2020 : Our Rides in Words, Photos & Videos

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David...those lop-eared Brahma (I think) do great in the heat. Always wary when bulls are involved.
Many years ago my brother on a Honda motorcycle stopped at a crest on a remote place on the Blue Ridge Parkway. The brush stirred and out came, one at a time, three little cubs (Black bear). Brother started taking photos and then through the lens came mama not too happy. He shoved off while taking a few more pictures of the bear charging. He missed his first try at ignition but was running with the bike downhill...then he got it started.
At the campground that night he described the incident to a park ranger who politely dismissed his claim. After he had the photos developed he mailed them to the park. The next year when he returned they had posted the pictures at the nature center explaining the mama had probably adopted the third cub.
 
"Bread basket" - Today's ride with Charl along the wheat fields nestled up to the foothills, certainly about ready for harvesting and looks great - now if only those dark clouds along the west mountains hold off for a few more days . . .
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Looks like smoke way back there.
For sure, southeast British Columbia took some lightning hits last weekend and fire season is rolling now with the Doctor Creek fire area in the East Kootenays one we are keeping a close eye on as we have a family cabin in the area. I was wondering if some of the smoke on your Salmon Creek pictures might be drifting down from the fire by Penticton?
 
Ready to charge?
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Fairney View, Queensland
I've watched sufficient wildlife documentaries shot on the Serengeti plains to know what happens next. I kept my Trek Powerfly between me and them and made sure that the motor was set to Turbo.

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o.k. yesterday I'm making some smart -ss comments about magpies, David, and today you have to show me some bulls, back in my wheel house as our family raises bulls for rodeos, so a picture of my grandson feeding a calf before they become terrors, then a bull named "wish-chip" after Charl's happy-hour penchant for chips folded over and this bull's ability to fold over riders, and finally my son on the left racing with the milk bottle on the wild cow milking contest for these ranch rodeo competitions that has nothing to do with biking but fun . . .now I am open game to my posts . . .
 

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Took a swim in the lake early in the morning

It's better if you have a bike to transfer yourself to the lake fast since it is some km from the village (it's a walking distance though). The host can rent trad bikes.

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Lake Lubicz Wielki at dawn.

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Having your own e-MTB means being in a luxurious position there.

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Extremely well maintained recreation site at the lake. Foresters seem to really care.

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Last Friday's party with our hosts. The farm is not a hotel. You feel at home with caring friends there. I'm going to give the farm 10/10 rating at Booking.com (actually they do have the 10/10 rating already there).
 
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Messin' around on the moors on my Haibike.
There has been considerable comment on the forum related to fat-tyred ebikes but, somehow, this thread has missed out on fat tyre enthusiasts documenting their adventures. Fixed at last!

Thanks, FBR. More please.
… David
 
QUOTE="Stefan Mikes, post: 321235, member: 27790"]
Took a swim in the lake early in the morning

It's better if you have a bike to transfer yourself to the lake fast since it is some km from the village (it's a walking distance though). The host can rent trad bikes.

View attachment 63138
Lake Lubicz Wielki at dawn.

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Having your own e-MTB means being in a luxurious position there.

View attachment 63140
Extremely well maintained recreation site at the lake. Foresters seem to really care.

View attachment 63141
Last Friday's party with our hosts. The farm is not a hotel. You feel at home with caring friends there. I'm going to give the farm 10/10 rating at Booking.com (actually they do have the 10/10 rating already there).

[/QUOTE]
Took a swim in the lake early in the morning

It's better if you have a bike to transfer yourself to the lake fast since it is some km from the village (it's a walking distance though). The host can rent trad bikes.

View attachment 63138
Lake Lubicz Wielki at dawn.


Having your own e-MTB means being in a luxurious position there.


Extremely well maintained recreation site at the lake. Foresters seem to really care.


Last Friday's party with our hosts. The farm is not a hotel. You feel at home with caring friends there. I'm going to give the farm 10/10 rating at Booking.com (actually they do have the 10/10 rating already there).
Beautifull photos, @StefanMikes .Either you have your new camera dialed in, or perhaps Brix is pretty good with a camera? 😃
 
For sure, southeast British Columbia took some lightning hits last weekend and fire season is rolling now with the Doctor Creek fire area in the East Kootenays one we are keeping a close eye on as we have a family cabin in the area. I was wondering if some of the smoke on your Salmon Creek pictures might be drifting down from the fire by Penticton?

