Category: trip reports

Categories
bikes european bike epic general trip reports

cycling: north germany (22 – 27 July 2009)

It feels like we’ve been on the road in Europe much longer than 20 days, but simultaneously, time is flying. And even though we’re in Germany now, it initially feels very much like Friesland more strongly than anything else – lots of canals, dykes, sheep, flatness, and windmills. There are still model windmills in peoples’ gardens.

 

Bike statue outside of Leer, the first major town we reached in Germany. It was indeed bike friendly, and had good icecream, cheese and book shops.

 

 

Lambs on dykes – we were cycling past scenery like this for days and days it felt like

 

The bike-oriented infrastructure shot dramatically downhill after leaving the Netherlands. Case in point: we could tell when we entered Germany (despite the lack of sign) due to the sudden disappearance of our bike lane. It’s much more like the UK – bike lanes that come and go at will. I could also tell we’d arrived in Germany as although there were still plenty of men with inappropriately short denim shorts out mowing their lawns, now they had moustaches as well.

One of the novelties of being here is actually speaking German to Germans in Germany (finally, after all those years of study, now I’ve forgotten everything I ever knew). Although when I actually have a conversation all in German, I’m quite convinced people are only pretending to understand me.

 

Bremerhaven

 

The other amazing novelty is the overwhelming array of reasonably priced and delicious cheeses available in Europe so far – in Australia (and Canada is even worse), cheese is ridiculously expensive even for the tasteless rubbishy stuff. In Europe I find even the cheapest cheese to be tasty, and it’s all so cheap!

As we get closer to Hamburg the roadside potatoes and eggs morph into roadside berries, which seem much more preferable. I’ve seen lots of roadkill hedgehogs now, none alive yet. The only other roadkill I’ve seen is slugs though. Them and the snails. The land also begins to change as we draw closer to Hamburg. Then there are hills – enormous hills. We reach 24 metres above sea level and my poor legs strain with the effort – my breath is short, and I pant to gain enough air for my oxygen-deprived lungs. The flatlands haven’t been kind to our fitness apparently.

 

Lubeck

 

After cycling through Hamburg and Lubeck, it’s on to the German seaside – which is thoroughly alarming, apparently it’s Aalwoche? I’m confused by the direct translation until I find there’s a saying in German about lying in the sun like an eel, and this is some sort of festival relating to the beach. The noise of the seaside campgrounds scare us into wild camping for the second time since we started our European leg, and we find a copse in the farmland that seems suitable. It’s all good except for the deer that keeps coming to bark at us during the night.

 

Wild camping with laptop

 

After suffering many flat tyres, we finally buy new rear tyres, walking out of a bike shop in Oldenburg with Schalbe Marathon Plus tyres that look magically puncture proof (although they aren’t exactly lightweight). In the process of triumphantly switching on our new rear tyres, we realise that Alex’s old tyre has lost all of its middle tread, and mine’s nearly as bad. They feel nearly as thin as inner tubes, and are full of cuts and nicks. No wonder we were getting so many flats. Our front tyres are still in reasonable condition, so we leave them for now.

 

Old tyre – new tyre

 

Inner-tube vending machines, best idea ever

 

After standing and admiring our new tyres for some time, we head on to Fehmarnsundbruecke, and across to an island of summer-cycling holidaying German families. Bikes! Everywhere! Across the island to the ferry to Denmark – like most of the European ferries, this one wants us queued up with the cars. Once onboard our bikes are unceremoniously dumped by the side of the ferry, and we trot upstairs to sit around in the heat for an hour.

 

Fehmarnsundbruecke

 

 

Cycling past endless fields of wheat, in every country

 

Distance cycled: 441km
Flaginess levels: Very low – only some regional flags
Public toilets: Occasionally exist
Open wifi access: Almost non-existent
Bike friendliness: Ok, some bike lanes and national cycle paths

Categories
bikes european bike epic general snow travel trip reports

cycling: netherlands (16 – 22 July 2009)

After an anti-climactic entry into the Netherlands we head towards the coast so we can camp by the ocean. I’m disappointed by yet another mediocre European beach – I need to stop expecting Australian quality beaches over here. I still go for a swim, and then we cook and eat dinner while sitting on the dyke (I’m not sure how a small boy could block a hole in one, they’re enormous things) as large ships meander past us at a distance.

