Bicycle Luke in Istanbul Turkey

Bicycle Luke in Istanbul

Bicycle Luke, one of the more vibrant characters of this travelogue over the past few months, has finally arrived in Istanbul. He began traveling by bicycle from Scandinavia at the beginning of summer and rode all through the north of Eastern Europe, down to the Croatian coast, up to Bratislava, and met me in Hungary before going off to Romania and Bulgaria on his long Road to Turkey.
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Wade from Vagabond Journey.com
in Upstate, New York, USA- September 21, 2008
Travelogue -- Travel Photos
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I had lost track of Bicycle Luke after a few raging nights in Budapest last summer until I received the following email. He had clearly arrived at the end of his golden rainbow:

"Well my European leg of the journey has also come to an end as I fınd myself ın Istanbul. Flyıng out ın 2 days after nearly 2 weeks explorıng thıs ıncredıble place. Defınatly the most excıtıng place ı have every stumbled upon. The fact that ıt ıs currently ramadan may have somethıng to do wıth that as well, as the festıvıtıes just go off!

I am off to the UK for 4 weeks before headıng to Thaıland where ı wıll meet my cousın and rıde for 3 or so months through the neıghbourıng countrıes."


Bicycle Luke has crossed the finish line in Turkey!

So Bicycle Luke will keep riding on chasing horizons. This guy is a traveler - he sleeps with the crickets, only stays in hostels when in big cities, eats food from grocery stores, worked hard to save up his travel funds before setting out, knows now to save money, and has made his way across a continent under his own steam.



Bicycle Luke's crazy ride through Eastern Europe (I assume it looks something like this).

Luke and I both set out on the long road for Turkey, he arrived, and I ended up somewhere else. Whereas I just bumble my way about planet earth, Bicycle Luke travels it.

Links to previous travelogue entries:

• Worst Public Transport in the World
• Baby Bananas and the Beady Eyed Fruit Man
• Not to Columbia Journalism Department

Bicycle Luke in Istanbul
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Vacation to Lake Balaton

Vacation to Lake Balaton, Hungary

I suppose I have not yet made it to Romania.

Rather, I was got held up in a delightful net in Budapest and, deeming that it would be silly to peddle all the way to Romania just to turn around and peddle all the way back, I decided that I would take a vacation to Lake Balaton.

I am no longer surprised at my own sporadically itinerant Path. I do not even know where I am going.

I was offered a little paid employment in Budapest and, like any work scrounging vagabond, I took it. I got pretty well paid, too. But, as money is ultimately made to spend, I promptly blew my earnings on comfortable living and set up my tent (good fortune - or two spoiled Brits - had provided me with a real tent) in the expensive campgrounds of Lake Balaton. Life is good.

I have just been relaxing, swimming, exercising, riding my bicycle leisurely, and enjoying these days before I enter the concrete inferno of New York City.
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Wade from Vagabond Journey.com
in Keszthely, Hungary- August 22, 2008
Travelogue -- Travel Photos
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But I think some exterior events also occurred in my delay in Budapest that may have altered my Path in a larger capacity. . . . but dear friends and readers, I will have to write more of this later, as I am now on vacation.

Affordable internet scarce here, and I think that I am the better for it.

Taking a break, resting, relaxing, reading, reveling, meditating, pondering, reflecting, writing funny little poems to please myself, contemplating, swimming, not talking. Enjoying my week long vacation.

Walking Slow.


View Larger Map
Map of Lake Balaton

Links to previous travelogue entries:

• Bicycling to Romania
• Opening Ceremony Beijing Olympics
• International Study Travel

Vacation to Lake Balaton, Hungary
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Bicycling to Romania

Bicycling to Romania

These days of reception work at a hostel in Budapest are coming to an end. I only have twelve days until I should be in the concrete canary cage of New York City. I am going to have to breathe in a lot of fresh air now to last through these next few months of city living.

As I look at a map of Europe, I find that there is no fresher air than in Romania, and the bicycle is the best vehicle for the taking in of such air. So I am getting the bags packed, the emails written, and the blog posts up; I am getting ready to bicycle to Romania.
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Wade from Vagabond Journey.com
in Budapest, Hungary- August 15, 2008
Travelogue -- Travel Photos
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I bought a really good road atlas yesterday. The thing costs me $20. But I know that there is a huge deficit in the quality of a good road atlas compared to that of a bad one. I could have saved $7 and purchased a poor atlas, but then I would still have been paying $13 for a piece of crap. I do not like buying things, and, when I do, I try to buy the best quality things I can. For I know that needing to purchase a cheap thing multiple times to compensate for its poor quality is more expensive than spending a little money and buying a good thing once and using it for a long time. If I am going to go through the ardor of buying, I am going to buy something good.



Map of Romania

So I have a really good road atlas to Europe which includes Turkey, Syria, Armenia, Georgia, and parts of Iraq. This atlas even has the smaller routes numbered and labeled. It is amazing to me how many maps include roads without any semblance of a label. This is pointless. For how will I know when I am at an intersection if the route is not properly demarcated on my map?

I can't. I would have to guess.

Guess working directions in a car is one thing, on a bicycle it is quite another. When on a bike I do not want to have to guess if the road on my map is the one that I am riding on, as one wrong turn can take an entire day to correct. (But, then again, if I have no destination, I have no worries; if I have no worries, I do not need a map. But if I do happen to have a destination, then I want a good freaking map.) So I dropped a little money and bought an atlas that I can use for traveling in Europe for years to come.

I opened up this good road atlas yesterday and looked out at Romania: it was all grey mountains, skinny, wavy little lines masquerading as roads, and hardly any dots. The less dots you can find on a map, the fresher and more vibrant the air. I am in a hunt for good air, so I am going to ride out into the rocky, dotless land of Romania and track it down one lung full at a time.

Hopefully, I will become so full of air-substance that I can just float through these next few months of Big City traveling.

I have always dreamed of Romania. I have always dreamed of Gypsies, horse drawn wooden wagons, black felt hats, old dirt encrusted farmers, and rolling hills of perfect, glorious nothing.

Links to previous travelogue entries:

• Opening Ceremony Beijing Olympics
• International Study Travel
• Photo Copy Travel Guides

Bicycling to Romania
* Travel Blog Directory * Vagabond Journey.com * Travel Photos * Travel Questions and Answers

Bicycling to Budapest

Bicycling to Budapest

I took leave of my Japanese friend Yumi on the eastern fringes of Gyor with a big goodbye and a hopeful "we'll meet again someday," and rode fast out of the city. It was mid-afternoon and I was making my way towards Budapest.

