Journal /
Smooth sailing
Smooth sailing it has been this first week. Very little trouble and much enjoyment.
The only trouble I’ve had was a hole in my glove that appeared on the first day which I then sewed closed and then lost my gloves completely on Monday…
It took longer than I had anticipated to travel out of the Netherlands. This because when I cycled to Prague almost 2 years ago I took the quickest road possible to milingen aan de rijn. This time I choose a more scenic route.
Wensday I stayed at a campsite in the Ardennes that was run by this older good spirited and nice dutch Lady. When I arrived at the campsite a sign hang at the door saying in dutch I’m somewhere on the campsite, just wait a minute and I’ll come around. I got nervous after waiting there for 15 minutes because the next campsite was to far away for me to make that day. I was certainty not planning on wild camping because of the many hours of climbing I had done that day. I needed a shower.
After a while she appeared and said: “what a polite bunch of people you are sitting there waiting”
Then she told me where to put up my tent to get the earliest sunlight through the mountains. Which turned out to be next to a nice stream of water.
Later that evening I went to her office to pay and we talked a few minutes about my travel plans during which she grabbed my hands a couple of times while giving me some travel advice and wished me a happy and spirited journey.
The next day I ended the day in Bastonge which seemed like a fun place to stay an extra day. So today I relaxed, read, walked through the city and visited the war barracks museum.
It was interesting to see all this giant machinery and so many war vehicles and so many diffrent types for different purposes. One thing that really surprised me in a owhh ofcourse they would have these kind of way, was seeing how they had these gigantic mobile workshops vehicles with all kinds of machinery to fix vehicles at the war front.
I read 2 books this week
One I got from Benne and Tessa called The Amazing Tale of a Deaf Adventurer.
It is about a guy named Albert who traveled the world by bike while being deaf in the 1890s only a few years after the bike as we know it had been invented.
Very interesting book and I thoroughly enjoyed reading it. I can’t wrap my head around going to Russia and Jerusalem by bike in a time where roads simply weren’t made for that sort of activity.
Also he spent a big chunk of his life in Assen which is cool
The second book is a fictional tale called Ingrem by Louis C.K.
It follows a boy named Ingrem while he is coming of age. He is from the deep south and is abandoned by his parents at the age of 10.
The story follows him every step until he is grown. The most morbid stuff happens to him and it is quite a depressing book but you can’t help continue reading. You want to know what happens next to this boy.