Day #42 – The End

This is the end, we are done, but still it doesn’t feel like such a success as I expected. We don’t arrive happy and enthusiastic, we arrive broken and exhausted. After Waldburg (Austria) we had 3 more biking days to go, yet we have no pictures and no memories. Daniel was unconscious on the handle bar. I heard the pedals moving but I couldn’t feel them. I couldn’t feel the wind, didn’t see no landscape. I don’t know how Czech Republic looks like, I only saw the monotonous white line at the edge of the road. It was better that way. Ahead was only desperation. We do have a picture of that, of how desperation looks like… a long unendless road that looks flat but always climbs and becomes steeper at the horizon.

Daniel fell asleep on the bike and we missed a curve. The road turned but we didn’t. The front wheel hit the sharp curb and we crashed and rolled on the sidewalk… at least that was the only real laugh we had on the bike. The MP3 player was an escape, a distraction… but it ran out of battery 4h before arriving in Brno (Czech). A couple of seconds after the MP3 player turned off I started hearing music again… new music, a sort of sweet and simple electronic music that I hadn’t heard before. There was nothing around us, only empty wheat fields. I took the headphones off to be sure, the music was still there. I swear I could here it cristal clear. The wind blowed sometimes hard and sometimes soft, producing loud or soft noise, but the music remained undisturbed, always with the same volume. It was scary, but soothing. I am not making this up.

We are in Teplá, Slovakia, where we promised we would be. But it feels more like defeat than success. We were defeated 4 days ago. We just kept biking out of inertia. It was a great ride, lots of fun, lots of places, and lots of experiences, but too long in the end.

Thanks

We would like to give special thanks to all our hosts who gave us a place to stay and took care of us. It was a vital part of the journey. Without them we would have gotten sick of camping and loneliness, and probably wouldn’t have made it. We are very thankful and hope we can someday return the favor.

We also thank you all, for reading and commenting our blog. Specially to those who wrote comments supporting us along the way. It meant a lot to us and gave us a huge motivation. I hope it was fun to read about our little trip.

Stats

Day #35 – #38: Rest (Passau)
Day #39: 96km – 4:45h (Waldburg)
Day #40: 106km – 5:25h (Dobersberg)
Day #41: 125km – 5:50h (Brno)
Day #42: 143km – 6:40h (Teplá)

Grand total: 2712km – 141:53h
Average 19.11 km/h
7 countries: Spain, France, Switzerland, Germany, Austria, Czech Republic, Slovakia.
Mountain ranges: los Pirineos, le Massif Central, die Alpen, Karpaty.

Challenges page updated!

New pics

I finally uploaded a bunch of new pics. Oh and we left Passau this morning. It was the hardest morning in the whole ride: no motivation, throat hurts, long sprint ahead… We are now in Waldburg. Only 3 days to go, only 3.

Days #25-34 – Almost there

To hell with pictures

I am out of luck with Internet for the time being. First it was a Mac, now I need administrator rights to plug my GPS. I uploaded some new ones (from Schopfheim until Lindau) but the rest have no GPS tag and cannot be uploaded to LOCR, maybe I’ll do it in another PC later. It is not a bid deal anyway because I am not taking as many pictures as before. I don’t know, somehow it all starts to look the same. Perhaps you say a very cool and old church in one of my last pictures? Well every town has a cool and old church… and a cool and old house, many of them actually. It is slowly not so impressive anymore. It still looks beautiful, but not worth a picture. I think I am a bit tired of the ride already, but it is almost over!

Summary of 9 days

I haven’t written in a long time, now it is hard to summarize all this time without writing an essay. I’ll try to summarize the important things. The last thing I wrote is that we arrived in Lindau. It was a bit weird there but good in the end. The last sprint to Lindau took a heavy toll on Daniel. He biked as hard as he could dreaming of Kässspätzle (sort of pasta with melted cheese) and counting on not touching the bike for some days… je je… surprise surprise, Katja has no car anymore! And she lives in a hill, a steep hill. We had food for the day we arrived but the next day Daniel could barely walk, and he had to bike the hill back up after shopping. That certainly put him in a bad mood for the day, bad “surprise”.