"First peddles, bicycle journey, feel so good," I spoke to myself as I speedily passed under a mess of highways on the outer shell of Gyor. I was then faced with a decision:

I could follow the dips and turns of the buff River Danube and ride out an ancient Path to Hungary's capital city, albeit it was on a motor road with the promise of a decent amount of traffic, or I could play it safe a smooth and straight bike path almost all the way to my glorious destination through a somewhat monotonic countryside. This was a Halliburton-esque battle of Romance versus Discretion.

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Wade from Vagabond Journey.com
in Budapest, Hungary- July 21, 2008
Travelogue -- Travel Photos
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Romance - the River Danube by my side and a highway full of cars, trucks, and other fast paced motor vehicles.

Discretion- a quaint and safe bicycle trail through central Hungary.

"Romance, Discretion, Romance, Discretion," I kept repeating to myself as I neared the intersection that was the crux of my decision. One way lead to the Danube, the other straight to Budapest.

"Discretion is nothing other than an unwooable old maid," I spoke the words of Halliburton.

Of course I chose Romance.

I chose wrong.

Photo from Gyor, Hungary

Route 1 shot up to the Danube out of Gyor, but I would not have known it from the road-side view. There was think foliage, forests, and farmer's fields obstructing any notion that I was in fact riding near any river at all, much less the mighty Danube. The highway was also packed full of cars, trucks, big trucks, and side-of-road-whores scantly clad in skimpy underwear, bras, girdles, ugly faces, and nothing else. I looked at their bare bottoms hanging out of their thongs as I rode by and thought that the clothing was particularly well suited for such a warm summer afternoon whose clouds promised rain.

I figured that it would not take too long for a simple pair of butt-crack thongs and a scanty bra to dry after a rainstorm, but I wholly doubted if any amount of cloud water could wash the stonework grimaces off the faces of the whores working the countryside of Highwayland, Hungary. I imagine that I myself would probably be grimacing pretty hard as well if I were placed on the side of the road in nothing but my underwear (as I patiently waited to be taken into the vehicle of a stranger for the sole purpose of having odd body parts lovelessly shoved in unwelcoming places). I am immensely curious in the stories of side-of-road-whores - how did they end up on the highway all alone and in their underwear? - though they make me scare myself.

I rode my bicycle by them all the faster.

Soon I rode into the storm when I arrived in Komarom. So I made camp at around 7PM, fought viciously to keep my tarp from blowing away in the harsh wind, and read of Richard Burton into the night.

The sky belched cold rains intermittently through the night, but I stayed dry under my tarp, which I tied one side of to a fence and wrapped the other side on the ground beneath my body. Like this, in my cocoon of solitude, I thought thoughts of love and felt a touch of that peculiarly comfortable lonliness that comes to the traveler who finds a bittersweet sort of joy in nightime rain showers.

Soon enough morning came, and I rested for a while beneath my tarp for a day-break sprinkle to pass. When it did, I jumped up and packed my gear upon my bicycle and rode off into a rainy day with a poncho wrapped over my body.

I tried to cut away from the Danube highway that had no view of the Danube in an attempt to find the bicycle trail that is suppose to lead from Gyor to Budapest.

Could not find it.

Continued riding the busy highway with no shoulder into Budapest. Trucks thundered by me at a close enough distance to toss myself and bicycle rocking unsteadily. This proximity was too near for comfort but there was nothing else to do but ride as fast as I could into Hungary's capital city. I rode uphill, downhill, passed field, orchard, industrial wasteland, housing complexes with dirty grey exteriors, old ladies in nightgowns looking out windows, men with derby hats looking at crops, all under a sky that rained itself out and left only a shining sun to show for the storms of the night before.

Links to previous travelogue entries:
Notes from the Czech Republic
To Budapest
Travel in Hungary
Bicycling to Budapest
* Travel Blog Directory * Vagabond Journey.com * Travel Photos * Travel Questions and Answers

To Budapest

To Budapest

It was a good week in Gyor, but now it is time to be rolling out down on the road to Budapest.

Nice times in Gyor in thermal pools, picnics in the forests, and meeting up with my old Japanese friend Yumi in another time on another continent. I know that we shall meet up on another flip-side of planet earth again someday.
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Wade from Vagabond Journey.com
in Gyor, Hungary- July 16, 2008
Travelogue -- Travel Photos
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Just before walking out the door in Gyor I received an email form my friend Bicycle Luke inviting me to Budapest a few days before I begin the Hobohideout.com website trade with the Loft Hostel. He said that he is at the Art Hostel and to come on over. I cannot turn down the welcoming hand of a friend, and plan on rolling in to Budapest on the 19th.

So I shall be rambling with Luke the Fruit Pirate again soon enough. A smile spans my face.

Going to Budapest. It would be such a pity to deprive the nice bicycle trail that runs along the Danube the presense of my rolling wheels.

Links to previous travelogue entries:

• Travel in Hungary
• Thermal Baths in Hungary
• Hammock Tent as Travel Shelter

To Budapest
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Hammock Tent as Travel Shelter

Hammock Tent as Travel Shelter

Below is a photo of the hammock tent that is similar to the one that Bicycle Luke travels with. Since traveling with him I have been thinking quite often about picking up one of these shelters the next time I pass by a military surplus shop.
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Wade from Vagabond Journey.com
in Gyor, Hungary- July 16, 2008
Travelogue -- Travel Photos
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I think that these hammock tents could be a good alternative to sleeping on the ground style camping. The shear advantage to these shelers is that they hold you up off of the ground, so that you do not have to worry as much about being flooded out in a rain storm, insects, or small hungry mammals.

Photo taken from http://www.proadventure.co.uk/acatalog/Shelter_-_Bushcraft_Shelters_.html

I believe that when camping it is best to be propped up off of the ground. I look at the houses of jungle people all over the world and I have noticed that, almost invariable, they are all on stilts and up off of the ground. This is for obvious reasons, and I think that many of these reasons hold true when camping anywhere in the world.

