It’s all around us

It looked like it was going to rain a lot in Switzerland so we decided to take a route via the Netherlands and Belgium.

We crossed Germany all the way to Cologne. It was a very smooth ride apart from Wuppertal, which had very steep streets – so steep that we had to push our bikes all the time.

After Cologne there was another day cycling to the border and then to Maastricht, where we met our host who we contacted on WarmShowers (a website for traveling cyclists). Oh, what a suprise awaited us there.

The Netherlands. Maastricht is a student town in the province of Limburg in the south of the country. We didn’t plan to stay there more than a day but destiny would decide otherwise… After a good night of sleep we woke up and were getting ready to eat and hit the road, when our host entered with a shocked expression on his face: “Girls, your bikes are not there”. Waaaaait, what?! What does he mean “not there”? We had parked them in the closed yard the night before – not in the street – but in the yard where not many people have access to. We quickly ran down just to find our bike bags cut off and on the ground, and the bikes – well, gone.

An instant existential dread hit us hard 🥲 First, we went to the police. And though we were greeted by a very smily woman, we quickly underestood that this wouldn’t help the issue, as there were hundreds of bikes stolen in the province per day. Sadly strolling around the town we stumbled upon a cemetery, sat on a bench and had our moment of grief. What to do? Where to go? How to continue the journey? We had enough money for a plane back but how could we even think about taking a plane back when Gibraltar was still ahead and the tea that we wanted to drink on the top of the Gibraltar rock was still in our bags?!

Suddenly, an idea came to my mind. An acquaintance of mine was recently cycling across South America and his bike got stolen in Bolivia. He told his story to a tv channel and managed to raise funds for a new bike in several weeks. Could we try the same?! Let’s see, it’s always better to try than not to…

A bit more hopeful than before we left the cemetery and went directly to the HQ of the main tv channel of the province – 1Limburg. The lady at the reception listened to our story with a neutral face and went to talk to the manager about it. We were not expecting much, but the manager came to us and asked us to tell the story again… and by the evening we were on TV, radio, Internet and even in the next day’s newspaper – we had to pose for a photographer later in the afternoon at some bike parking lot. 😄 Phew, that was fun. But what was even more fun – the same evening our host received a call from someone in Roermond, a town 50 km north of Maastricht. It was the owner of a bike shop there who wanted to give us bikes to continue our journey if we made a promotion for his shop for the TV. We said big OF COURSE and went to Roermond the next day to film the ad and to get more details about the bikes.

We had to wait three days for the bikes to be fixed and set. They weren’t new bikes at all and the frames were pretty big for us but we didn’t dare to ask for more as these were already gifts. We decided to wait in Maastricht. Back there, we were suddenly approached in the street by two ladies. One of them was holding a newspaper with our big photo on the main page. She invited us to stay at hers for several days which was great as our host was leaving and we couldn’t stay with him anymore.

Shocked by the loss, but humbled by all the kindness we had received, we were patiently waiting for our “new” bikes. And, the day came.

We were also given a heavy Abus chain to lock our bikes. Thanks, Roermond, now it was time to leave.

Belgium. Oh, Belgian roads! As usual, around 100k per day… We had experienced the worst quality of roads that we had seen so far. For us, there haven’t been many memorable events in this country, maybe just peculiar mixtures of industrial zones and vast lonely fields.

Want to point out a warm welcome in Liege by Nastya who studied in my high school and classic Liege waffles that she made us taste. Then there was Charleroi and then we continued off to France entering through the Parc naturel régional de l’Avesnois and continuing to the fields of northern France.

France. Sweet sweet northern France. People really light up these long journeys. Landscapes do too, but mostly people. Somewhere in a small village that I will never remember the name of, just north of Saint-Quentin, we were hosted by a beautiful couple of 65ish y.o. whose house looked like a house from a fairytale – it had 3 floors and an attic and all these antique little thingys and pretty books and paintings. They were baking their own bread with raisins, and the lady knew how to sing a song in russian – Подмосковные вечера – which she sang at dinner to our pure surprise and nostalgy. We fell in love with this house and the owners and it was very hard to say goodbye. Though, we would continue to Compiègne the next day where we would stay with the lady’s sister, thus being with the same family. (ah, such a pity not to remember their names or even their village!) The day after we would be reaching Paris.

PAAAAARIS. First time in Paris. Staying at Boulevard Voltaire close to Nations in a communal apartment with our warmshowers hosts – what could be better for the first-time visitors? The first place where we went as soon as we arrived was – of course – Cimetière du Père-Lachaise. We were strolling and looking at beautifully decorated tombstones, saw graves of Jim Morrison, Edith Piaf… Oh, cemeteries, places to contemplate the fragility of life…

Otherwise, during our 3 days in Paris we walked a lot to compensate for usual cycling. We walked and walked and we saw all the cult places like the Eiffel tower, the Sacré Coeur, the Arch, Quais de la Seine… I wouldn’t say that Paris had ignited the same fire in my heart as the little village in the north did… not at all, I was actually eager to leave Paris and be out in the countryside.

From Paris to Limoges there were great days of cycling through forests and fields, washing ourselves in the rivers, camping in the vines (and harvesting grapes for dessert too!), as usual 100k par day. Our “new” bikes were slowly losing their shine and ardour, so we were praying for them to make it another 1000+k.

Having arrived in Limoges, we faced another event that added a great touch of synchronicity to our already outstanding journey. Before entering the city, we saw a big bus on the side picking up passengers – at the time they were called Megabus, now I believe they are Flixbus. Seeing that the bus was going to Barcelona, we looked at each other and I asked the driver in French if there were free places and what was the price of the ticket. He said that there were places and it was only 1 euro to Barcelona – it was a promotion. I have no memory of how quickly we decided to board or how we got the tickets, but eventually we woke up in Barcelona hours later skipping Pyrenees with our wonderful half-broken Roermond companions.

I will keep my favorite part, Spain, for a separate post, it deserves it so much. ❤️

In the next post there will be España and its wonderful people, nights on the beach and churros, mystical lands and broken hopes. 🚴‍♀️🚴‍♀️

Have a good day,

Lots of love,

Lucy