A daytrip to Luxembourg city

Wednesday, 5th of October. I slept until 10 A.M. and some minutes after waking up Pierre knocked on my door. When having breakfast he suggested to spend the day in Luxembourg, we would take the car and later pick up Jordane, who is working in this town. When sitting in the car I felt strange, somehow like a bad headache, but before the pain comes. My neck muscles were totally hard, I felt completely tired all of sudden. Because of additional noise and light hypersensitivity it could have been a migraine, so I took some medicine against that. But it wasn't really better when we started walking, so I asked for a coffee break and this really helped. We just sat and relaxed for a while and I tried two different types of coffee drink and after that I felt definitely better, so much better, that it was also distinctly and visibly for Pierre, because he mentioned that I seemed to be much more alive and also had a smile in the face and some glance in the eyes.

Luxembourg is really nice, it has lots of green, and the historic part is exiting. To me it was great discovering, I found lots of curious sights – I took many photos. And it was also fun to talk with Pierre. He told a lot about history when showing interesting places. When talking about favourite films and music we had also some excursuses about European culture and music theory – mainly the movies were much more a way to talk about things that were meaningful to us, no topic for small talk. And it really felt good to discover that we had lots in common, so I was and still are very lucky to meet him and also Jordane. When being altogether we went on having good talk on a personal level. I loved the anecdote, when a female friend of Jordane, whom she told they now would have their first couchsurfer and that it would be a woman, asked her, if she wouldn't be frightened that this woman could steal her husband.

Later we made some music together. Although both said they're just learners, both know a lot about music and also have extremely good equipment. Jordane is doing drums and Pierre is playing the guitar, and when he started to play it was really impressive – thereafter I first felt to shy to start myself. While to me the guitar is a way to accompany my singing, Pierre is able to play amazing turns and melodies, and he knows several styles – his sleight of hand is on a level I can only dream about. Curiously Pierre himself was impressed of my strumming technique and had problems to copy or do ordinary accord sequences. That's strange to me, but maybe it shows that it's just a question of practice – I definitely want to work on my guitar play and extend my abilities. It would be great to go on with music exchange (and of course exchange at all!) and I'm highly motivated to go on with learning from the guitar book I already have.

To me meeting Pierre and Jordane was very special and the best last hosts one could wish – just the right thing for the end of my trip.

Douaumont ossuary close to Verdun

Monday, 3th of October. I stayed for two nights at Bens place. Ben lives in a very nice house. When arriving in the night we mainly said hello, and after a shower and a meal I went to bed. But next day, a Monday, we spend the whole day together, starting with a very intense talk.

Ben told, he quitted work three years ago, so I became sensitive and wanted to hear more. The meaning of work in people's life was and still is an important topic for me. Ben was so relaxed when talking about a different value system: staying at home gives him and also his family – he has a sixteen year old daughter and a wife – so much more freedom. They now have less money but they also need less. There was no need to go on doing things he didn't want to do. To me it's still new, that one can change priorities. I still have all these „You are what you own “ phrases in my head (what I never believed but what seem to infect me more then I was aware). To me it was kind of apparentness to met someone who's happy with not working after I found out about my bequeathed inferiority complex. It's probably possible to do so without feeling guilty.

I told Ben about the changing in my life – quitting my job at university and maybe quitting work at all. When telling all the aspects why I no longer felt comfortable in doing my job I was a little bit shocked because it's so much what came together that it's actually no wonder I'm not able to go on. Looking from this side on the facts was kind of new, usually I prone to think that's my fault to be over-sensitive and not able to be factual and distance myself. It's still hard not to judge myself but take my feelings as a healthy reaction.

It was a very good talk, but after it I felt pretty exhausted and talking came to an end for now. It was a bright sunshiny day. Later we drove by car to Verdun and I got a feeling about the area I had cycled through in the night. Ben told a lot about history especially the battles in the first and second world war. We visited Douaumont ossuary close to Verdun, a memorial containing the remains of soldiers who died on the battlefield during the Battle of Verdun in first World War. In front of the monument lies the largest single French military cemetery of the first world war, it contains 16,142 graves.

