Ex-pat Inn

Every Greek Island must have their own version of an ex-pat run bed & breakfast; see Mamma Mia for reference.
Last night Conner and I ate dinner at Agistri's version, The Agistri Club. If I were to write a fictional short story about how the trim and handsome older proprietor arrived at his new profession, I would put him in an after hours business meeting in a Rat-Pack chic London wine and cigar bar. The latest real estate development deal looks like it's going through, and while he used to be elated when he pocketed the 1 million pound paycheck and celebrate with an oxygen facial and a glass of Johnny Walker Blue with one cube of ice, now he just feels kind of bored with the whole thing. He looks out the window onto the cold, drizzly London night, vamped-up East London girls drunkly stumbled past; he's 52, successful, handsome, and bored as hell.

So he packs up his money, ditches his black wool suits in favor of khaki shorts and white cotton button-down shirts, buys a shitty old building on the outskirts of town on the way to the island's best nudist beach, and sets to work renovating and painting all the stucco a nice Greek white.

Now he's the much loved gregarious host of the evening meals, dancing around entertaining guests and eternally waving a tall glass of gin and tonic in his hand.

We had a lovely meal and were presided over by George, who had the "good sense" to keep our icy cold beers full. Halfway through dinner the power went out over the whole island, cutting Frank Sinatra off mid-Fly Me To The Moon. Apparently it's a regular occurance because no one seemed surprised, lit the candles that were already set all about the patio, and soon brought in the British bard who played guitar and sang 1970's pop ballads.

When we tried to pay for our food we were told, "Oh my dear boy, guests don't pay! We run an all-inclusive joint here." I'd totally stay there if we were sleeping in a hotel, but as it is, we're camping on the eastern seaside cliffs in between the Agistri Club and the nudist beach (pictured above). There are lots of flat, if not slightly rocky spaces big enough for tents. When we first arrived on Saturday it was so packed that we had to hide some way in order to hunt down one of the much coveted tree-shaded spots. By Sunday evening it cleared out considerably as people left on the last ferry back to the mainland. So now we've upgraded to a nicer, closer spot and have purchased some rectangular floaties which provide cushioning from the tiny rocks that make comfortable sleep in the tent absolutely impossible. They floaties also serve their original purpose and turn the Mediterranean Sea into the greatest water bed ever. The only downside to the latter use is that yesterday Conner and I both fell asleep while floating over the waves and now sport slight sunburns. Alas.

Flying Dolphins

Conner and I finally got the hell out of Athens. We took the metro down to the port and hopped on a hydrofoil to Agistri, a small island in the Argo-Saronics, about an hour from Athens. I've never been on a hydrofoil before and frankly, had no clue what it was. It's pretty cool, engineerically speaking, and feels much like a little putter plane on water-fast but with a little turbulence.


The much slower Hellenic Sea car ferry also makes daily trips to Agistri, and costs half as much. We were operating under the sentiment, "Get me out of Athens as fast as possible!", and thus opted for the Flying Dolphin hydrofoil which gets here in under and hour for 12 euros a person.

Olympian Metros

If Athens' unique word is chaotic, then mine must be efficient-maybe that's why I love Germany so much. I came to Athens under the assumption that it would be orderly and organized like all other major cities in the European Union. I thought that the city had invested millions in new urban development for the Olympic Games of 2004, and that meant they had now joined the world of the polished European city. I was totally wrong and should have left all my assumptions at the sleek new airport.


I asked each of my Greek couch surfing hosts about the effect of the Olympics on Athenian life (not to channel my Berlin buddies). They both just shrugged and said, "Ah, not much changed at all." The only real improvement was the installation of two new metro lines which made transportation easier and more reliable, and cut back on the number of cars within the city limits. The inner city roads, like most European cities, were not built with the width of two cars side-by-side in mind. On several occasions I've had to squeeze by as two cars were locked in a battle of wills as to which one would stop honking and back up to let the other pass.

I do have to say that the new metro lines are pretty cool. They are all lined with freshly polished white marble and are actually much faster than the four previously existing lines. They also have museums in them; one is dedicated to archeology and the other to art.

Other than that, things apparently went on much the same before and after the Olympics.

When heading into the metro, there are always people hawking their wares; the Africans head towards Syntagma Square, their backs loaded down with a large white sheet that holds a bundle of fake designer purses or sunglasses. They'll lay out the sheet on the ground and then entice you into the land of faux Fendi. The Asians prefer Omonia Square with the bottom of a cut-off box that they attach a strap to and hang it from their necks, much like the Las Vegas cigar girl's mobile display box. They mainly sell small electronic toys with multi-colored lights. My favorite of these was a small silver plastic crucifix that has flashing neon blue lights on each point of the cross and was purchased by a small round Greek woman. The older Greek men and women can be found around Academia selling off complicated looking lottery tickets hanging from home made easels.

Meet Conner

Kat has returned home to Texas. I spent a week by myself in Athens-an experience I would decline to repeat. Now I have a new traveling companion and I felt it only right to properly introduce him.

This is Conner, my boyfriend whom I love and cherish. He's a wonderful musician and carpenter, and absolutely knows the success rate of the pick-up line, "Hi. How's it going?" Because that's what he used on me at a bar in Austin and voila, I fell for it. He's never been outside of North America before, so off we go to Greece.

