European Tour – One more sleep until Turkey! (Written by Gala & Chris)
Written by Gala
I always assumed, but never knew for sure, that there was a wall in bike touring. it creeps up slowly, and usually comes after about 7 weeks of strong cycling through unchartered terrain on tight schedules. Phillip, our driver, would have been the first to notice the trend with first a Keely, then a Nigel, then an Eileen, Erin, and a Shani in the car.
I’d vouched after about a week of riding that I would ride the entire route to istanbul. No matter what. Just to prove it to myself, you know? ‘you can do it, Gala! wooo!’
But once that wall hits you in the middle of the night, and you wake up in the overly-hot gymnasium of the french immersion school in Plovdiv, and your stomach is wrenching around, and you make a mad dash to the w.c., you know that today is going to be your day to take a day off and ride in the car.
Is it ok? Should I take a day off? really?’ I look for reassurance among the team. Jake responds, ‘didn’t you just throw up ten minutes ago while you were talking with phil on the stairs? I think everyone will be okay with you riding in the car, gala.’
Considering the fact that the world caved in on me as I dizzily searched for juice in the popmusic playing mega marina supermarket, and I had to make a mad dash to the exit and throw up on the sidewalk, I don’t feel that guilty for taking the day off at all.
(Writers note: since when did I become so comfortable talking about my stomach activity with the internet? i guess its all part of the touring thing…)
K-os, Bob Marley, & Regina Spektor led the way as Phil and I rolled in four wheels over the foothills of Bulgaria, feeling only slightly sorry for the team. We have a day off in Kardjali today, and I haven’t left the little house we are staying in for even a minute. Lounging around in my short shorts with Keely and Sabrina, reading, Internetting, dozing off like kittens, as the others hang out in town visiting local media and wandering new streets.
Apparently we only have 5 days left. WHAT?! And then 3 days to debrief. It has me thinking about my next four months, and how I’ll adjust to not having these 20 amazing kids around me every second of the day.
Sayonara for now
Written by Chris
Our stay in Kostenets a couple nights ago was probably one of the most memorable days for me. On a personal level I was quite sick for most of it so there is that memory, but there is also so much more. The ride itself finished with 15km downhill right into the town we were staying which is absolutely the best way to end any riding day. You cannot help but to be in good spirits after that. Then we were greeted by some extremely amazing hosts who not only graciously let us stay in their kindergarten, but also brought us a local food dish to sample and a bunch of raspberries for dinner. I should also mention that our dinner was likely one of the best we have made for ourselves on the trip: grilled Panini! There was then a great 2 hour internal discussion about development that followed and I think everyone slept very well after such a great day.
The next day into Plovdiv I joined together with three others to form a medium to slow pod. I still wasn’t feeling 100% and everyone else just wasn’t really ready to ride fast, we all just wanted to take it easy and it was an 80km day so it seemed to make sense. Now back home whenever I say I’m going to ‘take it easy’ almost the exact opposite happens, and apparently even when in Europe the same thing occurs. Instead of ‘taking it easy’ our pod rode the entire 80km in about 2 hours and 45 minutes without taking our feet off the pedals once. We didn’t have to stop for a traffic light, there were no nature or snack breaks, we just rode directly from Kostenets to Plovdiv. It wasn’t even close to intentional, but the day just started off with a big downhill and we never stopped rolling after that. Really I think the lesson here is that I need to come up with a better expression for not wanting to do something as hard and fast as possible.
Yesterday in Kirklareli was our day off and I think I am in a similar boat to many people on the trip in that I didn’t want to do much of anything. Most nights we arrive in a town between 4pm-9pm and have either that night or an hour or two the next morning to see it’s sights and then move on and it gets exhausting. Every now and again you just need sometime to do nothing and yesterday was one of those days, for the most part. We did have a very productive meeting about what we want to get out of the last week of the trip and have a lovely traditional Bulgarian dinner with our host (complete with dancing) but even that ended quite early for most. I know I’m really looking forward to being in Istanbul for a couple days and not actually moving before I set off on the rest of my travels post trip.
As sad as it is for the trip to be winding down it is also very exciting to be reaching the end of this great adventure. Tonight is our last night in Bulgaria and then it’s onto Turkey. What should be especially interesting is that we will be hitting it right as Ramadan starts. A pretty cool time to be visiting.
