08/07/2021

It’s 12 o’clock, the sun is shining, the wind is blowing from the front, the tents are packed up and a lot of work has already been done, which still needs to be done at the same time. This blog alone took two hours this morning, sorting through and editing photos and videos, correcting and expanding last night’s post… It’s all more work than we imagined, but it’s still nice to be able to review everything, like in a diary. It also brings a lot of awareness to what we’re doing.

So far, breakfast has consisted of a power bar and a few nuts. Perhaps not the most filling meal when you’re planning on cycling 90 kilometers, especially in our special way. We’ve covered ourselves with sunscreen as a precaution and I’m going to put on my straw hat for the first time today. So, off we go back down the small muddy path to the road where we almost got stuck last night and “on the road again.”

OK, the events of the last four hours need to be digested first and so I am writing here in the back seat of the dandem while we steadily approach the German border.

Four hours ago it looked completely different, but from the beginning!

The broken chain

We had only been travelling for five kilometres when we suddenly heard strange noises, which had started yesterday and which we put down to the gears, and the chain suddenly stopped moving… damn, the next worst case scenario: a broken chain link!!!

What now?… We immediately called our friend Arne, who was already on his way to us by bike to pick up my car and drive to Cuxhaven, our final destination. We asked him to bring us tools, as we had unfortunately not brought any of those. That way we at least had the prospect of being able to continue on in the evening.

So, what should we do? I made a makeshift repair to the almost popped-out chain link with a pair of pliers and we cycled almost at walking pace to the next village. When we got there, we didn’t have much hope of getting any help. We were still wondering how we were going to find a bike shop on a Saturday afternoon when I saw a man standing by a van in front of a pub at the last house in the village. We quickly decided to speak to him. As he didn’t understand English or German and we don’t speak Czech, I showed him our problem. He immediately disappeared through his gate without saying a word and came back a little later with a chain riveter. We were very relieved and had a big grin on our faces. Wearing white shirts and greasy hands, we tried to remove the chain link but didn’t really know how to put a chain back together without breaking anything else. The man recognized our problem and went through the gate again and brought a brand new chain with him, which he would probably have given to us as a gift. We gave him €20, which we had saved up for emergencies like this, as a thank you, and then tried to attach the chain. The funny thing was that the chain lock that came with the new chain didn’t fit, and despite YouTube tutorials that made it look really easy, and attempts by a fourth villager, we all failed miserably. In the end, I tried again with the old chain and actually got it together, so that we were happily able to continue our journey after 45 minutes and gave Arne the all-clear. We left the chain there, of course, as well as the €20, and the man even gave us washing paste and a bucket of water to clean our hands for the rest of the journey.

What an incredible, improbable event. How crazy it is to ask the first person you see for help in a small village in the middle of nowhere, who then promptly provides you with everything you need to continue your journey. I’m telling you, that was the shooting star we saw yesterday. Even my shirt stayed white during the incident!

Terezín

A short time later we reached Theresienstadt and suddenly and unexpectedly found ourselves in front of the former concentration camp. Unfortunately we hadn’t earned any money yet, so all we could do was take a moment to remember, during which I really cried when I saw the graves that covered an entire field in front of the memorial.

In a somewhat subdued mood, we drove in the wrong direction. But that was a good thing, as it quickly turned out. We stopped briefly at a gas station where Andreas wanted to ask for directions. Since I didn’t have a mask, Andreas went in alone and while I was waiting, a man, bare-chested, suddenly came up to me with interest and asked in broken German what that was on the trailer and where I was going. The man was very nice and when he realized that we had a piano on the trailer, he excitedly invited us to play for his mother-in-law in the allotment garden, whose birthday it is today. No joke! We agreed: “In 5 minutes, in 5 minutes we’ll be in the garden and play for your mother-in-law.”

No sooner said than done, and as a welcome we were given a whisky that we couldn’t refuse. After just one piece, we were served a decent meal with fresh tomatoes and cucumbers from the garden and, of course, a beer. In the warm atmosphere and with fun communication via the sixteen-year-old daughter, who spoke English quite well, we had to be careful not to lose track of time. After another piece on the piano and the inevitable farewell whisky, we continued in the right direction and were even given a whole bag of freshly picked vegetables as provisions for the journey.

Continue into the night along the Elbe

We just had another wonderful, wonderful experience. We were already on the road in the dark and came through a small village where we passed a small village pub and some were still sitting there drinking their beer. They greeted us with loud cheers. We spontaneously got off, as we wanted to fill up our water at the next opportunity anyway, attached the seat to the Tastdem and played our piece “Everything is possible” to the enthusiastic audience. There was also great applause and cheers, absolutely exemplary for the small number of people. And of course, something you unfortunately can’t avoid here in the Czech Republic, we were given a beer and a shot. After some nice conversations and another improvisation with one of the ladies, we continued on with freshly filled water bottles. The warmth of the people here in the Czech Republic is simply amazing, at least the people we have met so far!

Now we are on our way to Germany, it is 9:20 p.m. and a pleasant drizzle is blowing in our faces. This makes traveling fun, so we are definitely not going to starve or die of thirst. The only question is whether we will manage to stay sober here. Not likely!

At 00:30 somewhere outside Ústí nad Labem in pouring rain

Can you please pinch me?! So many events and experiences in one day is really enough now.

After our really nice stop at the pub, we made really good progress without any further incidents, except that it was now pouring with rain and we had to contend with inclines that required all our strength to overcome in the middle of the night. We were even forced to drag the trailer and tandem up separately twice because it wouldn’t have been possible otherwise.

It was almost one o’clock in the morning when we had to pass an annoying passage directly on the Elbe, which we only drove at walking pace. The roots of the trees had caused bumps everywhere in order to fight their way back. Despite the slowness, however, the constant rain and the darkness made it impossible to avoid what followed. Suddenly there was a very worrying noise that made us stop immediately and when we understood what the pschffffffff meant, we saw the mess. We had driven through a water-filled pothole with the left tire of the trailer, the sharp edges of which, despite the slowness, were enough to cause the next and hopefully last “worst case scenario”: a flat tire of the finest kind. I mean, does that really have to happen? Why?!!! Isn’t a broken chain, heavy rain and getting lost twice enough for the day? How do you patch a tire in the middle of a rainy night?

Take a deep breath and think for a moment and, despite all the ambition and spirit of adventure, be realistic. Arne, the friend who was supposed to pick up the car from the Czech Republic, was also stuck in the mountains, prevented from moving on by a thunderstorm because he had the crazy idea of ​​riding his racing bike. The promised spare wheel, which we had actually ordered and been promised with the car, had not been ready when we picked it up. Real crap! So annoying, because simply changing the wheel would have at least been possible. After we had tried in vain to find someone who would let us put up our tents, there was only one option left, especially given our schedule, which had fallen apart again and again.

We made everything waterproof and while I got on the tandem alone to ride the 56 kilometers straight along the country roads to my car, Andreas tried to keep warm and save his things from the rain and getting completely soaked.

After I had almost run over a deer with the tandem, I arrived at the car in Mêlník at four in the morning, completely exhausted. After loading the bulky tandem, I set off straight away, only to be back with Andreas and all our things three quarters of an hour later, turn off the engine and immediately close my eyes for half an hour out of exhaustion.

Andreas and Arne loaded everything and I was fit enough to help stow the trailer and the bikes on the roof of the car and even drive on. We decided to take a shortcut through the Czech Republic, to sleep for three hours in an overcrowded car in Bad Schandau just across the border, the three of us, and see what happens tomorrow.

Next entry: We are still alive, don’t worry, and things always go on somehow

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