We did manage to have a good rest in Lindau. We stayed for 4 days (much more than planned) and Katja joined us on the biking to Sonthofen (1 day). After Lindau we’ve had plenty of hosts that have made the ride much easier. In Sonthofen we had Katrin who took us swimming (water in Europe is ALWAYS cold, but sometimes it is a necessity). Then we went to Reute, that is actually Austria but just besides Füssen, the land of the fairy tale castles. There are three huge castles nearby. One of them, Neuschwanstein, the most impressive, is the original inspiration for Disneyland’s castle… but is much better than Disney’s!

We stayed in Reute for an extra day but not for rest. Our host Beate was so increadibly nice, we just had to stay. She seemed so happy that we were there and she had that kind of good vibe, you know? She took us to see the castles at night, took us to another castle on the next day… Anyhow, it was wonderful… just to give you an idea of how good she treated us, look at the pic of what we found on our bed. A friend we met in Girona (who should have been our host in Immenstaat) dropped by in Reute and we toured the castles together.

Last free camping

We had our last free camping near Bad Tölz. There was a camping place nearby and of course we could have afforded it. But we realized that we haven’t payed a single euro for accomodation in Germany, not a cent!!! Most have been couchsurfers or friends and a bit of free camping, I find it unbelievable. On this last camping we found a hunting hut where we wanted to sleep, but 5 minutes after the mosquitoes were bitting through Daniel’s clothes. I don’t know why Europeans are so scared of tropical insects… the mosquitoes and flies here are much more aggressive than what I am used to!

Host’s parents

Not all of our couchsurfers and friends have been available, but that doesn’t mean we haven’t had hosts. Their parents are often just as friendly and hospitable! In Bad Endorf we were hosted by Vanessa’s (friend from Passau) parents and in Burgkirchen by Elisabeth’s (couchsurfer). We were served dinner and breakfast by both, and treated like at home. That is a great thing about camping so much, you can appreciate so much more the nice details that your hosts do for you. We are very thankful.

Flag is gone :’(

I am not sure how… you judge… It has happened only once that the wind took the flag away, that was when we set a new personal speed record, and that was a strong wind. But when we got to Burgkirchen, there was no wind and we were not riding that fast. We got to the house and our hosts saw the flag, then we went to the bakery and the butcher, left the bike outside, and when we arrived back home… the flag was gone. The stick is still there, but no flag. I know there was no wind because Daniel was sitting on the floor studying the maps and no wind moved the carefully ordered maps. Did the flag fell while (slowly) biking to the bakery? We searched the street (500m) 4 times and found nothing… did someone steal the flag…? I don’t know… but the flag is gone.

Finally in Passau!

This concludes another stage of the trip. Germany is finished! We were making numbers and if we can hurry up a bit, we only have 4 biking days ahead of us!!! 4x biking and we are there!!!!! Thank “god”!!!! It is now not just the physical fatigue, that is normal now, I feel mentally exhausted. Making the effort every day, things look alike… in which direction is Ithaka now?

Stats

Day #25: Rest (Lindau)
Day #26: Rest (Lindau)
Day #27: Rest (Lindau)
Day #28: 74km – 4:20h (Sonthofen)
Day #29: 60km – 3:30h (Reute – Austria)
Day #30: Rest (Reute – Austria)
Day #31: 128km – 6:37h (Bad Tölz)
Day #32: 79km – 4:14h (Bad Endorf)
Day #33: 62km – 2:42h (Burgkirchen a.d. Alz)
Day #34: 114km – 4:49h (Passau)

Grand total: 2203km – 117:20h

Alive but without Internet

Ok, I do have Internet, else I could not post, but I am using a Mac which is almost the same. It took me time to find the @ symbol, I cannot upload pictures in batch, I cannot add gps tags to them… I cannot write a nice post… so I will not try We are in Bad Endorf (am Chiemsee) and will post properly in Passau.

First impressions

The one thing I do really want to do is comment on the ironic comment of Faustine (“…in Germany where
bad welcoming do not exist!”). It was my fault, I guess, I should have written the “I love Germany” on another place. I have many personal reasons for loving Germany but the one I was refering to was the language(s), though I did not make it clear.