 

Dinner on a dyke

 

Working our way up the coast of the Netherlands involves catching several ferries, and cycling along a few long sea walls, through towns with canals and locks and unsurprisingly covering a lot of very flat terrain. On the plus side we catch a lot of nice tailwinds, although there are a few less nice days, filled with rain.

 

One of many ferry crossings

 

 

Cycling along a canal, a fairly common scene in the Netherlands

 

 

Stormy seas – it was a bit wet, but luckily the wind was blowing from behind, we were hitting speeds of over 20km/hr without even pedalling

 

We miss the cycling route into Rotterdam which involves a ferry, and instead end up in an industrial area and take a bike tunnel UNDER the canal to get into Rotterdam! It’s very exciting, except the lifts are broken so we have to use the escalators to get the bikes down and up at either end, which is always an interesting proposition with a fully-loaded touring bike.

 

The tunnel crossing to Rotterdam, completely empty except for us

 

Arriving in Delft, we wander round and find a coffee shop to sit in and dry out after a morning of persistent wet. The rain showers are petering out, and we set off into the city (where I find a bakery with 4 muffins for the price of 3 – bargain!) and then gradually pick our way along bike paths to Amsterdam. There are lots of birds with young, as well as small goats and ponies.

 

BEWARE OF WILD ROOSTERS! (I still haven’t checked what this is actually supposed to be a warning sign about, assuming that it’s not actually wild roosters – perhaps it is)

 

Hunting for camping, we cycle through Amsterdam and admire all of the bike lanes and cycle friendly infrastructure. We end up first in the Zeeburg campground: to the east of Amsterdam city centre, it’s more like a festival than a campground. There’s so much smoke hanging in the air you’d only have to walk through the place to get stoned. So we cycle back and out to Gaasper, south of the city, it’s a much quieter proposition, even if it’s 9pm by the time we arrive. A long day.

Cycling is a great way to get around Amsterdam – especially on a quiet Sunday morning. There is already a queue of over 130 people outside Anne Frank’s house and it’s not even 10am. The backpackers are thronging, so we flee the city by afternoon. Well, attempt to flee the city. We cycle and cycle, and the gravity of Amsterdam is pulling us back. Finally we reach Haarlem, and eventually the ferry across the Nordzee Canal to Velsen/Beverwijk.

 

Canal in Amsterdam. I did not fall in.

 

It seems we’ve finally escaped Amsterdam, so we start picking our way north, stopping at a market in Castricum (a town name which disturbs both Alex and I) where we find poffertjes and ham burgers (not hamburgers – these are burgers full of shredded ham, very tasty too). Bergen has a nicely wooded area surrounding it, very unlike the farmland we’ve been in until now. We’ve been passing lots of growing flowers and lettuces and such, but still no tulips. We follow the handy Netherlands cycling numbers (they have numbered junctions, with signposts pointing you to the junction with that number, and general maps at most junctions, showing you where you are, and with all the other numbered junctions too – so you can just write down a list of numbers and follow them to your desired location) up the coast and across to Den Oever, past lots of flowers and farms and tractors, but no tulips still.

 

Thank goodness we had all of these windmills to keep us cool

 

 

3000km!

 

 

Not tulips

 

From Den Oever we cross the great 30km dyke/bridge. I’m not sure what it should be called, but it’s a very long, very straight bit of road, and it’s easy to cross it quickly as there’s not much else to do. There’s just road, and then sea on either side. With some boats. Oh, and there is a statue and a service station in the middle of it. Otherwise it’s just an awful lot of straight road.

 

30km of this (thankfully there was a separate bike path and no headwind)

 

Thirty kilometres later, we keep following numbers, mostly along the coast, which means dykes. Green grassy dykes with sheep on them. As we cycle through Friesland, both in the Netherlands and Germany, the sheep and green grassy dykes are a recurring theme. At least Germany believes in public toilets though.

