…living in and dreaming of…

i stayed in my hometown for about a week and had a couple of drinks with friends before i started the last leg back to berlin.

i didn’t do much research about the long distance cycling infrastructure within germany before i started this trip three years ago, back then my gaze was already fixed on more distant lands. this time i had a look and chose a route over bamberg, the rennsteig,  and along the river ilm until weimar where i planned to team up with alex, a friend from berlin.

it was still cold, especially in the early morning hours. but with the sun out it was always a promise it would warm up at least a little during the day. by the time i passed bamberg and coburg i was used to the cold and it was getting warmer every day. but when i climbed the hills of the thuringian forest the amount of snow still lying on the ground was increasing and by the time i reached the rennsteig, the bike and hiking trail on top of the range, the whole path was covered beneath layers of ice and snow.

from time to time i had to push my bike for some hundred meters as the snow was either too soft or too icy. this took a while and i was starting to worry if i would be in time to meet alex in weimar. i got up early the next morning and while cruising downhill, leaving  snow and ice behind, i made up time and arrived at the train station at eleven o’clock. alex arrived five minutes later and after the greeting ceremony we made a quick visit to the tourist information in the city center. we got a few tips what to see but decided after half an hour that we had seen enough and had a second breakfast instead of more sightseeing before we were under way. alex had organized two couchsurfing opportunities in halle and in dessau. for the last night stop we found a hostel on a farm which had its former stables converted into a basic accommodation. very much alike the one we stayed in on our trip to copenhagen around five years earlier in the mecklenburg lake district.

here you see alex resting in merseburg directly at the river saale with the dome and castle area in the background.

our goal was to reach berlin in time for my birthday. the weather was glorious until we woke up to icy winds and rain on the last day. we cycled for about an hour to the next town and decided to take the train. once in berlin it was a flashback with all the grey surroundings, the houses, the streets and the leaden sky. the humming cars, streets signs and the trains hovering above our heads. we stopped at a corner coffee store for breakfast. quite exhausted as we were, we headed back to alex’s flat and rested for a couple of hours. in the evening we met up with some friends and had a couple of drinks in kreuzberg to celebrate.

and to conclude this post and the journey itself somewhat, on a sign in the middle of the forest somewhere along the way johann wolfgang von goethe found once more the right words not only for someone being on the road.

the translation would read something like this:

if it whirrs inside your head and heart

what better thing you’ll get!

who loves no more and errs no more

is yet as good as dead.

so… that’s it for now. i’ll work over the summer and see once winter arrives what whirrs inside my head and heart then. thanks for reading and sharing!!

i crossed the border to germany at fessenheim over the bridge at the hydroelectric power plant.  my first stop was at bad krozingen, a typical town with a pedestrian zone in the city center and its historic buildings surrounding the market square where the farmers sell their goods on a saturday morning. it was nice to order in german again. i had a nice chat with a lad who approached me and the first time since years i was addressed with the formal “Sie”.  his first question was  if i was on a longer journey with my bike… i said i was coming from paris which seemed enough at that moment.

in the afternoon i arrived in freiburg were i met christoph, an old friend from home. the first evening we just had a couple of drinks, had a look at some pictures and exchanged stories. the next morning the weather was glorious and so we decided to go for a ride and while we were on it, took all we need for a bbq with us. from the house it took us less than five minutes to get out of town and into the woods of the black forest. there were still patches of snow and ice along the way and the climb took quite some energy because the forest paths were soggy from the melting water and last year’s leaves. some collegues from christoph’s school arrived sometime later and and by then we had a nice fire going.

the next evening we met with achim,  a friend who arrived by train with his bike as we planned on cycling back to stuttgart together the next day. we choose quiet roads through the black forest until we arrived in schiltach which is part of the german timber-frame road.

the town was once part of the duchy of  württemberg until it went to baden in 1810. we passed the historic border between württemberg and baden on our way out.

we stopped in alpirsbach for the night. it took a while until we found an accommodation. achim was quite particular about the kind of bed he wanted to sleep in. it had to be one without footboard and no place in town seemed to have one without. it was dark and we were both freezing until we finally settled into our quarters, the beds had footboards, but by then a hot shower and a meal was everything that counted. thus we were a bit late to visit the brewery and felt that the next morning would be the wrong time to do so if we still wanted to reach stuttgart before dark. so we made a quick stop at the abbey instead.

we had another half day of nice cycling but coming closer to stuttgart it was getting more and more difficult to avoid roads with heavy traffic and we eventually took  a train for the last twenty miles into the city. thanks to achim for joining me in this part of the trip.

i arrived sometime in the early morning hours. this was the longest flight i was ever on but i didn’t feel too tired. the excitement of being back in europe probably helped. the weather outside wasn’t that inviting and i took my time to assemble the bike before calling felipe, a friend who offered me a place to stay. it was an amazingly chilled out week while i stayed in paris and the great shock coming from zealand into the big crowded city failed to appear. wikipedia states the density of population with 6.6 per square kilometer for the south island of new zealand and a staggering 21.196 for paris. well, without the bike i was but one of many in the streets.

one evening i went out for dinner with sophie and laure. i know them from the time we were all living in berlin. laure’s recommendation to visit the san miniato al monte in florence was also the first station of the worldtourguide i visited.

here with felipe at one of the many bridges over the seine during one of our strolls through paris.

thanks again felipe for your hospitality!!

i took the train out of the city to avoid traffic and started cycling from belfort. next destination germany.

