View from Two Weeks

Two ideas have been resonating around in my brain for the last two weeks. First , the trip has given me a sense of possibility. Two years ago we set a goal of going to Europe on two tandems and we made it happen. It was a huge task organizing our life around these four weeks, planning the route, learning about accommodations, arranging logistics and communicating the to all the people involved. It was not just our family either, family and friends pitched in to help as well. At the same time, it has been incredibly easy to snap back into the daily life of work, soccer practice, cleaning, maintaining cars, … While all these things need to be done, without the two year goal you will not carve out the hour to start planning or talk about how to approach the goal. All this makes me impatient to start the next big task although I have no idea what this should be. Another big vacation, a financial goal, extension on the house, starting a small business? The goal doesn't matter, I want to get started. The Europe trip has given me every confidence that our family can achieve whatever we decide to do.

Second, I have been struck by the history that exists in Europe. Not the history that exists in museums or dedicated historical sites but the history that exists around people as they live and work. There were many examples of cafes and stores working in the old cities right beside or in buildings that were hundreds of years old. People didn't visit history they live it every day.

Also, some of the cathedrals we saw took hundreds of years to build. I can't even imaging the commitment required to keep a project of that magnitude running from generation to generation. When you sit and stare at a building that took three hundred years to build, maybe you think that the deadline at the end of the day is not very important or maybe you think that you should try to achieve something as grand and lasting as that building. Either way it can't help but impact your view on the world.

August 23rd The Return Trip

Although the alarm went off at 4 AM to start our return trip, there were few complaints from the kids. We were ready to go home. Our driver was an interesting lady who, with her husband, ran a company that provided support to different types of productions. Essentially it sounded like they were roadies but not for rock bands. Since they were experienced in shipping and moving large productions, they also provided logistical support to missions. We had a very interesting conversation about her work and aid work in general. Time flew and soon we were at Schipol Airport arriving in the pre-dawn darkness. We wheeled our large baggage into the airport and once again met no resistance during check-in.

The trip to Dublin was short and soon we were back in a familiar airport. The kids mentioned how nice it was to be able to understand the language around them. We had a good lunch and boarded our plane to Washington Dulles.

The almost eight hour trip has afforded me some time to reflect on our trip and think about if I had accomplished what I had hoped for when I envisioned the trip.

The first thought is that the trip was difficult. Each day presented new problems, new challenges and a long day of riding. Some problems were similar day to day such as finding a place to stay and getting drinking water. Other problems were different each day such as bike problems, train scheduling, heat, rain, navigation and terrain. Each problem we faced and overcame and everything eventually worked out. Some days the problems were easy to overcome and sometimes they involved stress and arguments. While I had expected difficulties I expected it to get easier after a week or maybe two. It did not. While I was willing and even excited with the daily challenges and long bike rides other we not.

The trip was clearly a trip into uncharted waters. The more we tried to set a schedule and plan ahead, the more difficult it became to maintain the schedule. When we went 'off-schedule' it became more difficult in some ways but overall less stressful. I believe the trip is an analogy for many large, new endeavors in life that require a large amount of planning and paradoxically the abandoning of the plan on the first day of execution. Not performing any planning would result in not enough knowledge to react to changing situations and insurmountable problems. Even with all the planning we did, still so much is unknown that we faced daily challenges.

All this sounds very negative but my emotions are the exact opposite. The trip was surely not a vacation but an adventure. We learned and experienced so much that I don't even think we have begun to processed it all. I think it will take me a month or more to process it all. People were asking the kids what they liked best about Europe and they can not begin to answer the question. I think it will take the kids months maybe even years to sort out everything they have experienced.

I'm already feeling nostalgic and want to plan the next cycling trip. I'm more convinced than ever of the value of bicycle travel. While traveling by bike we experienced the culture, landscape and people of Europe. The rest or non-bike days were certainly more comfortable but we experienced far less. I will do more cycle touring in the future. The appetite for this type of adventure among the rest of the family is may well be zero or may higher with some changes in the trip format. The next trips on the horizon will be skiing and a return trip to the grandparent's cottages.

The trip was also much more that experiencing Europe. The time I have spent with my family and my kids has been so wonderful it is hard to describe. I have learned more about my kids than I have in the last several years. I will forever look back upon the hours of conversations with my daughter while riding through the Rhine valley as among the best experiences of my life. In bad and good times, I learned about the members of my family and love them more for it.

In a few weeks, I will laugh about the hills in Switzerland, the rain in Duisburg, the smells of farming and the Youth Hostels at the tops of hills. I'm already fondly remembering Xanten, Stein am Rhein, dinners in Konstanz and breakfasts in Emmerich. Who knows how the kids will view the trip in five years or what lessons they have learned.

August 22nd Packing Day

Today was quiet with most of the day being spent preparing for our return trip. Packing the bikes took about 4 hours and packing everything else took about the same amount of time. Making the transition from bike to plane travel requires repacking everything. Imagine dumping everything you have on the floor and then deciding where it should be packed. This was pretty close to what we had to do. For most of the day our room was a mess with piles of stuff all over the place. We also had to discard many items that were useful on the bike part of the trip but not as useful going forward. In the end we had what we started with two bike boxes and four suit cases. In addition to this we had a pile of trash.

We went to bed early to prepare for the 4:00 AM alarm.