Cultural References

I've noticed that when I travel alone, I tend to hide a bit. I read up on all the Lonely Guide picks for best restaurants and cafes. Of course, these dining establishments have been chosen as the fabulous few for good reason, and as such, they are inevitably crowded. I seek them out on my highly crumpled Athens map, and cruise by only to be intimidated to actually go in.

I feel much more comfortable finding the quietest cafes and generally just walk around a lot. Having a second person seems to boost my confidence, adventurousness, and fearless attitude 10-fold, and makes for a much more interesting traveling experience. And there is of course, the added benefit of having an arm nearby to punch when finally looking up and seeing the Acropolis floodlit at night to say, "Wow! That looks way more majestic at night now that all the restoration cranes have been blocked out by the light."
So, I whiled away the hours at the pool today until my next traveling companion will arrive, reading McMafia, until it closed and then marched myself down to a cute little bar off a side street on Monastiraki square, to read some more and nurse a very large Amstel beer. Henekin and Amstel are the main two beers to be found in Athens; they're considered 'local'. This is funny to me since they are both decidedly Dutch beers.

The music mix they were playing at this bar is worth noting; they started off with a very cheezy French pop artist and then dove into a succession of 70's musicians.
*Sounds of Silence-Simon & Garfunkel
*Friday's Child-Nancy Sinatra
*Jackie-Scott Walker
*And then Willi Nelson!

I'm sitting in a bar in Athens, Greece, and they're playing Willi Nelson! Musical god of Austin, TX! Different parts of the world, all listening to the same music.

I just finished reading John Peel's biography, hero of British Radio 1 who was the first to play death metal, grime, British hip-hop, and reggae on the air. He also hosted the famous Peel Sessions that had live sets from PJ Harvey and the White Stripes. He talked about traveling to different countries, devouring records from local music shops, and taking them back to England to play on his shows. And at the time, because there weren't quick and easy ways to travel in between different cultures, nor was there the Internet or satellite TV, being exposed to something created in Asia or Greece was exotic and wholly different. Now it all kind of blends together; and now it's almost impossible to find contemporary music not sung in English, from which ever country you go!
Athens, when I'm being honest with myself, it's actually not that alien in terms of cultural references. They played all this music that I know, McDonald's is around the corner, Ikea can be reached on the metro, and there are 2 H&Ms here.

One of my couch surfing hosts had a small dinner party comprised of two Greeks, an Australian, and me. We all sat around discussing cartoons that we all grew up with-why is this a typical bonding practice among kids of the 80's? Some of the cartoons were all the same across the board: Captain Planet, Fraggle Rock, SheRa. Then there were others, imported from Japan, that the Greeks and Australian could bond over; those were lost on me.

Amazing. Various parts of the globe, all watching the same Saturday morning cartoons.

Proliferation of Athenian Dogs

I here by forth forbid myself from traveling alone, especially to countries in large, hectic cities to which I have never been before.

I've been a poor budget traveler since stepping off the metro three days ago. I have once again checked myself into a hotel despite every intention of hosteling it tonight; the breakdown occurred around 3pm after dragging myself around the very packed, very new New Acropolis Museum. The museum just opened in June of this year, as yet another member of the designed museums that you go to more for the modern glass architecture and less for their collection. It is however, only one euro until December, making the trip semi-worthwhile. The coolest bit by far was the miniature models of the north and south pediment sculptures of the Acropolis.
It's really the heat that truly did me in. There was no wind to dry a bit of the sweat that was dripping down my back only to be soaked up by the waistband of my underwear. And it was Sunday. Sundays are the bane of my traveling existence because everything in Europe seems to be closed on these holy days. In fact, there is a far greater amount of open establishments in the God fearing land of America on Sundays than anywhere in Europe, an entire continent that seems to be moving further and further away from organized religion. With only museums and cafes open today - and having no more energy for more exhibits and having spent my allotted per diem on coffee already - I yearned to escape the stale heat of the street and go back to a roof-top pool. So, I caved and found a different pool than I had already visited. While Kat and I may have ice creamed and H&Med our way around Northern Europe, I seem to be roof-top pooling it around Athens.

My mom informed me that Rick Steves, travel guide god, said one can do Athens in two days. I say that indeed, Athens can be done in a maximum of two days, but those days must be spent in a nice hotel equipped with a pool and air conditioning. The charm of Athens I must confess, is entirely lost on me and I can not wait until my boyfriend, Conner, gets here and we run off to some of the more relaxed Cycladic Islands.

Things I've noticed about Athens:

a. It's expensive. Ice cream cones in Western Europe generally run around 1.90 for two scoops. Here it's 3.90 - 3.90 I tell you! Absolutely ludicrous.

b. Sure are a lot of stray dogs hanging out, sleeping in the shade of metro stations. In Amsterdam every shop, restaurant, grocery store, has a cat to hunt the mice that are simply a fact of canal life. In Athens they have dogs hunting-well, I have yet to figure that out, but they all look quite robust and healthy.
c. Greek men have flirting skills that require the same level of patience as a Planet Earth filmographer trying to capture footage of the rare Costa Rican Quetzal bird. They just stare, and stare, and stare; sometimes for the entire length of a 45min tram ride. Occasionally they do break the barrier and talk, but usually in Greek, which still baffles me. I obviously look like a tourist and well, don't they know that while English has become the universal language of business, it is also the language of the global pick-up line: the most effective being, "Hello. How are you doing today?" My main way to combat all of this nonsense is simple ignorance. So, if I return to the States and now ignore anything that is not said directly to my face, well, you know where it comes from. Hopefully after having returned to Texas for a couple weeks, this will have all vanished without a trace and I will once again be the super friendly Southern that now lies dormant.