On the other hand, she brings an interesting point. What I write about here are first impressions, they do not represent the entire country or a part thereof. That is why I do not write a post “How are the frenchmen”, because you cannot generalize. We have only tested a couple of things thoroughly throughout both countries (road names and signs, bike road availability, language), all the other things depend on the persons we meet. Probably we only had bad luck with the knock knock in France and good luck in Germany, that is why we are not trying it again. Better to have a good impression than a disappointment.

Days #21-24 – Goodbye France

Last days in France

Ah the last days in France, what a joy! Don’t get me wrong, France is very nice and I am sure most of you would like it, but for us it has been very hard with the language. Germany finally brings the possibility to have meaningful and grammatically correct conversations.

Celine’s smile certainly kept her promise. We had a fabulous rest day. She took us to a BBQ and out with friends. It was so good that we had a hard time leaving. Daniel woke up late and we left her home at 11am, having promised our host in Belfort that we would arrive at 6pm. A funny thing is that Daniel’s clothes apparently do not want to continue. He lost one sock in the last camping place, another one tried to stay in Besancon, and one of the shirts was hiding deep in Celine’s dirty laundry basket.

The ride to Belfort was a funny one. Things started to pile up to avoid us from arriving on time. First we leave at 11am. Then we find 2 mountain bikers and we start to follow them to keep a good tempo, but after 15min they realize we are still with them so we start talking and they invite us for a drink. It was nice so we lose about an hour, plus eating… now it is 2pm. I lose the VeloRoute so we start following the river. There is a nice road connecting the floodgates. Now the road is no longer paved, now it is grass… now there is a forest in front! Aja, this floodgate is on the other side of the river :S So we are late and lost, and as we cut way through a field, the bike turns over on a steep mini-climb and Daniel kicks the handlebar with his knee. He gets back on the bike and gets down after the first pedaling, screaming in pain. Honestly I think he was exaggerating, but I am not. Late, lost, and injured (and hungry)! So we can’t stop, because we are late, but also because the knee gets swollen up if we stop… Daniel is getting concerned, I am just laughing, it was so funny! After all, what is his hurry? The host won’t get offended if we arrive a bit late.

And we did arrive late (40min) and it was not a problem. Our host, Damien from Belfort, seemed a bit strange at the beginning. He had an old-bread collection (about 15 different types of old rock solid bread piled up in the kitchen), a huge apartment in the attic, but no furniture! He was indeed a very nice guy. We had a fabulous dinner with special homemade pepper ice cream for dessert

After that it was bye bye France!

Knock, knock… again?!?!

Never again… I know! Risk too high… I know!! Demotivating… I know!!! But we didn’t want to, we wanted to free camp and we got caught. We were scouting the hills of Schopfheim for a hiding place and just when we thought we found a good one… Daniel turns around to see the owner staring at us Nothing left to do but talk to him and explain the situation. The first thing he says “Where are you from?” in a cold and low voice… oh no… here we go again…

But surprise surprise! He was nice!!!! Sooo nice! And his wife too! They offered me to sleep in an old mobile home, no need to pitch the tent. They invited me for dinner, offered me the shower, and even brought me breakfast in the morning. Wow!!!! It was amazing, sooo good! The wife even started the conversation in english. Ah… I love germany!!!!

Home, sweet… äh?

Indeed it felt like home coming to Lindau. Funny. We lived here for only 5 months, and though we lived in Scotland and Spain for 6 months each… I don’t think we would now feel like this there. But this is a false feeling and it easily turns into disappointment. I like Germany but it is not time to call it home.

Germany is a different place. It was clear as soon as we crossed the border. Hmmm, even before. Alsace looks like Germany. They have German town names and German architecture… or is it Alsacian? They look the same to me. But after the border many other things are different, for example:

Bikers here come by the dozen. So many bikers and so many with bags (even bigger than mines)! It is only natural that bikers don’t say hello to each other like we did in France. I found myself saying hello every 5s and getting almost no answer. But though they might appear cold, simply ask for directions and they are suddenly super nice.

