Cycling Europe Day 60: One Day to Tallinn!

Today was an absolutely miserable day. It doesn’t easily get more miserable. I loved every last minute of it.

We woke up this morning to the pitter patter of rain on our tent. No big deal. I’ve been in that situation before. I packed the wet tent. We would dry it out once we got the chance. Breakfast at camp was really good and wholesome: oatmeal with cinnamon, bread and jam, boiled eggs, cheese, and coffee and tea. The skies were dark so we put on all our rain clothes. We might as well be prepared for a long, wet today.

It didn’t stop raining all day long.

We got drizzle. We got moderate rain shower. And we got downpours.

None of that would have been a big deal. I’ve cycled in rain before.

If not for the 35 km of dirt roads.

I checked the route the GPS had for us today and it seemed fine. I could tell, based on two-months-worth of experience, that some of the roads were possibly dirt roads. Colin and I decided last night that we’d decide what to do when we reach them.

When we did reach the first dirt road, we both had a what-the-fuck-let’s-do-this moment; except we pretty much stayed in that moment the whole day. Staying on the dirt roads would save us a few kilometers as opposed to going on the main, paved road. As we saw that the dirt road was just going on and on, rather than backtrack, we just kept on it. You see, we had been on much worse dirt roads in Lithuania not long ago. That day, we had no choice but to get off the bikes and pull them through mud. The bikes almost didn’t make it that day. Even with us not on them they kept getting jammed with mud and wouldn’t move. Today, the dirt roads were wet, they had many puddle-filled potholes, there were big gravel stones we had to steer around to avoid toppling over and countless little ones that were unavoidable, and our back tires spit wet sand onto our panniers and backsides. It was an ongoing what-the-fuck-let’s-do-this moment. What can I say.

Cycling Europe Day 46: I’m That Guy We All Despise

I don’t understand people who have personalities like mine.

Why ON EARTH would anyone choose to cycle 115km in pouring rain for some eight hours?

Today the rain almost didn’t stop at all. It was cold rain. There was a headwind that made it colder. It also made the cycling harder. I’ll admit the more difficult cycling meant more body warmth for me in that cold weather. Cars and trucks splashed dirty, wet road spray on me all day. Visibility was poor because of the clouds and rain, made poorer by the multitude of water droplets on my glasses all day long.

When I reached 30km, I said out loud to myself, “How am I ever going to get to Wroclaw today?”

Yet, I kept cycling. At one point I roared (I’m not kidding) to push myself onwards.

At another point, I had this conversation in my head:

“Why did I have to turn out to be this sort of woman? Why couldn’t I be one of those women who turns her nose up at people who camp and do activities that involve energy and getting dirty? Why couldn’t I turn out to be the kind of woman who just wants to spend most of her day in the kitchen cooking good food for her family? Why couldn’t I be one of those women who walks around in fur coats?” That one stopped me in my tracks. “Wait a minute! I DO want to be the woman who has a fur coat! Why is it I don’t have one already??” And then I got all upset about a conversation I had about fur coats with my husband. He’s against them. All of them. Unless they are fake. We’ll have to have that discussion again.

Don’t get me wrong. I love cooking for my family. I also love luxury holidays when I’m fortunate enough to have one. I can be the laziest person on earth for weeks if I don’t feel like being a productive human being. I aspire to have a comfortable lifestyle. I don’t walk or cycle to the gym unless I absolutely must because I don’t have the car.

But then I go off and do crazy stuff like this. Why??

Cycling Europe Day 44: When Hope Returns

I didn’t get killer hills today!!

Turnov, Czech Republic

I got thunder, lightening, intense rain showers, and absolutely soaking wet.

BUT I DIDN’T GET KILLER HILLS TODAY!

You have no idea how happy I am. I cycled 95km today. In the best of conditions that is a lot for me. The terrain was not flat by any means. It was mildly undulating. For most of the ride it was raining really hard. I had to be extra careful so I wouldn’t slip. I got splashed on countless times by trucks and cars. I had to change my upper body clothes twice because I got so wet I was shivering. I had to pee more times than normal probably because I was feeling cold. But did any of that matter to me? Not one bit as long as I did not get the killer hills!

Everything is so relative. If I had a ride like today just some time last week, I’d have been miserable. But now that I’ve seen TRULY miserable, almost anything is better in comparison.

I’ve been thinking about my visit to Prague and other large cities and why they don’t impress me much anymore. The advantage to doing the kind of trip I’m doing is that you get to see so much more of a country than you would by taking planes or driving a car on motorways. You see the backroads and the small towns and villages. You stop and eat in the tiniest of roadside restaurants. You see how people live across the country and the differences in standards of living. You stop in towns where tourists rarely, if ever, go.

I wouldn’t say that you get to see the REAL country and people. The capital city, with its inhabitants, usually smarter lifestyle, tourists, and tourist attractions are all part of what makes a certain country what it is. But it’s only a part.

That made me reflect on Egypt. Cairenes tend to think of Cairo as being Egypt. Not only that, Egyptians who live outside of Cairo, when traveling to Cairo, will say they are going to Masr, the Arabic word for Egypt. When I think about all the horrible things I dislike about living in Egypt, most of them are related only to living in Cairo: such as the awful traffic. I’ve always said that the second one sets foot outside of Cairo, one sees how beautiful Egypt actually is.