Some years ago there were made graves for the Muslims which now face to Mecca. But the most curious experience was that there were lot of crosses pulled up the ground and lying there like a trenched field. Because the crosses are made of concrete they have to rebuild regularly.

Ben also showed me the little windows behind the ossuary, placed under the big red ones which symbolize all the blood. Beneath you can see all the human bones, the remains of both French and German soldiers who died on the battlefield. Some of the cave rooms, each representing an area, were full to the top.

Reims

Friday to Saturday, 1th of October. Antoine, a cute nineteen year old first semester, lived just for some weeks in a cosy small student flat just in the centre of Reims. We had nice talk when I arrived in the night, especially about our couchsurfing experiences, music (he is playing the guitar, too), psychology (his studying topic) and education system in France in general. It was relaxed and open atmosphere, and when we went to bed Antoine offered me his bed to sleep. He himself would sleep on a sleeping mat in then kitchen. But as his bed was a fold-out couch and therefore big enough for two people I invited him to share the place with me.

Next day Antoine showed me around somewhat, as the city was still new to him, too. I really like this city. It was a fantastic sunny day and the atmosphere was very relaxed. The Place Drouet d'Erlon, that is just in the next street of Antoine home, reminded me a lot of Victory Square in Temeswar (Romania), where Klaus and I had been some years before. It contains many lively restaurants and bars, as well as several attractive statues and fountains, my favourite one is shown at the photo above. During the summer it fills with people sitting outside the many cafés enjoying the summer sun. And they have psychedelic buses in this city…

In the afternoon Antoine did some work for university (he's still very engaged at the moment…), so I went to an Internet café to go on with my blog and organize my remaining stages and couchsurfing hosts. In the evening we met some of his friends and went out for a beer. Because Reims is a student city most night life happens during the week, on weekends all the students go home to visit their parents. This phenomenon was new to me and still seems a little bit weird.

Being with his friends was curious. Since my staying with Antoine and his flat mates in Caen I'm used to the French way of welcoming and biting farewell other people, it's no longer weird to kiss the air – nevertheless it's still a little bit strange that this convention on the one hand seems to be more personal as the German handshaking but on the other had it's much more difficult to break through and give the other one a real hug. So on first impression French people feel more close but at the same time they make sure to keep some distance. I don't know if they are aware of this, maybe they just can't imagine to act different. The friends of Antione in Reims were young nice man, but they weren't able or didn't have the heart to speak in English. So most of the time the three guys talked and had fun and then Antoine translated to me in three sentences the topic of the last five minutes. In this sense the first evening was much more nicer and personal. Once we played tabletop football, but the French table are totally different from the ones I'm used to in Germany. So I lost very bad. No fun.

Another thing I recognised and couldn't understand was the fact, that French people didn't seem to be aware of pollution control. As one example of many my fellows (and also the other people in the pub) drank their beer out of a plastic cup. I myself had ordered a Guinness and because the pub had only bottles they asked if I'm okay with the bottle, so I took the chance to ask for a glass – and I got one with a very nice unusual shape. Because I was curious I asked Antoine about this unnecessary production of waste, and first he seemed to understand the problem as he talked about French mentality who didn't want to change behaviour to change reality. But the more I focussed on the question, why he didn't drank his beer from a glass, the more he didn't seem to understand and ended up in the phrase that they always used to do so. Later in the discussion he assumed that the pub probably had charged me extra for having a glass (I had paid more than the others), so I had a nice chat with the people behind the bar, who assured to be glad to give people a glass – surely without any extra charging – if they would like to have one. I'm afraid French people are far away to think about all the little changes in behaviour to save nature which are so usual in Germany.

Time out in Caen

Tuesday, 27th of September. I took a time out in Caen, and it was a very relaxed day. I went on with my blog (but was very slow because I felt very tiered, too). In the evening we, this means Antoine, his two flat mates Amin and Marine, Sebastian, a friend of him who is also living in the flat at the moment (he came for one week to visit, but felt in love with the city so he's staying somehow longer) and Tino, the other couchsurfer, went to the town, had a drink in an Irish pub and had some fun at the castle Château de Caen. Sebastian is a very ambitious photographer, and all of us had fun when posing.