after returning to christchurch, i had three days left before my flight back to europe.  three days to sort out my stuff, see a couple of friends and prepare myself for the nearing end of the trip. i had a couple of beers with phil whom i first met while working in hillston back in oz and then again in melbourne. he also offered me a ride to the airport with his newly purchased car which hopefully holds up well during his trip around new zealand. this time i had a bit of time at the airport, purchased a bikebox for the first time and had to take the bike apart to fit it in.

after flying deluxe from australia, the fall to my economy class seat was deep and so it took me by surprise to have to pay for water again after even red wine and dessert were included on my last flight. and it seemed so perfect until then that i had handed over my last dollars for the bikebox to the lady at the luggage department. well, refreshments had to wait until kuala lumpur where i had a comfortable two hour wait before boarding the plane to paris.

an airport is not a good place to remember a place by. so i say goodbye with a picture from the days cycling up the west coast of the south island.

a great last part of the grand tour. see you back in europe!

i had a light start into the day until the turnoff for the hakataramea pass at kurow. it was perfect cycling weather with enough clouds to cool down the temperature in an otherwise blue sky.

the hakataramea pass was another recommendation from bob, the guy we stayed with at the buller gorge. a quiet gravel road leading through one of the most beautiful areas of the south island.

i found a wonderful spot for the night directly at the hakataramea river. since these were my last days in new zealand i was happy to experience all that makes it such a great country for cycling like here in mackenzie country.

the pass itself is not that high. so the crossing of several fords was the most challenging part. i went further on gravel and over the mackenzies pass before i came out at burke’s pass village, where i passed with jens, laurence, sarah and churo about four weeks earlier. from then it felt like the trip was coming to an end as i only retraced my steps on known territory back towards christchurch.

it was nice cycling weather when i left ranfurly and it stayed that way until halfway up the pass. the top of the pass was engulfed in a black cloud which i soon couldn’t see anymore because of the mist that was getting more and more dense and a constant drizzle was cooling me down considerably. but it was a rather fitting atmosphere for that kind of scenery. the road leading to the pass vanishes in the mist.

on top of the pass the sight was reduced to 30 meters and the drizzle was now a proper downpour. the downhill part was quite tricky. sometimes the gravel gave way to sheer rock with muddy patches on top which were slippery and more than once i was rather sliding downhill.  i was chilled through and through after the descent and the last kilometers were dragging on until i stopped at a campsite as i was in dear need of a hot shower.

once in middlemarch, the start of the otago central rail trail, it began to rain and i opted for a stop at the kissing gate cafe. along the upper taieri gorge the trail is crossing viaducts, leads through tunnels,

and over some of the original bridges from the rail line.

there is an informal camping just next to that bridge with a river flowing beneath it providing water and inviting the dusty cyclist for a swim. early next morning i was on my way again to ranfurly where i would leave the rail trail towards danseys pass.

my motivation stayed with me until dinner but was rapidly reclining within 5 minutes. washing up and brushing my teeth was all i could muster before crashing into bed. i got up once for breakfast the next morning but went back to bed immediately and stayed there until the afternoon. in the evening we enjoyed a couple of drinks and the view from the roof top terrace and recalled the highlights of the past weeks cycling together.

the next day we said goodbye at the railway station where jens and laurence hopped on board the taieri gorge railway to get towards the otago railtrail. the two of them would continue to the westcoast whereas i would take a more direct route back to christchurch.

i followed an invitation from maria and david whom i met at amberley a couple of weeks earlier. their house is a bit outside of dunedin and overlooking the ocean. here i had two wonderful rest days and started refreshed towards the central otago railtrail.

we camped at another freedom camping spot in fortrose before cycling through the caitlins. we stopped at curio bay to have a look at the petrified forest and saw some yellow-eyed penguins sunbathing.

the south island has a lot of scenic places but didn’t score with beaches so far. but the caitlins have that as well like here at tautuku bay.

we ended our day at papatowai. several times we got the recommendation to stop at the lost gypsy. a tinkerer who’s living in his green bus putting together little machines which can be wind by hand and make all sorts of funny moves or noises. here the bicycle related item in the front yard.

the next day we visited the purakaunui falls, which need a little bit of rain to look pretty, and cycled past the caitlins lake to owaka and then out to nugget point before stopping at the kaka point campsite for the night. the next day we had a long stretch on the highway one from balclutha to lake waihola and it was about time then to turn off to taieri mouth and continue on the less frequented coastal route until we reached dunedin after a very long day of cycling.

after two days on gravel it was a nice change to ride on a sealed road again. just at the junction for the von river road we met a swedish couple who sailed in fourteen month from their home to new zealand and found out about the best way to see the country and switched to bicycles. a very inspiring story.

after the decision to go all the way to the south, leaving out milford sound was another change i made. we had another long day of cycling until we stopped at the clifden suspension bridge campsite. the district of southland has a list on their homepage with spots for freedom camping. like the one at the aparima bridge reserve near thornbury where we stay the next night. after we pitched our tents we lay in the shallow water of the river and let the current wash away the dust from the road and later had a glass of wine with our dinner and went to bed rather late.

we only passed through invercargill as jens and laurence wanted to get to bluff, the southern end of state highway one. as they have been already at cape reinga, the very northern end of the road. we stayed at the bluff campground, a nice district run campsite with honesty system which is rare for such a place with all the amenities. we stayed an extra day as it was raining and our legs needed a rest day before retracing our steps to invercargill. we all had some things to organize and to do some shopping. and as we’d all seen the movie “the world’s fastest indian” with anthony hopkins playing burt munro, we had a look at the original motorbike and the replica which was used while filming.