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Agrandir le plan“>> The Route
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- paris et je t’aime
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- french crossings
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- ahhhhhh the delight of TEA
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- one of the french camps
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- ahhhh paris!
I`m a long way from Montague St, Brisbane, but closer to the revolution than ever.
Amsterdam – Paris, pedal power all the way to the city of love.
Most vehicles have captured my curiosity at least once. Trains of course, their beauty obvious… ships, their romance and mystery… even cars, where so many strangers have become friends. But bikes, for some reason, never stopped me in my tracks.
Sure, I rode mine through Holland a little, around cities back home, and always saw cyclists with respect… but never did i gaze at the two wheeled machine with love, admiration and pride.
Until I met someone, with so much dedication to this mode of transport, that almost all others were boycotted. Someone who knows the ins and outs of a bicycle as an extension of himself… where the sounds and creaks are a language he hears fluently.
After 600 kilometres up and down hills from Holland, through Belgium and into France, there is certainly a stronger connection between me and my rolling companion. I have learnt more about her structure, her desires and her shortcomings. I now know how to fix her flat, tension her chain, tighten her spokes. How to differentiate between a serious sound and just that bloody fender rattling again. How to maximise her on the downs and how to curse at her one speed on the ups.
Discoveries within have developed too. I have spent every night and day with someone who has as much if not more power than I do, and faced the challenges that followed. I`ve learnt to judge less, say what I really mean, and always love a little more.
What better place to practice than Paris in the spring? And all by bike of course!
