News

I was told that the last time I wrote under the heading “News”, I probably shouldn’t have, and was called a smart arse. So I wont do it again. You hear me? I wont.

I was talking to an operator at work today (in my, now very good, “international” English: ie, slow clear, and nothing complex – it’s amazing how much of a conversaion you can have with people who claim not to understand any English when you both try). He mentioned some friends had just cycled around the world. Amazing, does everyone in Germany go riding? Anyway, it dawned on me that it works better in different languages when most of the content of the blogs should be pictures. I like words. They are good for me, and with this computer and my internet connections they work ok. But no-one else wants to read them. I may have to add more pics. Just after I start taking some.

www.radreise-asien-2008.over-blog.net

or cheat and use google translate (my new best friend) -> the same blog in english

www.radventura.net

Burghausen

I can fall in love pretty much anywhere in Spring. This year I seem to have found Bavaria at the right time of year. It is beautiful here.
Regensburg is actually a very nice town. But it lived up to it’s name (Regen = Rain) when I visited, 2 of the 3 days it rained, so it was hard to really love it. But it didn’t matter, I had fun with my Bock. I could continue with a touching remark on the value of having good friends, but I might miss some of those in Oz, and I might appear to be sentimental. We wouldn’t want that.

So I had to go to ‘work’ in Burghausen (Castle House). It is also a very pretty place. Apparently the castle, which is quite imposingly placed on a ridge above the old town, is the longest in Europe (at around a kilometre long – but only 50m wide). I’ve managed to get enough time away from work to look around, and it seems to be idyllic here. Really. Everything seems to be so perfect that it’s almost… kind of scary.

There is an exceptionally well maintained castle, above a the Salzach river and the very pretty, and also well maintained old town. Behind the castle, where there is some flat land, is the new town of Burghausen. Which is also new, very well designed… and (surprise) well maintained. There are green community areas, with climbing equipment (with gym climbing holds), fountains, artwork, bike tracks. Old people are riding bikes where there isn’t any obvious reason for them to be there – goodness knows what they are doing, surely it’s not just for fitness?? Is it? I haven’t seen a fat person (although there are a few crazies around), but plenty thinner than I. There isn’t any graffiti. People say hulo (or grössgot or something) in the streets. There are bikes everywhere. They try to engage me in conversation when I buy something (umm, err, Ich spreche kein Deutsch? Smile, wave, feel stupid). No one wears headphones. People are well behaved. No one will cross the street until the light goes green. What kind of utopia have I stumbled upon?

Well, one that I don’t understand any of the language. Again. I keep running into that problem. Stupid Australian who speaks only English.

Of course it is spring, the trees are blooming, the birds are singing, the sun is shining. Ahhhh. Perhaps it is the season that makes me see only good things here. Perhaps it is absolutely horrible in winter, and dastardly dull. That must be it. Or perhaps you get sick of (or scared of) such a well organised community at some stage.

View Larger Map

For some lighter relief, I took a bike for a ride today, into Austria. A crappy hired city bike, through some farm land, dirt tracks, back roads and a forest, to a town I had pointed out to me on Google map. The town name is slightly amusing, and the signs at the town entrance allow one to snicker, although I found the town exit sign more amusing. No more of that allowed outside of here. A few weeks ago I was in Ibiza and missed out – I should’ve just come here.

But the ride was, as the few runs were in the last days, really nice. Everything is green, flowers are out, birds chirping. You wont be surprised to hear that, even the tiny back roads are asphalt and smooth. And on the horizon to the south, I was slightly surprised to see the Austrian Alps. They look bigger than I expected. I’ve been there before, but that was almost 20 years ago… and they are within easy riding distance if I had my gear and didn’t have to come back to work…

Perhaps I should hurry up and find some more adjectives to use to describe this place so I can move on. Everything is so nice it is sickening. I am not complaining, as a work location it certainly beats a few places I’ve been.

Mobile Technology

I haven’t had a phone in about 2 years. I got one on Thursday, and lost it on Sunday. It wasn’t deliberate, perhaps I’m just not meant to be in the technological world yet.

Bock!

Since I have known Stefan and Sabine (which I am reminded was Australia Day, 2008) they have been known as “The Bock”. Slang I learnt from ‘The Swiss’, aka ‘The Cowtails’.