In total we have ridden almost 400km in Germany already, but would you believe that we haven’t ridden more than 2km on a road with traffic?!?! EVERYTHING has been bike roads or hiking trails. All of them with little stickers indicating the direction at every crossing. Periodic signs with directions and distances. Amazing!!!!! I think only the strict german mindset can achieve such perfectly marked and distributed trails. It is wonderful to ride them. You can get lost if you are not looking for the stickers, you can take it easy along the rivers, or take the hiking trails through the mountains (we mix them). …wow…

The south of the black forest

Hmmm, I wanted to write how beautiful are the mountains in the south of the german black forest. How we took a detour from the easy road besides the Rhine (actually we got lost) and ended up climbing again. How the rain caught us by surprise and we had to free camp in the middle of the woods. How Daniel woke up several times that night due to the pain in his leg muscles. How nice the trails and the views were up in those mountains… but I don’t want to bother with too much text. [my locr account is full, will upload new pictures in August]

Stats

Day #21: 110km – 5:38h
Day #22: 110km – 5:35h
Day #23: 95km – 5:13h
Day #24: 133km – 7:28h

GPS

Days #17-20 – Getting speed

Go, go, go

Ah back on the bike! Do you remember what was the effect of our last rest in Beziers? Daniel biked a bit more than planned the next days. Well what do you expect after 3 full rest days?! We left our planned stop (Chatillon-sur-Chalaronne) behind, we even passed by the next stop (Cormoz), for a great total of 120km the first day and 100km the next day. We are picking up speed. If these improvements keep happening we’ll do Czech Republic in a day

The downside of this is that we don’t have that many pictures to show. At first I wanted to take pictures but Daniel said he was feeling too good to stop and take pictures, then he said he was so tired that if we stop to take a pic, we would have to sleep right there on the spot.

Knock, knock v2

I mentioned there was no reason to try this again having so many hiding places around. But on day #17, after biking 120km we found the camping closed! We asked and the locals said the next camping was about 20km away (and off the route). Daniel was destroyed, not feeling like biking around for a hiding place. So why no try our luck? Oh I will tell you why not…

We knock and explain the situation. This time we begin by saying “we have a little favour to ask and it is not a problem if you say no” (in french). But before we finished the final sentence “…if we could camp in your garden” the guy was looking at the ground and shaking his head, kind of like saying “of course not”. He said “no” in about 10 different ways (without me saying a word) and he then said we could camp in his other property (an empty lot) about 500m away and must be gone in the morning.

He was cold and uninterested. He seemed annoyed by our request for the garden. But Daniel was dead, we really needed a place to sleep, this was no experiment. We camped as far away as possible. He then soon came to give us a bottle of water. Hmmm, maybe he is getting nicer (like the old lady in Verrieres)… the hell he is! He was just giving us water so that we had no honest reason to come near his house. He wrote down Daniel’s full name and nationality. He closed the door, all windows, and even locked the old barn. With the bottle he said “have a nice trip”, i.e. “I won’t talk to you again” (and he did not).

Right… ’cause we have biked more than 1000km, for 17 days, just to come there and steal his old stupid lawnmower in the barn. How the hell do we carry that on the bike? The other lady was scared, I can understand that, but this one was scared, uninterested, and selfish. He did not care who we were or why we were there. We were simply a problem, a risk, he didn’t want to deal with.

The experience really brought our motivation to the ground. The first day we biked 100km out of excitement, the second day we biked 100km to get as far away as possible. No one waved goodbye to us during that day, no flaggers, only uninterested people. A single girl approached us as we were looking at the map in Pierre-de-Bresse… je je, a Belgian… We will not try this again. I know there is nice people out there, but the risk is too big. These cold people bring us down. They make us want to give them a reason to be afraid. But we didn’t, we left the campsite better than we found it.

Veloroute to Budapest

On day #18 we got to Dole (I think an uncle worked for Dole some time ago). And by coincidence a guy mentioned there was a bike route going to Besançon, fabulous! We are going to Besançon! It turns out the route doesn’t go to Besançon, it passes through Besançon… it goes to Budapest! From Nantes (french atlantique)!!! We took it and it was lovely. It borders the river Doub until Besançon, filled with cyclists, walkers, and roller skaters. All of them suddenly friendly again! A road biker catched us and asked us about the flag, the country… he had even heard of “la vuelta ciclistica de Costa Rica”! Oh people like that motivate us again. It was a great surprise and althouth he was much faster than us, we rode together for a good while.

