Cycling trip days 12 to 14
Have had trouble with laptop time to write these reports. Anyhow! Day 12 took me from Luxembourg to Bastogne in Belgium. I didn't intend to go the whole way, there were some camping sites on the Belgian side which seemed like good candidates, but unfortunately I messed up and didn't get there in time. The ride was through beautiful forests and fields, but also with a lot and lot of climbs. Legs didn't seem to have power at all. In the end I got to Bastogne at around 9pm, quickly finding a pizza and then onto the camping site.
Regarding the camping site "De Renval" there was no worry about arrival, it had a 24 hour self-check in, the first one I've seen. It also had the lowest Campy rating I've been at so far, a 2.7/5. So, expectations were not very high. Check-in went pretty well and generally seemed pretty ok in terms of sanitary facilities. Found the tent field with it already being a bit dark. One other tent, lots of space. Lots of birds making a lot of noise. Some geese maybe as well? The tent field was next to a pond. Oh.. Confirmed by looking at the bottom of my shoes, this field was full of shit - quite literally.
A problem for the morning.. Fell asleep with earplus stuffed halfway into my brain and slept really well.
Distance cycled: 97.77km (today), 812.46km (total)
Morning, day 13, stepped outside to confirm indeed, everywhere was geese shit. Just to prove the point, a family of geese were wondering towards my tent, honking away. "Fine, fine, I'll leave", I told them and started ninja-packing, a game of tip-toeing around the field and managing to pack everything without anything touching the ground. What the tent footprint looks like I didn't want to think about. Tried to wipe it a bit on clean bits of grass further away and fold it smartly, so the next night it would be the same side to the ground.
I wanted to join the EV 19, so while having lunch I was trying to figure out what next. Liège was the clear target, but it was 108km away. I felt physically very tired after yesterday. Sanna was also being increasingly noisy with a click sound happening when spinning the crank, also when spinning backwards while the bike was stationary. Bottom bracket? Difficult to say, seems worse when riding on a small gear.
Anyway, towards Liège was the only real option at this point. From two options, one going more through more forests and the other going more villages and on roads, I chose the latter option. Komoot claimed it would be a few climbs and then mostly downhill, but course over 100km the altitude graph isn't the most clear. It ended up being lots of climbs over hills and then lots of downhill sections, gradually going down some 300 or so meters during the ride.
The ride was super exhausting, every single climb feeling a pain, with legs really not wanting to do this ride today. However I did get the long windy downhill road sections today. Lots of them, some lasting several kilometers of simply letting go and hoping Sanna doesn't give up from underneath. Furiously gropping the handlebars and trying to avoid all the bumps and holes in the roads. At 50km/h one doesn't really want to hit large holes. Actually, I don't think I've ever gone this fast on a bike. Especially with two panniers and two fork packs, making bike handling in the wind somewhat special. At least I got my downhill sections, the ones I was hoping to do in Switzerland but missed them due to the rainy weather.
I would have stopped for the night before Liége, but there didn't seem to be great camping or hotel choices. Plus I told myself if I get to Liége, I can take an easier day tomorrow. With what seemed like endless amounts of pedal pushing I finally arrived around 10pm. Saw some bats on the way which cheered me up. Checked in at an Ibis hotel, convinced the receptionist to let me put my bike in the private parking garage, ate possibly the worst falafel of my life around the corner from the hotel and crashed into bed.
Distance cycled: 107.30km (today), 919.76km (total)
Day 14, a good nights sleep in a proper bed, I tried to remember last nights promise. Take it easy. Well I had to do laundry anyway, so off to circle the city center and find a laundromat. A few attempts and some hill climbing later ("hey, you promised us easy!" -legs), found a laundromat and got washing done. Have to say Liége while being a beautiful and really interesting city, wasn't the easiest to navigate around. Or maybe it was OSMAnd, trying to take me across all kind of weird road setups and even steps.
At 6pm I started heading off towards Maastricht and a camping site just before it. More broken promises to the legs, it was pretty hard head wind all the way and I was in a rush the make it to the camp site before reception closed. Regarding camping in general, I feel like the biggest issue for me is camping site reception times. Quite often you need to be there before 8pm or even before 6pm sometimes. For someone like me who wakes up late, has a lazy lunch and generally takes his time throughout the day, it's a bit of a challenge to also fit in a long ride and a camping site - feels like it's a "choose two" situation here. I do wonder what happens if you just go in and set up your tent anyway, and pay in the morning. Only one of the sites I've been to has had a proper gate, the others seem to only have a barrier, which of course as a cyclist is hardly a problem. Would they be ok or be mad? The few I called and asked if I could do this said it wasn't possible to arrive after reception hours for "security reasons".
The Netherlands! A restaurant with the waiter speaking good English! A menu with a vegan burger option! The vegan burger actually being really good! I'm sorry France and Belgium, but you made it really difficult for me in terms of food. Not being to understand any menu, not being able to ask about any menu and generally very poor vegan or even vegetarian options, at least in the regions I went through. Eaten way too much dairy, hoping for that to change while heading towards the northern parts of the Netherlands.
Poor Sanna is clicking away, but at least it hasn't gotten worse I think. Can't see anything externally broken. Could be just dirt somewhere, but possibly the massive amount of rain in the early parts of the journey did their damage. Might pop into some bicycle shops for consultation on the way but don't really want to stop for extensive repair time, if it can be avoided.
Distance cycled: 44.34km (today), 964.1km (total)