We spent some time together in Patagonia and Brazil; more or less three months (I should count the days one day – to see how long Stefan really had to suffer). I had a great time (both in SAm and last weekend). Sabine tells me that my English on the blog needs some work, so maybe she can post a reply with corrections We can joke, but I know for a fact that they speak more Portugeuse, and Spanish (although I’m rapidly closing in) that I. Oh, and maybe a little more German (or “bock”).

So last weekend I knew I was to be in Munich, which is pretty close to where Stefan and Sabine pass the time as teachers between cycling holidays. Being teachers, they were of course on holidays, but luckily not on a cycling tour. So I invited myself over and had a great weekend. I hope they enjoyed it as well. It just so happened that Stefan and Sabine were hosting a get together for some of their friends on Saturday night – which was great, except Sabine had forewarned all her single girlfriends to stay away . Lucky for them! They have put together a slide show of their trip photos, which was great. I haven’t – I started to a few times, but it takes a lot of effort. Perhaps they have inspired me to try again. To retaliate, I made them watch the movie that Stu produced of our April 2007 hike in Tassie. That was only 2 years ago. Amazing. For everyone on the hike, a lot has happened since.

S&S took me (S) around their home city of Regensburg  – a very nice place, even in the rain. We talked about Patagonia for hours. They cooked up a great memory – Argentinean steak and Malbec. Mmmmm. We needed to use the diary to remember something and found the scores of the dice game we played with names in the columns of S, S, S. Went for a run together. We looked at photos. Cooked up some food, waited for the rain to stop.

Monday was sunny. On a sunny day, the city and region around Regensburg is exceptional. Really. They must be very careful with their hospitality – I might take a liking to the area. Stefan leant me a bike, one of nine – my kind of people . We went for a gentle circuit around through the rolling hills (green this time of year), the Danube, the small villages. Great, real Germany.

Stefan let slip that in six weeks they will be crossing the Alps (by bike of course). I have a hole in my calendar just then…

Yacht Racing

Before I even started working in Europe, my new boss had me lined up for a yacht race to Ibiza. I’m not sure what his motivation in inviting me was: simply being friendly, wanting to ‘bond’, or desperately needing crew. Since I was (and still am) a useless sailor, I hope it wasn’t the last.

But I’m up for almost anything, at least once – so of course I jumped at the offer. This is a pretty big race: The Ruta de la Sal (the salt road – something to do with salt being desperately needed in Barcelona in 1846). It was a while later I found out they were dead serious about winning the race (on handicap, of course). “They” morphed into a crew of six very experienced sailors. Experienced, as in: four of them (currently) own a racing boat, one lives on a boat, and the other basically grew up on a boat. And they were mostly Dutch, flying in specifically for the race.

Right. I was suddenly a little out of my depth.

But hey, I was here. I’m fit, able and pretty intelligent, I can help out somehow, surely! Well, it turns out I can’t. I tried, I learnt most of the ropes/sheets/guys and roughly what they were used for, but I was simply inexperienced. So during the race itself, my most useful function was to keep out of everyone’s way, and put my body in the most advantageous position to help the balance of the yacht. Ie, go sit over there, out of the way. In all fairness, everyone did all they could, when they could, to include me in the operation of the boat. But the winds were extremely light for most of the race, which meant it was important to make changes very quickly to get the most out of the winds.

The boat has all the technology, a tactical computer, weather station, GPS. Four different sources of weather forecast. Each weather forecast uses a different model, and is slightly different. The computer calculated two optimal routes (based on different weather models) and guess what? We followed the one that dumped us into a patch of calm weather. Several times. Which is fine, if everyone has the same conditions. Apparently a short distance to the west there was wind. The crew got somewhat frustrated at having to work very hard all night to keep the boat moving. I found it quite relaxing. Sitting on the side of a yacht goodness knows where in the Mediteranian Sea, working on my tan by day, dozing on deck at night.

So some of the other boats got wind and we didn’t. So we didn’t win, although from what I saw we would have done very well if we had taken the course with wind. Next year: more technology to find the wind while we are out there. I was amazed at times to see the boat move at an angle to, but into the wind, faster than the wind speed. These guys could really sail this yacht.