Greek Carresses

I've spent the better part of my 3 days in Athens lounging by the roof-top pool amongst young and topless French and German couples. I flit between the safety of the umbrella shade and the bed-like cushions in full sun, trying to even out my bikers version of a farmer's tan. The tops of my thighs, my hands, and the backs of my calves-go figure-are quite brown while my stomach is still pasty white. My foreign pool-side female colleagues bask uninterrupted in the harsh Greek sunlight, their nipples becoming a dark shade of coco instead of the pink they started began with. Their male counterparts sport small, solid colored manties.
I must confess that I checked out their bikini line, because surely, if I have to do summertime maintenance, then so do they in the face of such a small amount of Lycra. It turns out they do, at least the Donatella-Versace-dark Greek man sitting in front of me.

I did venture out briefly yesterday, determined not to be intimidated by the crowds and noise of Athens. I went in search of the little gelateria the receptionist referred me to and after finding it got two scoops. Bad idea. I'm a leisurely ice cream eater and in the Greek heat, this concept does not exist. By the time I finally chomped down on the last of the cone, I had dripped the chocolate hazelnut cream all down the front of my white shirt. I had quickly turned into the gouche tourist, only needing a fanny pouch to complete the look.

Another incident caused me to retreat back into my roof-top hide-a-way. I was absent-mindedly window shopping down a side street from the hectic Ermou shopping district--they even sell really cool exotic chickens! As I was gazing at some clothing a group of young boys passed behind me and the smallest one let his hand casually pass over my butt. Little punk. I turned around and raised my leg to kick him but thought better of it at the last minute. Ah, to be a light-haired, pale-skinned obvious foreigner in a Roman land; one of the reasons I vowed to never return to Italy without a tall strapping man to discourage such unwarranted caresses.

Nasty Words

I warn readers that I am about to say several mean, nasty things and that I mean no offense by them on a personal level.

I hate the British. They drive me absolutely up the insane on multiple levels. I feel like a couple direct quotes would illustrate my problem; all taken during my layover in the London Gatwick airport.

Little girl sitting across from me:
"Dah-dy! Dah-dy!"
"Yes, sweetheart?"
"Can I wear this in the pool?" (small charm bracelet)
"Of course dear."
"Good. Because I want to look good."

At the airport bookstore:
"Would you like a bag? 6 pence."
"Uh, no. But could I borrow a pen real quick?"
"89 pence. Nothing's for free in this world honey."

On plane. Girl standing in aisle calling down:
"Cah-ly! Cah-ly!!! I'm so upset right now I'm about to have a fucking melt-down. I'll clean up my language soon but right now I'm fucking upset!"
(exclaimed as she hovered over a poor elderly couple desperately trying to sleep)

Old man sitting next to me, speaking to his wife:
"What a fucking stupid selfish cow."
In response to reading the newspaper headline, 67 Year Old Mother Dies Leaving Twins Aged 2, as wife studies Greek phrase book.

On the bus that took Kat and I from the London Stansted airport to the London Gatwick airport (a 2 hour ride!) at 4am, the driver gave us trouble about getting on the bus with our hot chocolates, said they were forbidden on board. He relented as we started chugging the hot liquid saying to just dispose of our cups at the end of the ride. Ugh.

Sometimes I feel like they try to 'out-American" us by being the loudest, most obnoxious, most Paris Hilton-esque, most unstylish people ever.
By first roomate is college was British and she was wonderful. My mother is a huge Anglophile and went as far to spend 6 months living in London. She loved it and it's the happiest I've seen her in ages. I think British humor is brilliantly awkward, 1960's Brit rock and punk is legendary. Coming from Germany where everyone is quick to be helpful and laid-back (yes, 'tis true despite common assumptions), to London where everything is an ordeal and nothing is done without expected compensation well, it just made me want to die--let's call it a slight case of 'culture shock'.

Sunken Yachts

We're not used to public transportation, that much is clear. We tried really hard to maintain our optimistic and positive outlook on life through the long and chaotic lines of Ryan Air although we were both struggling. We got through another long line passing by customs into Croatia and changed some money, only to wait with 40 other people for the bus that was supposed to come in 10 minutes and whisk us into the city center.

We waited and waited for well over an hour. Several people jumped the bus line and shared a taxi together, taking them one step closer to the promise of the clear Croatian sea. Several more people did it too and we looked on with increasing envy. Finally we shared a taxi with 2 other American girls who were "backpacking" their way around Europe by way of B&B and hotels; they had 7 pairs of shoes stored in their packs, each. 7 each. They had just graduated from high school.

Once we got to the city center we caught a bus over to our haven, Villa Lippa. It's a modern house that was split up into 6 apartments. Our apartment takes up one half of the top floor and we have two balconies. Everything is white and airy with tiled floors and french doors. White curtains billow in the wind and there are sliding blond wood floor-length shudders that can be slid in order to block out the sun without blocking the view.

