June 6, 2024
8 hours of effort and 9 kilometres of cycling
We woke up before 5:30 this morning. Not because we were excited about starting our trip, just because that’s when Kevin always wakes up with his cheery “good morning Daddy, play with cars?” My son is completely obsessed with cars. The irony is not lost on me.
By the time we’d played with cars, had our breakfast and played with cars a bit more, it was time to start getting ready for our bike trip. We had eight hours before our planned departure at 4pm which you would have thought would have been enough time to pack but ultimately wasn’t, perhaps because for the vast majority of the time one of either me or Dea really did have to be playing with cars. Come 4pm we were still frantically getting things ready but by 4:30 we had just about got ourselves together.
The reason for the late departure was because of the weather forecast. Tomorrow night we are meeting Dea’s family about 50 kilometres away and we had planned to split it over two days, camping on the beach in Kolding halfway. But there was heavy rain and even thunder forecast for this first afternoon so we changed plan to only ride a short distance to some shelters in Skærbæk, after the rains had passed. That was the plan anyway. What actually happened was that not one drop of rain fell all afternoon, until 4:30. As soon as we stepped outside with the bikes the rain began to fall. But there was no stopping us now. We had a trailer with us, ostensibly to put Kevin in when it rains, but the boy has a strong will, and he had decided he was sitting in his seat, which had to be on mummy’s bike, so we wrapped him in a very nice red poncho thing, and we were finally, at long last, ready to go.
Thankfully the rain passed quickly and it was ok with me that Kevin was on Dea’s bike. My bike was heavy enough towing the trailer, and Dea got to field all his questions about what every car we passed was. After a little while we turned away from the traffic on a fantastic little gravel road that led down to the water. It’s a road I have cycled on before with Kevin and it’s a fantastic little adventure in itself, through forests and along the coast. It goes past some weird big buildings too that make it feel a little creepy. This time we came across a man with a chainsaw on a long pole which could have been terrifying on this remote road, but he was just using it to cut some tree branches, and everything was fine.
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We came out of the forest and had a bit of paved road into Skærbæk where we found the shelters. These are a very Danish phenomenon and a brilliant one - places you can go to sleep in the nature for free or for a small fee. We have slept in these before and this time we were lucky to have them all to ourselves.
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After a pasta dinner we walked down through a field to the sea. The skies were blue now and Kevin had a really good time playing with the shells and throwing stones in the water. It felt so nice to sit there and enjoy just being outside. Already the stress of getting ready felt like a different day, a different life. Now we were just travelling again, our little family.
Kevin was really happy to see the sheep above, I was more happy to see the workout bars. This year I have been getting really into obstacle course racing and trying to find places to keep up with my training could well be a theme of this trip. I actually had a race last Saturday, that I am not completely recovered from. Here’s a photo of me in action.
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We noticed that there were some goats in the field to the shelters and while Dea went to the toilets I took Kevin over to look at them. We watched them from a safe distance then began to walk back up the hill. But then one of the goats only went and started chasing us. I held Kevin in my arms and hurried up the hill towards safety, but the goat continued to pursue us, with the rest of the flock just behind. “No Mr Goat” I said, as he started to nibble at my trousers. “No Mr Goat,” Kevin repeated, all the way up the hill. At least he could see the funny side, as could Dea when she looked up the hill at us.
Then it was time to put Kevin to bed in the shelter, which went surprisingly well. Then I headed back down to the beach for my workout, being careful to avoid the goats on the way. The workout was okay, but a bit awkward when, just as I finished crawling upside down on some bars like a monkey, one of the mums from Kevin’s playgroup walked past. Tomorrow hopefully we’ll get a bit further from home.
Today's ride: 9 km (6 miles)
Total: 9 km (6 miles)
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6 months ago