The only period of wind came right at the end of the race. We had been basically dead in the water, within sight of the finish line, watching Ibiza not get any bigger for about 4 hours. Suddenly the weather changed (as was predicted, but at a different time). The wind swung around to the SW (the direction we were heading) and rose from more or less zero to ‘force 5′; 20 knots or so. Suddenly we needed to get the waterproofs on and hang of the side of the boat to help it stay down.

We left at 0800 on Thursday. Arrived 35.5 hours later on Friday evening. Approx 150 nautical miles. Average speed: around 4.2 kn, or maddeningly slow. No one had a whole lot of sleep, maybe two or three hours each. Even I didn’t, although sitting is not hard, we were constantly tacking, jibing, changing things up to get maximum speed. I probably got more than most. But we were all really beat up when we got into Ibiza – still ahead of a significant portion of the fleet. So we decided to go out for a meal, and then to a night club and dance all night. I mean until 6 am when the club closed.

Well, you know how much of a party animal I am not. But occasionally dancing is fun, so I did. We all got on pretty well, the others in the crew got pretty drunk. But I was surprised at how dead Ibiza was. This was certainly not the party capital I was expecting! It turns out that April is off season. Really off, as we found out by the weather. The wind that blew us across the finish line brought a storm, and it was crappy weather all the rest of that day and the next. So there were no tourists, a few locals, and no party goers. I’ll have to go back and scope it out later in the year. Or not.

So Saturday we slept. Until some ungodly hour, like 11am, when we had to get up to eat. We then made a few minor repairs to the yacht, restocked the larder and got things ready for the return to Barcelona. Getting there is only half the fun! The award presentation was on Saturday night, we had a small amount of excitement when we realised a boat ahead of us maybe wasn’t playing by all the rules and we could raise a challenge, which was dashed when we found out the time for challenges had long gone. So, for now, we have settled for 2nd in class, and 8th overall. From 150 entries. Still a damn good effort. I can say this because I didn’t really help (and I hope that I didn’t slow the boat).

During the awards presentation/feeding session, comments were made about the storm kicking up in the Med. Some discussion about 35 knot winds and 2-3 m waves. Before we set out, the crew scared the pants off of me by suggesting that I really should take the ferry back to Barcelona. Why me? Why not everyone? Was I especially likely to get into trouble? Was someone calling me soft? Needless to say I would have taken the ferry had I been ordered to, but not because of a bit of wind. Or should I? Was that wind really as bad as they were telling me?

Well, it turns out we managed to miss both of the storms. One passed to our east, the other out west. It took only 24 hours to get back (remember 36 hrs to get there). And we did it, essentially in one long tack. I think we tacked maybe 3 times, and changed sails once (dropped the storm genoa) in the whole trip, and generally got thrown around the boat. The seas weren’t all that huge, but in a 35 foot yacht, 2 meter waves will make everyone wet. The wind only got to 25 knots (which is still fairly respectable in my book). I can only imagine I would have preferred to be in the ferry if it ever got to the predicted 35-40knots (which I now know is a gale – ie walking is difficult).

But we survived. The wet weather gear I borrowed was certainly past it’s prime – I spent 24 hours in dampness, so I escaped below deck after about 2am on the trip back, when we were resonably certain we’d missed the really bad weather.

Next time: Get good wet weather gear. Take a book for the long periods of calm weather boredom. Have some sort of function in the crew.

I took some photos if you are interested.

Easter

I don’t know that I’ve broadcast it yet, but tomorrow morning (in 6 hours actually) I’m to take part in my first yacht race. I think we have a chance of winning – the boat is sporting a race number of “001″. Because this crew won last year.

Do you think now is a good time to tell the crew I don’t know a sheet from a guy, starboard from the helm? Actually, that is a lie. I picked some terms I do know, because the ones I don’t… well, I don’t know them.

I’m learning that my greatest asset may be my bulk. I suspect I’m going to be primarily ‘rail meat’. The main function of this crew member is to sit on the side of the boat (the rail) that is trying to come out of the water and hold it down. With my incredible bulk I’m sure that will be easy. I think the trick comes in when you have to stay awake all night and half of the next day, and definitely not fall off the boat.

I’ll do my best.

Home

I’m back home. For an itinerant that doesn’t mean very much. Ok, I’m back in Barcelona. But not for long.