We dumped our stuff and ran to the market for fresh fruit, bread, and wine and then off to the beach by the yachting club, a 10 minute walk south. The "beach" area is a short collection of rocks before it plunges into the clear, cold, blue ocean. The small jagged rocks are brutally hot and sharp and make entry and exit from the water one of the least graceful acts ever.

Zadar seems to have the quiet laid-back vibe of a beach town but with an underlying desolation. Old wrecked yachts act as diving boards, gray stuccoed structures have missing roofs, buildings outside of the 2-building financial district don't rise above 3 stories with the trees not getting much higher. They are currently revamping the quick post-war concrete rebuild that occurred in the 70's (I think) and the Sea Organ and the Sun Salutation are at the forefront of that effort. The Sea Organ below is amazing! It's so calming and just fabulous. There's an explanation of how it works at Wikipedia.

Croatia's lovely and makes the flight and non-existent bus worth while.

Ryan Air

I question our sanity in deciding to go to Croatia at the end of this trip. At the current time I classify it as a bad decision. Ryan Air, when on the ground in the comfort of your own home, seems like a brilliant idea, to fly cheaply all over Europe. When actually going on a Ryan Air flight, it's the worst conception of an 'air taxi' ever.

Kat and I checked in online several days in advance and we had our confirmation number. But because we didn't print out the boarding pass for lack of a printer, we had to "counter check-in" for a fee of 20 British Pounds. Totally ridiculous! First we had to go through security where they made us throw out all liquids over 100ml, which you know, is nothing new. But still, they made us throw out the sunscreen, and we're going to Croatia and a pale-faced girl like me is going to curse Ryan Air later, I can feel it. My saddle bag with all of my bike equipment had to be searched and I was preparing myself to throw a hissy fit. But no, it had nothing to do with my bike parts, they were unhappy with the cutting knife that I had just chilling in my bag. Haha, whoops. Then there was the matter of Kat's carry-on bag being overweight and they charged her 30 pounds. It's just a series of regulations that they are absolute about; they leave no room for error. And coming from laid-back Germany, the hard-nosed Londoners were quite a pain to deal with.

Plus, it's like a freaking cattle run to get onto the plane. They don't assign seats and it's just a first come, first serve kind of thing. Everyone's pushing and shoving to be one of the first people to get on the plane and plop down in the coveted window seats away from all the children. A freaking mad house and I don't understand why they don't just save everyone the stress and print seat numbers on everyone's tickets. Ugh.

Funny thing is that they always have some sort of classical music playing on the plane once you do shove your way onto the plane, in a feeble attempt to calm us all down again so they can dole out water for 3 pounds each.

Breaking Through To The Yellow Side

Ah, ha, ha...ok, bad. That was bad, I know.

Kat and I took the opportunity to "work through" a couple things on this trip. Mine was to figure out what my new five-year plan is to be. Being 26, I feel like it's high time to get my act together and you know, get a 'real' job or at least start down that road-I say this what the same feeling as, "Aw, Mom, do I have to clean my room?" Kat wanted to work on living in the here and now. Kat quote: "Forget the ants, focus on the State Of Now Kathleen." Both objectives are slowly being reached to one degree or another, however, there are other things we have improved about ourselves as well.

Apparently for years Kat has been unable to pee without the faucet running and absolutely no one around. Spending so much time on the road, and most of that on scenic bike paths, peeing in nature with one of us acting as a look-out makes Kat's previous peeing requirement obsolete. Even through she was beginning to get a stomach ache from how bad she had to go, she couldn't as we rode up the coast of Denmark. But by the time we reached Dusseldorf, I am happy to report that it is an issue of a bygone Kat-ian era. Haha, ok, that was a bit of an over-share, I admit.

Oh! While I am on this most ridiculous subject, I forgot to mention that in Amsterdam they had such a problem with the lack of public bathrooms, drunk tourists, and an overflow of late-night peeing on the sides of buildings that they put in "public urinals".
But they're only for men and you just pee up against the make-shift wall. Ah! Even though we know how to pop-a-squat really well now, this isn't going to help Kat nor I for any late-night drinking. We saw some men in bright orange jumpsuits cleaning one of these with scrub brushes while we were in Amsterdam. I think that has to be one of the more unpleasant jobs in that town.

Bike Abandonment

After our night of imaginary hell, we rode the 22 remaining kilometers to Mannheim. Needing security and comfort, I figured that because I used to live there 6 years ago, that would be the closest we could get to proverbial chicken soup from across the ocean. It's amazing how little the town has changed in all these years; my favorite cafes are in the same place, the awesome antique jewelry store is still on the corner, the medical library still has free Internet, and ice cream cones are still 1 euro-the cheapest we found the whole trip.

The first stop we made was to the medical library Internet where Kat scoped out hunky doctors-in-training and cheap hotels, because there was no way we were getting on our bikes again to camp. It turns out the most affordable hotel in the center of town, Hotel Luxa, was the one my mom and I stayed at when she first dropped me off in Germany, and which I had totally forgotten about. Kat and I were so worn out since we got in to town that we ended up staying 3 days when we only planned for 1. The thought of moving at all filled us with dread. We became very, very boring. Our idea of a perfect day was to spend several hours reading at Star Coffee, followed by several hours of Internet, some window shopping, always to retire to our room by 7pm for dinner, a bottle of wine, and watching music videos - some cheezy, some brilliant, and some just with fun songs.

