Mar 26
A view from the bike on the way back. The open landscapes simply stunning, especially on a sunny day like this. Travelling while everybody else is working has it’s positive sides: there was hardly anyone on the road.
Speeds were better today: 141 kilometers in 6.5 hours, almost 22 km/h and that is including lunch breaks and some photo stops. Distance cycled this weekend: 370.
Mar 23
After working for half a day, I set off on my fully loaded recumbent bike for a trip through the provinces Utrecht, Gelderland, Flevoland, Overijssel and Drenthe. Because of forecasted headwind, I did expect a long and difficult ride. It turned out OK-ish, and my arrival in the town of Ruinen was just in time for evening tea. 166 kilometers total on this day.
Mar 13
Today I decided to practice getting a nail through the side of the back tire and repairing it at the side of the road. The lesson learned: the small pump I have is mightily inadequate for getting a tire up to the proper pressure…
Mar 12
The best birthday present en route to work: views like this on a foggy morning. The highways are jammed because of the fog, but for the country-road cyclist this is pure bliss: open views, water and the fire of the sun trying to get through. By the way: I crossed the 2000 kilometer mark since the start of the year last week!
Feb 05
Since the start of the year, cycle commuting has become a serious part of the working day. With close to 40 kilometer each day, 200 per week, the distances add up pretty fast. Last week, the wheels of my old bicycle rolled over the 1000th kilometer in this year. A very good training for what is to come… The conditions, especially in the last few days, have been quite challenging. Storms in the first weeks, snow and -17 degrees Celsius now. It can only get better from here. 1000 travelled so far, 11000 to go.
Jan 07
A beautiful film about people and the world. Filmed for free by so many people in their parallel universes on just one day, edited by professionals. Truly awesome.
http://www.youtube.com/user/lifeinaday
Watch it, this is a documentary that is well worth your time!
Jan 07
2011 has been a great year with many new experiences that have again helped in understanding more of the world we live in and getting more tolerant and open to all that it has to offer.
Inspired by Chris Guillebeau’s annual review articles on http://chrisguillebeau.com/3×5/2011-annual-review-the-beginning/ , I decided to give his idea a try. The annual review is a great way to reflect on the year that has passed. At the same time, it is a very helpful helpful tool for setting new goals for the next year, the next step that will follow in a short while… Thanks for the ideas, Chris!
What went well in 2011?
Travel:
The year started with the first real backpacking trip in a long time. That almost 2-month trip brought all that I could hope for: beautiful sights, solitude, awesome people, great food and lots more. Sitting on the plane for the last long leg back home, the sudden realization came that, although the other side of the world has shown me so many fantastic things, my own continent must hold many things that could be just as great. This was when I decided that I should explore more of Europe before getting on my next long haul flight. What I have seen so far did not disappoint. Especially Eastern-Europe is an interesting place that deserves more attention in the near future.
Travel metrics of last year:
– 13 flights
– 8 long train journeys
– 8 bus trips
– 6 days solo walking on track through the wilderness
– 5 lifts
– 48 beds
– 11 countries
– 3 continents
– almost 3 months on the road
I had interesting conversations with people from China, Hong Kong, Israel, Great Britain, United States, Japan, Korea, Germany, Italy, Czech Republic, France, Australia, Austria, Switzerland, Denmark, Sweden, Poland, Ukraine, Russia, Norway, India, Latvia, Ireland, New Zealand and Canada. A fantastic way of getting a broader view on the world.
Paragliding:
Even though not a whole lot of flying was planned for this year, I managed to squeeze out a very reasonable number of flights at many different locations. Especially the unsupervised flights were awesome. New, unfamiliar locations were interesting too.
– 28 flights
– 9 launch locations
– 7 landing locations
– 11 hours, 45 minutes flight time
– 3 landings away from official landing field
Bicycle riding:
– 135 commutes to train station (18 km return trip)
– 2 complete commutes to work (136 km return trip)
– a little bit of recreational riding
– around 3500 km covered
Throb Audio:
Officially started the company at the first of April.
– Delivered great sounding custom-built loudspeakers to several happy customers
– Produced good sound recordings in two famous venues
Garden:
– Yield has been good for tomatoes, capsicum, pepper, potato, strawberry, rhubarb, rocket, grapes
What did not go so well in 2011?
