June 11, 2023
Day 16/17 - Hallbergmoos
This should have been simple
Yes, I’m a day late writing this, but technically only 10 hours late. That’s really not so bad, is it? I shall explain why this is 10 hours late in the course of this blog entry.
Presently I’m sitting in Flughafen München. My flight doesn’t leave for two hours. I’m here so early, that I haven’t even had a gate assigned yet. I could have slept in. To understand why I’m here so long before my flight, we need to backtrack to yesterday….
I stayed at the Hampton Inn by the airport Saturday night. Accommodation options were limited. I’ve already sufficiently covered that. They didn’t have a secure place to store the bike, so it ended up parked in a normal parking space with the magical invisibility cloak (motorcycle tarp cover thingy.) No one bothered it during the night thankfully. I’ve used that cover several times this trip with great success. Where I could fold my Azub Origami recumbent and bring it into the hotel room, the W9 gets stuck outside. That is a downside to such a large bike.
After breakfast I hung out in my hotel room until check out at 11am. I had nothing else really to do. From there I rode the scenic route to the next hotel on the other end of Hallbergmoos. My room there was ready early so I dropped off my stuff and went out riding. I was 32 miles from reaching 600 for the trip. There is a nice long flat road nearby that is a popular cycling route. I wanted to try riding without the extra weight of touring equipment. It was a lovely ride with a stiff crosswind. Acceleration without the extra baggage was a bit faster. I pushed it hard towards the top of my sustainable power and was cruising around 25mph. On the way back I even was able to sustain 30mph on the flat for awhile. The bike is definitely not as fast as advertised, but it is still nice to ride. I decided to try mounting the faster rear tire I had with. This was a bad idea….
I’ve been riding with a gravel tire in the rear. It was a very good decision, giving me grip on surfaces that the faster stock tire would never have managed. I even got through the whole trip without any flats, not something I expected given the tires. I don’t have any nice flat long streets to ride on at home. I wanted to at least try a run with the fastest setup I have available right now. The bike has a 650B rear wheel. This is a gravel bike size. Finding narrow inner tubes for this size is a challenge. Actually, finding narrow tires period for this size is hard. The supplied tubes are for 26” wheels. It works, but it’s a tight fit. Herein lies the problem. The fast tire is also a tight fit. I ended up slicing holes in both of my 26” tubes. I really hate patching flats. Usually I just replace the tube. I had a big flat patching session a couple months ago. Most of them still leak. On Sundays, most everything is closed in Germany. That means nowhere to buy a spare tube. So up to my room I went to try and patch the tubes. Fortunately the patch worked and held. Had it not, it would have been a problem for getting to the airport since I needed to ride the bike there.
After patching the tire I did a second run of the same road. It was maybe a little faster, but not as much as I had expected. After finishing the ride I ate a somewhat early supper and packed up to ride to the airport.
One thing I have not yet tried is the racing hood for the new bike. It is ugly and big. I’ve sat inside once with it on to mount the mirrors. I recalled very well how tough it was to secure it with the bungee hooks. Yes, it’s still very difficult to secure. The hood is not made for this bike, but the designer insisted it fits just fine. In theory he is right, but in reality it clearly is not made for this model and doesn’t really fit that well. What is more alarming though, is that the view out for me is not good at all. The view to the side is limited and in traffic is not sufficient for me. The side openings are not quite tall enough and there is an A pillar that gets in the way on the side. It’s just not a good design and obviously not made by someone who rides in American traffic. Thankfully the ride is almost entirely on bike path, but still, it was scary for me.
I knew from when the Bülk flew out last week that there was a way to avoid the stairs at the end of the bike path leading to the terminal. That route got me to terminal 1, but from there to the Hilton hotel and terminal 2? That was more difficult. I wandered through terminal 1 for awhile. I pulled up Google maps and had it give me a walking route (no way I was going to ride on the road by the terminal with that racehood on!) Still, I could not figure out which road I needed to push the bike down. A short conversation ensued about the bike with some guys loading luggage into their car. No, it still doesn’t have a motor. Finally I found the street leading to the Hilton. I pushed the bike down the road and next to the hotel.
