Half the fun of the travel is the esthetic of lostness. ~Ray Bradbury
Today the road led me again through many German
villages. Having woken up early, I had a good opportunity to see the
brisk morning in these rural areas. Tractors and heavy machinery were
everywhere on the road, farmers were taking care of their stock and you could
smell the typical village scent. Not many times you have the opportunity to
soak into this atmosphere, especially if you grew up and live in a town as
me. I am only afraid that I am becoming numb to all what I see. I do not
simply perceive things with the "wow" effect anymore, but find it somehow
normal. However, the typical image of German villages goes far behind my
experienced perception in Slovakia. In my country, villagers are happy to make
the both ends meet and have a quite modest life. On the other hand, in
Germany and Austria farmers appear to live quite comfortable life with
standards that the Slovaks could only dream of.. You could barely find derelict
buildings – everything was like new, out from the box, nice and
tidy. There were many shining examples of the ideal family house. Solar panels were omnipresent as if they were
an indispensable part of houses and each small village had a perfectly equipped
sport playground. I guess it is beyond all comparison with our Slovak villages.
I just hold high hopes that one day, in a far and distant future, when our
politicians stop robbing every Euro fond coming to our country, maybe Slovak
people in the countryside will also enjoy a better quality of life.
At noon I biked in the picturesque landscape
of another national park with many hikers and bikers on the way. Unfortunately,
I got lost pretty bad, this time due to poorly marked GPS data. Out of the
blue, the way along the river stopped and one had to clamber on a steep hill
that was impossible with my bike. I tried to find an alternative route, but got
hopelessly lost in the forest where I had to push my bike uphill for good 40
minutes, meanwhile having been ferociously attacked by mosquitoes. When I finally
reached the peak, I was not very sure with the directions so I asked one older
German group leader. He was very nice and told me how to get down, but firstly
wanted to show me a great view from the cliff. At least the view was worth of
all the struggle. I was advised that in the monastery that you can see in this
picture, one have a great opportunity to indulge him/herself with delicious
Bavarian beer. You did not need to tell me much after my long biking travel in
the sun to persuade me to go there. We were supposed to meet there and finish
the chat we started on the cliff. This lunch break was actually a great idea. I
needed to stop for a while anyway and nothing could be better as drinking
well-deserved beer in a monastary that proud itself with brewing the first beer
in the world! I was really lucky that I came across this place.
Once again I bit more than could chew as far my
map planning is concerned. As a result, I was lacking behind and had
to bike until 11 pm. The next day, I was supposed to arrive in Ulm, where
my couch host Judith was expecting me; therefore, it was important to be on
time. The estimated arrival was at 7 pm, there were 100 “map“ km to make the
next day and I was still behind later at night. Therefore, I tried to
do as much as possible, but the roads were badly marked and in the dark it was
really difficult to ride through forest lanes. Eventually I gave up and
put my tent in a crop field near the forest. I was tired as hell, but
that night, I had another scary experience that later did not let me fall
asleep so easily again. Around 2 am, I was woken up by immediate squeaking
and clatter. It was obvious that hogs were around, but then it was becoming
even more intensive. Suddenly, I could distinguish two different “voices“.
One of a small cub and the other, much huskier, of its mum. Apparently,
the young one got lost and frantically tried to find its mother. Generally
speaking, wild hogs are not dangerous for people, unless they are hurt or feel
protective of their off springs. In such cases, they can become extremely savage
and there is little that human can do to save his skin. I have heard
stories of a hunt on wild pigs in which one big daddy had to be shot 7
times from close distance with a shotgun before it bit the dust. Not a fat
chance that one could defend against a wild hog with a knife, unless
you have a sword, katana, axe or any other heavy cold weaponry from the
middle ages. I did not even have a small knife and no wonder that with
my pepper spray locked in my tent, I did not feel particularly safe.
I was really in anguish that the young one goes astray near to my tent and
its big mamma would think that my very presence was the reason for all
troubles. If that had happened, I would have been left totally defenseless,
as there were no trees to climb on and even worse, I was in my tent,
unable to run away in case the swine swoop on me. Even though I did the
pleasant duty of marking my territory around the tent to scare away any animal
intruders, one could never know if the stupid cub in its panic does not
disregard these warning signs and trespass my claimed territory. I was
only to hope that something like that would simply not happen. The horror spectacle
last for about an hour, taking the scene few times quite close to my place
until they finally found themselves. What a sigh of relief! I just love
happy endings and I was really pleased that this story starred me only as
an observer and not as an actor.
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