12-Jul-2008 -- Story continues from 36°N 115°E.

Have you ever wondered where that missing stylus went? Perhaps this girl has it. She has a stall on a pedestrian overpass in Púyáng City, where she offers thousands of different styluses for sale, the origin of which one can only begin to imagine.

We collect our bags from the Xīnhuá Hotel in Púyáng, and at 12:45 p.m. are on our way NE to Táiqián County (台前县). Rushing to get our second confluence in one day, we elect to engage a minivan upon our arrival in Táiqián. This not only saves us a lot of time, but also allows us to do the confluence in style and comfort, which is probably just as well, because Ah Feng is coming down with a cold.

The confluence is 13.5 km east of Táiqián. Along the way, we pass a huge haystack on the side of the road. When we reach the village of Zhāngshū'ān (张书安村), we discover that we could easily have taken a commuter bus all the way here. We mistakenly ask our driver to turn right one block before reaching the confluence street. Never mind. Our minivan parks here, and it's a walk of less than 100 m to the point, which we find right on the edge of the road.

As usual, we take the GPS photo, and the shots facing north, south, east and west. The surroundings have changed somewhat since the previous visit in November 2006. A few new buildings have been erected, and interestingly, the roadblock to the north of the confluence has been moved aside, allowing larger traffic into the street, so it's probably not as quiet as it once was. As we make our way back to the minivan, some shy but amused locals look on.

This is the last of the Hénán confluences for us. We have successfully visited them all on this trip. Now we move back to Shāndōng Province (山东省), to attempt to do the same with all the land-based confluences there.

Story continues at 37°N 116°E.