In A Vagabond Journey Around the World Harry Franck once blamed sleeping on the ground in the jungles of Siam as a cause for fever. This simple statement stuck with me and I thought about it from time to time over the years. Then, in the spring of 2008, I camped out on the ground in a field in Tikal, Guatemala and was feasted on by nightime grass insects. The following morning, as I inspected the hundreds if not thousands of bites that covered my body, Franck's words rang a little more true:

It is not good to sleep on the ground.

Therefore, I think this hammock shelter could be a good piece of travel gear for travelers who often find themselves camping out on the sly.

The only disadvatage to the hammock tent is when you find yourself in a place where there are no available places to tie it up. But, as bicycle Luke readily replied, you can just tuck yourself in it and zip it up as a bivy sack.

I think that these hammock tent shelters could be good for traveling. Now I just need to locate one.

Links to previous entries:

• Hobohideout.com Mission Statement
• Modern Architecture in Hungary
• Words of the Dead

Hammock Tent as Travel Shelter
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In Gyor Hungary with Japanese Friend

In Gyor Hungary with Japanese Friend

I rode the Danube River bicycle trail down into Gyor a couple of days ago with an Australian bike traveler. We soon parted ways upon entering the city as I had previously arranged to stay with my Japanese friend Yumi and her new husband A'kos.

Bicycle Luke, the Australian, had given me some Hungarian coppers before he took off to find a place to camp in the bush, and I scoured the town of Gyor for a payphone to make a call to Yumi from. In these modern days of cell-phones and credit cards, finding a payphone on and stretch of this planet that still takes coins is a miracle. I looked and looked around Gyor for one of these antique beasts of communication. I eventually found one and made my call. It went through and Yumi answered with a little Japanese "hello."
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Wade from Vagabond Journey.com
in Gyor, Hungary- July 13, 2008
Travelogue -- Travel Photos
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"Hey Yumi, its Wade. I am in front of some grocery store with a red sign downtown."

She said that she would come and get me, so I pulled up a seat on a park bench and smoked a pipe of tobacco, as I watched the city's bums laugh and joke with each other drunkenly in the streets. All of a sudden I heard my name called out excitedly from a little mouse voice in the distance.

It was Yumi.

Now, I do not think that Yumi has been properly introduced on VagabondJourney.com before, so I will take this opportunity to give her the welcome that she is due.

Yumi is a traveler who came from some nowhere city in the middle of Japan. She set off on her journeys at a young age and found herself learning to speak English in England and then in Canada. She has traveled through China, Tibet, Mongolia, Southeast Asia, worked on a fishing boat off the coast of Alaska, got silly and married an American navy boy from Texas, divorced the navy boy, kept traveling, met me in a market in Mendoza, Argentina in 2002, traveled with me to Buenos Aires and Uruguay, visited Venezuela, and somehow ended up married to a Hungarian and living near the Danube River in Gyor.

In the intervening years since we met in Argentina, I had visited her three times on my travels about Japan, and now I have holed up at her husband's place in Hungary. They gave me a couch to sleep on with a blanket and a pillow, and I am very happy.

I found her husband, A'kos, a kind, provident man with a good sense of humor and some traveler tales himself, so we all drink beer in the evenings and mint tea during the day, as we talk about traveling, the people and the places of the world. We walk about the city at dusk and along the river trails watching teenagers get drunk and the sun set. Sometimes we meet up with their friends for beers in outdoor cafes or complimentary tea from the hippies at the Oriental goodies shop. Life is relaxed here. Hungary is good.

I will probably remain here for two more days and then begin my descent into Budapest. I have a Hobohideout traveling webmaster arrangement set up at the Loft Hostel, and I am hoping that it goes through. I cannot afford a bed in that city in summer, I know this, and I would like to stroll around old Budapest for a week or so before carrying on along the Danube south.

Budapest is also one of the last stops for a while on this journey East where I assume that I can easily find work. I am hoping to find a quick job where I can make up enough funds to carry me on through a quick run to Istanbul.

Ain't nothing else for me to do but to keep on keeping on.

Bicyle journey to Gyor, Hungary:


View Larger Map

Links to previous travelogue entries:

• Friends on the Road, Bratislava to Gyor
• Nazis, Communism, and Wine in Moravia
• Hodonin to Bratislava- Bicycle Journey Day 12
  

In Gyor Hungary with Japanese Friend
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Hodonin to Bratislava- Bicycle Journey Day 12

From Hodonin, Czech Republic to Bratislava, Slovakia- Bicycle Journey Day 12

Woke up to a beautiful day after a restful night at the Geology Museum in Hodonin. The sky was clear and blue and seemed lonely for lack of clouds. It was the perfect day for bicycle travel.
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Wade from Vagabond Journey.com
in Bratislava, Slovakia- July 9, 2008
Travelogue -- Travel Photos
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So I peddled a hundred kilometers across Slovakia and arrived in Bratislava in the afternoon. This is a map of the route that I traveled:


View Larger Map

This is just a travelogue entry to keep readers current, I will probably describe this leg of the journey in more detail at my next stop.

Going on to Gyor in Hungary today. Riding along the Danube river. Leaving Bratislava now.

The first leg of my bicycle journey to Turkey is complete, and I figure that I am 1/10 of the way there.

Links to previous travelogue entries:
Czech Culture and Character
Learing to Love Traveling Again
Leaving for Bratislava- Bicycle Journey Day 11

From Hodonin, Czech Republic to Bratislava, Slovakia- Bicycle Journey Day 12
* Travel Blog Directory * Vagabond Journey.com * Travel Photos * Traveler Photographs.com

Learing to Love Traveling Again

Learning to Love Traveling, Again- Bike Journey Day 11

"I have lost a great deal of happiness, I know, by these wanderings. It is as if I had been born to exile; but it is God's doing. . . . I am away from the perpetual hurry of civilization, and I think I see far and clear into what is to come; and then I seem to understand why I was led away, here and there, and crossed and baffled over and over again, to wear out my years and strength."
-David Livingstone to Henry Morton Stanley, 1871

"People are happiest when they can really learn to be who they are. A beggar has to learn to be an all-out beggar. Unless he can be that, he will never taste the happiness of being a beggar. A person has no other way to live than to be out-and-out the person he is."
-Taneda Santoka, April 6, 1932

Today as I was packing up to leave the museum hostel in Hodonin, my friend Pavlov encouraged me on my journey by chanting romantic notions of the wandering life:

"You are a traveling man; you will travel away from here and on to new lands, meet new peoples, and experience many new things."