We arrived at Besançon and met our host for the next 2 days: Celine from Couchsurfing. Her friendly smile immediatly promised to erase all the bad knock-knock experiences. There are very nice people out there indeed, you just have to know how to find them

Peaceful nature

We have a lot of alone-time to spend. I like meditating though Daniel is a bit more restless. Still, he has no option sometimes. And a funny thing happens when you stay quite for a long time, you blend in with nature. I don’t mean spiritually, I mean the animals forget you are big and dangerous. Unfortunately I don’t have pictures of this, if I had, probably I couldn’t write this section because animals would get scared.

Pigeons are normal, they are not shy, but did you know they also eat some types of grass? I didn’t. Maybe they just clean their beaks with it. We had squirrels walking back and forth half a meter in front of us. I think the best were a couple of little deer, not bigger than a dog, who came to our campsite. They stood about 25m away, took their time, ate grass… just in front of us!

We witnessed the organized hunting of grasshoppers by 3 birds… oh but that is a cool and long story. You can ask me about it in person

Stats

Day #17: 118km-5:38h
Day #18: 98km-5:05h
Day #19: 65km-2:45h
Day #20: Rest
GPS

Days 12-16 – Rest Lyonnaise

Bonjour bonjour! We have been disconnected from the net (and any sense of responsability) for a long while. A good long while We just leaved Lyon, our first big stop and the conclusion of 1/4 of our journey.

Food update

Just one day after writing what Daniel eats in a typical day we started having problems. The way from Yssingeaux to St. Etienne was “short” (62km) but Daniel’s legs were in very bad shape. It was not muscle ache but simple fatigue. They didn’t want to pedal any more. We had to take it slow, with low gears and a lot of patience, and the day seemed to be eternal. One could think it was because of the lack of rest, but because we couldn’t solve that we assumed it was about the food. The diet was upgraded and the next day (St. Etienne-Lyon) was a breeze, the legs working like the first day. Therefore Daniel is now strictly eating 5 times a day! And those are 5 full meals each. Here is the diet for St. Etienne:

Breakfast: Cereal+Milk+Banana
2nd Breakfast: Pastry from bakery (around 300g of bread, creme fraiche, ham, and sausage), 3 energy bars, 1 peach, 1.5L of isotonic drink.
Lunch: 2 pears, 1 peach, 3-floor tuna sandwich with egg (maybe 650g).
2nd Lunch: 420g of canned raviolli.
Dinner: 2 chicken filets, pasta with white sauce (350g), rice with sausage and cheese (200g).

Eating is good…

Naked Europe

As a young copper ball I used to be amazed by the documentaries about african tribes who didn’t wear clothes. Some would be topless, some totally naked, and I wondered how weird it would be to be in such place, with everyone naked around you. It is, for me, a rule of common sense: thou shallt cover thyself. Ah but you don’t have to go as far as Africa to find these weird tribes, they inhabit ALL Europe!

In the Sauna in Germany it is forbidden to enter with clothes, not optional to be naked; a rule. It is terribly uncomfortable to go to a beach in Spain, there is nowhere to look without staring at someone naked. I don’t want to stare, but they are everywhere! And now France…

I played goalie on the football match in St. Etienne. All fun except that there was a clear line of sight to the changing room, and no door! The whole match (1 hour) naked men were coming and going… it was… uncomfortable. How do you concentrate? Ah and of course, after the match, it was our turn to come and go… naked. No curtains, no doors… Hell they practically took their clothes off on the playfield and walked to the showers. What is left to do? Get naked, look down, go, shower… uncomfortable. After all, do I really want to get used to it? The risk of “nakedness” being a regular thing, with no fun, is too big.

THOU SHALLT COVER THYSELF!

Last sprint to Lyon

The last biking day was fantastic. The goal was so close! We were as motivated as we could be. The route started climbing after St. Etienne but a big part was later downhill. We found several fellow bikers along the climb that kept us company.

