Happy encounters (page 3) - CycleBlaze

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Happy encounters (page 3)

David ChavezTo Leo Woodland

I’d have to think long and hard about my “happiest” encounter, but my most interesting by far was with John in June 2019.   It was in New York state while I on my way to San Francisco and he was heading east on his way to Vermont.  Interesting, because I had first met John in September 2018 when I had just coasted down from Lake Tahoe on my way east while he was starting the climb up the hill heading to Oregon.  Nine months later we met again, each heading in the opposite direction.  It remains a mind boggling coincidence, especially because the second time we were both following the Erie Canal yet at the time of our encounter were taking a break from the tow path and found ourselves on a random highway...

Westbound John. California/Nevada border, September 2018
Eastbound John. New York state, June 2019
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3 years ago
Kathleen ClassenTo John Pescatore

John, I had to look up the Aland Islands. What an amazing part of the world. I am going back to read more now. 

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3 years ago
John PescatoreTo Kathleen Classen

Hi, Kathleen - if you didn't see my journal of our tour, it is here.

I think I mentioned in the journal that it would have been very doable self-supported, at least in "normal" times. 

I've never been a history buff, but the history of the islands is very interesting, with Sweden and Finland and Russia all involved over centuries. I'm always amazed in Europe how casually people talk about events from the 15th century!

I remember back 15 years or so, flying into Brussels and talking to the guy next to me who managed a factory in Belgium. He said (I may be garbling some of this) one side of the factory floor had machines with French instructions and the other side had the same machines with  Dutch instructions because there was tension between the different language-speakers. When I asked why, he casually talked about battles in the forest between Flanders and Wallonia in the 5th century long before Belgium even existed...

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3 years ago
Kathleen ClassenTo John Pescatore

It is so much fun to discover somewhere new to dream about biking, and so lovely to wake up to such a great idea for a morning activity...read a bike blog.  It has actually snowed here in Victoria BC (we like to pretend it never does that) and so life has ground to a complete halt, as we don’t cope well when the rest of Canada misplaces their snow. Reading about your trip was a wonderful diversion. You had me at ‘man doesn’t notice passport had expired’. I laughed out loud, although I don’t imagine it was very funny at the time. Keith and I joke that we only want to make every mistake once, but we do seem doomed to make every mistake.

We both want to bike tour in northern Europe, for all kinds of reasons. Your blog has really given me food for thought. While we wait for vaccines, for that day when we feel comfortable with long haul flights and we have tickets in hand we can dream, and ride locally...when this silly snow melts!

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3 years ago