The 23-hour day

October 29, 2021

Got kind of tired packing and unpacking
Town to town and up and down the dial
Maybe you and me were never meant to be
But baby think of me once in awhile

My television-addled brain triggers this verse whenever the rigors of life on the road start to wear me down. Why am I humming it at the airport? It must be the strain of all this gear. The two gigantic bike boxes, and the two relatively tiny handlebar bags barely fit on the cart. There's no way for us to use a second cart. Any time we move, one person has to be out front, serving as the eyes for the person doing the pushing. I carry the duffel, which has the two small panniers and our tent, on my back. A large pannier hangs from each of my shoulders. I'm carrying almost the full weight of what my bicycle carried. I complain about dragging this from the terminal door to the checkin counter, yet my bike dutifully bore the burden for almost 3000 kilometers. What an incredible machine.

Last night was typical for us at this hostel. The walls are thin. People strike up conversations in the halls any time between 5am and midnight. It's the down side of staying in such affordable and flexible lodgings. The lack of sleep certainly has contributed to my lack of energy over the past few days. We finished taping the bike boxes, and we organized our gear as well as we could.

I kept telling myself that there is no reason to worry about today's journey. Yes, there are any number of things that could go wrong, but there will be solutions. First concern is whether the taxi will show up. It's right on time. See? Second is how the driver reacts to seeing the boxes. We told the dispatcher about the boxes, but I'm pretty sure the message doesn't get passed along. This driver is not too happy. We can't fit the boxes in without lowering all the rear seats. The driver says we'll have to call a second cab, since he can only carry one passenger once the boxes are loaded. We say ok, if that's what we have to do... but a few seconds later he's acquiescing to Sunyoung's offer to sit on top of one of the lowered seats. It's unsafe, and probably illegal. I'm surprised the cabbie gave in so easily.

It's only as we approach the airport that he starts guilt-tripping us in his limited English about the risk he's taking. It was starting to work on me, but Sunyoung reminded me that it's no fault of ours that he was put into this situation. We told the cab company exactly what we were carrying, even offering the dimensions of the boxes to them. And what about the risk Sunyoung took by riding without a seat belt? We tipped him what we had originally agreed upon for the extra work of handling our unusual luggage, but no more.

The next stage of the gauntlet is checkin. It was somewhat comical, since the boxes obscured our view of the staff. A voice from somewhere asked all the usual questions, plus the "have you deflated your tires?" question, which I'd always been prepared for but had never been asked until now. I had in fact deflated the tires, but if I hadn't, do you think I would've told them the truth?

In all our previous experiences, we have had to move the boxes to another area for them to be inspected. This time, two cheerful gentleman were called to cart them off for us. We watched as they deftly weaved through the crowd towards the elevators.

We went through security, arrived at our gate, and found two incredibly comfy chairs to sit in. Good thing, too, because the Lufthansa flight currently occupying the gate was taking its sweet time to deplane and board. Meanwhile, we could see our bike boxes among the luggage being staged. The Icelandair jet approached and waited patiently for the Lufthansa plane to do its thing. I tried not to think about the rain that was soaking our big beautiful bike boxes.

Well, Icelandair appears to make all its money carrying cargo. There were no fewer than 12 large containers removed from the belly of the arriving plane, and at least 6 added to it. I think our boxes were the last items to go on. They had been exposed to the elements for at least an hour. Again, I told myself that everything was going to be fine, that even if the boxes melted into a soggy mess, it was out of my control.

Now I started to think about how the plane is running late. What if we miss our connection? What if our luggage misses the connection? I imagined not having to assemble the bikes at the airport, but instead having them delivered to our house by courier the next day. How sweet would that be?

Airlines pad flight times to improve their statistics, so we made our connection with no problem. Over the course of the second flight, I slowly started turning into a zombie as our bedtime passed. I don't sleep on planes, and even if I could, I was determined to power through the time zone difference and minimize jet lag. I just wanted this to be over with.

Zombie me made it through customs, baggage claim, an airport train ride, and an elevator ride to get to our bike assembly spot. Usually we head over to the "official" bike assembly station at Baggage Claim 14, but tonight we plunked ourselves down near the elevator. So yeah, the boxes were pretty soggy, but they survived and protected the bikes well. It was a real treat to have so little to reassemble. I made quick work of it. We took turns changing into more bike-friendly clothes, mounted our panniers, then made our way to the light rail station at 8pm.

A nearly-empty train made our trip easy. I used a bungee cord to secure my bike to a bank of seats, so I could sit down rather than babysit the bike the whole time. We exited at Husky Stadium, turned on our lights, and hit the Burke-Gilman trail for our last ride of the tour. We stopped at a pizza place near home, but the person in front of me bought the last slices. I didn't want to wait around for them to cook another pie. Instead, we went home and reheated some frozen vegetables and rice. A healthier choice, anyway.

After being away so long, I was surprised how quickly I embraced the familiarity and comfort of home. That attitude may change when we start to miss the people and things that made us happy during the tour.

I will add a couple of entries to sum up our experiences. Perhaps one tomorrow, and another a few days later when it's a little further in the rear view mirror.

Today's ride: 8 km (5 miles)
Total: 2,883 km (1,790 miles)

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