Welcome to the blog of Bike to the Future

Nice quiet relaxing day, by the lake here in Gubin.

Scrumptious 4 course meal courteous of our in-camp chef Simon: melon, tortellini, vegetable curry and fruit salad -THANKYOU Simon!

So over the border tomorrow

 ”Dzien dobry Polska” or  ”Czesc Polska” for the more ‘informal linguists’ amongst you

Article in German magazineArticle in German magazineA little early for a diary of the day’s events but in the meantime, some sexy footage of Les and team in the ‘Useful Links’ on right hand side of this page - titled “RTL Interview July 31st”

Now, about the day: we woke up in rain, pouring down in fact, packed up quickly and left at 8:15am without breakfast which we finally ate after our first 40km. The next 40km was wet, we all got soaked and stopped for lunch in a bus shelter; the good thing was that we only had another 50km to go so we just got back on the bikes and did it arriving at the campsite at 5:30pm - earlier than usual!

Some people’s energy knows no bounds - Smit and Jordanna were sprinting aganist each other all day, Peter (Swedish) too. Smit won the sprints GB 2 - Sweden 0! Trace has had a fantastic week cycling and has done every mile so far - a true inspiration. Simon  (Steady Eddie) has continually been available to help and encourage the team, put tents up etc. Joy has also done a fantastic job buying and preparing meals and encouraging everyone; Sandra has been doing a fabulous job driving.

We’re right on the Polish border tonight and we have a rest day tomorrow when we leave Germany - A huge THANKYOU to Peter (who has cycled 680 km across Germany) and to Sandra who has driven us across Germany).

The good thing is we haven’t got lost for two days so some things are improving - the weather not being one of them!

So, into Poland on Monday!

The Magdeburg campsite has been wonderful - one couple nearby charged all our electrical things up overnight, another couple did all our washing up as we were packing up this morning, another family donated bread…so after a late start (10:30am as Peter went to pick up Sandra who has agreed to drive for the rest of the week) we finally got going.

It was a lovely day, not too hot (although there was a headwind the first couple of hours) and the contrast of East to West Germany is apparent - here we are going for miles and miles past fields seeing nobody; the Eastern part of Germany seems empty.

We stopped this afternoon outside a house, and the lady living there came out and gave us all freshly picked tomatoes from her garden, then asked if we had music in the van. On answering ‘Yes’ she then proceeded to dance to the music and ask if we wanted to come to a wedding that evening in the village. Having declined the generous offer we continued on our way and arrived at the campsite at 5:45pm - 73 miles.

Another tooth (Les’ this time) got broken on the way (as Les is a vegetarian it can’t be the Wurst sausage again!)

We went to a reception in the evening organised by a Kone supplier, Jordhal, a metal fabricator. They laid on food and drink and made a video of the team; also a local Trebbin newspaper journalist came along and interviewed Les and the team. We had a tour of the factory and then returned to thunder and lightening over the campsite, so straight to bed to prepare for the last stage in Germany (and Peter’s last stage) before a rest day on Sunday, and then into Poland on Monday.

33 degrees with a headwind and undulating - not the easiest 100 miles done so far! (Again the stage should have been 90 miles - these extra miles keep on creeping in). Ralf Systermans (Kone) drove and his 12 year old son and friend (Hendrik and Till) each cycled 20km.

Stopping for lunch, several people stopped and asked about the bike ride (maybe they’ve seen the team on TV already!).

Luckily the bike tools include tweezers as they were required for Simon and Peter (Broberg, he is the sixth team member for the Germany stages) to extract a tic from the back of Les’ leg.

Les cycled 65 miles and decided that he would slow up the team if he carried on as the heat, wind and hills were slowing him up. The team battled on for the last 35 miles only arriving at the campsite in Magdeburg at 8:30pm. Apparently the German campsites are excellent but we’re not really seeing much of them! 

A shorter day (about 100km) tomorrow thankfully (although we’ve said that before!).

After a day’s rest the team was raring to go this morning, hence the 8:30am start. It was Les’ debut ride and he was a little apprehensive to say the least, cycling until lunchtime being his goal.

At the first stop Simon was eating a Wurst sandwich (or worst? (sorry!)) and broke his tooth on it! Must have been a solid German pig!

Lunch at the Kone Hanover office where, funnily enough eating a sandwich, Smit broke his front tooth (apparently false anyway!). Jordanna glued the tooth back together with superglue! Unfortunately this couldn’t be done with Simon’s.

After the Hanover stop Les decided that he felt good enough to do the whole day’s cycling so 20 miles on to Uetze making 73 miles total today. RTL (the biggest commercial TV station in the world) filmed the team on this last part of the route so if you happen to be in Germany tomorrow evening you will see the cyclists on TV and their interview. The local Uetze newspaper also interviewed Les, so Les is having his 15 minutes of fame (in Uetze - does that count?).

On we go tomorrow, hoping it is as flat as today!