Goodbye to Germany

The day before I left Seattle on my trip, my neighbor lent me an old smartphone of his to use as a navigator and as a translator. As long as I have a wifi signal to latch on to (which is surprisingly uncommon), I have access to Google Maps, which has been incredibly useful, because the bike signage from town to town is often confusing, ambiguous, contradictory, or outright nonexistent.

Well, yesterday morning I took a short break on a bench on the side of a bike path, and when I got up, I evidently left the phone on the bench. I was six kilometers down the road before I realized I didn't have it anymore. I did a quick check of all my bags to make sure, and then about-faced and hightailed it back as quickly as possible. I knew it didn't stand a chance of still being there, though; countless numbers of cyclists and pedestrians had passed by in that amount of time. Sure enough, I returned to an empty bench. I was incredibly disappointed, because a) it wasn't mine to lose, b) there went my easy access to a map, c) there went my translator, and d) I had used the camera to take a bunch of pictures when my camera battery ran out, which were now gone. Bummer.

I started off Thursday morning from Radolfzell for the last time, and quickly left the flatlands, and entered the foothills of the Black Forest mountains. Now, the Black Forest has always lived in my imagination as a place like Fangorn Forest: dark, dank, and not to be trifled with. Sadly, I get the impression that any resemblance to that passed long ago. Instead of monstrous trees with canopies that turn day into night, I saw just an ordinary, average looking forest. Granted, I only took one path through it, and I’m sure it might be different elsewhere, but it looked to me like a bunch of young and 2nd-growth trees. (I have noticed that German houses sure seem to love having walls and walls of firewood in their yard.) I thought it was particularly telling when I saw a sign indicating how to identify a tree by its stump.

How to identify a tree in Germany.

To be fair, growing up in the Pacific Northwest, I have a pretty high standard for forests. The Black Forest made for mostly pleasant riding. At one point I mistakenly followed the wrong kind of bike route sign, and ended up on a highly technical and extremely challenging mountain bike path that took me over steep hills, instead of around them. Fortunately, once I found my way back to the right path, it took me down a gentle river valley, surrounded by forested hills in every direction. 

About three hours down the path of this river valley, I noticed a rubbing sound coming from my back tire, and a little rolling resistance to go with it. I stopped my bike to pull out the branch that had probably lodged itself in there, and what did I find instead? Sandwiched between my tire and one of my brake pads was my missing phone! I have a hard time fathoming how, but evidently it hitched a ride there unnoticed for the last sixty kilometers or so, even through mountain bike terrain. Weird. Lucky.

The path eventually led me across the border and into the Alsace region of France, which is where I arrived this morning. I'm in the city of Strasbourg right now, but haven't yet had much of a chance to look around, other than the mind-boggling cathedral that puts the others I've seen to shame. The Strasbourg Cathedral was built starting in 1176, and is an awesomely impressive example of gothic architecture. Evidently it was also the world's tallest building for more than 200 years.

The entrance to the Strasbourg Cathedral.

Enough from me for now, time to go explore!

Bodensee, with Company

Number of kilometers: 381

A few days before AniMOVE summer school ended, my partner Melissa showed up on my German doorstep, all the way from Seattle (not unannounced, of course). She planned a trip to be here for a week, with enough time to explore Germany by bike with me for a few days, and to do some of her own sight-seeing. At least, that's how it should've worked. Instead, Melissa was promptly floored by a nasty virus (no doubt introduced from the plane ride), and spent her first few days here feverish and bed-ridden. I was happy that I could provide her a bed in which to convalesce, but I did not feel optimistic about us climbing on our bicycles and riding 50 miles a day.

In the meantime, I finished up my classes. On Friday, I was one of six lucky students who were randomly chosen to go up for a ride in the Institute's research Cessna. We strapped a pair of antennae to the outside of the plane to radio-track some UHF-tagged ducks, and went up in the air to "gather some data", which basically amounted to a scenic tour of the area.

Wheeeeeeeeeee!