On the 2nd day we had to finally deal with getting our bikes home. The plan was to ship them back to the States and then frolic on Croatian shores sans cycle. Getting the bikes to Europe was not really a huge problem, the bike shops in Austin even offered to send them from the store and then there was always taking them on the plane. Getting them back to the States proved to be a greater issue. Kat investigated through a few shops around Mannheim and they all said they would provide a box but we would have to deal with the German freight companies ourselves. Total pain in the ass.

One of the boys at the bike shop said he would buy Kat's Crosscheck because they're coveted in Europe and apparently olive green and gray are super rare colors over there. She sold it for just slightly less than she had hoped, but not by much. Success for Kat!

Mine was a slightly different story. Because my bike was homemade, it didn't fetch any buyers. I decided to do a little cycle surgery and take all my 'good' parts with me. Armed with a large glass of wine and my multi-tool, I went down into the hotel basement junk area where we stored our bikes-the part they don't want the customers to see. I took off the tire tread and tubes, my girl seat, the rear rack, and the derailleur and chain; unfortunately I had to leave my peddles because they were welded on and despite my best efforts of my newly formed biceps, they wouldn't budge.
The parts combined were more than the $50 frame and my boyfriend, Conner, said in a worse-case-scenario to just leave it and we'll build another one back in Austin.

Afterwards, on our way to get one last ice cream cone, I unceremoniously left the poor remnants by a dumpster and quickly walked away before anyone saw. It was actually really sad; we rode over 1,500 miles on those bikes and well, damn it, parting..yadda, yadda...sweet sorrow. End of a biking adventure.

Died And Gone To Heaven

Holy Shit, I've died and gone to heaven!

Kat left this morning to fly home and I ventured on to Athens, Greece. Being with one other person for 5 weeks with no time apart - I kid you not - and to have them gone and then going to a country where I've never been and can't even read the alphabet, well, it's terribly unnerving. So in order to make the transition from cohabitation to being again, a "strong, young, independent woman", I felt like a needed some training wheels for that. In my yuppie-in-training mind this obviously meant to throw down for a really nice hotel and hibernate for a couple days before I feel strong enough to venture out once again and reclaim my adventurous spirit. I did some research and settled on Hotel Fresh : Athens Design Hotel.
It's freaking awesome! I'm on the 8th floor, everyone has their own balcony and mine faces the Acropolis, they have a sauna and a steam bath, a rooftop pool. Sigh. I plan to employ all of these services to the fullest extent tomorrow and then I feel confident that I will quickly regain my mojo. Plus, I am supposed to be working on some scarf designs for my mom and I have yet to begin them. Tomorrow is the day.

Athens has a lovely transit system they put in place for the Olympics several years back. After visiting Croatia, I totally appreciate having it be super straight forward as to how to get around. Nothing like getting to the airport and then being stuck waiting for a bus that was supposed to come in 10 minutes but yet still has not come in 2 hours. When you can smell the ocean but only see the black tarmac, well, it sucks. But anyhow.

The hotel has computers and Internet that are at my disposal and so I shall be catching up on so many missed stories. Yay! Mojo returns!

A Southern Girls Guide To Ditching

On the morning of the third day with Michael, he spoke of taking another day off of work and continue heading south with us. We gave each other the covert wide-eyed girl look that screams, "What the hell?! Save me!" It had been fun to have a pause in Kat and Rachel's Series of Unfortunate Events. But as my mom told me-as I sobbed to her over the payphone about my screwed up flights on the way over here, heaving, "This is exactly what I hate about traveling!" (when tired I become inept at damage control of any sort)- that traveling is about discovering what you're capable of in tough situations, as well as seeing new people and places. With someone else manning the helm of the trip, we felt like we were on a cycling equivalent of a cruise ship and not a bad-ass sailboat.

Being Southern ladies, we didn't want to be rude, but we didn't know how to gracefully bail out.

While Kat was off peeing, after several false starts, I finally said, "We'll probably ride with you till Mainz (the end of our bike map), but then I think we're going to peel off and resume our girl bonding trip." He just shrugged and said, "Ok. Sounds perfect." Man, why do us Southern girls over think this kind of stuff? Worrying over nothing.

So we got to Mainz and he went on to Frankfurt while we headed south towards Mannheim.

Which brings me to recount what has to be the one most difficult night of our entire trip.

Kat and I were already really tired but we wanted to get as close to Mannheim as possible, find a nice campsite and get a good night's sleep. We rode along the elevated path through southern German farmland. It looked just like a photo from a Fodor's travel guide that is so vivid you think, "Surely that must be photoshopped." But no, real, all real. It was so nice to be back in the countryside after a stint through so many industrial towns along the Rhine, between Bonn and Frankfurt.
Around 9pm we came upon a confusing rerouting of the path for construction and I saw one of the temporary signs thrown on the ground to the side of the road. Then we passed a parking lot full of teenage boys who began to laugh as we passed. I have really learned to hate groups of teenagers on this trip; If they're not trying to run us off the bike path into stinging nettles, then they're spraying us with a fine mist of soda, or just being little shits in general.

