Klein Köris


Had a wonderful day cycling mostly through landscapes devoid of car, cyclists or indeed any other people. As a result of a slight misjudgement in the morning, I ended up on a more Northerly route that I had intended. This meant crossing former mining areas, full of man-made land formations, artificial lakes and riding along old mining roads for most of the day.

Despite the lovely peace and quiet, I could not helping sensing the desperation that the rapid closing down of mines had brought to this area and its inhabitants. Indeed, chatting to a fellow customer in a cafe in Großräschen, a sleepy little town in the heart of the mining district, my hunch was confirmed. According to this very outspoken lady, the abrupt closure of the mines had left almost everybody unemployed, bitter and hopeless, as prospects of finding any kind of a job are so poor. There must be tens of thousands in the same situation, with very few hopes of ever getting employed again. Even the pensioners are having a really hard time as the prices are now the same as everywhere while pensions are calculated on the income during the DDR years. Not a pretty picture, I had to agree.

In the afternoon, I rode through an area that must come close to being the loveliest I've seen on this trip. Being called Spreewald, it consists of a maze of channels and lakes, surrounded by lush forests and meadows. As it had also been proclaimed a protected area, there was no motorised traffic, and the scenery was certainly very attractive, even for a finn who has seen a lake or two...;-)

As I was having such a lovely time, I decided to carry on a bit further than I had planned to. However, this meant having to race against the sun that was rapidly sinking. This in itself would not have been anything new, but when during the final 10km stretch I hit a forest track with deep, loose and fine sand, I had to admit that this was indeed a problem. Furthermore, the track that had begun as a clearly marked gravel road quickly forked into several pathes that I was not at all sure of which I should follow. In the end, I actually had to push the bike through the ankle deep sand, only to find that the campsite was at the end of another such road.


The sandy track that forced me to push the bike.

Asking an upcoming young woman about another campsite she quicky invited me to pitch my tent in her backyard. I accepted gladly, and after a warm shower and a generous meal offered by my hosts went to sleep feeling very content with the day's achievements.

Alexandra and her family.

Comments

  1. Anonymous28/06/2010, 09:55

    Hei! Olet kulkenut taasen pitkän taipaleen ylä- ja alamäkiä. Niitähän se elämä on. Ellei olisi ylämäkiä, et osaisi nauttia alamäistä. Praha kiinnostaa. Saksaan olet palannut ja takapihalla saat nukkua ;) Jussi täällä aaton jälkeen aurinkoistui. Zemppia paluuseen! Jokainen päivä on uusi seikkailu.

    ReplyDelete

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Paris, finally!

Image
Paris. Here I am, after all those weeks on the road, at the End of this Road. And I Love It: The city is lovely, the weather is beautiful, the people are friendly and the dancing is good. Most importantly, though, I feel really good about the achievement that took most effort in the very beginning and the last few days. As a matter of fact, I did get here already Friday evening, but time has just passed in such a blur that I simply have not had the time to sit down and write about it. Even as I write this (at 4 am on Sunday morning, having just returned from a milonga), I am about to fall asleep while seated, so I will need to be brief. On Friday morning, I had an early start from Peronne, and despite the minor (?) logistical problem of a 40-km stretch missing from my maps (funny, considering that they were the neighbouring pages of a series of maps) managed to cover most of the remaining distance without getting lost. This changed, however, the moment I got into the...
Read more

Getting into the swing of it (Pärnu)

Well, after two days of cycling I have both good and bad news. The good news is that very little seems to have changed for me in terms of travelling this way. Yesterday, although getting out of Tallinn was as stressful as leaving a strange city on a fully-loaded touring bike always is, I quickly noticed that indeed, I had not forgotten how to do this. Nor did the little over 100 km I covered both yesterday and today seem impossible to do, although the last 20 km certainly took some willpower. One thing that has greatly eased my settling into the right mindset is the fact that my Dad is accompanying me for a few days in his camper van. This means that not only do I have a soft mattress to sleep on and someone to pay my meals (;-), most importantly, there is someone to encourage me on (in his case, this means trying to get me to put the bike on the van and driving with him instead of cycling, something that I obviously wont do :-). All this works in my favour, as does being able to get...
Read more

The charm of the Danube (Vác)

And so, after 10 days of cycling, I am now almost within shouting distance of Budapest. What remains is 35 km of winding bike track, hugging the side of the now slowly, almost dreamily flowing river. The sky has a few scattered clouds that at this hour (11am) still offer some shelter from the heat that is set to climbing up to 40 degrees as the day progresses. Knowing there would be little escape from the sun, I set off from the campsite at 7, stopping in the centre of Esztergom only long enough to get some groceries for breakfast. A minor problem arose at the campsite reception, when the same guy who had refused to charge me when I arrived last night, saying I would have to wait until the morning, now said the reception would only open at 9. Now this was Far too late for me, as it would mean I would have to cycle the whole 80 kms in the already merciless heat. So, what to do? I simply put on my tour leader mode, the one that was once needed to keep my safari staff operational, ...
Read more