It took the staff a bit to locate my big roll of packing material. Then I tried to remove the bits sticking out on the bike like the mirrors and the light module. The mirrors I got off, but I spent way too much time trying to remove the light module. I finally just wrapped it with a lot of padding material and tape. I will hope for the best. By the time I finished wrapping up the bike, plus the time spent trying to get to the Hilton and everything else that went wrong, it was 9:45pm.
Now, why was I at the airport the night before? Well, last week when the Bülk flew out, it was dropped off the night before. It was very simple. Then sleeping in was an option. I intended to do the same. Apparently the bulky baggage drop off has a closing time. Exactly what that time is, is not clearly listed anywhere. The grumpy agent assured me they were closed. And why was I checking in so late. I told her this is when I finished wrapping up the bike. She didn’t care. Come back after 4am, she said in a most grouchy way. So now what to do with the packed up bike? I can’t ride it back to my hotel like this. I wheeled it back to the Hilton where I found the alway super helpful baggage storage guy hanging around. He consented to store it there over night along with my checked bag. What a super helpful guy he is. He deserves a raise. He’s been so helpful every time I’ve spoken with him. With that taken care of, I took the train and bus back to my hotel and collapsed into bed after setting my alarm for 6:15am.
Despite the stress of the bike not yet being checked, I did manage to sleep last night. As usual, my nose got stuffed up again and had to be cleared out several times. It’s quite odd, this thing with my nose. During the day it’s just fine, even when I’m not riding, but at night it gets clogged. I will be curious to see when I get home if it stops doing this. Maybe there is something in the cleaning products used here that irritates it.
I did actually get up at 6:15am. I was not happy about it. The breakfast at the hotel was a good one. I ate what I could in my cloud of hazy sleep. I was at the airport around 7:30 or 7:45, obtained the bike, and rolled it over to Lufthansa bulky baggage. This time I got a cheerful agent who patiently made the necessary calls to make sure the bike would be checked through. She had me taken care of in short order. The bulky baggage handling crew then had me roll the bike to the big elevator while he wheeled a crated dog. The dog got two Lufthansa agents escorting it. He was a good dog who looked at times sad, and at times excited, about his adventure to chicago. He also had his favorite stuffed animal with him.
With the bike taken care of, I could finally relax. I had quite a bit of time to kill, so I bought one last piece of Erdbeerschnitte to use up my remaining Euros. It was a below average slice, but any Erdbeerschnitte is better than No Erdbeerschnitte!
And now we find ourselves sitting in the airport using the free WiFi writing this long-winded post to kill time before my flight. I’m looking forward to being home again. I miss my cats, I miss my bed, I miss having to decide between more than two shirts when I get dressed. And I miss my shampoo (that got left at the hotel in Starnberg, part of what was a long day of disasters.) I’ve had my fill of adventure. I got to ride fast on flat roads, I got to ride fast down mountain descents, I did not die, I had no flat tires, I never got rained on, and no cars ran into me. Most importantly, I now know that the grass is not really greener on the other side of the fence. While I don’t have any mountains to ride past at home, I do have a pretty good area to ride my Velomobiles. Next time I come back it will be with my recumbent on quiet signed Radwegs where I can soak in the environment and not have to worry about logistics with a velomobile. I’ll still do some velomobile touring, but I’ll do that at home in Minnesota where airplanes aren’t needed. A velomobile is great for touring when you choose the sort of route you’d do with a car. Those types of routes generally aren’t the ones I like to ride here in Europe. And now I know that. Sometimes part of touring is trying different things until you find the setup that is most relaxing for you. For me I use the bike to get to sightseeing locations. Sometimes I like to skip ahead with the train. For that my folding recumbent is ideal. Every bike has its strengths. You just need the right tool for the job.
Today's ride: 33 miles (53 km)
Total: 601 miles (967 km)
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