Limerick

Tuesday, 6th of September. This whole place Tarbert seems to go south. Lots of shops are closed but don't say anything about this fact. They look just like normal shops from outside. Most traffic comes from the crossing vehicles which are only passing through. I was still looking for an internet connection – no chance in this village, although there had been an internet café some time before (even some of the locals didn't know it was closed). The friendly woman in the pharmacy gave me the advise to go to Glin, because there in the library would be a internet computer for free, so I started to cycle six kilometres in the direction of Limerick – and what nice people I found there! This library is just lovely. A small old stone built house, and inside mainly just one open room, some books and games (probably less books as we have at our home, and definitely less games…) and two nice computers. The friendly librarian was so broad-minded to my needs and so interested in my touring and blogging, it was such a nice and warm atmosphere and it was fun to talk a while. Many thanks!

Meanwhile Kate and Dave had send their address data. When the library closed at 2 P.M. I started speed cycling up to Limerick – I had an average of 24,3 km/h from the moment I started cycling this day until I reached Limerick (nearly 60 kilometres). During the cycling I wondered why I felt so very warm, and then I realized the sun had shown up again! This day was still a mixture of clouds, rain and sun, but it's so exhilarant when its clear, warm and bright. And I even had following wind from time to time.

I arrived early at Kate's and Dave's home. Kate was doing her home made felt clothes and accessory. She is a freelancer and all around the house you can see lots of different pieces in varied designs. While she went on working, Dave showed me around the town – Limerick by night. As a real cyclist I tried to turn on my light, as we left the house… (whithout having a bycicle between my legs, I bent forward to activate the dynamo —does anyone remember The third policeman by Flan O'Brian?)

Dave knows a lot about history stuff, but for me the contemporary image of this town was much more interesting. I wasn't so sure about if it would be worth it to come to this place. Some people said it's uninteresting, others (non locals) liked it. The reputation of this town isn't so good (mainly caused by some trouble in the 80's). Now I'm glad about deciding to come to Limerick, because it's not so typical (or what I would call typical from my previous experience). Its character seems to be much more used and industrial. And inside of this some very old churches and castles…

Dave and I ended up in a nice pub (their local), where to my big surprise he ordered a German wheat beer. He definitely has to come to Bamberg and taste all our local wheat beers, which are so much better then all these industrial beers from the big companies. I went on trying new brands of stout. We had some good talk about profession, contentedness, self-fulfillment and the need for sabbaticals. We found some parallels between our relationships in the fact that one can give the other one the freedom to be creative without financial bounds. My head and my heart are still mulling over what I like or want to do or to be or don't like or want to do or to be… Moments of insight and scruple take turns.

I also spend one day resting. Doing some improvements on the bike, install the new light and so on. Because of some troubles with the electricity a very nice electrician was in Kate's and Dave's house who gave me some useful material to make the grips softer. All at all just nice and relaxing. Nevertheless it was once again 4 A.M. when I ended writing and working on the computer…

Sightseeing in Tramore and than beeming up to Youghal

Monday, 29th of August. Instead of going straight on my bike after the doctor thing was done, I stayed for some food, some talk, some Internet, and then we (the four of us) had a sightseeing trip. Mark showed us around with the car and we stopped at some nice places to go and look around. And it was quite worth it. I especially like the Metal Man, a large cast-metal figure pointing seawards, set on top of one of three pillars, which was erected in 1823 to warn seafarers away from dangerous shallow waters. But I call him Elvis, and he has such a cute ass… By visiting this place I also did one of the points of interest which are shown on my map….

It was a good thing to see something more than the house with its great outlook and the streets we used when going to the doctor, the supermarket and the pub. I'm generally not so much into walking around and doing touristy stuff, beside my host would like to show me around. To me staying is much more about relaxing, spending time with myself, being with my hosts, especially when they turn to become friends. Just staying is part of this journey inwards – why try to get further impressions and experiences, when you also need time to digest what you have experienced and thought and felt while cycling?

