so ive calculated since piper left, 17 days ago, ive had 16 descent blunders...i wont go into all of them but i have gotten lost 14 times and i just recently bought what i thought was butter and poridge, turned out to be yeast and flour...hhhmmmmm.
I NEED THE DUTCHES OF SPICE!!!!!!!!!!!!! ( pipers dinner time nick name )
so i got to slovenia and here i am now. the final country. only another 10 days or so. feel like i will be landing from outer space soon.
eastern slovenia has lots to offer if your full of crazy human ailments and physical disorders. i arrived and quickly found the first camp which is at the largest and newest thermal spa in the country. people from all over flock to these thermal pools to cure all sorts of ailments. i didnt really want to go here but it was the only camp ground that i was sure existed and since it was raining i decided to go for it. when i checked in the receptionist told me that becaus ethe use of the thermal pools is included in the price they charge per day, not per night. so i said i wanted to stay for one day at 3400 SIT, about 20$ usd. he informed me that since i was checking in on one day and then leaving on the next day it is technically 2 days. "WHAT THE #&@#!!!!" i couldnt believe my ears. so we struck a deal, i would pay for one and a half days and need to leave by 9am. what a scam...i was pissed. and this "thermal" is more like camping at the six flags great adventure than a relaxing spa. pool slide, wave pool, twisty slide...so i spent the rainy afternoon on the twisty slide trying to get my self sick. i just ended up with a bruised back and pruny fingers...
timo-
total miles: 3330miles
total ass time: 336:46hrs
thats a lot of ass time!!!!
Friday, September 22, 2006
Sunday, September 17, 2006
oh where, oh where, could my biking tim be??
I have to say I (piper) was a little blogging-bitter after the digi went MIA, and we could no longer post pictures. But now that I've been home on US soil for a little over a week, I'm feeling extra bloggy, as if I could somehow live vicariously through Timo; still biking from one adventure to the next in Central Europe...
Touching the tarmac at the Baltimore airport with soles that have taken me nearly 3000 miles, I felt I had finally 'arrived.' A funny feeling, "arriving;" the bike trip being a series of mini-arrivals, but never the grand finale... and my life up to this point also being a series of mini-arrivals and revelations, but never before have i felt such an enormous feeling of accomplishment and joy at truly being humbled by the world in which we live.
... and where is Tim?
That valiant man 'o mine biked 10 miles (in the snow up a hill with nothing but a tshirt on ;D)... with a giNORmous bike box, back to our campground, packed up my bike and put me in a cab to the airport in Vienna... The cab driver (a balding, overweight, chain smoking Austrian man of 50, with bad dandruff, a black shirt, and a love for the Austrian equivolant to Celine Dion) graciously kept the conversation going to the airport, so that it wasn't until I boarded my flight that I got a bit teary thinking of Tim packing up the tent by himself for the very first time...
....he must be cursing the extra weight... muuuuuuuuuaaaaaahahahahahahh!!!
... but where is Tim?
Last I heard he had reached Budapest- about 3/4 days from Vienna, and he was heading to the Lake Balaton region (get out your maps kiddies...) about 2 days... but that was 3 almost 4 days ago... am I worried? Not really... I kind of feel like it's a game of "Where in the world is Carmen Sandiego.." trying to guess when/where he'll pop up on the radar again... crap... I feel like my mom.
Touching the tarmac at the Baltimore airport with soles that have taken me nearly 3000 miles, I felt I had finally 'arrived.' A funny feeling, "arriving;" the bike trip being a series of mini-arrivals, but never the grand finale... and my life up to this point also being a series of mini-arrivals and revelations, but never before have i felt such an enormous feeling of accomplishment and joy at truly being humbled by the world in which we live.
... and where is Tim?
That valiant man 'o mine biked 10 miles (in the snow up a hill with nothing but a tshirt on ;D)... with a giNORmous bike box, back to our campground, packed up my bike and put me in a cab to the airport in Vienna... The cab driver (a balding, overweight, chain smoking Austrian man of 50, with bad dandruff, a black shirt, and a love for the Austrian equivolant to Celine Dion) graciously kept the conversation going to the airport, so that it wasn't until I boarded my flight that I got a bit teary thinking of Tim packing up the tent by himself for the very first time...
....he must be cursing the extra weight... muuuuuuuuuaaaaaahahahahahahh!!!
... but where is Tim?