The thought popped in my head that they had changed the signs around as a mean joke on unsuspecting cyclists like us. The route took us down a long straight road to the river with only one muddy road branching off to the left. Two of the teenage boys passed us on their motorbike, honking and hollering, and stopped at the river ahead. The route took us down a long straight road with a muddy bike lane branching off to the left as the only exit strategy in sight. And in the waning light I thought, "Oh no. I've seen this situation played out before on a Lifetime channel's Afterschool Special. Shit."

We continued along with no assault and passed by the only campsite in 50km. There were lots of camper vans and a few tents, but not one person. The gates were locked and despite our 'hallos!', no one appeared. I could possibly, maybe understand the campers being shut down for the high season of late June, but why leave tents up? It was the eeriest thing ever, combined with the teenage boys, that when we soon came upon a cute clearing on the bank of the Rhine, I couldn't fathom stopping.

We hauled ass through the next two towns and stopped as soon as the path took a turn for farmland again. By this time it was far past dark and we made camp by the moonlight near fields of hay. It sounds romantic, and it should have been, as we huddled in our sleeping bags having a small dinner consisting of chocolate. But as a result of our Lifetime freakout, the camp ghost town, and extreme exhaustion, Kat and I were sufficiently petrified not to sleep at all the entire night. I kept imagining having heard heavy breathing by the tent, footsteps in the grass, and voices.

Worst case German Chainsaw Massacre scenarios incessantly flashed through my head and I kept trying to shove them out with images of butterflies and beaches. People say that camping on the side of the road gets easier, and it did-the part of falling asleep on hard dirt and setting up camp super fast in all conditions. The part of two girls with no method of defense-except maybe peeing on ourselves and clawing eyes out-and sleeping with only a thin layer of fabric between us and the world, that part got no less difficult. In fact, I think it got progressively worse as we headed south into more densely populated areas.

As we packed up camp early the next morning I kept thinking, "I'm totally over this. 4 walls=heaven. No more. No more." We made a bee-line to the nearest bakery which was to be found in a bizarre German version of Super Walmart. There were all these small groups of old people having passionate discussions, and running on empty as we were, this was highly comforting. We craved somewhere secure. We sealed the deal with a large cup of coffee and two pastries, each.

Worst day ever, and it was all in our heads.

Home of Augustus Gloop

Kat and I are admittedly yuppies-in-training. We like the art deco saunas and the chi-chi minimalistic restaurant above the yachting club. On the same token we're also game for roughing it on our bicycles-but that's not my point here. We were warned by our German tour guide, Michael, that Dusseldorf is the land of the rich, one time home of Claudia Schiffer, and training ground of arrogantly upturned noses. But really, could the hometown of Augustus Gloop be all that bad?We had our first coffee of the day sitting on the outside couches of a sufficiently hip coffee shop and watched the early morning strollers. It was like everyone was a model-in-training! They were all beautiful and stylish-very unlike my previous comment about German style being sensible. No, these people were so not sensible, wearing stilettos on cobblestone streets. I don't know how they did it!

Actually, I take that back. I did see how they did it. Two girls were walking, being adequately animated and decidedly oblivious to our staring. One stopped in her tracks because her heel had gotten stuck in one of the many cracks. She tried to wiggle it out, all the while trying to keep up the conversation, but it wouldn't budge. She finally bent down and yanked it out. Awkward, unsexy moment, but really funny for Kat and I to watch.

Dusseldorf doesn't just need one unique word, it deserves a whole song!

Oh, and people here had the best tattoos. Several of the beautiful young women had corresponding beautiful full sleeve arm tattoos. If I were going to get one in Germany then I would come here and forget Elfenzauber in Berlin.

Michael was so not impressed with the city and wanted to make a quick getaway, but Kat and I were secretly loving it. I wished we could have spent more time here, sitting in cafes and people watching.

Superior State Of Being

My absolute favorite documentary film ever is Surfwise. I am constantly mentioning it in passing and force my loved ones to watch it, because it's fabulous on so many levels.
In short:

Surfwise follows the odyssey of 85-year-old, legendary surfer Dr. Dorian "Doc" Paskowitz, his wife Juliette, and their nine children—all of whom were home-schooled on the beaches of Southern California, Hawaii, Mexico and Israel; they surfed every day of their lives, and were forced to adhere to a strict diet and lifestyle by their passionate and demanding, health-conscious father.

But really, just watch the preview.

So yeah, he's super strict, especially about their diet. He makes a point of health as not simply "the absence of disease", but of a "superior state of being". The Paskowitz's surfed all day long and ate essentially nuts and berries, leaving them crazy fit.

I acknowledge that this might be the most in shape I may ever be in my life. I simply can't imagine when I will ever have another time in which I can devote to 10 hours of cycling a day for 4 weeks. I wanted to try the Surfwise diet and see what happened, beginning from the time we crossed the Holland-German border to the finish of our trip in Frankfurt, 9 days. Kat and I went to the market and got carrots, nuts, beans, rice cakes, and lots of fruit. I made it through the first day and felt awesome, I even weathered the mid-afternoon ice cream craving.

Then we hit Duisburg the next day. It was so stressful that when Michael offered to treat us to pizza, it sounded like the best, most comforting thing ever. I caved. I then caved the following day too, as we passed one ice cream cafe after another with flavors like Pistache, Schwarzwald (chocolate cherry), Malaga (rum raisen), Prosecco Melon, and Honig. It was like tasting all the flavors of the dairy rainbow.