When I finally thought about actual leaving, I suddenly realized how late it was (half past 5), so there was no way to arrive at my next couchsurfing host's place in Youghal (70 kilometres away) within admissible time. So Mark gave me a lift with his car up to Dungarvan, where we passed the Eden Garden Center (!!!). The remaining 30 kilometres I cycled within 1.5 hours (the first five kilometres uphill and the rest downhill by trend). Arriving in Youghal around 8:30 P.M. I had some problems to find Lobsang's place as he didn't live at the number he had given to me (or I thought he had given to me). But a very nice man lived there with whom I had a nice chat about Germany and travelling, and he had an idea about which place probably could be meant and he even guided me. It was still not easy to contact Lobsang, as there was no reaction when I rang the door bell and his telephone was also dead. But shouting his name finally helped.

Lobsang was very nice, he made some egg based sushi for me, strove to give me the best time while offering food, Internet and everything one could probably need to feel very comfortable, although he had a bad hangover. Therefore he excused himself to lay down in a dark room, but later he asked for some guitar music, so we had a nice relaxed evening. He is also an extremely good musician, playing in a tradition eastern style and he also owns lots of traditional eastern instruments. I would have loved to listen to him much more.

A bright sunshinin' day up to Oxford

Friday, 19th of August. Woke up quite early from the warm sunray, so cycling was pleasant. Once again: People can't believe, other people do long distance cycling. I asked one man in Camden (or Barnet) about the direction up to Oxford and he asked back if I meant Oxford Street and when I negated he wanted to explain the route to the next railway station.

I cycled lots of bike paths and A roads – they are so different! In the village areas the A roads are just great. Cycled the first 50 kilometres very snugly, then I told myself to do some real cycling. A good, relaxed day, where I was constantly surprised how easy all these kilometres were done, suddenly I reached kilometre 60, also suddenly kilometre 70… although I didn't do anything. I just felt somewhat weary, but there have to be some side effects from the last view days… At kilometre 80 some problems with my left calf started. I got off my bike and suddenly for no reasons my muscle was pretty hard and aching. One will see how this feels tomorrow. Apart from that I'm somehow uninterested in gathering new impressions during the cycling. It's good to be involved with something during the day, but on the other hand it's kind of always the same respectively I'm not able to inspire myself.

From London (Camden) up to Oxford I cycled 110 kilometres this day. Had a warm welcome at my couchsurfing host's place. Alison had made some tasty food and we had some nice chat about politics and education and social system in England, Scotland, Germany and Australia, talked about Australia at all, 'cause she is a big Australia fan and wants to go to this country after finishing her PHD. We also talked about long time bicycle tours as she is very experienced in that, too. It's not always easy to understand her Scottish accent, but she is able to speak common English, too… When it went dark she showed my around. Oxford (that means the University area) is so lovely, so many nice old buildings, so much young people, so much life. And the Oxford urban planner know how to work with light.

London Calling

Thursday, 17th of August. Being in London. I arrived at Sunday (Monday), 15th August, 2 A.M. and will leave tomorrow morning, Friday, 18th August. Worth it all the time.

After staying at Dagnis' and Dagmara's place on the first day to have a long sleep, to do some computer stuff and just to relax, I went to Inner London, but after the first four kilometres the old tyre hole break up again. So I switched to public traffic. (I like the tube of London. It's placed so deep under the town…) Later I brought my bike back home and as I had to carry the bike's front it was pretty exhausting – one of the moments where I'm not totally glad about having a steel frame… Dagnis was so glad about being allowed to fix my bike, as he loves to do mechanical things but normally don't has the opportunity to do it. He was sad when he wasn't able to find something to repair.