 

Turbines by our camp at Seedykestoer

 

 

Sheep on the dyke-top

 

Distance cycled: approx 614km
Flaginess levels: Moderate (lots of flags and pennants on boats, more common to see regional flags on houses)
Public toilets: Public what? (Virtually non-existent)
Bike friendliness: Very high, bike paths are everywhere, and when there’s no bike path there are bike routes

Categories
bikes european bike epic general trip reports

cycling: france and belgium (13 – 16 July 2009)

[And yes, I’m finally getting around to getting these things written up and uploaded…]

We weren’t in France or Belgium for very long, but the main impression that lingers is that of very tasty food. Very very tasty food. Waffles and pain chocolate and bakeries and chocolateries and icecream and bread and cheese and …. mmmmm.

 

Belgian waffle!

 

Arriving, we cycled off the ferry, then out of Calais as quickly as possible, not wanting to get any stab wounds. We had a Benelux map which includes the top corner of France – all we had to do was try and cycle onto it. Forty kilometers later and no luck, so at 10pm we started hunting for somewhere to camp. We were stuck in dead flat farmland though, and it was nearly midnight by the time we found something even remotely possible. Lying out in the open in our sleeping bags, we listened to fireworks going off as it struck midnight, and realised that tomorrow is Bastille Day.

 

The sun is setting as we try to cycle further into France

 

Flat along the coast, our first morning in France

 

The next day brought a street market (which had all sorts of interesting things for sale, including pupppies and bunnies and chickens), and we tracked down our first French food- a bread roll and some bananas. The bananas don’t taste particularly French, but the bread was tasty. Wandering town to town we saw Bastille Day celebrations and old fort towns and bakeries. Soon enough we were crossing over into Belgium. We hadn’t quite gotten over the shock of being in France, and suddenly we were in another country! Europe is amazing!

 

Leaving France

 

Into Belgium

 

It’s decided to head to Ypres, where we ended up spending an extra day wandering around in order to see everything (and eat all of the waffles and icecream we need to).

 

A Commonwealth cemetry outside of Ypres

 

Ypres town square

 

Menin Gate – thronged with English schoolkids for the playing of the Last Post at 8pm

 

Leaving Ypres, we visited Paschandael and the Tyne Cot Cemetry, taking it in turns to go and walk around and look at the museum and graves, or alternatively sit and clean our drive train while listening to a small child recite the names and ages of everyone buried there. Both fairly sobering options.

 

Tyne Cot… I think

 

Zooming along the flat roads, soon we were in Hooglede and then Brugge (where we marvelled at the historical buildings and statues and throngs of tourists). Then it was time to flee along the nice bicycle-friendly canals past Damme (where we saw our first windmill – wind turbines don’t count) and across the border into the Netherlands at Retranchement (second windmill). We were disappointed by the complete lack of signs regarding the fact we’re in a completely new country.

 

The First Windmill

 

Distance cycled: approx 213km

Categories
canada general snow travel trip reports

wapta icefields: the return to mount gordon

Dist: 24km. Elevation gain: 1280m. Elevation loss: 1280m. Max elevation 3203m.

We were quite happy with the fact we managed our backwards traverse of the Wapta. But as we drove home again, we realised the one thing that bothered us was that we never managed to get to the top of any mountains. So one week on, the original Wapta Icefields Reverse Traverse team re-assembled once more to make an ascent of Mount Gordon.

As we were getting things together in the carpark we were astounded at how many other people were tumbling out of cars and skiing out across Bow Lake. There were hoards! It wasn’t even the weekend!

 

Alex skinning along out of the canyon below Bow Hut

 

We were chatting to the group parked next to us when our suspicions began to be raised. It was Amy who asked them.

“Would you be the Gay Christian Telemark Association by any chance?”

And they were! We had met the Gay Christian Telemark Association! They were heading up to Peyto Hut for their annual pilgrimage (and they let us know that they weren’t gay or christians, “You’re not are you?” they inquired).

