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