Sooty Old Coal 2 of 2

Wet and wonderful Germany



Its amazing to think back on all the nice people that have given me nice things, let me stay at their houses and generally looked after Doris and I. So much so that I have almost come to expect the best of people and when it does not happen it seems to come as such a shock. Crossing northern Germany I was thwarted by a canal or two. Mostly large ribbons of ocean snaking their way through the very low lying inland areas and fairly easy to work out where the crossings were. One such ferry crossing happened on a rather shitty day. There was some anger in the sky and the rain fell incessantly all through the morning and into the afternoon. The wind drove the soaking rain into my face and never was there a let up throught the struggle to make the kilometers I wanted.



Oh Doris



I waited momentarily for the crossing on the deck of the barge and even took the time to give the old girl a once over and fix something to eat. As I was at the front the two cars and two trucks that made up the front row watched me go about my tinkering. The boat got underway and out of the relatively sheltered cove bay and into the main channel the wind began to tear across the deck reducing visibility and causing me to hunker down behind the leading wall at the bow. As the wind increased the waves that shook the hull sent frozen spray over the wall, over my head and saturated the cars. Still they watched. I thought I could ask to sit in one of the cars but I also thought I would wait and see if one of them asks me to come and join them. Alas there was no luck in this ploy so while the warm drivers of their vehicles continued to watch, the wind and waves soaked Doris and I sending a might chill all the way through to the very bones holding it all together.

Here moosey moosey moosey

People are quick to come and start a conversation with me when I am standing outside a petrol station or a supermarket and the other day as I was doing just that when a man sturck up a conversation about cycle touring. We were chatting about some trivial things like the start of the second world war and the fall of the soviet union when a land dismounted her bike came over with purpose put what looked like donald trumps hair piece in my hand and said "warm in winter cold in summer, have a good trip"?? It wasn't until the man joked that I should not put it on my head that I realised it was a bike seat cover made from sheeps wool.

Furry Wet seat

So here is some of the new plans that are zipping around that little head of mine. It seems that there are changes in the air. It has come about through no real fault of my own that the original idea to get work in Scotland has fallen through and failing any really good reason to stay in the Uk I have decided to continue the bike ride. Given that the very lose original plan was to complete the ride after 6 months and 6000km in the Czech Replubic I see no reason why adding another 2 months to the extra 1 already taken care of to this point couldn't be a good idea. So here is what will happen. In a few days I will reach London where I plan on staying for a few days

The cat wanted to Ride The doris

. I will move from there with Doris (assuming nothing else breaks with her) to Perth, Australia where I will take on the Snakes, Spiders and tree less heat of the plains across to Melbourne where I shall take another jet to the land of milk and honey, landing in Christchurch and make my way to the greastest place on earth. That of course would be Te anau and the gateway to Doubtful sound before taking my leave and heading to the winding, hilly, stunningly brilliant vistas of the westcoast road heading north to Nelson where I shall finish 9 months after starting in the exact same place. I have been accepted to the Nursing Degree Programme at the Nelsom Marlbrough Institute of Technology and thus will be getting home for the start of Feburary.

Very Dutch

 I will be writing a summary of my European adventure upon getting to London so until then keep your toes warm and your tires pumped up and think of me as you are having a nice cold beer in the sun. Unless you are reading this from europe where you will be inside as it is cold as balls outside.

Sooty Old Coal 1 of 2

Riga by night

As I have been pushing my way through the festive streets of Northern Europe I have been thinking about ginger christmas cookies, trees with lights, presents and that sort of carry on. A thought came to mind about the preverbal lump of coal that should one day find its way into a persons stocking. Firstly you would be excited, 'oh, a lump of coal'!! 'I can light it up when the temperature turns chilly outside and warm the house for my friends and loved ones' Then as you turn the carbon brick over in your hands and realise there is a sooty black residue everywhere and accompanied by a nasty smell and acrid smoke as you light it up you think, this isn't that great, infact its not nice at all.

Bay Of Riga

Using this line of thinking I might well be putting Doris in the stocking of a person whom I despise. "oh my goodness, how wonderful, a bike" Somewhat shiny and looking the part the recipient would jump on and feel the wind in their hair until suddenly and for no good reason Doris would become a lump of coal. She would tear, creek, snap, break, bend, buckle and all because you were using her as directed...ish.



