2500 KM to Meditate

After having followed the Donau (the Danube?) for a few days, I am now going towards the South from, more of less Ulm/Neu Ulm.

The very kind farmers where I stop to pitch my tent gave me eggs, milk and all came to speak to me, one after the other.  I usually don’t drink milk (I don’t like the taste), but their fresh milk was quite good and I drank the half-liter they gave me.  I haven’t drank milk like that since at least 5 years - if not 10.
They gave me another half-liter in the morning.

It didn’t rain of the day - it was a beautiful day.  (Now it rains a bit, but I’m in my tent so I’m not bothered.  I just hope it’ll be a bit good weather tomorrow morning.)

While loosing its balance, my bicycle left me nice gear marks on the right calf.  I look like I’ve been attacked by a seven-clawed bear.

It’s been 12 days that I’m on the road, it looks like.  Time doesn’t really exist around here.  There are only the wake ups, the road, the bicycle, the pauses, the suppers and the sleep.

Another full on day.  Rain in the morning (again), front wind (as always), and other roads, small and less small ones.  But it’s going forward.

The young bakery lady.  The lake.  The mosquitoes, the search for a gas cartridge, the woman in the Kaufland & the handkerchief, the slope which went up by itself, the old villages, the medieval towns, the fellow with his Bavarian hat and his twisted moustache, etc.

It rains since 24 heures.  Since the beginning it rained - or was rainy weather - about half the time.  I’m not really uncomfortable, but it’s not the most comfortable either.  It’s a bit humid and cold, especially when the big wind rises, which happened quite often recently (but not very often blowing on the right direction for me, unfortunately).  I do not have closed shoes, only sandals (my boots were too big to bring and I simply don’t have any shoes in Europe), so it’s a bit colder.

There’s sometimes nice sunny moments, coming out of nowhere.  Just about an hour ago, I arrived unexpectedly at a cloister with a nice church, and as soon as I entered the compound the clouds cleared up for the first time of the day and I had nice and warm sun for the time I was there.
Many nice and beautiful landscapes as well, but nothing that can be kept with a camera.  The beauty is more related to the state of counsciousness of the viewer than so much the landscape itself.

I finished following the Main/Donau canal and I’m going towards the Donau river itself, cutting through hills to save a 50 km of river meanders.

People here (well, since 4-5 days, in fact) have a different German accent than the one I know.

I am now on the Main/Doanu canal since a few days.  It’s flat.  Or more like a very big and long staircase, with locks (for boats) climbing up 40-50 metres in one step.

I saw bridges for rivers, for them to pass over other rivers.  I did saw quite a few things in this world, but this one still surprised me much…

I learned that I have to follow the rivers.  The road is (much) more flat - it doesn’t look like an horrible roallercoaster anymore.  My legs also got stronger, I noticed it.

It rained part of the last 2 days & 2 nights, but it didn’t bothered me too much.  I had a few hours of Sun to put up my tent, dry it and eat.  (It looks like my tent takes a bit the rain now.  But that’s alrighy, that tent has been very well used for 8 years.  I’ll treat it later on.)

I’m now lying in my tent.  Much to my surprise, the solar panel fully rechagred the external battery even though there wasn’t more than a few hours of real sun in the last 2 days.

I should arrive to (or pass by) Nürnberg tomorrow.

I still don’t know what I’ll do for the Alps and the Pyrenees, but I’ll see later on….

I did 334 km until now.

And I just realized that tomorrow is Sunday (I thought we were Friday or Saturday), and that all shops will be closed.  I’d need to buy some food or I’ll eat muesli for breakfast, lunch and dinner….

Now it’s going better.

I don’t try to go anywhere anymore. I move on a tiny bit at a time, and that’s it. I’ll see later on.

I am no longer sure at all if I’ll manage to finish this trip….   It’s soo heavy….  The idea of the solar panel was a good one - and I managed that one - but it’s terribly heavy.

It rained this morning.  I slept about 11 hours in total.

My bicycle goes well, I don’t have any real pain anywhere (not even muscular pain in the morning, thanks to the yoga and stretchings, only a bit of back pain), it’s just that I don’t have the energy to carry all this.  It’s as if I was going up hill on a 4% slope continuously, and my speed falls down to 7 or 8 km (my smallest gear) as soon as the road goes up (which is half of the time here - the other half it goes downhill and I don’t pedal anymore, it’s not worth it…).
I’m only in the hills here.  It goes up and down all the time, but it’s far from being the Alps or Pyrenees…

So I don’t know what to do….

The rain was good this morning.  It washed the day of yesterday and bloqued me the Sun so that I could sleep longer.  (But now the bottom of my tent is wet, I’ve put my tent on a small shallow ground which filled with water with the rain…)

It’s also harder than I thought to be alone.  There’s nobody to bring the motivation up when it’s low.  Now it’s almost completely on the ground.

I shouldn’t have made so much advertising for this event.  I simply wanted to have a bit of fun, to go to the Dharma Yatra in France and to Spain by bicycle, but now there are a lot of people who gave money for the Open Centre (and also some for me) so that I do this tour and there were 2 (local) newspaper articles in Québec about it….
I feel a little bit stuck.

I just wrote to a frient "je n’avance pas, je me traîne" (something like "I do not move forward, I drag myself").  That’s the impression I have at the moment.

I did 172 km in 3 days (the figure seems big, I have the impression I did less than that).

Despair

In a small restaurant for having breafast (I don’t know too much what I ordered - there was potatoes in it)

I feel fragile.  That is what describes best my present state.  Fragile.
Ulrika is already missing me.  That’s as if, suddenly, I was home-sick.  Yes, that’s it, home-sick.

(But I don’t know too much where my home is.)

I’m really not sure if I’ll manage to complete this trip.  Spain seems so far, unreachable.  I drive at 15 km/h, sometimes 7 or 8 km/h going up hill.
If only my bike could suddently break in 2, I would have a good excuse to come back to Leipzig….!

Exhaustion

Profen (between Pegau & Zeitz).  45 km further than Leipzig.

I’m off!  Finally!

I’m tired, I had many hard and long days of preparation, but I’m on the road.  (Well, now, lying in the tent, about to sleep.)

My luggage is heavy, the whole computer-solar electricity system weights tons!  And there was a strong wind against me today - at least it didn’t rained, only in the morning before I set off.

Someone I asked directions (in my rudimentary German) gave me 5 euros.  At least that’s a good start!

It was really hard to set off….  The real trip has begun since 3 or 4 days now…

I will write here my trip over the days.