12 Aug 2011

Bretten to Dobel (40 km)

It was 5 am and someone was up and building herself a Tower of Power:

This was necessary because that same someone (a) couldn’t sleep and (b) refused to buy an Australia-Europe plug-in adaptor for $9.99 when we were living in Australia and toting around an Aussie phone and an Aussie camera, both of which are in use on this trip.  The Tower of Power did the trick but won’t last for long unless we also pull out the electrical tape to keep the thing from breaking apart under its own weight.

It’s too bad we were both up at 5 am for Gina’s Tonka Toy project.  We really could have used the extra sleep energy later today when our route went haywire, i.e., became way too much of the hilly variety and by hilly I mean the kind of hills that force you off the saddle and onto the pavement or, as is typical in Germany, hard-packed dirt, pushing your 65 pound plus load up that neverending incline with an upper body strength that is by far less than that wielded by those tree trunks you call legs.  Well, what I call my legs.  Gina’s legs are different, having earned her many nicknames over the years, ranging from Stick to String Bean to Bamboo.  They can also push a loaded bicycle uphill but the rest of the body they are attached to certainly makes some unpleasant noises when doing so and when I say unpleasant noises I mean the kind that your Mama told you good girls never say.  I suppose I’ll give her a pass on that one since we had more than one tough uphill slog today and none of those same noises were made this morning when we started out in the rain, which used to be a guarantee that choice words would be uttered.  But not today.  I think someone was still too overly happy about the success of her morning construction project to let a little precipitation bring her down.

As for this hilly Black Forest we find ourselves in now, we are afraid it might be more suited for mountain bikes and mountain goats than mountain gals with loaded panniers.  We may need to rethink this plan.