Baltic Sea. North of Riga



So there I was out of the saddle and getting myself and Doris with all her winter weight up a small undulation in Sweden that felt like mt Everest after the flatness of the baltics when without warning my right foot gave way and I very closely gave up having children on my top bar. A quick glance behind and I saw the peddle on the ground and initially I thought I must not have tightened it properly when they were replaced a week or so ago. However it did not take me long to realise that I had broken the crank in half, an injury that is neither common or try as I might, fixable in the field. So I walked, scooted and glided the 10km in the pitch black into the next small town where I set up camp and made my way to the bike shop in the morning. Not opening until 12pm I was sitting outside when some old ladies convinced me to move into the small mall where I would be out of the negative temperatures. As I sat there making a hat or two I was inundated with visitors one of which called me crazy and invited me to the soup kitchen right before her partner dropped beer all over my bread. They of course were the local homeless and nutty as a fruit bar and indeed calling me crazy. I left this featureless corridor to the supermarket as they are always good for warming to toes when I was approached by an aging lady of slim build and a healthy demenor. I explainied my problem and you wouldn't have guessed it but she was selling her brand new crank set which we found out later fit my bike less than perfectly but fit none the less. The bike mechanic only had the tools to do the job as this lady, Susan had wanted her crank replaced last season and thus he ordered and used them for the same reason twice.

Baltic Sea

Making my way out of Sweden and into Danmark I was simply shocked at the treatment cyclists get there. There are lanes and lights everywhere and get this, the drivers actually look for bikes when they make turns. It helps that there are almost as many cyclists at a given intersection as there are cars so I suppose a strength in numbers is assumed. In Danmark you just choose the direction you wish to travel and there will be a cycle path along that route. Too easy.

Fancy that. Fixing Diris in the cold

Currently I am in Holland having made my way through the north of Germany, Danmark and Sweden. Joy and I crossed to Stockholme from Tallin having ridden the Baltic Coast through Lithuania, Latvia and Estonia of copurse coming all the way through Poland. A big shout out to Joy all the Way from New York City who was with me for just over 5 weeks and amassed almost 3000km in that time. Pretty awesome for a big city gal. Thanks Joy and thanks for the post you put up last week.

Read on the next blog to see what the plan is from here. I have also posted the photos that Joy added with her post.

Joy to the world

"A Joyous Perspective"

Greetings to the followers of the Sore Bum!

Beach fire

Joy here. I've literally followed (and been followed by at times) the Sore Bum from Berlin to Stockholm. Ben's indulged me for the moment, and given me the opportunity to describe for you some of what goes on between the adventures he's been relating. I hope you will find the banality a bit interesting.

Yum yum, pastries and coffee!

Our days began with a reluctant emergence from the cocoons of our toasty sleeping bags. Change into the cycling clothes, eat breakfast of cereal and fruit and yogurt, pack up camp, ride bikes! Ben certainly spent the six months prior to my arrival honing his packing skills and developing an efficiency that I couldn't come close to matching. Although he did wear shorts for all but 2 of the days we cycled together, while I stacked on layer after layer against the ever-plummeting chill, so any head-to-head competition in preparing for the day would have been immensely tipped in his favor at the outset.

Even with all the baked goods....

Lunch!

With easy riding and favorable conditions, we trucked along nicely at the outset of most of our days. Until we would encounter a larger town with a bakery or grocery store, that is. Without any kind of certainty that we'd encounter another such oasis at some point that day, stopping in to pick up a pastry or six became a habit that will not be an easy one to let go of. A bit more riding before we would stop for lunch: I'd lay down a sarong and we'd make sandwiches in the sun or in a shelter from the wind. We spread our spread on many a bench of village greens, in bus shelters, next to lakes, even once in the lobby of an office building when a brief respite from the cold and wet was needed as much as the caloric fuel. Eating became something I looked forward to beginning from the last bite of any meal break, and it took me far too long to realize that Ben was munching snacks at a near-constant pace out of his handlebar bag. I was quick to follow suit.

Who's in the lead?

Back on the bikes for more riding through farmland and forests; along orchards and strawberry fields; past heaps of harvested root vegetables and lines of lettuces ripped from the ground leaving only a bed of soup greens behind to wilt into the soil. In every small village we passed through, we were greeted like heroes home from war with a ticker-tape parade by the domesticated (though unmannered) animals. The barking would spread from house to house as we rolled through, and the dogs would deepen the runways they'd grooved next to the fences that (usually) held them at bay. A squirt from the water bottle was often necessary to prevent the unfenced and unleashed canines from becoming our traveling companions. The cows would turn their heads, slowly following us with their fixed gaze, before occasionally letting out a surprisingly loud moo. Chickens seemed the only ones nonplussed by our presence, and I spent a great deal of time contemplating why the chicken did not actually cross the road. One does tend to have some pretty deep thoughts when spending most of one's day on a bicycle.