Last I heard he had reached Budapest- about 3/4 days from Vienna, and he was heading to the Lake Balaton region (get out your maps kiddies...) about 2 days... but that was 3 almost 4 days ago... am I worried? Not really... I kind of feel like it's a game of "Where in the world is Carmen Sandiego.." trying to guess when/where he'll pop up on the radar again... crap... I feel like my mom.
Monday, September 11, 2006
tim and piper an der donau, wanderlost in Hungary and other stories...
biking the Danube is for old people, and pipe and tim realized that as soon as they stepped rubber to pavement. but we weren't complaining. bike shops, ice cream shops, bars, restaurants, campgrounds...all on the bike trail. it was like a bike super highway and pipe and timo were in hi gear dingin our bells gettin granny to pull to one side so that we could steam past like a mad truck driver, trailer and all. you felt as is you just biked along a river, saw nothing but the river and some fields and then a camp ground appeared and you camped. kinda surreal. the bike trail avoids the center of towns, probably because of the massive amount of people who bike the trail, and there for you lose any sense of where you are and why your biking. we need towns!! we need to see locals doing their thing. we need to see chickens running across the street...we need architecture!!! all we got was the back side of all the slow bikers...oh well, now we know. also, everytown in the area is some name followed by "an der donau". like no one knew that these towns were on the Danube?? any way we had lunch an der danau. and pitched the tent an der donau and we even crashed into each other and fell down an der donau. it was good times an der donau. drank a beer an der donau in a tiny pub in the middle of nowhere an der donau, like a field an der donau , and there was this massive power plant behind it an der donau. and im talking stones throw behind it an der donau. but the powerplant an der danau wasn't spewing any funk or making any noise...it was dead quiet an der donau . eerie. when we left a guy informed us that the plant was meant to be nuclear but greanpeace stopped it and they never finished building it an der donau...huh. kinda cool, i'll drink a beer ( organic i hope ) to green peace!! ( an der donau )
passing into slovakia and Hungary an der donau was a bit of a mess. as soon as you pass into these countries the bike signs stop pointing you in the right direction and finding the right way is near impossible. i even managed to pass into Slovakia on a bike trail only to be stopped by a gate, so i turned around for Austria to figure things out and there was an irate border guard asking me for my passport and why i was in this forbidden area!!! " NO BIKING" he is teling me. "but this is a bike trail..." i though, go figure. many times while in Hungary the Danube trail would spit you out on some back road with no signs of where to go and a big sign that indicated "no biking". why the hell would there be a no biking sign on a bike trail??!! any way, i found my way to Budapest and here i am. tomorrow i leave for lake balaton and eventually into Slovenia...
one thing that pipes and timers got into was doing nite rides around sweet towns. we did athens, rhodos, nesebar bulg, chesky krumlov czech...and so in the past few days ive racked em up...a nite ride in bratislava slovakia ( where i got horribly lost...another story ) , the donau island (an der donau? ) -that was sweet, 20 miles from the heart of the city and a tiny quiet island with sand roads and people having camp fires and the moon was full and all the tourists left to go back to work...mmmmm:) and finally budapest. nite rides are the best, you get to see a lot of the cityand all te cool stuff is lit up...
talky soon!!
email us !!!!!!!!!
ok bye-
passing into slovakia and Hungary an der donau was a bit of a mess. as soon as you pass into these countries the bike signs stop pointing you in the right direction and finding the right way is near impossible. i even managed to pass into Slovakia on a bike trail only to be stopped by a gate, so i turned around for Austria to figure things out and there was an irate border guard asking me for my passport and why i was in this forbidden area!!! " NO BIKING" he is teling me. "but this is a bike trail..." i though, go figure. many times while in Hungary the Danube trail would spit you out on some back road with no signs of where to go and a big sign that indicated "no biking". why the hell would there be a no biking sign on a bike trail??!! any way, i found my way to Budapest and here i am. tomorrow i leave for lake balaton and eventually into Slovenia...
one thing that pipes and timers got into was doing nite rides around sweet towns. we did athens, rhodos, nesebar bulg, chesky krumlov czech...and so in the past few days ive racked em up...a nite ride in bratislava slovakia ( where i got horribly lost...another story ) , the donau island (an der donau? ) -that was sweet, 20 miles from the heart of the city and a tiny quiet island with sand roads and people having camp fires and the moon was full and all the tourists left to go back to work...mmmmm:) and finally budapest. nite rides are the best, you get to see a lot of the cityand all te cool stuff is lit up...
talky soon!!
email us !!!!!!!!!
ok bye-
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