"I am sick of traveling," I muttered. "Sometimes I just want to have a wife, make some kids, and live like my parents." I then laughed, but the heaviness of my heart at leaving these friends hinted at seriousness.

Pavlov just looked at me and laughed. She knew that I was speaking ridiculous bramble, and she was right: I have ventured too far to turn back now. I suppose it is ordinary practice for anyone to question their bearings from time to time, but I know that I must learn how to love the life that I lead full heartedly and not to allow myself to easily be pulled too and fro by the whimsically romantic notions of other ways of life. I know that I would not want to live any other way than how I do - I know this deep in my bones - though, I must admit, it does feel good to daydream thoughts of waking up next to a familiar face amongst hills that I know by name in a house that I made by hand.
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Wade from Vagabond Journey.com
in Bratislava, Slovakia- July 9, 2008
Travelogue -- Travel Photos
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I must say that it is highly tempting to allow myself to slip into these dreams about building log cabins in woods and having a strong woman to make chop up and cook the animals that I hunt and the fish that I catch. But I know that this is only a fancifully entertaining dream. Pavlov's sister, Shishuka, also giggled at me when I told her that I want to just get married and have kids.

"You are a traveler," she said, "you are living your dreams. I want to read your blog posts about Syria."

She was right. I want to read my blog posts about Syria too. I love the wandering life, but it is alright to dream - this is what traveling is all about.

I became caught up in Hodonin on the Slovak border of the Czech Republic. I made some friends here and was able to spend a lot of good times with their family. I went out to tea with them and their mother, picked cherries in their garden, was invited into their home for and excellent lunch, I had coffee and conversation with their father, and was pretty much treated as a member of their family during my stay. They even stopped taking my rent money after the third day, and made me feel like a welcomed guest. So I tried to make myself useful and painted some old oil drilling pipes in the technology park of their museum and revised their English language brochure.

And I was very happy there.

But then leaving day came, and the Road leading away from Hodonin seemed longer than ever. I spent an entire morning and most of the afternoon assembling, washing, and arranging my gear. I replace the chain on my bike, bought farewell gifts for my friends, and noticed that my gear basket was in absolute shambles. I did this all with a grudging sort of locomotion. This good family here in Hodonin simply reminded me of my own family in the USA, and their kindness filled me with waves of nostalgia for the times when I lived under the roof of my own home. I did not want to leave, and the thick dark clouds on the horizon were not tempting to ride out into.

But soon enough, my bike was loaded, and I said my final farewells to Pavlov at the entrance to their geology museum. She took my photograph, and then I slowly rode away into an impending rain storm.

I rode out of Hodonin with the heaviest of hearts, but the whispers of the Open Road soon became roaring shouts. I was moving again, and it felt good. I rode over the bridge to Slovakia and landed in the midst of a rain shower. I then questioned my intentions of starting out my day of biking at 4PM on a dark, busy highway in a storm. I looked at my gear, and found that it was well outfitted for the rain; I looked at myself, and found that I was not outfitted for a wet day of riding so close to camp-making time. A few extra miles was not worth a cold soggy night to me.

I retreated back to the geology museum.

But my heavy heart had dissipated, as I entered into a beautiful empty room that had a little couch next to a window for me to sit on and ponder some thoughts. I drank tea and read books and I knew that I really do love the life that I live. I must learn to fly with it fully. I am a traveler, and I must learn to be an all-out traveler, as Santoka put it.

"A person has no other way to live than to be out-and-out the person he is."

I believe that learning who this person is takes many years of trials, blunders, and revelations. To find out the person that I am, I feel that I must travel. I also feel that I must accept traveling as being a major part of who I am. At this point, I believe that the two cannot be separated.

"People are happiest when they can really learn to be who they are."

With each step, each peddle, each town, city, country, and continent, I think that I am slowly learning this deeply hidden knowledge.

I love traveling, and I must accept the fact that traveling man cannot have everything but the world.

"I have lost a great deal of happiness, I know, by these wanderings," but I also know that I have gain much, much more.

For the love of the Open Road.

Links to previous travelogue entries:
Leaving for Bratislava- Bicycle Journey Day 11
Rest for a Weary Traveler- Bike Journey Day 4
Asus Eee PC Popular with Travelers

Learning to Love Traveling, Again- Bike Journey Day 11
* Travel Blog Directory * Vagabond Journey.com * Travel Photos * Traveler Photographs.com

Leaving for Bratislava- Bicycle Journey Day 11

Leaving for Bratislava- Bicycle Journey Day 11

I am getting ready to roll out of Hodonin and on towards Bratislava, the capital of Slovakia. I have been told that it is between 70 and 120 km from where I am on the border, so I am hoping to make it in one long, hard day.
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Wade from Vagabond Journey.com
in Hodonin, Moravia, Czech Republic- July 7, 2008
Travelogue -- Travel Photos
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I replaced the chain on my bike, so I no longer worry about snapping it going over hills. I am now ready to fly. The bike sounds a lot nicer now and rides much smoother. My old $50 bone shaker bicycle is slowing turning into a brand new smooth rolling machine.

Near Bratislava the River Morava that I have been following since Olomouc feeds into the Danube. The Danube is a river of my dreams, and I look forward to riding her the way down to Bulgaria.

An anonymous commenter playfully taunted me, questioning if I have the focus necessary to keep going on this long Road to the Middle East. He even called me "Wrongway Wade." I think this person knows me well: I blow with the winds of intuition and care very little for travel plans or planning for travel.

Everything in nature and life moves in wavy, overlapping, and harmonus patterns. Should not my Path be equally organic? Nothing in nature is perfectly straight, and everything blows with the wind. I look out upon the world and see endless Roads to everywhere and anywhere criss-crossing beautifully over the plane of a gently curving spheroid, directed by nothing other than intuition, impulse, and gaity.

As does this anoymous commenter, or so it seems by the words they left:
"But as you know its all a big joke (life that is), follow your muse wherever it leads you. The road goes on forever and the party never ends (ride slow)."

Good words, whoever you are.

The taunt was purely playful, and I appreciate the good kick that it gave me. But a taunt is a taunt, and now that I have been formally taunted, I have little option other than to really ride my bicycle to Turkey.