August 21st Trip to Amsterdam

We were able to borrow a car from some relatives and make our way (GPS assisted) to a local train station and on to Amsterdam. Amsterdam is a beautiful city but we didn't have such a great experience. We went on the standard boat tour of the canals. The buildings in Amsterdam look all the same at first glance but as the boat tour progressed, they started point out some of the architectural features and suddenly they all looked different.

We did make a wrong turn while leaving our boat tour and these left us in a decidedly un PG-13 alley with a number of 'coffee' shops. We quickly left the alley and wandered through the streets. We stopped into a souvenir shop only to find it was also R and likely X rated as well. Only later did we find out that we were in the worst part of Amsterdam. Leaving the boat tour, we should have turned right when we turned left. While this may be true, the regular people walking the streets didn't give us the impression that this was a seedy area of town. Also there were very respectable stores in the area.

To us the souvenir shops reflected what tourists thought of Amsterdam. On the same rack you had souvenirs of the red light district, the 'coffee' shops, wind mills and canals. These items were generally weighted towards the first two attractions. Also the average Dutch person didn't seem phased by it at all. It was just the way it was. To me it seemed sad that a city with beautiful canals, fascinating architecture and fantastic museums is known more for the Red Light district and coffee shops. I guess the Dutch believe these are two parts of the same whole.

Links to Pictures

I've had many requests for pictures. Here are a few albums I have not published.

2009-08-06 Koln to Remagen

2009-08-18 Loerrach

August 20th Utrecht to Amerongen

Our overnight train was direct from Basil to Utrecht and arrived at 8:30 AM. We didn't have a map of the area and had to make a decision if we wanted to ride from Utrecht to Amerongen or take another short train to Amersfoort. Taking another train would require transferring the tandems from one platform to another. Looking at a map of Europe it didn't seem like there was a significant difference in the distance from Utrecht or Amersfoort to Amerongen. We decided to avoid the hassle of transferring the bikes and ride from Utrecht.

When we arrived in Utrecht we were able to purchase a map and it was only then that we realized the trip from Utrecht was significantly longer due to the location of the train stations in the cities. In Utrecht the train stain was on the distant side of the city while in Amersfoort it was on the near side of the city. We decided to start our ride and found that exiting the train station would require traversing a set of stairs or a set of escalators. We have navigated a set of stairs with scary results so we opted for the escalators. They turned out to be virtually drama free. With a creative use of the front and rear brakes as you are entering and exiting you could control the tandems quite well.

The Netherlands have great bike paths in general but those leading from the train station in Utrecht were poorly signed. Construction in the area was the primary problem but it caused us to ride in circles for a while. After some assistance from the locals (some of which was incorrect) we found our way onto a bike path that lead out of the city. As with our past city experiences, we made our share of mistakes guessing in poorly signed areas or missing a sign indicating a turn. Overall it took us over an hour to make less than five kilometer of progress. Once on the open road we slowed by the fatigue caused by a night on the train. At about 3 PM we arrived in Amerongen and finally found our destination around 4 PM. We were not expecting a serious ride today but this trip has been full of surprises and today was no different.

We were glad to be back in the quiet calm surroundings of Amerongen. We were even provided the exact same rules as we had at the beginning of the trip. We ate a hearty dinner in the guest dinning room and went to bed early.

August 19th Second Rest Day in Lörrach

In the morning we made arrangements to store our bikes and baggage at the Youth Hostel for the day. We also decided to have dinner at the Youth Hostel and after dinner begin our trip to Amerongen.

We spent a second day in Lörrach shopping for most of the day. In the morning, we went shopping in Lörrach and purchased a few items. In the afternoon we planned to go to a castle in Lörrach but by noon, the temperature was already ready 37 C. Simply walking through the city was draining and the kids were getting cranky. Walking through a castle in the mid-day heat would have been unbearable.

We searched for places to take refuge from the heat. We were hoping for a film that had English subtitles but they were all dubbed into German. We spent some time in air conditioned stores but eventually headed back to the Youth Hostel. Most of the Youth Hostel was quite warm except for the table tennis room in the basement. We spent the afternoon, playing table tennis waiting for dinner and our 8:00 PM departure time. At 7:30 PM we retrieved our baggage, packed our bikes and left the youth hostel for the train station in Lörrach. The downhill trip to the train station in Lörrach combined with the quick arrival of the train meant that we were at the Basel train station at 8:00 PM. This train station proved to have the best facilities for our tandems with long ramps on each of the platforms. As luck would have it, we arrived on and were leaving from the same platform. Our schedule didn't require us to change platforms in the train station with the best facilities for our tandems. As I look back on our past train schedules, the train station with the worst facilities was the one with the 7 minute transfer time. Clearly the German rail system was working against us.

I enjoyed a bit of ribbing since I was the one pushing us to make sure we arrived on time. We arrived two hours early, a bit more than 'on-time'. Both the people and the bikes had reserved locations on the train. We were in one car, the bikes were in the next. The bikes needed to be properly outfitted with their tickets but I could not exactly which parts of our tickets to attach. A quick trip to the information stall allow us to clarify which out of the 6 tickets needed to be attached to the bikes. We purchased some food for the trip at a grocery store located in the train station and soon the train was about to arrive.

We loaded our bikes onto the train and found our cabin. The accommodations for both bikes and people were quite comfortable. Sleeping was interrupted when the train stopped at stations and I had some difficulties sleeping due to the heat. Overall it was a reasonable night sleep but was not great.