Tag Archives: hot

Day 24 – Off, off and away

It only took one afternoon and one morning to make our flat look like a whirlwind went through. No matter, we’ll be back in a couple of days and can clean up then. 

Number 3 and I managed to go to the farmer’s market to buy cherries as a road snack and fresh bread at our local bakery.

Repacking was easy as we hadn’t unpacked a lot in the first place. So by 9am, we were back on the road. The distance to our friends’ place in the Netherlands isn’t too bad at 340km, but with two small kids, you have to time everything just right. 

The Agent slept and Number 3 was pretty good, which made things easy. Also, he can be distracted by audio books if push comes to shove. 

brand new and cool charger – but it did not take my charge card. 5 minutes delay for the call but then for free …

Finding a fast charger was surprisingly hard this time. Only because we started to be a bit picky and also because we wanted to stop next to the autobahn before we got to the sprawl that is the start of the Rhein-Ruhr area marked by Cologne. In the end, we stopped at an e-on charger. Flo couldn’t get the charger to work with his charge card. After calling in to report the issue, they activated it remotely and we charged for free. 

Again, there was no shade to be found. Plus, the actual rest stop was still closed on this side of the autobahn. Now we had the choice between a bench in the shade and a toilet at the fuel station or a walk across the autobahn bridge to the open rest stop. We chose to stay and eat our delicious bread and cheese. 

With all the kerfuffle in the beginning our stop ended up one and a half hours long, more than enough to fully charge the car again.

Summer holiday!

This time Number 3 fell asleep while the Agent was awake for a while. We managed to get to the Netherlands before Number 3 woke up and immediately started to complain that he had to live his life in a car and never wanted to go by car ever again. It was quite a long way for kids, we understand that. Once there, we planned to stay put for at least two nights.

As it was, the last 30 minutes dragged with me trying to keep the kids from screaming. And then just like that, we were there. 🙂 A house, a big yard and garden, shade, kids, something to drink and the world looked brighter again for Number 3. Both our kids went off to explore and we had time to talk to our friend Leonie which we hadn’t seen in way too long. 

She cooked a yummy veggie meal for us and Peter arrived before we all sat down to eat. All four kids demanded attention to get them fed and ready to sleep. By the time we had our two in bed and asleep (which didn’t take long), the others also were asleep. So, we had until 11pm to talk to Peter and Leonie before I had to fall into bed as well.

  • The one spot with shade – not in frame, the polish van driver just behind me cooking his dinner o.O
  • brand new and cool charger – but it did not take my charge card. 5 minutes delay for the call but then for free …
  • this is the final country for this trip
  • good that our host’s big one was still asleep 😉
  • Number 3 learned to use pedal power within the hour – the Agent though she could do it, too
  • he was allowed to pick the flavour
  • I dont quite remember the topic, but I am sure we were geeking out 😀
  • like the pipes of an organ, a german saying goes
  • All four of the little rascals in one shot. The two big ones get ice cream
  • Since Number 3 loved the tractor it was very high on the Agent’s list 🙂
  • Summer holiday!
  • Outside seating for a dinner for eight people
  • Getting ready for bed. A last round on the tractor, a last try of getting to the bubbles and me taking down the blinds

Day 281 – All roads lead to … Romans

The rain was good for this for sure

The rain was good for this for sure

We made it alive and well through the storm and rain last night. This morning, the tent was still fine (thanks Salewa, great product) and the sky clear.

There is very little to write about the road today, other than that it was amazing. I was not quite sure about this whole idea of ours of doing a big detour through the Zagros Mountains instead of the direct route to Hamadan before. The stunning landscapes along the road really did change that, though. The constantly changing landscape following down the Karun from 2400m down to almost sea level was truly worth it.

Rocinante and Flo posing with the great landscape

Rocinante and Flo posing with the great landscape

We had memorable little moments in between, nonetheless. The first one that comes to mind is at a police check point in Loristan. Iran is the first country we actually get stopped by the police at times. This time, they invited us into the main building for tea and to check our papers. Sadly, the shared language skills were not enough for any deeper conversation.

We stopped to buy some ingredients for lunch, when we were once again surrounded by a bunch of kids and very friendly villagers. After a brief chat, we hopped back on the bike to find a lovely picnic spot in the shade of a tree.

Suddenly, the tarmac stopped despite being marked as sealed on both the GPS and the paper map

Suddenly, the tarmac stopped despite being marked as sealed on both the GPS and the paper map

The green around us faded as gradually as it came yesterday. This time though, a bright aquamarine was added to the palette by the Karun River and its many hydro power reservoirs along the way. At the same time though the level of complaint by both Nina and Rocinante rose as the heat did on the way down. When we reached the altitude of our destination (100m above sea level) the thermometer hit 40°C again, even at 5 pm.

