Finally, a couple days of riding that I can actually say I enjoyed.
First few days, we rode down the urban corridor from Delhi to Agra along the Yamuna River (whichforms the suddern edge of the plain of the Ganges and eventually runs into the Ganges). The plain of the Ganges is formed where a deep trench is created by the Indian tectonic plate diving under the Asian plate (with the Himalayas being pushed up as the Asian plate gets wrinkled). The trench then fills with sediment washed down into and filling up the trench. It's wet and fertile and one of the most fertile and densely populated regions of the world. (I can attest to the density of both people, trash, cows, and Tuk-Tuks, as well as the loudest horns.) The Delhi-Agra corridor is not something that I would ever recommend someone visiting or bicycling through.
At Agra we turned west up out of the plain (never getting more than 300 meters in elevation) and escaped some of the congestion, though the cities still were dense, chaotic, and frightening for cycling. Although the area is part of the monsoon pattern, the wet season isn't very wet (well under 20 inches of precip per year) and soon we are in the Thar desert. Still dense population, for a desert, but gave some areas of riding that could be pleasant. But, so flat that some days the net elevation change was only about 10 meters.
The rock beneath the surface soil was limestone (reminded me of west Texas, but without the small valleys that cut into the limestone there), so there were lots of mines and cement factories. The modern factories looked like the towers near Lyons, CO. But there were primitive facilities with lines of human labor carrying pans of rock up a long incline to be dumped into a tower with heat and smoke coming out of it.
Days of riding the flats finally brought us to the Aravelli mountains - a long range which runs from SW to NE and ends at Delhi. There were substantial stretches of decent pavement, tolerable traffic and rolling hills with one substantial climb of 7 km at 5% av grade, with pitches up to 10-11%. There were 10 priors on Strava and I would have grabbed the KOM, but it looked like one guy must have taken a sag wagon and forgotten to turn off his Garmin (VAM near 1300 and estimated power output around 500 watts for 15 minutes). I felt crushed. The canyon was a bit reminiscent of Rist Canyon (but with cows, monkeys, dogs, pigs on the road which was only 1 1/2 lanes wide with trucks coming around the blind curves and leaving you only a foot or two of space).
They are definitely desert mountains - grass, shrub, few trees.
I had to buy some amoxicillin in a pharmacy here - about one dollar for a weeks worth. Better than King Sooper - if you don't think about quality control.
Internet is agonizingly slow, so no pictures for now.
First few days, we rode down the urban corridor from Delhi to Agra along the Yamuna River (whichforms the suddern edge of the plain of the Ganges and eventually runs into the Ganges). The plain of the Ganges is formed where a deep trench is created by the Indian tectonic plate diving under the Asian plate (with the Himalayas being pushed up as the Asian plate gets wrinkled). The trench then fills with sediment washed down into and filling up the trench. It's wet and fertile and one of the most fertile and densely populated regions of the world. (I can attest to the density of both people, trash, cows, and Tuk-Tuks, as well as the loudest horns.) The Delhi-Agra corridor is not something that I would ever recommend someone visiting or bicycling through.
At Agra we turned west up out of the plain (never getting more than 300 meters in elevation) and escaped some of the congestion, though the cities still were dense, chaotic, and frightening for cycling. Although the area is part of the monsoon pattern, the wet season isn't very wet (well under 20 inches of precip per year) and soon we are in the Thar desert. Still dense population, for a desert, but gave some areas of riding that could be pleasant. But, so flat that some days the net elevation change was only about 10 meters.
The rock beneath the surface soil was limestone (reminded me of west Texas, but without the small valleys that cut into the limestone there), so there were lots of mines and cement factories. The modern factories looked like the towers near Lyons, CO. But there were primitive facilities with lines of human labor carrying pans of rock up a long incline to be dumped into a tower with heat and smoke coming out of it.
Days of riding the flats finally brought us to the Aravelli mountains - a long range which runs from SW to NE and ends at Delhi. There were substantial stretches of decent pavement, tolerable traffic and rolling hills with one substantial climb of 7 km at 5% av grade, with pitches up to 10-11%. There were 10 priors on Strava and I would have grabbed the KOM, but it looked like one guy must have taken a sag wagon and forgotten to turn off his Garmin (VAM near 1300 and estimated power output around 500 watts for 15 minutes). I felt crushed. The canyon was a bit reminiscent of Rist Canyon (but with cows, monkeys, dogs, pigs on the road which was only 1 1/2 lanes wide with trucks coming around the blind curves and leaving you only a foot or two of space).
They are definitely desert mountains - grass, shrub, few trees.
I had to buy some amoxicillin in a pharmacy here - about one dollar for a weeks worth. Better than King Sooper - if you don't think about quality control.
Internet is agonizingly slow, so no pictures for now.
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