December 31, 2013
Happy New Year!: Eleventh hour (actually, twelfth hour) tweaking
It's a cliche to say that Christmas is a lot of things to a lot of people. For us, it's a chance to get all the children back home and to shower grandchildren with gifts and attention. The grandchildren are most important, so that we can keep our "nom de plume" of the "Grampies" in good repair. Here below are a couple of shots of the kids we are talking about. Of course, they look like ordinary kids, but to us they are priceless treasures.
| Heart | 0 | Comment | 0 | Link |
One other function of Christmas this time was to temporarily keep us (mostly) off the addictive Crazyguyonabike blogs and forums. However as soon as the family was safely on their ways home, and the house cleaned up (shovelled out?), we were back on the computers. So what pops up but a forum on best routes through Southern Florida, and ever more blogs, such as "The Captain's Lake O Adventure". In fact, a search on Crazyguy for references to Okeechobee produces 22 pages of stuff. This includes the page: "LaBelle to Belle Glade, Florida: Okey Dokey We Ride the Dikes of Okeechobee and Pass the Okaloachooche Slough Boo Hoo!"
Now, we were already a little uncomfortable with having chosen a Google Maps way through central Florida. It looked efficient, but mostly by-passed the Everglades. The Everglades feature fun stuff like alligators, 'skeeters, snakes, and panthers. Have a look at the photo that kicks off Bruce Thompson's blog! So when everyone seemed to write that Highway 41 is the way to go, we threw our previously printed maps for south Florida in the shredder and started again.
Grampies don't go out dancing anyway, but New Year's Eve found us hunched over a hot scanner. Look at the time on the screen in this photo:
You may also note that in terms of scanning and printing maps we are just leaving Florida as of midnight. So that's twelfth hour panic, right?
Actually, we still have two more days before throwing the bikes (still asleep in their hard cases) in the van and driving to Seattle for our cheaper flight to Key West. Even once we hit Seattle, there is still time for one last cruise through Recreational Equipment Inc. (REI) and once last chance to change out all our gear!
It would be better if we could just start the trip tomorrow.
| Heart | 0 | Comment | 0 | Link |
p.s. A Look Even Further Down the Road
When we got back from Grampies Go In Circles in mid-October we both felt (for us) quite fit. However two and a half months off the bikes have exacted a "heavy" toll. Yes, we both are heavier and weaker. So we are thinking, assuming we make it to Tucson and back home, then what?
Out answer is Brussels. Not Brussels sprouts, mind you. Good eating and sane exercise is no doubt the route to long term fitness. But, we are not sane, we are Crazyguys. So our Brussels is Brussels, Belgium. To this we added Koblenz, Mainz, Frankfurt, Wurzburg, Rothenburg, Augsburg, Fussen, Innsbruck, Salzburg, Radstadt, Irdning, Enns, Passau, Ingolstadt, Augsburg, Ulm, Konstanz, Basel, Freiburg, Strasbourg, Metz, and Paris. At least that's what we typed into Google Maps, or something like it. The result is another 4000km or more of healthful cycling fun.
We already have most of the Esterbauer Bikeline map books that will cover the tour. In fact, the way it comes about is that we stand in front of a shelf of the darn things, such as in the Globetrotter shop in Hamburg, or look in the attache case of friends such as the Paxmans, or get a gift from someone like Marius, and then say ooo, aaah, we gotta cycle that one! Our friend Sandra is in Germany right now, and will bring us back the Bodensee to Konigsee one. Then we will be pretty much set and will finish crafting a route that ties the dozen or so Esterbauer ones together.
We plan to launch this pretty soon after coming back from Tucson. In fact our likely ticket to Brussels is for May 6!
There is no blog or even name yet for this latest craziness, but there will be! so for anyone who enjoys following these adventures, another fix is on its way!
| Rate this entry's writing | Heart | 0 |
| Comment on this entry | Comment | 0 |