Travel Reference
In-Depth Information
Tim, after thinking about it for a minute, told me what I should have known all
along.
'You're here, mate, so you're obviously riding this next stage. And I'm sorry,
but just at the moment I've got too much else on my mind to really get my head
around that sort of thing and talk sensibly about it. Can't we talk about it later?'
Our conversation rambled. Inevitably, we found something about which we
could disagree. We began a drawn-out argument, but neither of us had the energy to
put much passion into it. Soon it had turned into more of a rambling discussion of
each other's failings. As our anger gradually subsided into exhaustion, we became
completely blunt with each other.
'I hate it that you always disagree with just about everything I bloody say!' Tim
told me.
I conceded that he had a point, but explained that this was because I felt that
most of his opinions were couched in sweeping generalisations and were said in a
tone that really offended me.
Tim told me he understood that my regular stormy moods were a result of miss-
ing Nat, but criticised me for almost always letting them spill over onto him. There
was something to that and it worried me. I knew it really wasn't fair on Tim and I
tried to explain.
'I really am sorry that it seems like that, mate, but it's when I constantly have to
stuff around waiting for you that I miss Nat the most. And that's when I wish like
hell that I was back home!'
We carried on, until the early hours of the morning, when we simply ran out of
things to say. We agreed to work on things and to try to compromise, then slumped
into bed. After two emotionally draining weeks, things had come to a definite head.
The argument had been civilised, but the personal criticisms we'd levelled at each
other had been honest and we'd covered topics that had previously been taboo. The
steady disintegration of our friendship had been checked. Hopefully, the journey
could still be rescued. We slept late the next day and didn't get going till the middle
of the afternoon. Tim was subdued and I was still feeling brain dead, but at the
same time I was more enthusiastic about the journey than I had been for a long
time. We struggled back onto the road, then set off along the bitumen under a clear
summer sky.
We were taking the back route to Novosibirsk, which meant over two weeks of
cycling along minor roads from one out-of-the-way village to the next. The map
showed a myriad of place names and connecting lanes scattered evenly across a