The clever commenter also mention something about me being caught up in Hodonin, and that was also very true. I was caught up in Hondonin, but it was one of the greatest stops that I have ever made in all of my travels. The people here are amazing and I made some truly heartfelt friendships that will shine bright in my memory over mountain, river, and beat of sea.

I leave Hodonin with a very, very heavy heart, a mild case of pink eye, clean laundry, and a bag full of food courtesy of my friends here. I also leave this town with good stories and plenty of beautiful memories. I will write of them, surely, as soon as I land in Bratislava.

Going back out on the Road. The sky is dark and heavy, as is my heart at the prospect of leaving these good friends on the Slovak borderlands of the Czech Republic.

Links to previous travelogue entries:
Rest for a Weary Traveler- Bike Journey Day 4
Asus Eee PC Popular with Travelers
Tarp Tent Search Ends with a Smile

Leaving for Bratislava- Bicycle Journey Day 11
* Travel Blog Directory * Vagabond Journey.com * Travel Photos * Traveler Photographs.com

Rest for a Weary Traveler- Bike Journey Day 4

Rest for a Weary Traveler- Bike Journey Day 4

Woke up in a ditch on the side of a farm road outside of Straznice at four AM. I pick my head up out of the dirt, brush off some side-of-road-brambles from my green military surplus fatigues, stretched my arms up into the brisk morning sky, and looked on to another fine day of travel. I slept four hours the night before and was a little cold throughout, but I raise my face up into a little smile at my focus-less expectation of what could become of this day that was just breaking over the cornfields of Moravia.

A traveler, a bicycle, and a world. There was nothing more that I could have needed. I had a little bread, some orange juice, and a pouch of Captain Black's pipe tobacco. The world was looking real beautiful through my shaky four AM perception. I stumbled out onto the Road with my bicycle and began riding off into the day.
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Wade from Vagabond Journey.com
in Hodonin, Moravia, Czech Republic- Late June 2008
Travelogue -- Travel Photos
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I had to retrace my route from the night before, as I had to retreat from Straznice in a moonlit haste (read more here), and I again rode into the city that frustrated me so much a few hours previously. But I was armed with a good bicycle map that I picked up from a tourist info shop, and I pieced together my way out of the city. The bicycle routes of the Czech Republic are, on the whole, well marked, but on occasion there are a few perilous slip-ups or oversights that can send a weary traveler out into the wrong direction.

I have gone in many wrong directions during the first three days of this bicycle journey to nowhere. Going the wrong way is seems to be something that I am very fond of.

But this time, I checked both map and compass, found the big church, and took the proper left. Well, the proper left according to my map. In actuality my map was severely out of date, and I was sent on a single bike tire sized trail through bramble, cattails, and high weeds along the side of a canal. The morning dew soon covered me and I became soaked through with wetness. Five AM is not a good time for a travelers clothes to be soaked through, but I cared little, as I knew that the sun would still be coming up full blast in but an hour or two and I would be dry again. I paused for a moment and watched the morning mist rise off the canal and the fields that encircled me. I was all alone. The morning was beautiful.

I kept on along another canal side trail that soon petered out into weeds. I pushed my bicycle through with a gentle rain sprinkling down from the tops of the cattails. I had a feeling that this was no longer the usual 47 bike route, but I provenience my location on the map and had no worries. I also found an early morning fisherman walking over a bridge and I ran up to greet him. It was a lucky encounter, as there was not another squeak of a human for miles. I pulled out my now damp bike map, and was assured that I was in fact where I thought I was and well on my way to another temporary destination on my journey south.

The trail then lightened up and the sun began breaking through the morning mist and my clothes were now only comfortable wet. I found the bridge that I was suppose to find and met up with the 47 bike route on the other side of the canal. Yes, my map was outdated and I essentially re-blazed the old bike path on the canal side. I then followed the little yellow bike route signs through waking morning forest and along old railway grades right down to the Slovak border. I was now about to exit the Czech Republic, but the gross expenditure of energy from the night before and the lack of sleep quickly caught up with me. I rolled into a city called Hodonin, and got the idea that I would speed up my journey a little and hop on a train to Bratislava, where I could find a dorm bed and an internet connection.

I found the Hodonin train station with little difficulty and wheeled my bicycle right up inside to the ticket window. I asked for a ticket to Bratislava and got one to Breclav.

"No, Bratislava, I want to go to Bratislava," I spoke to the non-English speaking woman behind the ticket window.

"Yes, Breclav," she said. Oddly, the way she said Breclav was remarkably similar to how I said Bratislava. I could not get anywhere in this linguistic merry-go-round, so I was directed to another ticket window where there was a women who could speak English.

I told her that I wanted a ticket to Bratislava and to take my bicycle on board with me. She said ok and printed out a ticket.

"You have to take three trains to get there," she began, "and your bicycle will be 25 CZK per train." This was a little more than I wanted to pay to haul my bike, but I was weary and agreed to pay it.

She printed up my ticket and then matter of factly told me that I could not bring my bicycle on the first train but could on the second and third ones. My logic quickly told me that if I could not have my bike on the first train then I would be without it on the second and third ones.

"What!?!" I say a touch exasperated my this fleet of logic. "I need to have my bicycle on all three trains in order to arrive with it at my destination."

"Ok," the ticket lady said, "You want ticket?"

"Can I bring my bicycle on all of the trains?"

"No"

I ended the conversation there and stooped out of the train station. I was again weary, and did not look upon the hot sun of day with exuberance. I figured that I would stay the night in Hodonin to rest and then figure out my exit strategy in the morning.

I went to the tourist information office and told that receptionist about the train fiasco. I tried to persuade her to call them and get me permission to bring on my bicycle.

The receptionist just looked at me puzzled. "You have bicycle?," she asked.

"Yes," I replied.

"Why don't you just ride bicycle to Bratislava?"

Good idea.
The tourist office lady then gave me a print out list of the accommodation options of Hodonin. There were prices on this list, so I took it happily and went off to find a room for a single nights rest, with the plan of setting off by bicycle to Bratislava the next day.

A week later I am still in Hodonin, with a smile permanently plastered to my countenance.

I chased down a couple hostels on the list but could not find them or they were "kaput"- no more. I rode all over Hodonin like a fool asking everyone I could for directions to this or that hostel. It is sometimes difficult to flag down a direction giver in the Czech Republic, and I found that I had to virtually jump in front of people in the street, wave my arms, while shouting "Doubry dan! Hello! Ahoy!" with a map in hand and a lost look on my face. In this way I was lead off all through the streets of Hodonin chasing wild gooses.