On Saturday, we had a morning of presentations on our individual projects, followed by a relaxed day of frisbee, card-playing, and napping. By evening time, Melissa was feeling just well enough to make it out of bed for the goodbye barbecue, which lasted far too late into the evening for my own good. I woke up Sunday morning bleary-eyed and hung over, and not too enthusiastic about starting a long bike ride. Nonetheless, the Kazakh vodka that contributed to my suffering was probably the very same vodka that delivered the final kick in the rear to Melissa's sickness, so who was I to complain? After nearly 60 hours on death's door, she woke up spry and fresh, and ready to hit the road. 

We headed down to Konstanz (her by bus, me by bike) to rent a bicycle for Melissa. A simple enough task in it's own right, but due to a cancelled train (her) and getting a wee bit lost (me), we both got into town about fifteen minutes after the bike rental shop closed. We instead spent a few hours sleuthing around for any other place in town from which we could acquire a bicycle, which was no small feat, given that it was a Sunday, and, once again, nobody does ANYTHING on a Sunday. We ended up finding an underground bike shop in what must have once been a subway station, run by a couple of guys rocking out to what can only be described as porn metal. Point is, we got a bike, and we were off! Several hours later than we wanted, but off, nonetheless.

Lake Constance from 1000 feet.

We planned ourselves a ride around Lake Constance (known in German as Bodensee), comprising a pleasant, flat, and well-traveled 140-mile loop. Bodensee is situated in the northern foothills of the Alps, defining parts of the borders of northern Switzerland, western Austria, and southern Germany. Bodensee also provides the beginning of Germany's portion of the Rhine River. It is far removed from the bustle of city life, instead buried deep in quiet, serene farm country. Our nights were mostly spent camped on the edge of a field between orchards and forest. 

A typical portion of bicycle trail around Lake Constance.

Tourist attractions abounded: the scenic island town of Lindau, Germany, exemplifies Bavarian architecture and culture. The opera house in Bregenz, Austria, is located quite literally on the water, and builds an unbelievably sophisticated new stage for every performance. (I'm also told it was featured in a scene in one of the newish James Bond movies, Quantum of Solace.) The spires of the Münster St. Nikolaus and Konstanz Minster churches dominate the landscape for miles.

The Bregenzer Festspiele's production of Bizet's Carmen.

Mishaps also abounded: during the middle of our very first night out, an unidentified bug crawled its way into my ear while I was sleeping. It woke me up immediately, but instead of panicking, I tried to just lie still until it decided to come back out. That never happened, so after about an hour of lying in the dark listening to its little legs scraping against my eardrum, I decided to wake Melissa for help. Fortunately, the simple act of me talking seemed to scare it out, and it made a hasty departure before she could even grab her flashlight. Ew.

Tuesday afternoon proved to be a wet one, with rainclouds rolling in unleashing their contents at unpredictable intervals. We dodged the major downpours throughout the day by ducking under awnings or into a restaurant, but just as we were picking out our camping spot for the evening, we got hit by a torrent. In the five minutes it took to ride from our field back into town, every little bit of us was soaked, right through our rain gear. The bike paths quickly turned into creeks, and it was not a difficult decision to hightail it to the nearest hotel. We spent a luxurious evening drying out our shoes with a hair dryer and sleeping warmly.

We got back into Konstanz earlier today, where I said goodbye to Melissa. She headed back to Zurich to catch a plane tomorrow, and I headed back up to Radolfzell to stay one more night in an inviting bed before hitting the road in earnest. I've spent two and a half weeks in Southern Germany now, and it's time to start making my way toward Amsterdam. The real biking starts tomorrow. Next up: the Black Forest!

AniMOVE

Before starting to explore Europe by bicycle, I arrived in Germany with two weeks of class ahead of me at the Max Planck Institute of Ornithology, located just outside of the town of Radolfzell, on the northern shore of Lake Constance. I came to take part in AniMOVE, a summer course focused around animal movement, remote sensing, and species distribution modeling. The program is truly international in flavor: I am one of thirty participating students, who collectively represent eighteen different countries.

But why am I here? Animal movement encompasses some of the most awesome and powerful biological forces on our planet: from the annual 44,000-mile migration of the arctic tern; to the unparalleled size of a caribou herd; the stunning flocking behaviour of a starling murmuration; to the unpredictable impacts of invasive species. These phenomena and countless others have a profound impact on our environment and our lives, and scarcely any of them are currently understood. If we want to protect an endangered species, for example, how can we do so without knowing its movement patterns and habits? Crops are suffering across the globe because bees are dying, but why, and how? We're running out of fish in the ocean, but will they come back, and if so, where? These types of questions are addressed in part by learning how different animals move, from the individual to the global population, from a day-to-day basis to patterns seen across centuries.

