From Backpacks to Bikes

Well, we’re on to another continent.  Having left our fantastic experience in Europe behind us, we’re now hours away from setting out to explore Eastern and Southern Africa.

While we’ve checked Europe off on our travel ‘to-do’ list, it left an impression on us that we’ll certainly never forget. Our experience was nothing like we expected.  We’d planned for 7-weeks of train trips, visiting world-renowned cities, and of course seeing friends.  We did this, but we also added over 2000 kms of cycling to the mix and that changed our plans pretty dramatically.

We owe our thanks to Geoffrey, a friend that we made in Bolivia who told us about his tales of cycling from his home town of Paris to Istanbul, Turkey as part of his 2-year world trip. We liked the idea immediately, and with three weeks remaining before we stepped off of South America soil and on to European ground, we started educating ourselves on buying bikes, gear (tent, sleeping bags, GPS, bike panniers, etc.) and cycling routes.  And that’s how our story begins.

In a renewed effort to keep this blog update and our Euro-trip story   from mirroring the length of a thesis dissertation, I’m going to return to the trip ‘stats and facts’ format.  So here we go:

Shane & Colleen’s 2010 Euro-Trip Stats & Facts

Geography 

• Point of Arrival & Departure to Europe: Frankfurt, Germany 
• Countries that we cycled through: Austria, Czech Republic, Germany and a small part of Switzerland 
• Base camp for pre and post-cycling trip: the resort-like home of Rolf & Brita Zitzlsperger (aka: super-host parents of our friend David)

 

Endurance

• Average number of kms cycled per day: 85 (our max was 115 kms) 
• Number of kms cycled for the entire trip:  Over 2000 
• Average weight of gear & supplies for each bike:        Shane - 50 lbs. Colleen - 30 lbs 
• Number of times we ‘climbed’ the same, freaking, monster-hill in freezing-cold, windy, rainy  weather because of ‘faulty’ signage:   3 
• Number of pounds gained/lost from 2000 + kms of cycling with 30 & 50 lbs of gear:  0   (the stats below might give you a hint...)

“Nutrition”

• Number of Ritter Sport chocolate bars consumed: 30 (and all of the flavours!!) 
• Number of Lindt chocolate bars consumed: 10
•  Number of cheese varieties consumed (and we’re not talking about a cheese plate here...we mean the full saran-sealed packages): 14 
• Number of stops for gelato: 20 
• Number of grams of gummy bears per bag that we consumed: 300 
• Total number of bags consumed: 15 (do the math...it’s disgusting) 
• Number of times we checked the fat & calorie content on food packaging: NEVER!! (and it was was awesome!)

 Who needs a cozy cafe when you can dine in a TESCO parking lot

Shut-eye

• Total cost of accommodations for 7 weeks in Europe: $35
• Number of times Colleen knocked on doors, asking the resident(s) if we could camp in their yards: 25

"The Hubers" offered us a nice spot on their front lawn to set up our tent

• Number of people that invited us to stay in their homes: 7 
• Number of rejections: 2  (number of minutes it took Shane to sooth Colleen's ego: 10)
• Number of nights spent sleeping in barns: 1

When you sleep in a barn, be prepared to cook with the cows

• Number of terrifying nights spent alone in a forest: 1 (see story below) 
• Examples of the incredible hospitality and generosity that we received from the super-host Europeans that we stayed with:  beer, wine, bottled water, flask of tea, biscuits, chocolate bars and gummy bears, honey, strawberries, breakfasts & dinners, showers, fresh towels and bubble bath. And...the use of the family car, invitations to stay at private flats in Vienna, Prague and Berlin (we gratefully accepted).

One ‘terrifying’ night in the forest...
On our second night of the biking trip we 'free-camped' (sleeping alone in the forest).  At 2AM we were woken up by a massive wild boar near our tent, screaming like it was hungry and had been searching for days to find stupid humans sleeping in the woods.  We didn't know it was a wild boar (where do you read about wild boars in a travel guide?!).  It sounded really loud with a deep-pitched squeal...like it was a big, kidney-eating monster.  It turns out that these boars are not your typical pigs.  They are up to 260 pounds, with 4 inch-long, straw-like hair, tusks...you get the picture here. 

I can safely say I've never been so scared in my life.  I almost passed out from taking such quick, short breaths.  Shane was so tired from the 90 + km bike ride that he ended up playing dead...I spent the next 5 hours trying to stop him from snoring, fearing 'pig man' was going to eat us for breakfast.  I should mention that the only weapon we had to defend ourselves was a three inch Swiss Army knife.

High point(s) 

The incredible people that we met, the fantastic food,  the gorgeous countryside, towns and cities that we cycled through, and of course, the coin-operated ponies that we rode (well really...it was just Shane).

Low Point 

During their travels in Austria, the  Sondermanns end up sleeping on a picnic bench in an information shelter (Shane using a bike tarp as a blanket).  They ran out of time to find a place to camp because they opted for a late night meal at McDonald’s. Yes, a totally ridiculous loss of reasoning and perspective. 

To sum it up
Hopefully these stats and facts give you a bit of a snapshot of our trip to Europe.  If we had to rate our experience on a scale of 1 to 10 we could give it nothing less than a 100.  The trip was incredible, the people overwhelmed us with their warmth and hospitality, the food was fantastic and the geography - from cycling along the Rhine, Danube and Elbe Rivers to traveling through farms, lush forests, and fields of poppies and canola - was gorgeous.

Gratitude

Before signing off on Europe we want to extend a HUGE thanks to our friend David and his parents Brita and Rolf.  The smooth transition from backpacking in South America to cycling through Europe to preparing for Africa can be attributed almost entirely to their incredible hospitality and support.

We also want to thank our wonderful friends that we made, for taking a chance on a couple of door-knocking, helmet-wearing Canadians.  Your kindness was extraordinary.

Africa: A new continent, a new adventure
Two weeks ago we arrived in Nairobi, Kenya where we were welcomed into the home of Patrick Fruchet and Megan Gilgan.  Our friend Erin put us with in touch with her relatives when she found out that we were heading to Nairobi.  Aside from the great conversations (they both work for United Nations and have lived in all sorts of interesting places including Afghanistan and Kosovo), Megan and Patrick have been instrumental in helping us fulfill our goal of purchasing a 4x4 vehicle to drive through eastern and southern Africa.  In our next blog update, we’ll give a better description of this with photos.

Having completed the “zero-fun” task of buying a vehicle in Nairobi we're now ready to head out - our first stop is Kenya’s Masai Mara National Park where we'll see what is considered one of the greatest animal wonders of the world: the wildebeest migration.  From there we'll visit several other parks and sites within Kenya before making our way south to Tanzania and ultimately to South Africa before returning to Kenya to sell our vehicle and board a plane for South East Asia.

Our Toyota Prado "LUVA" the Road Warrior - 
Named after two women that define the word reliable: our moms Lulu and Valerie

The upcoming updates will likely be short (I know, you'll believe it when you see it), given the cost and accessibility of Internet in some of the African countries that we’ll be visiting.  We’ll do our best to check in though, just to let you know where we’re at and where we’re heading.

As always, we hope that this blog finds you well and enjoying life.

Shane & Colleen