I finally vowed that I would try to find one more hostel on the list, and, if it proved faux, to ride my bicycle out of town and push peddles towards Bratislava with no regard for rest or sense. This final attempt at finding a bed in Hondonin sent me over to the Museum Hostel on the other side of the train station. I rode into the museum grounds and found neither sign that it was hostel nor that it was a place that I could sleep. I rode my bike in a circle for a moment but could not find anything that resembled a hostel. Thinking that I was again spoofed by the accommodation list from the tourism office, I set out to leave the museum yard. I then saw a boy sweeping just inside of the open front door of a building, and I resolved make one last attempt at finding a bed.

I rode up to him and pointed to the place on my list that said "Muzeum Youth Hostel" and then made a sleeping motion by bringing my joined together hands up to my cheek.

"Yes," the boy said, "this is the hostel. Wait a moment." He seemed nice.

I stood outside the museum for around five minutes kicking at a snub of grass sticking up out of the pavement and thinking about how badly I must smell and look. If I appeared to be half as retched as I felt, then I do not think that any hostel in this world would have offered me a bed for fear that I would spread my dirt all over it. Sleeping with your head in the dirt does not make for a very cleanly traveler the next day. I really wanted to wash then sleep.

The boy then returned and showed me to a room. It was perfect in all ways. It had a big open window on one side, a wash basin, mirror, and, best of all, an electrical outlet so I could plug in my laptop.

I rejoiced as I laid down upon the bed and found myself dreaming restful dreams the day through.

Links to previous travelogue entries:
Asus Eee PC Popular with Travelers
Tarp Tent Search Ends with a Smile
Second Contribution to Vagabond Journey

Rest for a Weary Traveler- Bike Journey Day 4
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Tarp Tent Search Ends with a Smile

Tarp Tent Search Ends with a Smile

There was a morning time knock on my door at the Museum Hostel that I had been staying at in Hondonin on the Slovak border of the Czech Repubic. I opened it to find my friend Shishuka with a big blue tarp in her hands and a smile on her face.

I smiled too, for my prolonged search through the Czech Republic for a tarp had just then come to an end.
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Wade from Vagabond Journey.com
in Hondonin, Moravia, Czech Republic- July 5, 2008
Travelogue -- Travel Photos
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The previous day I was ranting to Shishuka about how I could not find a tarp anywhere in her country, and I had mistakingly proclaimed the Czech Republic a tarpless land. Shishuka then asked me some specific questions about what kind of tarp I wanted, and then said something to the effect of, "Yes, I think we have some of those in our attic. I will bring you one tomorrow."

I grew excited. Could my ravenous hunt for a tarp be drawing to a close?

Tarp that I can tie up and use as a tent.


Eyelet in the tarp that I can pass a rope through and hang up on a tree or fence.

The next morning the perfect tarp was presented to me - it was exactly what I was searching for - and my heart was subsequently warmed, not just by the gift, but also because of the fact that my friend thought about me outside of our meeting and put real effort and energy into helping me. She had remembered that I needed a tarp, found one, and gave it to me the very next day. Shishuka is a real friend, and it is a pure joy forming real friendships in the oftentimes socially ephemeral world of travel.

I am just a traveling kid on a journey to nowhere and everywhere, and Shishuka and her family befriended me, sheltered me, fed me, taught me about their culture, and now they even be-tarped me. There are good people in the Czech Republic.

I must say that the people of this country are vagabonds-at-heart.

I like the Czech Republic.

I have found smiles here, and my heart was warmed at the giving of a tarp.

Links to previous travelogue entries:
Second Contribution to Vagabond Journey
Bike Vagabond Maps to the Sickle Moon Horizon
Hard Traveling- Bicycle Journey Day 3

Tarp Tent Search Ends with a Smile
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Bike Vagabond Maps to the Sickle Moon Horizon

Bicycle Vagabond Maps to the Sickle Moon Horizon

My proposed route of travel by bicycle through Eastern Europe to Turkey is outlined in the below maps. I began this journey on the 27th of June (Stubbs' and Moby Dicks' birthday) from Olomouc in the Czech Republic. I think that I just may follow the little blue lines on these maps through Slovakia, Austria, Hungary, Serbia, Romania, and Bulgaria to the great Muslim land of Turkey at the end of this long Road.
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Wade from Vagabond Journey.com
in Hodonin, Moravia, Czech Republic- July 5, 2008
Travelogue -- Travel Photos
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From Turkey, only my dreams will tell me where to go next. But I do have another proposed meeting with the Hobotraveler being worked out in Ethiopia. Yes, I think this Road is going back to Africa.

Map that shows my bicycle route down the River Morava to Hodonin on the Slovak border.

Perhaps I will really stick to this route and bike the blue like to Turkey. If I do this it would be an absolute miracle, not because I rode a bicycle a long distance, but, because I actually followed a planned and drawn out route to fruition.

Lets find out what happens.

Links to previous travelogue entries:
Hard Traveling- Bicycle Journey Day 3
Photos from Czech Republic- Prague Olomouc Moravia...
Search for a Tarp Continues

Bicycle Vagabond Maps to the Sickle Moon Horizon
* Travel Blog Directory * Vagabond Journey.com * Travel Photos * Traveler Photographs.com

Hard Traveling- Bicycle Journey Day 3

Hard Traveling- Bicycle Journey Day 3

"I've been having some hard travelin', I thought you'd know. I've been having some hard travelin' way down the road."
-Woody Guthrie

Rode out of Komeriz comfortably at 8AM on a newly fixed up bicycle. I had the rear wheel, tire, and sprocket all replaced with new parts, and we were riding high now. Going good, going good through the beautiful countryside of the Czech Republic. This was no indication of what was to come.
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Wade from Vagabond Journey.com
in Hondonin, Moravia, Czech Republic- Late June 2008
Travelogue -- Travel Photos
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Beautiful path through the Czech Republic countryside.

I pumped pedals like this for around 10 hours through beautiful field, orchard, and village; passed lakes and flew along river banks under a big blue sky. Then it got hard going. I hit a stretch where the bike trail skirted a highway and the trail signs did not match up with my map. One modern highway town gave way to another and another. There were not many places worth stopping to take a rest.

