Fast StartDay one didn't have much room for mistakes. I had booked the Eurotunnel Cycle Service, for 3.30pm and couldn't be late. I departed at around 6am and within the first hour I already needed to use a cable tie. The head on one of the bolts on the front rack was (I thought) just big enough to do it's job but after a bit of jolting, it had come loose. Nothing was open, so the cable tie would have to hold up for a while. Before long I was once again heading in to the frigid morning. The day was cold and clear which made for great riding conditions. I made it all the way to Ashford before I was confident that I could eat lunch without a worry that I wouldn't make it. From there it was a short hop to Folkestone where my mood was good. I did a few bits of shopping in Calais then set out to hopefully find somewhere to camp for the night. I was still a bit jet-lagged having only been in Europe for five days. As the afternoon wore on I started to realise that finding somewhere discreet to camp wouldn't be as easy as I thought. This was significant because it was the first night and I figured this might set the tone for the trip. I was tired enough to sleep by 6pm, but there were still a few hours before the sun would go down and I could pitch my tent. I think if I was a bit more in the mood of "screw it, here will do", I would have been ok, but all I could see happening was me getting caught. After stopping to chat with locals at various points, I decided the only thing for it was to stop at a camp ground. While it was only 8 euros for the night, that would be a whole lot of money if I were to do it for the entire trip. I pitched my tent for the first time to discover it wasn't as big as I had hoped, locked up my and lay down, too exhausted to read, write or even eat that much. Same ProblemsI decided that I wanted to get to Ghent by the end of the second day. I was just using my phone for navigation but I hadn't had a WiFi connection in a while so the detail was poor as I got close to Ghent. I thought my English SIM would work abroad for a few days until I ran out of credit (this is what had previously happened), but as it turned out that wasn't the case. One thing to note about rural Belgium is that it is very smelly in the west. There is a lot of organic farming so rotting food was being used as fertiliser. Also on the farming note, there were literally hundreds of tractors that went past me on the road, sometimes towing tractor sized trailers. Also, all the roadkill was of birds. I'm not sure why that's significant, but I decided it is. After Tielt, the roads started getting really bad and I knew that the sounds coming from my front rack meant damage was being done. There wasn't much I could do in the moment, so I just put it on the list as another thing which had not gone as I hoped. As the day wore on I began stressing again about where I was going to sleep. My offline map was really poor quality about 15km out from Ghent so I needed to stop somewhere for WiFi. I was pretty much ready to quit looking for a random place to pitch and take the cop out campground option. Loneliness was setting in pretty hard and as I pushed my way along, I thought of all the other options available to me than cycling all the way around Europe by myself. I was beginning to think that this is what my trip would be and the majestic days lounging around in a copse of woods next to a river were simply a pipe dream. My experience at Donza changed everything (and can be found here). A New OutlookWith a full stomach and a good attitude, I positively flew along the road towards Leuven. The ever-present bumpy roads seemed to be less of a problem (with my headphones in) and I knew it was only 180 more kilometres until I was with Jennie. I rolled in to Leuven feeling lucky and sat down at a bar to use the WiFi. I contacted all the Couchsurfing hosts in the city and sipped a beer with some ex-locals while waiting for a response. I ended up finding a room with a guy called Jan within only a few minutes. The room was nice and he was chilled out and understanding of the fact that I was knackered. It was nice to once again sleep in a bed. The next day I had a fair bit of time to enjoy the ride because I was aiming to get to Maastricht by 4pm. The orchards were blossoming which (in the least floggerish way possible) was really pretty. Tongeren is the oldest city in Belgium and had a pretty cool church and the sun came out just in time for a delicious tuna mayo baguette. The last 17km to Maastricht flew by because by this time I was pretty excited to see Jennie. MaastrichtThe change as I crossed La Meuse (a river) in to The Netherlands was dramatic. The road instantly became more cycle friendly and the trees and buildings around the road made me feel welcome. I got a little bit lost on the way to Jennie's house, but arrived at the door at exactly the same time she did. What luck! Smelly Viktor help with taking my stuff up the three flights of stairs and all of a sudden I wasn't living out of my bike. I think I've decided that what happens when I'm visiting friends is the same as my normal life has been in London, Montpellier or Melbourne. I probably could blog about it, but it's just everyday life. Besides, some memories are best left for the people in them.
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Chris JonesJust a guy going for a bit of a documented ride. Archives
May 2018
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