Epilogue.

August 16, 2024

It's been a couple of days since we've been home. The washing is slowly getting done, panniers are empty and stashed in the storage box in the backyard, and the bikes are still sitting outside in their boxes. I just don't seem to have the will to deal with them just yet. But, maybe I'll find the motivation today. It's also equally likely that they'll sit out there for another day, maybe even two. Perhaps it's the jetlag, or even just plain laziness. Either way, it can wait.

Yesterday morning, we were both wide awake at 1am. Today, we woke up at 2:30am, so that's a bit of an improvement in the right direction, I suppose. So, what's there to do in the middle of the night when our bodies tell us it's actually late morning? We get up and have coffee. What's the point of pretending to sleep? It's not all bad though as we've both been able to get out each morning for some early morning exercise; Sue to her spin class at 6am, and me out for some early morning rides on my road bike just as the sun is coming up. Vancouver is a beautiful place to be in the early morning. Here's a photo from today's early morning ride:

The Fraser River and an early morning sunrise over the Oak Street Bridge. One of the benefits of jetlag.

However, as the day wears on the sledgehammer of sleep drops heavily and conks us both out in the early evening with a 'doink', 'doink', and we often find ourselves at some point waking up sprawled out on the floor or drooling on the couch. Sleep seems to come up on us so suddenly that we're almost helpless against it's grip, so why fight it? We know in a couple of more days, we'll get adjusted and begin to feel more normal. Hopefully.

*Update*

I lied at the beginning of this entry when I said that we've only been back for a couple of days. Those two days have now turned into five, and I'm feeling sluggish about dealing with the post-trip stuff, and finally putting the finishing entry together on this journal.

But, I haven't been completely idle. There has been progress, and to prove I haven't been a total bum since we've returned, I've taken the bikes out of the boxes, and have cleaned and assembled them. My motivation to get the bikes assembled was brought on by last night's rain storm that managed to turn our bike boxes (which still contained bikes) into wet sponges. One box became so absorbed by water that it fell over in our backyard in the middle of the night and startled us awake. It was a sign to get this job done before our steel touring machines turned into buckets of rust. Here's a picture to prove it that I'm not lying:

After a few tours with a lot of neglect, I'm finally changing the worn tires, and brake pads out on my bike.

So, now that we're back and the memories of our trip disappear like sands through an hourglass, we're trying not to make the same mistakes of past tours and let the memories slip away once we get back to our busy working lives. Believe me, on too many occasions Sue and I have have tried to recall previous events that have happened during tours and we often get ourselves so confused about where and when these events occurred at all. To remember things you also have to rehearse them, and somehow manage to store them into a more consolidated memory; that's what I'm consciously trying to do. So, I'm reviewing this journal, looking at our photos and even going back to Google Earth to see if I've remembered places correctly.

So here is a list of ten highlights in no particular order, just to remember.

1. Spending time with Susanna

2. Incredible cycling infrastructure

3. German beer and biergartens

4. Altstadts and Timber-Framed buildings

5. Fish and People in European Rivers

6. Gravel through incredible forests

7. Great flights :D

8. Quiet countryside

9. Meeting Suzanne and Janos

10. Coming home

So, with that said, here is a montage of photos I will just call, 'The Out Takes'. There is one photo for each day of our trip, and ones that we've likely left out of our journal for some reason or another. But, they also might be helpful in providing a broader view of the tapestry of this trip.

July 13th. Someone's not a happy camper before departure.

July 15. Packing before the trip. I even brought too much, and actually left a pair of jeans in Germany because I was sick of them taking up so much room in my panniers.

July 16th. Waiting for the cab to the airport.

July 17th. Frankfurt is a huge financial and banking city in Germany. I couldn't help but notice this.

July 19th. Mid day beer along the Rhine looking across to Mainz.

July 20th. Another beer shot? What can we say? We love German beer. Sander Hotel patio.

July 22nd. Some dudes actually need this info!

July 23rd. Coming down train station steps in Saarburg.

July 24th. Reflection of castle in a Saarburg puddle.

July 26th. La Petite Pierre morning walk.

July 27th. 'The Little Venice' of Colmar's canals.

July 28th. Peekaboo view through the wine bar under the arches. Colmar.

July 29th. Cheeky glass in Mulhouse. Took the train here.

August 3rd. Covered bridge in Eriskirch, Germany.

August 5th. Somewhere along the way to Vorderburg, Germany.

August 6th. Just north, en route to Mittenwald.

August 7th. Hike to Lautersee and Ferchensee.

August 8th. Cool place for dinner at The Madhouse in Bad Tolz. Big sandwich and Sue had pasta. Molinari schnapps with Hippie Dude.

August 11th. English Garten. Biergarten with Suzanne and Janos.

August 12th. Bitburger travelling at 240kms an hour towards Frankfurt.

August 13th. Known as “Stolpersteine”, or “stumbling stones" are the world’s largest decentralized monument to the Holocaust. There are now more than 70,000 such memorial blocks laid in more than 1,200 cities and towns across Europe and Russia. Each commemorates a victim outside their last-known freely chosen residence. We walked over such blocks all around Frankfurt.

August 19th. On my way to an early morning group ride with my riding buddies. There's no place like home.

Rate this entry's writing	Heart	12
Comment on this entry	Comment	0