My map showed a campsite a few towns south so I just kept on riding. My perception grew wobbly and my vision shaky. I was entering the first stages of exhaustion. But I kept going. There was nothing else that I could do other than kneel down on the side of the highway and prolong the purgatory. I then made a perilous wrong turn - I missed a bike route sign completely - and I ended up following a canal way out into real nowhere. The fishermen on the canal looked at me like I was a booger stuck to the moustache of their doctor while he perilously hovered over them during an examination, and I, in turn, felt like a misplaced booger. I simply did not belong where I was. My bicycle packed with gear going out into what the fishermen knew as a nowhere route was sort of odd looking, I am sure. But I rode on anyway, ignorantly watching the interplay of cloud, sky, and water.

Czech church on the long road south.

I was slightly delirious from over-exposure, days worth of ungratifying meals, and pure, basic overwork, but I soon realized that the quickly petering out canal path into the nether regions of Moravia was not the way to Slovakia. So I turned around, rode back by the fishermen - they still looked at me like I was a booger - and returned all the way to the point where I turned off onto the canal. I then noticed a little hidden yellow bike route sign that had 47 written on it pointing in a different direction that I went. It was my route south.

Czech people in traditional clothing.

So I jumped back onto the glorious 47 trail and was pleased that I at least now had the comfort of knowing that I was on the long southern Road once again. The affection with which a traveler can feel towards a path is astonishing. I was beginning to fall in love with this 47 bicycle route and the little yellow signs that showed me its shapes, figure, and curves. Her ups and downs and her turns and changes were looking real beautiful to me after three days of riding. A Path can become animate to those who travel it.

I was feeling these great feelings of well place love now as I gave up resistance and just relied on the Path to show me the Way. I no longer checked map or compass, I just rode from little yellow sign to little yellow sign, blowing them sweet kisses as I passed. I was becoming seriously exhausted.

Young Czech people drinking wine and celebrating the drinking of wine.

Soon I rode out of a field and right into the complete converse of anything I could have expected:

A Czech folk festival was in full swing at the terminus of where the bike trail led into the town of Straznice. Men were adorned in lavish costumes and the women were not to be outdone. They were singing folk songs of old and everybody was drinking beer. Lots of beer.

I pushed my bike through the crowd as if in a dream. Czechs from centuries ago danced to and fro singing and basking in all out merriment. I found a quiet place to lay down in to try to make some sense of this scene. For more than ten hours I was pushing pedals through the blue emptiness of day with only my own thoughts to keep me company, and now I was flung into the throng of thousands of people smiling, yelling, and intoxicating themselves in celebration.

The search for your bearings - your marbles - is one of the greatest experiences of traveling. I knew that this abrupt change in my surroundings could not ever be made sense of, so I just laid down in a grassy area, let the music flow into my ears, and watched the festivities with a satisfied smile. As I had unloaded my burden to the ground, I felt the all encompassing joy of severe physical exertion coming to an abrupt halt. I breathed in deeply and let all of my muscles settle into the good and restful earth.

I watched the festivities carry on and scribbled a few notes into my Moleskine:

"Laughing, joking, yelling, the Czech man is a friendly drunk."

"Czech men in traditional clothing for festival. I think they wish that they could dress like this all the time."

"Even through the costumes, I can tell that culture is very thick here."

Route south to Slovakia.

I remained stuck like this for a long time, just writing little notes and enjoying the happiness that was flowing in waves all around me. When I finally rose again to try to find a place to sleep, it was getting near nighttime.

I initially just figured that I would find the campground that was drawn on my map and drop a $5 bill for a restful night of sleep with running water facilities. But when the campground did not present itself to be where my map said it should, I took to the trails that crossed through the fields around the festival area. It was twilight now, and the fields were not accommodating for the prospective camper. Corn, swamp, corn, wetland was how they progressed. No place seemed very inviting or even campable. I then spotted a nice little raised up clearing ahead on the trail and rode to meet it with a smile. But when I arrived, to my fallow despair, I realized that this perfect little camping place was already occupied. Yes, a nice big tent with two legs sticking out of it was placed right where I wanted to sleep out the night. So I kept on searching for a sleeping place. Nowhere proved accommodating. The entire area was either scrubland, wetland, or cornfield, none of which I wanted to sleep in. So I kept on.

I returned back to the festival area, spotted an orchard, and made a break for it. Just as I had committed to the trespass I noticed two lights coming towards me. It was just a couple people with flashlights on the nearby trail, and I was not overtly concerned, but I still retreated from the orchard anyway. Good thing. The flashlights were held by police officers making the rounds of the nearby fields because of the large influx of people that the festival brought to this small city. I walked by the cops as if I had a direction to be going in, and gave up sleeping in this area.

It was fully dark now, and I rode into Straznice to try to find the bike trail that lead to the other side. It proved to be very difficult to locate in the dark, but I saw a sign for a campground and went to it. I was very tired. When I arrived I ordered up what I thought was a site from the sleazy campground attendent. He tried to charge me twice the amount to camp there. No, I do not speak Czech, but I can read the numbers on a sign. But I was in no position to argue, as my fatigue by now overrode my monetary senses. I agreed to take the site at the inflated price and went out to find it. To my great despair the campground was just a small field that had tents butted end to end against each other. It was packed with people, and hardly a sliver of space remained. I also did not have a self supporting tent, and I needed at least a tree or a fence to set my poncho up as a sort of mock shelter. No such supports were present, and I thought for a minute how ridiculous I would look just sleeping out amongst the stars in a field full of a hundred campers with nice tents and camping gear. This would not do.

I can sleep out under the stars for free, I would only go to a campsite to rest, relax, shower, and do my laundry. It was clear that I could not relax crammed in between a dozen tents full of drunken Czech campers.

So with this notion I scoffed off and made a quick exit from the campground, grunting to the sleazy manager that I did not want to stay on the way out. I was again on the loose; it was late at night; I was over-tired and completely fatigued. I returned to the orchard that the police routed me out of earlier. There did not seem to be much other option for an expediant night of sleep.

