I rode my bicycle 4220km from Finland to Portugal. This is the story of that 55 day long solo adventure, continuing with part 2, ‘The Escape’, which takes me south from Denmark to Belgium via Germany and the Netherlands.
I hope you enjoy the ride and it also inspires you to get out there and explore.
Cheers,
Jyri
——————–
JOIN THE LIFE ON THE RUN COMMUNITY!
——————–
I’m an Australian-Finn, now in the second half century of life. I’m an intrepid nomad and professional coach possessed with a keen curiosity to explore the world around me, and to keep discovering and learning new things.
I created this Life on the Run channel to share my experiences from my various active lifestyle activities and adventures. Should you enjoy the content here, then please like and subscribe. However, even more importantly, consider joining our Life on the Run community at https://lifeonthe.run, where our aim is to offer both support and inspiration for fellow free spirits and world explorers through the sharing of our collective experiences from this wondrous and magical journey of life.
#bicycletouring #europe #germany
Do when i rolled over into germany i started to experience an uneasy sense of guilt it took me back to the time in 1990 when i crossed the border from poland into the post-war eastern side of germany on a night train and route to berlin maybe there was something i didn’t want
To remember or perhaps admit to myself maybe it was something i wasn’t proud of and had buried away hoping would never see the light of day isn’t it funny how your emotions can get the best of you when you’re exhausted and you have to deal with new and stressful situations
In completely foreign environments that’s also exactly the reason why i love to travel so much as it takes you to the limits of your comfort zone and beyond When i realized that it was going to be completely dark within the hour i was surrounded by large flat farming fields with very little prospect of finding a decent place to even stealth camp but then i came across a very large farmhouse and i had the bright idea to
Go and knock on the door to ask whether i could pitch my tent on the owner’s land well some 14 hours later i’d enjoyed a great dinner beers shots of jack daniels as well as breakfast with such a friendly farmer couple and their super cute dog stella oh Wow Bye In bramerhaven i was hosted by a wonderful lady who was a very experienced bike tourer she’d done trips to cuba the us and new zealand amongst many other places she gladly shared her many stories experiences as well as travel tips with me all of which i greatly welcomed
As a complete newbie to the world of bike touring The morning i rode out of bremerhaven i received a message that would have me change my heading due south steering away from my original route going through amsterdam my initial disappointment at not visiting amsterdam was quickly replaced with the realization that i was no longer attached to a set schedule to meet anybody
I was also no longer riding into the most severe headwind of my life but what’s most amazing about this change is that my new route would result in perhaps the most immediately impactful and significant encounter of the entire journey uh g’day guys uh it’s the evening here in oldenburg germany
I’m in the campground um just wanted to give you a bit of a look around on making dinner it’s nothing exciting but this is how i’ve been living every day so there’s my dinner a bit of macaroni that’s from actually little in finland some tuna some nice pumpernickel bread some cheese and
Meat a bit of coffee coming later um i’ve already been to the shop so i’ve got a couple of beers those things they only cost like 49 cents which is pretty uh good all that shopping cost me like six euros okay there’s some sweets that’s for tomorrow i’m not having those tonight maybe
Ramen for tomorrow and there you go so um that’s pretty much how i’m living so it’s been good though i’m really enjoying it so um thanks again for your support see ya So So Good morning guys um i’m in a place called wordly i think i don’t know how you pronounce it uh yep um it’s gonna be a nice day i’m hoping if you can look at the sky it’s snow clouds there but it was actually raining about an hour ago but
I’ve got my bike all packed i haven’t comb my hair i’ve just got this bed head which i’ve had for probably two and a half weeks now and i don’t care um but yeah so it was a good night and uh hopefully i’ll have another good day today and i
Should be actually getting pretty close to the uh the dutch border if not actually over it so it actually it’s kind of weird because you’ll go over the dutch board then back into germany and back into holland again so uh well we’ll see how the day goes but anyway that’s it
Um thanks again bye On day 20 i arrived at a camping ground on the outskirts of emerich near the rhine river in complete darkness it had been pissing it down for hours and i was soaked through and freezing experiencing an extreme case of i want my mummy itis then while pitching my tent on a soaked
Plot of grass a guy that i had stopped early to ask for directions came to invite me to stay at his house with my latest random host i enjoyed a delicious dinner beers and shots of some nondescript rocket fuel or with some great chats about life and travel
In the morning as i was about to leave for a crossing of the rhine river my host gifted me with a comfy gel touring saddle after he saw the rockhard racing one i’d suffered with for the last fifteen hundred kilometers that one act of understanding spontaneous kindness and generosity
Literally saved my ass completely changing the nature of my journey to that point i’d mainly been focused on managing my physical discomforts and by that i mean i saw a rear end now i was free to focus on managing my thoughts instead of saddle source it was now definitely confirmed ich liebe germans [Applause] These kinds of random encounters would continue to occur throughout the entire journey with one of the most significant occurring in centroid and belgium with my warm showers hosts a very experienced bike touring couple who had even ridden all the way from europe to singapore in addition to the great local beer
Tasting session i was greeted with upon my arrival they gave me a world research route to guide me along the famous camino de santiago pilgrimage pathway to now navigate all i had to do was follow the blue line on my google maps iphone app all the way to santiago de compostela in spain
This would include guiding me down some special cycling routes such as ravels which rolled railway lines that had been converted to bikeways discovering these pathways as well as many other quiet roads and hidden trails ones that i certainly would never have found on my own made me feel like i was
On some kind of secret treasure hunt just like robert langdon and sophie navoo in the da vinci code After all of these numerous serendipitous experiences it really felt like something strange was happening behind the scenes that are somehow being set up to meet exactly the right people in the right places at the right times and they’ll go out of their way to help you along your journey without any ulterior motives
Just with the simple desire and passion for sharing up to this point in my life or 51 years of it i’d become quite cynical about people’s motives which had significantly affected my ability to trust and show vulnerability unfortunately being this way can also lock out of my life
Those people have done nothing to deserve my ice-cold wrath which my daughter enya likes to call the prince of darkness treatment during this stage of the journey i came to see that the world is actually full of some truly amazing people and if you open yourself up to the possibility of meeting them
Then you certainly will you As i meanded down the banks of the lemieux river towards france i started to consider whether there might just be an even greater purpose in all of this however i’d now been handed the key to free myself from the self-imposed psychological prison and mistrust i’d been festering in for the better part of
The last 10 years and i didn’t hesitate to open the cell door to make my escape You