To be a pedestrian in Inner London is great. Now there are lots of signs, and you are moving like one flow. Nobody waits longer then necessary at a traffic light, the green and red signs are much more an offer and there's no singled person who suddenly crosses the road, it's a great working mass communication. And nobody is disturbed or mad about this traffic light usage. And all these people, even if they move fast without any waiting, are still very friendly. Whenever I asked one of them for an information, same thing happened: If they didn't knew the answer they themselves asked another person, to be able to tell me instead of sending me to the other guy…

I like this town, I wouldn't have thought this could happen, as I had give a damn about London while planning my route. I just thought, it's on my way, so it would be weird not to see and to stay for a while. But it's just great. Nice atmosphere, much structure. London just has style. So great colours, the red buses (that sadly are no longer this originally old ones), all these colourful alternative markets, somehow flower power is still alive. And another funny thing: I start to think, I become able to understand English movies much better – right now I'm in such a movie. It's easy for me to discover unusual sights and details – so I hope the photo I took from Picadilly Circus isn't that much touristy.

Camden, where Dagnis and Dagmara are living, was definitely the right choice, especially for this Stable's Market (and also Camden High Street)! I get an idea what aspects of old Passerelle in Hannover I miss so much, where now there is no longer a Passerelle but a Niki-de-Saint-Phalle-Promenade. I feel pretty good in this town, this country. (But sometimes this feeling pops up about having no – reachable – home. Then I start to loose balance – that’s kind of scary.)

Everywhere in London you can see the the promotion for Conan the barbarian remake. I have no idea, why there has to be a remake as the old one still works very well and is also that much connected to young Arnold Schwarzenegger. They even don’t mention the name of new Conan. But it's in 3D.

The other day I really cycled through London, a totally different experience, pretty hard to have some orientation plus extreme much traffic, so much vehicles, and all this standing still while waiting for green traffic light. There are not so much cyclists in London traffic, but those who are there most of them have a racing bike. And we all cycle fairly risky, but nobody cares about that. In Germany they would constantly tot and shout at you how dare you to do such things (and I think it's mainly this reaction what makes the situation much more dangerous).

This day I visited Hyde Park, Regent’s Park and Notting Hill with its
lovely Portobello Road. And I also saw this Traveller's Bookshop which was archetype for the cute Hugh Grant's shop in the movie Notting Hill. Another place I visit because of a movie. (Did I mention that in Brugge there’s a guy who offers In Bruges guiding tours?) Meanwhile I have a pretty good idea of some area's map (and I am also totally used to cycling left hand for quite a while. Now I can’t understand why I had such weird feelings the first time). In Regent’s Park I got the first free hug in my life! A boy and a girl were running around calling out crossing people if anybody would like to have a free hug. Older people normally ignored that or went away, but I was so glad about – both of them were affected I get off the bike.

Staying with Dagnis and Dagmara was just great. All the days we had interesting talk about relationship and love attachment and also other stuff or we just relaxed together while sharing some thoughts sometimes. I gave some juggling lesson and we made some great music, really good playing on my guitar so both were really hooked, they danced, they made some rhythm and other escorting sounds, they even sang although both of them claimed they are not able to sing before – and it sounded fantastic. Just great atmosphere, cosy and intensely. Dagnis and Dagmara are such a lovely, warm, cute and attractive couple.

Last words:

• …Who said London would be expensive? Things I normally buy have same price or are cheaper as in Germany.
• …Since Tuesday my guitar is once again a six string guitar. It's an interesting sound when played. Different but good. Just after this all time playing the last few days my fingertips start to hurt.
• When I visited London (Hyde Park, Notting Hill, Regent's Park) I cycled 42 kilometres, and I also reached the 1.000 kilometres survey point
• …All over this country there are so many old two-coloured VW-busses (V1 and V2) still driving, that’s so nice! Some of them are so old, they actually have a splited front shield.
• …Just for the statistics. Yesterday evening some rain felt down – the first time I saw rain in whole England. Today is just a rainy day. Main reason, why I'm still here.