Ah only 20km to Lyon!!!! Only 20km to rest!!! That deserves a picture… but then two road bikers take advantage of the pause to overtake us. Hmmm that is not fair, but wait, they are not going that fast. We catched one, overtook the other one. The one we catched soon took another route but the one we overtook was trying to overtake us again, JA! Nothing like a small race to finish the journey

Did I say the last day was a breeze? Je je, a breeze until the last 20km. It was a fierce race, 30kmh average, Daniel was screaming of pain (literally) at the end. After all, we carry around 30kg of extra weight and wide tires. Ok, that only means the road biker was not that good because he should have won, but we arrived at Lyon at the same time (did he realize we were racing?)

Lionesse vacations

Our hosts, the couchsurfers and the Jond family in Lyon, have treated us like kings. It has been another world. It is funny how fast one forgets things. Riding a car suddenly feels weird, you move but make no effort! Not to mention not having to pitch the tent every day and sleeping on a real bed.

Jean-François in St. Etienne took us on a little tour of the outside of the city. We got lost and instead of the majestic view of the city from the highest mountain we got a majestic view of trees in the highest mountain. A funny thing, he took us to play footbal… precisely on the day Daniel’s legs were fatigated, ja ja ja, but it was actually really good.

I will not write every detail of our vacations in Lyon… would be too much and you wouldn’t enjoy it. I cannot thank the Jond family enough, they were too nice. Luis, Faustine’s brother, was our personal tour guide every day. As a welcome, they took us to the ruins of an old theater made of stone. The cool thing was, that there was a big concert going on (Le nuits de Fourvier – Goran Gregovic), fabulous. They took me to eat traditional Lyonnaise food… again fabulous. They really did too much for us, thanks!

Lyon has a huge park with a Zoo inside, and it is all free! Very impressive.

Stats

Day #12: 62km – 3:30h
Day #13: 77km – 3:18h
Day #14: Rest
Day #15: Rest
Day #16: Rest

GPS

Thanks to all who are still with us reading and cheering!!!

Days 9-11 – No summer in the Massif Central

Cold rain and despair

I am immortal. Had you notice that? Yes, I will still be a copper dog long after you are all dead and gone. But Daniel is not and he forgets that often. Luckily the gods always find time to send a little reminder of how fragile he is. Day #9 was one of those reminders.

The plan was to skip Châteauneuf-du-Randon and go directly to Issarles. But our map didn’t show clearly the magnitude of the mountains in between. It turns out that Châteauneuf is known because it is a town on the top of a mountain (1265m). Still we felt big…

A huge nail destroyed our rear wheel’s rubber (our first flat tyre!) just outside Châteauneuf. That takes a lot of time: unmount baggage, remove tyre, change rubber, inflate manually, lock baggage to a post, drive to gas station, pump wheel properly, drive back, reassemble baggage. Still we felt big…

As soon as we started mounting the baggage again it started to rain. Really rain. We seeked a restaurant in Châteauneuf for shelter but it was too late, Daniel was soaking wet. The temperature had fallen to 12°C (at noon) and the sun did not shine any more that day.

We decided it was a health risk to continue in the cold rain so we camped in Châteauneuf (losing one day, now we are only 2 days ahead). The mini-towel was wet, the tent was wet, alas, even the sleeping bag was wet. Daniel changed his biking clothes, but he has no winter clothes, his hair was wet. We delayed building the tent until it stop raining… well, we delayed for two hours and then we built the tent under the rain.

During this waiting time we sat (and trembled) in a corner outside of the bathroom building overlooking the campsite. Help? No one helps, people are strange when you’re a stranger. There was a fucking neighbor in a caravan that stared at us the whole time. He didn’t speak to us, did’ come. He just looked from his window. He saw us sit in the corner, saw us have (cold) dinner, saw us pitch the tent. He just stared… the bastard.

Despair was setting in. If it is so cold during the day, how cold will be the night? How will we survive with a wet sleeping bag. I looked at the parked cars with envy, a car would make a perfect waterproof shelter. My mind was blank, I just wanted to warm up. I saw Daniel’s shivering and fear of the coming night… the reminder was clear. Then an inspiration came. The memory of the cold german nights. Aja! A warm bottle! I made a warm bottle out of the camelback and put it inside the sleeping bag between the feet. Oh heaven! Warmth! It got Daniel through the night.

