For some reason this sensible reaction caused some confusion so I got explained again that I was not allowed to take my bicycle onto the metro. I explained that I perfectly well understood what I was told. And that I was stuck.
And then I learnt some magic. I got handed a tool to take off my front wheel. Because something that has only one wheel attached to it, cannot be a bicycle anymore.
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So you might understand my confusion of being outside at a bus port. But since we agreed upon no more cycling than was inevitable this was not the option I wished for this time.
Magic!
Only took us about an hour to find our way back to the metro, going some no-return-lanes the wrong way and squishing into elevators.
Yepp, that’s Niklas and his bicycle with all it’s wheels in it’s appropriate places on the bus. I was pretty impressed and didn’t think we would ever find a bus driver who would allow the bike on board regardless of it’s wheels.