Dead ends

Tourist games

Navigation proved to bring its own adventure. I got a big kick out of the days when we had an enormous distance to our next destination and we picked a direction and ambled generally along it. We used what tools we could: maps, road signs, and bicycle path signs; on sunny days, we followed our long shadows north; we chased rivers downstream toward the sea or kept them as best we could to one side of our path; we encountered dirt and gravel roads that we would take a gamble in following. Ben asked once how long I'd be willing to try one such road. "Let's just commit to it, it's gotta lead somewhere", I replied, which was usually true. Except when that somewhere was a river bank with a long-gone bridge, a sand quarry, or a house at the end of the multiple kilometer long driveway. We did manage to continue along in a forward motion most of the time...only twice did we find ourselves riding in circles when trying to make our way out of a city.

Don't cry over spilled yogurt.....eat it!

Working for posterity

As the sun sank slowly, we would look for a place to call home for the night. We managed to find some exquisite campsites that people would have waited in line to camp at in warmer weather. We'd set up camp and cook dinner. If there was wood and a bit of seclusion, we'd have a fire to make staying outside the tent past dark bearable. We'd read, write in our journals, discuss the finer points of life, make a treat of rice pudding or popcorn. before diving into our sleeping bags for the long cold night.

So there you have a bit of the routine that we fell into. I hope all of you who know Ben can appreciate what I've endured, er, "experienced" in our travels without either one of us resorting to physical violence. Big thanks to Ben for letting me share in a good bit of his adventure (and for letting me make use of so much the gear he carried), and may fortune continue to be his constant companion!

Joy

Baltic Slug

nice fellows at lunch in Lithuania

I am beginning to think that the color of the sky here in the north eastern Europe is actually grey. The conversation would go as follows. Hey Fred, hey mike, great weather we are having. I know mate, I looked out over the lapping waves of the Baltic sea today and I could barely see anything. just multiple shades of grey..... It is true however that there is a certain beauty to behold when the sun does glint through the thick stratus clouds and warms the disjointed secondary roads that we a have been following for the last week or so.

Doris waiting at the Baltic, Lithuania

Joy and I thought we would be clever and follow cycle path that cuts along the ocean but what we found was hands down the most challenging road I have come to thus far. Its fair to say that I have had my fair share of challenging riding and it is a testament to Doris that she is still ridable at this stage of the game. This road being that it was only meters back from the beautiful exposed beach was of course very sandy and in places far to deep to ride. We took our chances on a path that led away from the beach but it introduced us to a grassy road with hidden bogs lurking just under the green surface. These sometimes caught us weary bike riders off guard and at one point Doris sunk up to her hubs with little more than a squelch of warning. Once through this smelly watery mess we made a farm crossing that was so riddled with pig scratchings and cattle hoof divots that it was akin to riding over a large golf ball. At least I think it would be. And thus, out the other side we popped into Latvia and headed for Riga where we are now.

a slippery bridge

Lithuania/Latvia

Doris has taken some TlC after breaking a pedal which I managed to completely open only to discover that the bearings were so worn they were not even round. In fact if you took a peanut M&M and dropped it from a mouth height it may start to look like these particular bearings did. Needless to say I bought a new set against my will only to discover that my foot cages would not fit until I found and used a discarded fan belt and manipulated it to my needs.

Start of the worst road ever

After a quick dip in the rather refreshing Baltic to continue my quest to swim on all sides of the Eastern Europe land mass we made a camp in the sparse pine trees adorning the coast but close enough that the refreshing and beautiful smells and sounds so familiar to the coast dweller I once was. It is great to be back where the sand is beneath ones feet and the foamy water tickles at ones toes.

 Further to my trying to fit in with the locals, as well as learning what words I can when I get into a country I am growing what I have termed a Baltic Slug. That is to say I have shaved my delicate face with the exception of a slug or soup strainer as it were above my upper lip. I have been known to give a cheeky cheer when I see a local (often swigging from a plastic bottle of beer) when they are also sporting the same facial do.

Joy and I have the good fortune to ask some lovely small towner's if we could use their fishing hut to get out of the wind for lunch. After they had created a bench and a couple of chairs by lugging large freshly cut rounds of wood under the awning they took off in their car to return a few moments later with hot water in a flask, arabian coffee and a micky of brandy to wash back the chills of the afternoon.

Riga, just in case you did not know

The weather has been extremely friendly considering the day time temperatures are and have been hovering between 0-5deg. I continue to be told by animated locals that it is uncommon for the ground to be clear of snow at this time of year so I hope we can continue to keep dodging that bullet.

Life on the road continues tomorrow. We head from Riga north to Tallinn, Estonia and get the ferry to Stockholm heading west to London where the trip is scheduled at this stage to be completed. There is however another plan in the works so I will keep the world of my blog posted as the plan formulates.