The cold hasn’t given up yet, but at least the rain has. The next two days were increadibly cold. Daniel rode with his jacket on. Every little road we take means a new mountain. Going up warms the legs, going down makes you scream (from cold, wind slows us down to 30kmh downhill!) The day to Yssingeaux was more (higher) than I expected. But we are here.

Food

Just to give you a quick idea of how much Daniel is eating, let’s review a typical day.

Breakfast: cereal, joghurt, banana, pastry.
During the ride: 3 energy bars, banana, nectarine, 1.5L of isotonic drink.
Lunch: Lasagna (restaurant [not typical]), ham sandwich (restaurant, half a baguette).
Dinner: Orange, 820g of lentils (you should see the can of lentils, almost a kilo, devoured without stopping).

Enter Couchsurfing

Now we enter a new phase of the trip. We have met our first couchsurfer! David from Yssingeaux. Ah it was wonderful. A warm bed, no need to pitch the tent, he even cooked for us (chineese!). We have a couch waiting for us in St. Etienne and then comes Lyon, wonderful Lyon where (hopefully) Faustine is waiting for us. The trip is far from over, still soooo much to come, but from now on it looks like we won’t have to camp as much as before… super.

Stats

Day #9: 39km – 2:20h
Day #10: 60km – 2:45h
Day #11: 69km – 4:00h
GPS

Total
757km – 42:13h

Days 6-8 – Freestyle

Again here! We have so much to tell and it is so hard with these french keyboards. I’ll start with the least interesting, so keep reading, it will get better.

Ahead of schedule

Yes sir! The rest day in Beziers did wonders for Daniel’s legs. As we were considering “camping options” Daniel said: “If we are going flexible with the campsite, why stop here? I’m not tired!” So we didn’t sleep in Bousquet de l’Orb as planned, we went a bit farther. On the next day we went by Cornus but pedalled until Verrieres. Yesterday we arrived here at Mende, half a day ahead of Chanac. If we arrive today at Issarles and Daniel doesn’t need a rest day before Lyon we will be 3 full days ahead of schedule!!!!

I hear voices

and they are dangerous. They are nothing but a whisper now, but they threaten to get stronger. The first came before Beziers and it only said one word: “why?” Oh a dangerous word. It was not my voice. I cannot give them attention, that leads to doubts. That word has been banned. Another voice whispered on the morning of day #6: “again?” Still, they are nothing but whispers.

Changing landscape

These days have had a LOT of mountains, but what that takes in energy it gives in spirit. The views are amazing. Every hill has a different style. Some are full with trees, but suddenly the trees change into bushes and after another hill, the bushes turn into rocks. Then the bushes and trees appear together, with wheat or sunflower fields in between. Impossible to capture these changes with pictures, though I try.

Can you appreciate such landscapes and such fine changes from a car? I can’t. That is why the bike is so good for travelling. Walking is too slow for me. I suggest you try it as well. You don’t have to be crazy and go two months. And you don’t need to have super condition. Just take a bike, any bike, put it in the car, drive to a mountain, and take a ride. Everything looks different… at least to me.

Offroad

On Day #8 we went offroad! It was damn cool and damn hard. Some of the locals didn’t even know there was a path to the neighboring town, je je. It was a rocky way that needed some walking. An odd side-effect of the low speed is that it gives flies a chance to catch up. At first there was one fly, then two… then a whole swarm of them! They were not the normal shy flies, these were agressive. My hands waved, I hit them, but not hard enough. I felt like a sick juicy horse. They followed me for kilometers uphill. I am sure they were ready to go to Slovakia. The only way I could get rid of them was speed: 25km/h minimum.

We got lost a thousand times and we asked every person we met. Oh they were so nice. One led the way with his car, a grandma asked if I had enough to eat, a kid stopped his bike to ask if I was lost. Offroad was exhausting but worthed.

Freestyle camping

Daniel’s mother wished someone would offer him a shower; His brother was asking what he how was going to go to the bathroom. I don’t think they understand the idea of a camping place. Here we have 2,3, or 4 star campings, and even the 2 stars have warm showers and clean bathrooms. Um… wait… that is not right; Who the hell needs a 4 star camping place? Maybe it is me who doesn’t understand the idea of camping!