Starlings in flight.

This branch of the Max Planck Institute of Ornithology, hereto referred to as MPI, is small, but astonishingly ambitious in its research. It promotes and emphasizes collaboration and data sharing through a fledgling but highly successful, freely accessible standardized worldwide database of movement data. (In this age of "big data", making sense of the glut of information out there is an onerous to impossible task, and the importance of standardizing information so that it can "talk" to each other cannot be overstated.) MPI collaborates with governments and NGOs such as NASA, National Geographic, the Smithsonian, and the National Science Foundation to conduct research as sophisticated as launching their own satellite. As a student, I benefit from the enormous wealth of knowledge and experience from the professors and researchers here, and get to rub elbows with some bigwigs in the science community as well.

Now, prior to my arrival in Germany, my German lexicon consisted of the following:

• bitte
• danke
• bier
• Reinheitsgebot
• schlagsahne
• kartoffelbrei

Suffice it to say, not quite enough to get by. Fortunately for me, AniMOVE is taught in English, which has severely softened any culture shock I may have otherwise experienced.  Instead, AniMOVE reminds me of a summer school I might have attended as a kid, except with a lot more work and a lot more beer. The days consist mostly of lecture and labs, but the atmosphere is relaxed and casual, with a healthy amount of time for play. I've spent most every afternoon and even some mornings (I'm not known as a morning person) swimming in a nearby lake (I'm also not known as a water person); the evenings are spent enjoying communal dinners, beer, and general camaraderie. The thirty of us students are housed in respectably luxurious guest quarters, with a spacious community building in an old renovated mill just a short field's walk away. Adjacent to the mill is an ancient castle occupied by a scarcely-seen baron, who I can't help but imagine staring down at us from behind his parapets, scowling through his monocle with a watchful, disapproving eye, but this is probably not an accurate reflection of reality.

Konstanz architecture.

This past weekend allowed time for a couple of fun forays: Saturday took us into the nearby town of Konstanz, a place filled with beautiful architecture, ancient churches, and European charm. On Sunday we took a trip to the Swiss Alps to climb Säntis, at 8209 ft (2502m) the highest peak in the region. The climb to the top featured sheer cliff faces with metal steps and hand cables hammered into the side of the mountain, and the descent was enjoyed from the luxury of a dizzyingly high cable car, that stretched more than two kilometers across jagged peaks and alpine pastures.

The view from the top of Säntis.

All in all, I can scarcely believe that I've already been here for ten days. I've been kept tremendously busy, but I'm having a wonderful time in class, and have absolutely loved the people I've met here.

Me with a classmate "in" traditional Swiss garb.

I've gotten a surprising amount of work done on my graduate research over the last week, but've still had time for frivolities like frisbee. I'll be sad to go in just a few days' time, but am just as excited for what lies ahead when I'm done here.

I hit the road on Sunday! I hope you'll stay tuned.

An Exciting New Adventure

Guten Tag!

It's been a little over two years since my last entry here, and not without good reason. First and foremost, I haven't had the time for any notable bike trips; instead, I've been frittering away the months in graduate school at the University of Washington. I'll soon be starting my third year in the Quantitative Ecology and Resource Management program, where I'm currently studying how climate change is affecting species' distributions in the Pacific Northwest. It's been a lot of work so far, and there's an awful lot more to come, but I love what I'm doing, love what I'm learning, love the people and the university environment. And despite the hard work, it's not without its perks.

Case in point: as I type this, I'm currently sitting in class at the Max Planck Institute for Ornithology in Southern Germany, nestled in the foothills of the Alps. Last fall I learned of a two-week course on animal movement being taught here that was directly related to my research. I applied and got a scholarship for the class, my advisor paid for my plane tickets, and BOOM!, just like that, a (mostly) free trip to Europe!