I got into the orchard quickly, made a little camp for myself, and laid back and relaxed as I looked up at the stars. But just as I began breathing restful breathes, I heard a car coming my way on the path. I looked up and noticed with a start that the car had a big spotlight attached to it that was slowly moving side to side. It was the police, and they were looking for someone- probably me. I then made a mad dash to cover up the reflector on the backend of my bicycle with my black Carhartt jacket, and with my Kelty backpack and North Face messenger bag in my arms I quickly rolled backwards down a hill full of brambles and shrubs that I was previously perched on the apex of. I watched as the police spotlight flittered above my head, as I was on the lee side of a little hill completely tangled up in a mass of weeds. I held my breathe and only released it when I was sure that the spotlight was pointed elsewhere. I had not been spotted.

I then peaked up and noticed that the police were inspecting another area of the orchard and realized that I had to make a quick break for it. This orchard was obviously not a good place to sleep. I then cursed and scoffed as I was routed out of a comfortable sleeping place for the second time this night by the police. I ran away while pushing my bicycle to the far side of the orchard. I made it to the bike trail and just rode far, far out of town in the direction that I had come into it. It was now passed midnight, and I realized that I had been going with little rest for the passed 16 hours. I was shaking with exhaustion. Soon I made it to the village to the north of Straznice, and set off to get far out into the countryside. I did so, but people were very much awake on this night partying, drinking, and having an all out good time. I found far too many seemingly empty fields occupied with partiers or weirdoes. This was getting really hard.

I finally peddled hard to the far, far countryside until I could not go anymore, and just collapsed behind a tree in a ditch on the side of a farm road. I could not move anymore, and I just wrapped myself up in my Carhartt jacket and a sleeping bag and, with a satirical little laugh and a quick look up to the beautiful star-speckled sky, fell off to vagabond dreams with my head in the dirt.

I think the crickets were even laughing at me on this night.

Links to previous posts:

Photos from Czech Republic- Prague Olomouc Moravia...
Search for a Tarp Continues
Private Room in Czech Republic

Hard Traveling- Bicycle Journey Day 3

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Search for a Tarp Continues

Search for a Tarp Continues

When tramping I often rig up a tarp to use as a tent. I find that this is a lighter, cheaper, and almost as effective way to carry your shelter upon your back. I simply put rope through the tarp's eyelets and tie up one half of it to two trees, a fence, or and tie-able vertical supports, and then pull it out so that it looks like half of a roof and put rocks down on the opposing corners. It this way I give myself a lean-to shelter that I can snuggle up into. This really works, and I have remained dry many times I the rain under tarps.
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Wade from Vagabond Journey.com
in Hondonin, Moravia, Czech Republic- July 1, 2008
Travelogue -- Travel Photos
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Tarps also have the added benefit of being disposable when you reach a stretch of traveling where you know that you will not be camping often. I find this to be very effective, as I do not like carting around travel gear that I do not use regularly. The best part is that tarps are cheap enough to be semi-disposable, as they often only cost around three to four dollars in any country.

But I am a week into my bicycle journey and I still have neither a tarp nor a tent of any kind. I packed a tarp with me to the Czech Republic, but ditched it at the airport in Prague when I was trying to trim down the bulk of my bags. My thoughts then were that I was going to step out of the airport and board a train for Turkey; I had no idea that I would find myself in the Czech Republic a month later riding a bicycle. I also figured that if I was in for a round of camping that I would just walk into the nearest Czech hardware store, shed a few dollars and walk out with a tarp.

This was a big misassumption.

Since the day that I conceived the bicycle journey to Turkey, I have been scouring every hardware, home, and grocery store in the Czech Republic for a tarp. I have not yet found one. I am beginning to conclude that the Czech Republic is a tarp-less land.

I still face the long Road ahead without shelter.

Previous Travelogue Entries:
Private Room in Czech Republic
Camping on the Sly in a Wheat Field
Photos from Prague Czech Republic
Czech Republic Bike Trails
Search for a Tarp Continues
* Travel Blog Directory * Vagabond Journey.com * Travel Photos * Traveler Photographs.com

Private Room in Czech Republic

Private Room in the Czech Republic - Bicycle Journey Day 2

I have found myself in a private room for five dollars while traveling by bicycle in the Czech Republic. It is a little stuffy, the walls and floor are bare concrete, the beds are hardwood with no cushion, and there is not only one, but an entire room full of showers. I have commandeered the locker room of an outdoor athletic complex in Kromeriz.
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Wade from Vagabond Journey.com
in Hodonin, Moravia, Czech Republic- Late June 2008
Travelogue -- Travel Photos
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I rolled into this town the night before and camped on the sly in a wheat field after a failed search for the bicycle campground. The sleeping was good and my free bed was comfortable. I awoke at first light and rode back into Kromeriz to shudder with a shock when I saw where the hands were pointing on the clock tower: it was but quarter after four in the morning. This is too early in the morning to wake up and do anything, and, as I wanted to have my bicycle repaired, I did want to leave the city. So I plopped myself down on an old park bench by the Morava River and fell into a couple of hours of restless sleep.

Bicycle repair at a Kelly's bike shop in Kameriz, Czech Republic. I just bought the parts for around $50 and the labor was included. Not a bad, it beats wrenching it on the side of the road.

Upon waking, it was time to go off and search out the campground and a bike shop who could replace the rear end of Kamila. I went into the local tourist information office, and the lady there spoke good English and gave me a free bicycle map for the Road ahead as well as directions to the cyclokemp. She also let me know that their office offered travelers free WIFI. This solidified my ambition to bunker down in this town for a day of rest and repair.

I then went to the bicycle camp and had a difficult time communicating with the lady in charge. She did not believe that I had a tent - she was correct - and also seemed apprehensive about the fact that we could not verbally communicate with each other on any level. But when I placed my hands up by my head in a "sleeping" gesture, she nodded her head yes, and I went around to the side of the office building for a quick wash up in a outdoor sink. This felt good. The lady soon came and gave me a couple of bike riding pamphlets and good wishes. She was alright.

I then went about getting my bike fixed, restocked my food supply, showered and did some laundry. One day of summertime bike travel and night of camping on the sly makes clothing almost un-wearable filthy the next day. So I realized that I must stick hard to making sure that I always have a backup of clean clothing. I only travel with one additional set of clothing other than what is on my body, so this means that I must continually be scrubbing my reserves clean.

Once finished I went in search of a bicycle repair shop to replace the rear wheel, tire, and sprocket of my bike. I went into one, my bicycle was put up on to the repair rack, but then I got the feeling that the mechanic was pulling a few