Speaking of comfort. When biking for a while, past our exhaustion point, for one reason or another, and we have something lovely at the end-beautiful campsite, delicious meal, squishy bed-then it all seems worth it. It's easy for us to get up early again the next morning with a positive outlook and do it all over again. We're exhausted, our asses hurt, and we have dirt rings around our necks but it's cool because at least we have this amazing castle in the distance with two! rainbows, and it all seems worth the hassle. However, if a respite from the pain never materializes then it's really hard to not want to give up. And in fact, while I'm on the subject, I think we can handle about 11 days of straight-up biking before we need a couple days off to chill in cafes and lounge in saunas to get our mojo back in working order. Cycling and sleeping on dirt for 11 days, that's our limit.

Even Cycling Texans Get The Fairytale Blues

"So much to say, so much to say, so much to sah-ey"
So Much To Say. Dave Mathews Band-during his cool years

Kat and I have gone a long way since I've been able to properly write.

Third Leg auf einer größeren Karte anzeigen

We left Rotterdam and headed towards what has to be the worst city in all of Germany. Duisburg used to be a major center of steel, but then all the factories closed down, and it went into a steady decline. Now it is one of the poorest, dirtiest, most vile cities in West Germany. The minute Kat and I reached the northern suburbs it felt like we had entered a gauntlet-from the people to the architecture. We stopped in a small plaza with several old people around to check our directions. We figured that if people were leaving the old timers alone, then surely they wouldn't bother us. While we were pouring over our maps, across the street part of the ornate stone decoration fell off of the side of the building and almost hit a group of people walking below. Like a gauntlet I tell you.
Kat says that one of my talents is finding at least one thing positive about a situation. The only redeemable aspect I can find about Duisburg is that they have quite talented graffiti artists. Because really, how else are you going to pass the time in a shit town except paint the decaying buildings pretty colors? We took some pictures but don't have a way to put them on the computer yet. Soon I will get some more up here.

Whenever I travel in Europe and I come across a heavily industrial and ugly town, I always think, "Bombed during the war." And vice versa, if a town is old and super cute then is was saved heavy bombing during WWII. I feel like Duisburg must have been mauled during the war. I learned that even the Germans bombed their own bridges, some built during Roman times, so absolutely no one could get across. Ancient architecture gone, at the bottom of the river. Damn war kills all the cool architecture.

Hell-bent to get out of Duisburg as soon as possible, Kat and I blazed a trail past another young, tattooed, saddlebag ladden dude. We inadvertantly picked him up as a traveling companion for what we thought would be a couple of hours, but ended up being 3 days. You stop to figure out where you should be going and then voila, a young man offers to show you the way himself, and poof, instant traveling companion. That's how it's done. He's a chain smoking German firefighter who took off on a cycling trip after his live-in girlfriend broke up with him and he needed time to 'think'-except he just hung out with us instead.

When traveling, occaisionally you get thrown into an extended companionship with someone towards whom you only feel a lack of negative sentiment. In normal life you'd probably never become really good friends with them, even though they seem nice enough. Thrown together on the road, you get along pretty well before you part ways with no intention of keeping in touch. You also seem to share a lot of information with eachother about your personal lives because well, you'll probably never see them again. That was the story with the romantically challenged German fireman named Michael.

Kat however, hated him. He drove her absolutely crazy. When she finally told me after the first day I was totally surprised since I felt totally neutral about him, and just kind of enjoyed not having to figure out where we were going for a while.

Michael did let us in on a nice German secret. Technically the land along the Rhein is "owned" by the river. Every five years or so, it floods and climbs up the riverbanks about 20 meters. So technically no one can fuss at you for camping on the banks of the Rhein. Sometimes it's a trick to find a nice, flat, non-city, non-campsite bit of Rheinside land, especially through the Loreley Cliffs. That area is freaking amazing and it's no wonder that the Brother's Grimm collected so many fairytales here.

Side note: I read that Jacob and Wilhelm Grimm were first and foremost, German linguists. As of the 19th century there was still no unified Germany, only 39 nation-states, whose sole common link was the Germanic language. They were collecting German folk/fairytales as a way to help create a cultural identity.
We actually camped across the river from something like the picture above. We had ridden so far that day, 120km, and were dead to the world but we couldn't find one nice flat place to camp until we came upon this sight. We set up camp and were in the middle of cooking bratwurst on Michael's portable stove, when it started to lightly drizzle. Over the castle across the way two rainbows formed. Two! Sigh, fairytales.

Mannheim, Germany

Oh my god. We're in Mannheim, just below Frankfurt on the Rhein River. I studied here about 6 years ago and it's nice to be in a familiar city again. Kat and I are really, really rough around the edges right now. We're dead to the world and desperately holding on to the last shreds of our sanity. I think we're going to stay here the night and figure out what to do tomorrow after some sleep, which neither of us have had in about two nights. We're sooo over biking at the moment, but maybe after sleep and a shower we'll reconsider biking back to Frankfurt-another 80km. Sigh.

And I'll fill in all the missing parts in between 'happy and vivacious! us' to 'sad and pathetic us'...but later. As in much later...tomorrow.

