June 5, 2023
Day 10 - Eggstätt to Halbergmoos
Today it was back to the airport near Halbergmoos for the Bülk to make its maiden voyage to the USA. But first, the little matter of actually getting back to the airport.
The daily average speeds this trip have been…slow. It’s not the fault of the bikes. They are fast. It’s the riders. I’ve had a lot of difficulty this trip following the track on my gps. I’m not sure why it’s been a problem this trip. I’ve used that unit for a few years now and never had so much trouble following the track. Maybe I’m just getting old. There have been multiple missed and wrong turns every day. Today I missed a few simply because they happened during downhill sections and, well, any little hill gets a velomobile moving VERY quickly in quite short order. In fact, the top speed today was my fastest ever at 49mph. The other issue I’ve had is with this being a brand new model and one of only 4 built so far, the factory had incorrect numbers for setting the distance between the front tires. That left me with a massive turning radius that has necessitated getting in and out at tight turns (that will get fixed tomorrow for the second half of the trip.) The final reason the average speed has been so low is because every day has had at least 2,000ft of elevation gain, generally achieved through multiple longer climbs. Every day has been ending around 6-7pm.
Today was largely a reverse of the first day of riding, just a bit longer. Eggstätt to Wasserburg went surprisingly quickly. Rather than go through the center of wasserburg, the route led around the outskirts up on the river bluffs. It did throw in a brief bit of gravel just for sentimental reasons. From there it was across the countryside with various climbs including one of over 600ft followed by a rapid downhill and another shorter but still steep climb. Aside from that, it was mostly a reverse of the way out. The mountains receded, the fields got flatter, the pavement got smoother. There was on road riding, there was bike path riding, there was fast riding, there was slow riding. And then the airport came into view. My gps insisted on a route. The signs on the road disagreed. Turns out my gps is unaware that a section of road on the southeast of the airport no longer exists. This posed a problem. I did not fancy riding all the way to the other side of the airport. Instead there was a gravel trail. A sort of rough gravel trail that led in a round about way to the desired destination of the airport. Problem #1 solved.
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Problem #2 was that the bike path doesn’t actually go right to the door of the airport. No no. There are stairs with a narrow ledge next to the railing to push your bike up. That’s fine if you have two wheels, but a velomobile has 3. What to do now? There was only one option: carry the velomobile up. Ok. That works when you have two people, but what about me in the morning? I’m leaving the airport alone with my bike. Next idea, park my bike at the bottom of the stairs, carry the Bülk up, and ride mine over to the hotel I was staying at the first night in Halbergmoos. Then I’m the morning I’ll hop the train back. It was also necessary to stop at the hotel in Halbergmoos to pick up a few things that needed to fly back with the Bülk.
It’s a fairly rapid 7.5 mile ride from the airport to Halbergmoos. It’s flat and I was moving rapidly. It was lovely. Despite that, the other rider who took the train and bus still beat me. I had to get out twice because the turning circle wasn’t tight enough for a couple spots.
The hotel was fine with letting my bike stay there overnight. After acquiring the needed items, Über delivered us to the airport. On the way, I discovered that if you ignore the bike route signs, you can get to the upper level of the airport without using the stupid stairs. That lowered my stress level substantially as I was worried about how I would get my bike to the airport on my own. Problem #2, solved.
The final problem was getting a velomobile checked onto the flight. The flight starts with Lufthansa to Frankfurt and then Condor to USA. Originally both airlines told me it would be no problem. Then when I called about the second bike, they said no way. That meant it was down to the checkin counter. On a whim, we checked around 9pm to see if early baggage drop off was possible. Turns out you can drop bags off up to 24hrs in advance. So we wheeled in the wrapped up bike. The checkin counter guy gave a skeptical look and got out his measuring stick. At this point I figured it was all over. But no, he said they would accept up to 2.93 meters. The Bülk is 2.57 so it was accepted, but at a higher cost than I wa Siri finally quoted. At this point I was fine with that. The important thing is the bike was wheeled off by the bulky baggage guys and ready to go on the plane in the morning. Talk about a huge relief. Now precedent is set for my bike next week.
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And with that, the events of the day have been fully related aside from the fact that wake up this morning was hideously early because the note in Eggstätt is under construction and they started banging away around 7:30am.
Today's ride: 62 miles (100 km)
Total: 343 miles (552 km)
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