Travel:
– some signs of ‘traveler fatigue’: another beach, another city…
– I took the easy way of traveling from city to city too often, missing some of the ‘real’ places
– I was not always ‘outgoing’ enough, missing out on some interesting contacts
Home:
– I did not do some long-overdue rebuilding of the rear facade
– It is a big mess far too often
Bicycle riding:
– Maintenance of material has not been optimal
Paragliding:
– After some flights in an area I get bored, while I should learn more
Throb Audio:
– The finishing quality was not always as perfect as I would have liked. This was more a cause of not wanting to deliver late; more careful planning needed in the future.
Garden:
– Neglect at some crucial moments resulted in lower yield for beans, carrots and cilantro
Dec 12
The bar with the best view over Riga from the 26th floot of the highest building in town.
Dec 11
To see something of the Latvian countryside, I hopped on the train to the little town named Cesis, hoping to avoid crowds in the more popular weekend get-away place Zigulda. Cesis is the final destination on this line at about 2 hours from Riga.
The crowds I avoided: there was hardly anyone there. There was a Jehovah’s Witness however… The town is small with a tiny historic center that is also the home of one of Latvia’s oldest buildings: St. John’s church. Beautiful from the inside, but slowly disintegrating from the outside. This seems to be true for most of the buildings by the way.
The weather: terribly cold but not quite cold enough to freeze all the sludge in the holes and cracks in roads and pavements. Nice if you accidentally step in one…
Dec 10
One example of a lighted Christmas tree of which they are so fond in Riga. Most ‘trees’ are not trees at all, but simply trangular structures with lights on the outside. Unfortunately, there is mostly no decoration apart from the lights…
For the rest: the weather gods decided that rain is the precipitation of choice. The rain in combination with temperatures around 0 degrees and a very strong wind makes that being outside feels like being in Siberia. The Christmas markets do look a bit out of place in these conditions.
Dec 09
En route from Eindhoven to Riga over the Baltic Sea. The flight is about 30 minutes shorter than usual (wonder how they know, this is the first flight on the route) due to a strong tail wind: 1000 km/h groundspeed on an A320!
Nov 06
Sometimes, you arrive at a place that unexpectedly turns out to be pure magic. This is one such place that I stumbled upon during a long autumn walk for testing out some new walking shoes.
At only 2 hours walking distance from my home, there is this path through a very dark and humid part af the forest. Moss growing not only on the ground, but also in the trees. Mushrooms of many types and sizes everywhere. The result looks like an underwater forest with seaweed hanging from the branches, very surreal.
Oct 30
The second day today of a walk around the island Schiermonnikoog. Yesterday, I walked eastward over the beach and back through the tidal area on the Waddenzee. This was a bit more soggy than expected, resulting in soaked shoes and trousers. At some points the (tiny) path would just end on one side of a fairly wide creek, and go on on the other side… Total distance covered was around 30 kilometer.
The Western part was covered today, with a very comfortable 8 kilometres over dry paths.
Oct 23
Received an overview of my annual electricity usage, compared to the average household usage today. 880 kWh for me versus 3500 kWh on average, the result of using efficient appliances and using them as little as possible.
Of coarse I am quite pleased with this, deliberate use of energy does pay off!
Oct 18
The wind finally changed direction, making more interesting flights possible. The hight difference of almost 1500 meters made for an interesting flight along the first mountains on the edge of the Po plain. The landing with pretty strong easterly winds proved a challenge with my comparatively slow wing: I found a place to land around 30 meters short of the landing field. Only one wing tip in a small olive tree…
Conditions improved further in the afternoon, making long and high flights possible.
Oct 16
We moved to Bassano del Grappa, where the sites are at least flyable. Nothing great for long-distance flying, but at least a few new start and landing locations and nice and sunny weather.
Oct 16
Snow, wind and very high and steep mountains. Not an ideal combination if paragliding above this fantastic landscape is the goal…
Oct 08
It does look like the middle of winter here on the Fernpass. Lots of snow and bloody cold…
Oct 06
Watch this fantastic speech that Steve Jobs gave at Stanford University a few years ago. Very sad news today that he is no longer with us.
If you have 15 minutes of spare time, watch this video (better just make time for it):
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=D1R-jKKp3NA
Stay Hungry. Stay Foolish.