An addition related to Martin's commentary

In Bruges…

Wednesday, 10th of August. Brugge is so great! I arrived yesterday night at 10:30/11 P.M. (after 95 kilometres of cycling) and now I'm in a nice youth hostel. This town is so lovely and relaxing – just all these tourist are disturbing… I don't feel like one of them. I don't want to take a boat trip through the canals and I'm not interested in making photos. It's unbelievable how much boats are there and all of them full with people (as one can see in this photo someone else shot…)

After spending much time on the internet working on my blog while Bart was at work, it was 4 P.M. when I left Antwerp yesterday. It's funny to ask somebody: "I want to cycle to Brugge, in what direction do I have to go?" – he will meet you with disbelief. First I had to cross a river. There are several tunnels for bicyclists and pedestrians, the elevator goes 31 metres down.

In this elevator I had a conversation with a cycling retiree, who come back from a cycling tour to Portugal quite recently. I asked him for a bike path to Brugge, and he invited me to follow him, as the route I had to take was also his way home, so I had some nice companion for the next 5 kilometres. Then I cycled a bike path he had shown to me nearby the arterial highway, which meant heavy traffic noise, but this stopped after 20 kilometres, so it was nice and easy to cycle and, best of all, the most direct route. After 50 kilometres I had a cappuccino break in Zelzate. I always forget that the Belgians have their own understanding of what's a cappuccino. They also offer some creamy thing, once I had something what could have been vanilla butter (very good to eat separated!) once something that could have been egg liqueur. Until I approached Brugge with 25 kilometres left everyone I asked for the route to get sure I didn't miss something showed the same reaction: meeting someone with disbelief, complete amazement, repeating the word Brugge in different languages and pronunciation – and at least they informed me about how much kilometres Brugge is away from where I was now (and each time the mentioned a much to small number!).

After Antwerp hasn't been that good, I expected nothing from Brugge. And than it impressed me totally, because I arrived at one of the town gates, Kruispoort – and there was such a great warm light, so lovely, so calm… And – what a fortunate coincidence! – I found myself just in the youth hostel's street.

What a welcome. Some guys at the connected pup were immediately curious about my guitar, another one wanted to invite me for a glass of wine. But I first wanted to unload my stuff to the 10 persons bedroom. When I came back, the guys were gone, but I found my glass of wine on a feeder pillar. So I went with my glass along the street, and joined a nice small Turkish diner, where I had a lasagne and shortly companion, too, because it turned out, that the Turkish owner was able to speak German. He had learned it in school and worked about ten years in Ankara, where he'd practised a lot, but had never been to Germany. He invited me for another glass of wine, we had nice talk, he complimented my eyes, then tried to hold my hand, so I had to made plain to him, this was to much, and we went on with talking. We hugged for good bye, and he once again tried to made it a closer hug, I eluded from, but altogether it was e very nice, interesting, strange night. I had a very late shower and some very good sleep.

Hobbes has said, he no longer wants to travel inside a bag, and he's a big tiger, so today we visit town together. We greet Klaus, Nilsbär, Kleiner Bär and Henry!

Antwerp

Antwerp, 7th to 9th August. After I met Bart yesterday we went to a music event. Right now everywhere in Antwerp is celebrating, because it's Zomer van Antwerpen and therefore there are sunflowers everywhere. I love sunflowers. :-)

Bart hadn't to work on Monday to be able to regenerate from weekends festival experiences. Monday evening he volunteered at an event of Zomer van Antwerpen (because of all this volunteering most of the events are for free). Meanwhile I worked on my blog. Earlier this day he showed me around (but it wasn't that good as my first unforgettable impressions together with Wim).

Bart is very experienced to couchsurfing, he opened all his flat to me, being much tolerant in any way (I spend very much time at his computer. Thank you again, Bart). He demonstrated absolutely no suspiciousness, I hope I was able to show I earn so much trust. I don't think he cares about any risk and surely has a good gut instinct. Bart is very companionable and very active in organizing stuff, especially for the couchsurfing community. He cares about economy and was very helpful (so I was able to wash once again). I regret we didn't have private talking. I'm not sure he was somehow interested in me and my personality.

Bart is a big beer fan. Finally I could upload the Schlenkerla Rauchbier from Bamberg (and also two printed T-shirts I had made for my dear couchsurfer Tomas, who was also hosted by Bart shortly before. Bart will send the shirts and some Belgium beer to Tomas). Now I'm eventually able to put my rucksack in one of my paniers.