Of course, having never been to Europe before, the way I figure it, if I'm going to fly all the way out yonder, I should probably go ahead and make it worth my while. That's why I decided to take an extra couple of weeks after my class is over to explore the area. And of course, what better vantage could be found than the seat of my bike? After two years of relative physical lethargy and neglect, it's time to dust off the old saddle and venture out once more! Never mind the ever-growing pain in my ailing knees caused by previous bike tours, never mind the fact that I'm out of shape and haven't ridden more than twenty miles in a day in forever. When the road's a callin', this guy heeds the call. So here's the plan: I scheduled my travel so that I fly into Zurich. From there, I travel to Radolfzell, Germany, for two weeks of class. After that, I have eighteen days to make it approximately 650 miles to Amsterdam by bike, to fly back home. As far as I'm concerned, anything and everything that happens between here and there is pure gravy. Now, before I get ahead of myself (since I'm already here in Germany), let's bring you to speed:

I had never flown with my bicycle before, and was pretty anxious about the process for a few reasons: the only prior experience I had checking precious cargo on a plane resulted in a thoroughly destroyed instrument case and a missing (read: stolen) pocket knife, so I didn't have a lot of reason to trust airlines to take good care of my bike. Furthermore, airlines are notorious for shaking down bicyclists with exorbitant fees, and I was flying with Delta, widely regarded as the worst offender.

Every town in Switzerland of more
than 20 people has one of these.

In order to package a bike for flying, you need to compactify it a little so that it can fit inside of a giant narrow box, mostly just by removing the pedals and turning the handlebars sideways. I wrapped many of the more sensitive parts of my bike with newspaper and masking tape, used my sleeping bag and Therm-a-rest as extra padding, and used copious quantities of packing tape to ensure the box wouldn't lose its contents on a tarmac in transit. The box arrived pretty thoroughly beaten up and with a couple of small holes, but the contents were no worse for wear, and, most importantly, nothing was missing. In order to avoid the baggage fees associated with four panniers' worth of gear, I took advantage of a suitcase I found in an alley in my neighborhood just a week or so prior to my trip. I was able to fit all four panniers and their contents inside of the one suitcase, and then I just abandoned it with a free sign on it after I arrived in Zurich. Once I got off the plane, I was able to find my luggage and reassemble my bike and gear all inside of an hour.

From there, I set off to ride from the airport to Radolfzell, equipped with a laughably complex set of directions printed out from Google Maps, and a map that didn't show enough detail to be of much use. After several false starts in the wrong direction I eventually found my bearings, despite the fact that I couldn't find any of the roads mentioned in my directions. After I made it through the first couple of towns, I realized that my directions really weren't needed; as long as I knew which town I wanted to head to next, I could just follow the signage without too much trouble. I took some wrong turns here and there, but for the most part it was smooth sailing.

The area between Zurich and Radolfzell was mostly scenic farmland and gently hilly forest. Every single township was connected by a bicycle path that guided me away from roads and instead through fields of crops and sheep and along forest borders, restricting my interactions with traffic to passing through towns. Any other day of the week this would've been the most wonderful thing in the world, but it didn't make much of a difference to me; the roads were almost completely deserted, presumably because it was Sunday, and apparently nobody does anything on Sundays here. Every town I passed through featured ancient clock towers chiming for no one, echoing off of shuttered businesses. Bucolic public wells continually replenished babbling cisterns with drinking water on almost every street corner. I saw lots of cyclists out enjoying the countryside, but most of them were either families or adorable old couples.

One of many many charming public wells.

Unfortunately, I didn't end up sleeping much on the plane from Seattle, so I departed from the airport for the 90-kilometer ride when my body was telling me it was 3am. By the time I got to Radolfzell, I had been awake for close to thirty hours, and I was more than ready to collapse into a bed. As it turned out, I arrived about eight minutes before the orientation began for the class I am attending, so I ended up quietly nodding off in a chair for a bit instead.

And that more or less brings us up to speed. I'm far from caught up on sleep yet, but that'll happen in due time. Until then, I'm in class here for the next two weeks. I have always strived to restrict this blag to be about bicycle travel and only bicycle travel, because I never wanted it to devolve into a pathetic, ignored and unread exposition about my personal life. That said, I won't be hitting the road to explore Europe for a while yet, but I still plan on writing something here occasionally; it's a whole new world I'm experiencing here, and even if I'm not actively cycling, it's all part of the same trip in the end. So one way or another, stay tuned, there's plenty more to come.

Glad to have a reason to be writing here again!