Our smoke and ash, yup ash has been falling off and on, are from the Palmer fire which is only about 30 or so miles away. Your country was getting the smoke from that yesterday. The winds were from the south and pretty gusty here. It's a crap shoot. So far it isn't bad here this morning. I plan to bike up and see how many helicopters are at the airport today.

The Palmer fire is burning up some very pretty country. Homes have burned also. I was planning on riding around in that country when the weather cooled down. I still might do that. It's another road without a lot of traffic.
 
Took a swim in the lake early in the morning
It's better if you have a bike to transfer yourself to the lake fast since it is some km from the village (it's a walking distance though). The host can rent trad bikes.
View attachment 63138 Lake Lubicz Wielki at dawn.
View attachment 63139 Having your own e-MTB means being in a luxurious position there.
View attachment 63140 Extremely well maintained recreation site at the lake. Foresters seem to really care.
View attachment 63141 Last Friday's party with our hosts. The farm is not a hotel. You feel at home with caring friends there.
I'm going to give the farm 10/10 rating at Booking.com (actually they do have the 10/10 rating already there).

Your early morning lake dip reminded me of this... ;)

 
Sheltering from the sun …
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Brisbane River
  • Foreground : Go Between Bridge – road, pedestrians, bikes
  • Beyond : Merivale Bridge – trains
2020-07-20-map.jpg


Just beyond the 57 km marker, there is a hole-in-the-ground (preposterously expensive tourist development). Soon there will be a new pedestrian bridge across the river to the 33 km marker.

I'm not sure whether mere cyclists will be permitted to use the new bridge. Even if we are, it might be too dangerous as it will link tourist attractions – think selfie-taking groups too fleetingly in town to have noticed that cyclists keep to the left!

For this year, the cycle paths and bridges are for us locals.
 
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Your early morning lake dip reminded me of this... ;)
Except, water in my lake was very warm :)
And guess what? I rode back to the farm, we packed the car, ate delicious breakfast, said good-byes to our hosts...

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...drove to Tuczno so Brix could say good-bye to her Grandma... (This photo was taken remotely by Brix' brother Kalon from Kraków, 569 km away, using the family's private security camera mounted on the Grandma's block of flats!)

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...and then the weather in the whole country suddenly changed to thunderstorms and violent raining! We were so lucky with the West Pomerania trip!

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We had a single longer stop on the long return trip. Here, in Toruń (Thorn), an ancient Teutonic big city, the birthplace of one Nicolaus Copernicus (see the blurred statue in the background).
 
Hot, Hot Day in West Pomerania

As I mentioned before, last Friday began with a quickie 32 km ride on Vado to Tuczno and back for breakfast. I am an early bird. The breakfast (with fresh bread and buns baked by the hostess Ewa) was announced to 8:45 a.m., so I was short on time. I rode the Vado on purpose: a. To see if it could ride off-road (hardly) b. To experience the Brix' ordeal of the day before myself.

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32 km in 1 h 20 mins. 13 km off-road in 40 minutes and 19 km on-road also in 40 minutes. Poor Brix... She wouldn't have managed the off-road ride (we rode on-road only on Thursday). Poor girl suffered so much on the "washboard" gravel segment; me, too; my arms are still hurting. And I forgot I was fit, while she was not, so I was riding fast like a madman and she had to follow me, good it was the speed Vado... Poor girl! She appreciated her e-bike on hills, though. And I can tell you: You really need 1600-1700 lumen headlight in the forest at night; both of us had such headlamps, luckily.

I have shown you the Tuczno Castle before. Interesting place. The castle was built in 14th c. by von Wedel-Tuczyński family, who were subjects of the Polish Crown and were even fighting the Teutonic Knights! Tuczno was a Polish town in the Germany frontier area until the Partitions of Poland. (I was not aware of that until my visit there).

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This is the Saturday's breakfast. The Friday's one was far, far bigger and with even more options (we breakfasted with a couple of canoeists). Scrambled eggs not shown. And those freshly baked buns! Ah! I braked in the garden at 8:45, when the host Michał was just coming with the pan of scrambled eggs! :)


Brix said "pass" and decided to spend the day on leisure. She was very right about that as the future showed. Michał and Ewa, who maintain friendly atmosphere with the guests at their farm (they are urban people from Poznań with a great passion for countryside life) produced maps and explained to me what route to take for my Giant Trance E+ ride in the wilderness.

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It was a hot, hot day. I think it was 35 C (95 F) with strong, hot headwind. The first part of the trip led through dry dirt roads completely damaged by heavy forestry machines. (The forest industry is one of the most important in the area). The forest teemed with wildlife. Deer were running across my path! I was so glad to ride a full-suspension e-bike with terrain tyres! After relatively short ride, I had to take the first stop.