So on day #6 we decided to send the fancy camping places to hell, we are going freestyle camping. We found a rest area near a river, it looked perfect, we took a bath and washed the biking clothes. But it was too early so we biked some more. At 6pm Daniel got anxious. Under a bridge perhaps? No, too close to the street. Near a river? No hiding place. Aja! An old rock hut on a hill beside a small road. We hid the bike, checked that it was not visible from the street… and we waited… As criminals, darkness brings comfort and safety, so we waited for 3 hours, ducking every time an engine sounded. One car passed honking, oh the fear… had he seen us? Is the police on their way? Nah, impossible to see us!!!!

The actual sleeping was itself an experience. All our experience came in handy. Ants were crawling on me the whole time, but we had gotten used to that in St. Cyprien. Mosquitoes attacked at dawn, but we are used to that from Costa Rica too. So Daniel layed on his arms to cover the skin and put a shirt on his head, leaving only mouth and nose out… sweet dreams. Cold awoke me in the middle of the night and as I got into the sleeping bag I saw a pure and bright starry sky, together with the feeling of freedom from free camping… priceless.

Next day, in Verrieres, we tryed something else: knock, knock! It was 3pm, an old lady came out in pijamas. “Bonjour, je suis un Costarricien, aui fait 2000km avec le velo…” It was awkward. She tried to convice me that it was better to go to the next town, they have toilettes and showers there. Um ok, if it is a problem I’ll go (je je). She agreed, she didn’t have any reason to say no. She even asked if I had my own food. She then recommended a place to camp near the river… and suddenly I was free camping again! This was no garden, she sent me 300m from her house, but it was fine. Necessity made Daniel take a cold naked bath in the river. To avoid leaving any, um, surprise in her “garden” Daniel asked her to use the toilette, she said: “chez moi?” :s (“in my house?” the smiley doesn’t really capture it). Again she let me, again awkward. Eventually she asked a couple of questions and in the morning she invited me for coffee. I’d say she was actually nice, I just really took her by surprise.

But she did bring up an issue. Why ask for a garden when you can camp by a river and have the same things. On day #8 we were playing with the idea, free camp or shower? Then, just before Mende, it started to rain. Oh no. We can stand rain but it is not nice. That made up our mind. Find a hiding place, a path goes into the woods. No one saw us, the place is ok. But the rain stops and it is only 3pm, too early to wait in fear until dawn. Hmmmm… and that nasty fly buzzing in my ear. Two flies… my foot itches, and I see at least 10 flies trying to eat me alive!!!! We get on the bike and get the hell out of there, but it is too late. The way is uphill and the curse is upon us. The swarm follows us uphill. Nothing to do but swear and wave our hands in despair. Then a faboulous thing happens… rain!!! The constant and soft drops achieve what our furious hands could not. All flies are knocked down by the rain, fantastic.

No… wait… rain is not so good, I’m… wet… But not too wet, my bags are still dry. There is a hiding place, go in, find a spot, unpack the tent, WHAT!?!?!? The demonic flies were hiding under the luggage from the rain!!! Now the fly around Daniel as he puts up the tent, throws all luggage inside and we jump in. The flies are outside. They won’t go away. The find the way under the upper layer and they wait. We are under siege. We ate and changed clothes in the small tent… and they waited. Trapped in the tent for the rest of the day.

Not all flies survived the siege until morning, but those who did followed us on the rest of the way up. Today after having experienced the freedom of free camping for 3 days and considering the way that flies follow us… I think it is time to get a shower.

Stats

Day #6: 85km – 5:00h
Day #7: 78km – 4:10h
Day #8: 85km – 5:20h
GPS

More pics…

Days 1-5 – Stats

I forgot the stats…

Per day

(includes only route between campsites)

Day #1: 65km – 3h
Day #2: 65km – 3.5h
Day #3: 66km – 3.5h
Day #4: 68km – 3.3h
Day #5: 30km – 1.5h (rest day?)

Total

(includes cycling inside the towns, shopping, etc.)

327km – 17.5h

GPS log

Here