Reaching Shushtar was a bit of a stretch, but we still made it by 5.30 pm and quickly found a hotel. While looking in vain for the recommended one, we were waved into the newly renovated traditional hotel in town. They made us a good offer and even had a ramp ready to get Rocinante into the inner courtyard. We bottomed out for a second, but no damage done. Tomorrow without luggage then …

Looking down on the historic parts

Looking down on the historic parts

The town was one of those pleasant surprises you get. Never heard of it, but full of great historic stuff. The waterworks here had been built 1800 years ago and were crucial in the irrigation of the whole region. Oh, and they were built by forced labour from Roman Legionaries. The force was captured by the Persians, including their Emperor Valerian. The only Roman Emperor ever to have been captured in battle. He likely died in captivity in the resident Salosel Castle.

Tomorrow, we will go for even older stuff … 3300 year old Elamite Ziggurat of Choqa Zanbil!

Day 231 – Klicks

We had a good night’s sleep in our little “resort” in Hot (resort in Thailand means a hotel a bit out of the city center or out in the fields). Today, we even got a free breakfast – including fresh strawberries!

The first bit of the route was "scenic"

The first bit of the route was “scenic”

We had about another 100 km of more or less windy back road until we were planning on hitting the highway 1. These really turned out to be quite nice, even if my arm was still taking a bit of enjoyment out of riding. It would still get stiff and cramp after like 30 minutes of riding. On top of it all, it was once again scolding hot. Riding was still fine, but any amount of walking or stopping out of the shade were just … inadvisable.

Once we hit the highway 1, it became quite a different ride again. 600 km of flat land on a road pretty close to a motorway. Cruising speed moved up to 110 km/h, at least outside of the many stretches of roadworks forcing both directions on one of the two multi-lane strips. The kilometers just melted away.

We passed this pick-up going at least 80kmh so the dog was quite deformed

We passed this pick-up going at least 80kmh so the dog was quite deformed

After a very brief and unmemorable lunch in Tak, we were on the road again when a macabre first for the two of us occurred. As expected at a little traffic jam on a stretch of roadwork, we came past an accident. A ute came off the road and had hit a tree. As we passed it, we both got a look at our first dead person that we can remember. Lying right there on the road with the paramedic just taking pictures of him was a lifeless human form wrapped in white sheets – with one blue and mangled hand sticking out.

We got the whole thing for a very good price

We got the whole thing for a very good price

We ended that day with only 250 km to go in another resort somewhere in the no-man’s-land between towns. The benefit was a killer price for an excellent room – the down side was that we were not prepared for the fact that we could not just walk 100m and have dinner ready. I ended up riding another 20 km alone in search of food and all I came up with in the end were crisps and an eight month old one-square-meal.

 

 

Day 105 – From rain forest back into savannah

Nice view for breakfast

Nice view for breakfast

Tete batu was even cool in the morning. But we decided to just see one waterfall before heading off to Kuta. Maybe we could have a beach day after all.

Driving up the rather washed-out road, we stopped at the house of a local with whom we had spoken yesterday. He pointed us in the right direction for the Air Terjun and we walked the last 200m there by ourselves. The place was way smaller than the waterfalls we had seen so far but it was still a lovely little place. One of the small falls produced a rainbow where the water hit the rocks and the locals had made a dam by the two biggest falls to retain the water. The thus created pool was deep enough to wash in.

All handcrafted organic rice here ...

All handcrafted organic rice here …

Coming back up we asked for a short guided tour and were taken through the village and along the rice fields for a good while. The sun was burning down again…I was really wishing for a pocket waterfall by this time so I could refresh myself whenever I wanted…

The tour ended with a walk through the aptly-named “monkey forest” where we saw many black and grey monkeys, some of them even carrying babies. Pictures are not nearly as impressive as we still don’t own a tele.

After this, we just packed the bike with the luggage we had left at our guest house (and realizing it was on the “monkey forest street”) and left the lovely town of Tete batu, full of nice people and great roadside “nanas” (pineapple).

As soon as we came further south, the landscape returned to the very dry savannah we have seen for so long now. I simply found it too hot to ride which made me grumpy which lead to a misunderstanding with Flo. We discussed things over food which helped and continued to Kuta, one of the beach towns in south Lombok. Unfortunately, neither Flo nor I took a particular liking to the town so instead of relaxing, I got properly homesick. I haven’t been homesick in a while and I guess exhaustion also played its part.

To compensate, we (against better judgement) tried pizza again for dinner and were only mildly disappointed with the average one we got.