Staying Clean

There's something about checking off the cities as we along our route that gives us a sense of progress, ''Ah, 4 more small towns closer to Frankfurt!'' Although, it seems like super slow going for us through southern Holland, around lots of farmland and small industrial towns. In fact, if there's one smell that will instantly take my memories back to this trip, it will be cow manure. Not sheep, not goat, but cow because seriously, judging from these Bikeline routes, one would think that cow fields are what Europe is comprised of.

The other thing about the scenery staying so constant is that it's way more mentally tiring than riding where there are lots of new things to see; it's kind of like running on a gym treadmill instead of along a mountain trail. Kat suggested I think about something completely different to break the monotony. She likes to daydream of future situations where comfort is the top order of the day: spa retreats, hours of yoga, movies on the couch with a hot chocolate and a warm blanket. I focus on songs-or more like, I try desperately to remember the lyrics to songs I should know. My favorites, and most successful remembrances, are Blackbird and Sweet Baby James. Both songs are super comforting and easy to pace with my squeaky metronome-like peddles.

It's finally gotten warm enough to break out the sunscreen, tank tops, and biking shorts. It's the kind of weather I was envisioning for this trip all along. It's totally awesome. The only downside is that it's hard to feel clean for more than an hour. In Holland, they don't have those large bathroom sinks big enough to fit one's head under, like they do in Sweden. Here, they are more akin to the size of an airplane sink, just enough room to put one hand under at a time. And now we actually sweat. Riding through farmland all day, with wind kicking up dirt that then gets stuck to our bodies, well, that's just plain gross by the end of the day, even by our standards. The sunscreen we keep slathering on adds a nice layer of grease to our already sweaty and gritty skin.

After noticing the rings of dirt on my neck-I kid you not-Kat said she had reached her gross threshold and we were definitely showering at a bonafide campsite that night. We can make it for about two nights just camping by the side of the road, but by the third it's mandatory to find a nice shower and go to bed early. We also bought these little Dove face wipes that also work well to de-grit at the end of the day in between showers that seem to help us feel slightly more clean before we get in our sleeping bags.

Personal Words

In Amsterdam I read a bit of Eat, Pray, Love, which was awful. It was just too much god-talk for me from a overly politically correct New Yorker--might as well just come out with it instead of pussy-footing around the matter by throwing in 'Allah, Yaweh, etc...or whatever you may wish to call that great being in the sky'. Makes me want to gag.

However, the premise was nice; after a messy divorce she spent a year doing all the things she always wanted to do: language school in Italy, meditation retreat in India, etc. There were a couple things she wrote that I keep coming back to, despite the heavy-handed writing. An Italian man she met said that everyone has a personal word that is unique to them, and every city also has a unique word. Rome was Sex. New York was Achieve. LA was Succeed. If your personal word and that of the city don't match, then you'll always feel like a bit of an outsider.

I bring this up because I have never seen Kat react so negatively to anything we've seen so far as she did to Rotterdam. If the word for Rotterdam is Gritty, then Kat's must be Genteel, forever at odds with one another. Myself, I didn't see really see why anyone would want to vacation there and take up all the hotel rooms. But I did see that it was the most immigrant populated city in Northern Europe, super diverse. It was rough around the edges, and a little depressing, but it also seemed to have a lot of cool music and art happening; maybe like Paris in the 20's or New York in the 70's.

Back To Old Ways

Um, all that stuff I said about having learned to do the second leg of our trip in comfort & style? Yeah, well I have come to realize that was all utter bullshit. It was supposed to be easier this time round; our muscles were seasoned, we figured out how to successfully read our foreign maps with fewer instances of getting lost, and we even had squishy beds to look forward to through couch surfing.

We left Amsterdam for Rotterdam and it was like the first day all over again. Almost a week and a half of lounging in Vondlepark with wine and sweets and we were beginners again. We didn't find our way to our nice squishy bed until 11:30pm, far after the time our host had already gone to bed-we were supposed to get there at 8pm. Trying to find a safe, free, place to camp in a big city so late at night seemed like the worst idea ever, so we decided to bite the bullet and spring for a hotel. We were so exhausted and irritable at this point that all the latent obscenities started coming out.

''What the hell should we do?''
''Fuck if I know.''
''Damn it all to hell! I just want to sleep.''
''Well shit. And just how should we go about that?''

For some ungodly reason all the budget hotels that we could find were full. We were finally sent to a hotel that had one more room for 120€. We were so tired we were ready to hand over our credit card saying, ''Ah, fuck it.''

Trying to find that hotel we came across Hotel One. The young, slightly nervous concierge said that indeed, he too had just one extra room, which normally went for 100€.
I leaned in, ''Normally?''
''Um, yes...but tonight maybe...maybe I could rent it for 90€'', which sounded like there was room for negotiation. As the daughter of a woman with whom there is always room for negotiation, hesitation is always an invitation.
''How about 80€?''

It was a deal! I've never bartered with a hotel before, but I figure that now I should just add it into my hotel rule-of-thumb.

Trying to reach a destination by a certain time is really difficult and leaves no room for spontaneity. We like to have coffee and read for an hour, two if the book is really good. We like to stop at the kids playground because they gasp! have a kick-ass zip-line. Oh, and not to mention getting lost, which we do often. We don't have reliable Internet access, so coordinating housing is hard. So if the night's arrangements get messed up, by that time we're so tired that we'll even consider staying at the Hilton by way of calculating how many ice creams will be necessary to skip in order to break even.

This is what we learned and now we're back to old ways.