So we fought our way through the hoards and started the ascent to Bow Hut, which was all fairly straightforward. Once we reached the hut we stopped for a snack, and then headed on up. We were realising how lucky we’d been with the weather on our traverse. Today there was a horribly cold wind, the view was largely obscured by drifting clouds and mistiness, and as we got out onto the glacier we were being constantly attacked by the gritty wind. So we slogged on and on and up.

 

Rampaging glaciers on Mount Gordon

 

We finally curved around the enormous rock and up to the summit of Mount Gordon. The wind continued to be cold and throw snow at us, and the drifting whiteness let us catch only glimpses of what we could tell should have been an awesome view. Oh well.

 

Amy and Alex, making their way up Mount Gordon

 

So we skiied down and down on the horribly wind-affected snow. Then down onto slushier snow, and a high speed zoom through the packed snow in the canyon, and a final skate out across Bow Lake.

And then there was hot chocolate – ridiculously delicious hot chocolate – from the Num Ti Jah Lodge, as we rested on chairs made out of antlers.

Categories
canada general snow trip reports

wapta icefields traverse: day four

Peyto Hut – Peyto Lake. 10km. 550m altitude lost. 4hrs.

This morning was another sleep-in morning, especially as it looked so cloudy and miserable outside. It had been quite windy overnight as well, which would mean unpleasant wind-affected snow to ski on.

 

Peyto outhouse

 

After some extended lazing around, and a very slow breakfast (included a nice cup of tea) we wandered out towards Mt Rhondda, decided the snow was a bit rubbish and there was no visibility so there was no point skiing to the top of the mountain, and just did a run down from where we were.

 

Alex dug a hole

 

I was unimpressed with the snow, and Alex wanted to dig a hole, so Amy went off and did another run while Alex occupied himself with digging and I occupied myself with watching.

He dug down to the glacier underneath – over 2.5 metres below the surface.
We all hopped in the hole and confirmed that there was indeed a glacier in it, then hopped out again, filled in the hole, and skiied back to the hut for lunch.

 

In which we found a glacier (it had bits in it though)

 

My ski had been feeling a bit odd, and when I took it off at the hut I noticed the binding was a bit wiggly. We unscrewed it from the ski, and realised that two of the screws holding it to the ski had sheared off. Well this was a bit unfortunate. The only allen key we had with us was too rubbish to loosen any of the other screws, so we only had two to work with. Luckily K2 telemark skis have more than one set of insets in them, so you have the option to place your binding in two different locations on the ski. So I reattached the binding a little further forward, with one screw at the front, one at the back, and hoped it would hold.

After that issue had prolonged our lunch, we set off into the white. Visibility wasn’t particularly terrible, it just wasn’t particularly good either. As we started heading downhill, I spent as much of my time skiing on one leg as I could, trying to avoid applying much weight or twisting forces to my gimpy binding.

 

Hiking out over the moraine, past the glacial research huts

 

We got off the glacier, and then it was skis off as we started hiking out over the moraine. A quick explore around the glacial research huts, and then we kept hiking – eventually giving in on the idea of carrying our skis, and just shoving them in our packs, as we kept crossing from snow to rock to snow to dirt.

We got our first glimpse of Peyto Lake, then it was a steep descent down to reach it – done mostly on foot by me, not wanting to risk my binding.

 

Peyto Lake – back at ground level

 

So, we were back in the land of trees again. Skiing across the lake it was odd to have a frame of reference to make our progress so noticeable again. Skiing across the lake I decided that even with a frame of reference, the lake seemed unnecessarily long and irritating to ski across. I don’t mind skiing uphill, and I don’t mind skiing downhill, but this shuffling across long flat surfaces just gets a bit tedious.

Luckily, the tedium finally ended, and there was just the final kilometre through the trees to get to the car. It was an interesting steep and winding track through trees, which wasn’t as always as easy to follow as we would have thought, but after some interesting close encounters with trees, we finally popped out at the car park. Back to civilisation. Boo! I was secretly hoping we were just going to end up at another hut, freshly stocked with food for us, so we could continue our journey.

 

And back at the car, feeling strangely energetic