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Past Nowa Korytnica, I found the "forest freeways", the pride of local foresters (as described by Michał). These are wide gravel roads and are smooth! Unluckily, the surface is fine gravel made of very hard rock. It killed my front Rekon tubeless tyre. I was sprayed with the sealant gushing through the puncture!

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What to do now?! All information on tubeless bike tyres claims a small puncture should seal by itself. And you can ride at extremely low pressure. I jumped onto the Trance and rode very quickly back to the camping-site in Nowa Korytnica. There, I sat in the shadow and started thinking. Then I reached into my pannier to find a "MTB pump" there. A miracle! The sealant -- given some time -- really worked! I was able to inflate the tyre to 1.8 bar (26 psi) and could continue the ride. The day was saved. Now, I can understand why MTBers love the tubeless...

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The Grandma said the day before: "You're going to see the Castle in Niemieńsko!" I didn't risk riding the "forest freeway" again, and chose asphalt road. The Niemieńsko castle is in fact a post-German hunting mansion, hosting an institution for mentally disabled youth for past 50 years. The kids are taught here how to live and survive in the society.

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Having met two nice farmers taking shelter against sun in some village (it was a very pleasant chat; they told me a lot about the area and also gave directions), I rode many kilometres via forest dirt roads (avoiding gravel!) to finally hit the main highway #10 and reach the town of Kalisz Pomorski (Latin: Nova Calisia, German: Kallies).


I need to tell you something about the history. The area I have been on our trip not only belonged to Germany before 1945 but it also was in the Germany-Poland's frontier area. Germany was convinced the Polish would start a war some day. Since 1930, construction of so called Pomeranian Wall, or a system of modern fortifications started. With the rise of Nazi, the area was fortified even more. In the beginning of 1945, Polish Army (part of the Soviet Army) was given the task to break the Pomeranian Wall. It was a slaughter. The Poles eventually broke the Wall at the cost of numerous lives. After 1945, the region became heavily militarised, and the NATO military is still there, having replaced the Soviets who withdrew (as the Russian Army) from Poland only on September 18th, 1993. The area is less militarised now, and the Allies actually pay for their stay but generally, demilitarisation meant some economic collapse for the region.

(The fact NATO pay for their stay has actually resulted in economic growth of Kalisz Pomorski, specifically, as the main training range is in the town's jurisdiction).

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At the "Stanica" cafe in Kalisz Pomorski.

I was talking a lot about "wilderness" of the area. Yes, there are good and bad sides of that. Good thing is you recreate in real wildlife Nature area, far from civilisation. Bad side is you are far from civilisation :) Find an ATM there. There is a single operating ATM in Kalisz Pomorski (you'd find more in Mirosławiec). Don't expect anything fancy from the "Stanica" cafe: ice-cream from a fridge, no sugar-free drinks except of mineral water but at least coffee was good. Want to buy bread at a village store? Nope. You need to pre-order that! (But you can buy anything you need in any of the small towns, which are sparse and far away). The phone/internet coverage is poor. It is hard to find a restaurant there, even in towns.

For all these reason, a farm such as Satnatorium (exact name) is a miracle there. Because your hosts will feed you, ensure you can use WiFi, rent you a bike, and will provide everything you need. You just enjoy your stay! And you can even play tennis in Nowa Studnica, or rent a canoe, too.

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When I was enjoying coffee and ice-cream in Stanica, Brix texted me: "The dinner is ready in 1.5 h. Hurry up!" No need to hurry. It was just 12 km more ride left... :)

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51.8 km in 2 h 27 min (ride time). I was terribly tired afterwards but Brix and the hosts produced cold wine from the fridge after the dinner... I could not resist it!

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The place of our stay with the names of all 16 Polish regions (voivodships).
 
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25 dry miles and 28 wet miles was the story of my day, the weather forecasters failed today for sure! All week the forecast for today was mainly dry with possible light showers, the light showers turned to persistent light rain followed by persistent heavy rain and I got home soaked! 53 incident free miles and half a mile from home an idiot in a car passed me with about 6" to spare and there was no other traffic on the road!!!!! I'm almost certain he was messing about with his phone, at least he did wave an apology!

It was a little cooler than @Stefan Mikes 35C ;) A lovely 14C which was just perfect even in the rain, it was still a fun ride despite the rain and the moron in the car, you can see the beauty I encountered in my photos! Of course now that I'm home the rain has gone, just your luck some days!:p

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