On the road again

Hitchhiking in Morocco is one of the world wonders! After being horribly followed because of my western look in the touristic Chauen not far from the Northern coast I hitched the next day to Rabat. It seems especially the middle-class is picking me up. The poorest people don't own cars and travel by overly packed old mercedes taxi's that are appearing everywhere in massive amounts with never less than 6 passengers. 2 in the frontchair, 4 in the back. The rich people do not seem to be interested in the theme of hitchhiking, they live their own lives way above the rest of the poor country. The middle class "la verdad es aqui se vive la vida de puta madre" of small businessman use to pick me up within 15 minutes whatever speed they are cruising or whatever place I have parked myself. They also like to spend their money on me, which I tend to accept after one or two polite refusals. It is a complete chaos over here, but for me an exotic chaos, a lot of the not tourist-oriented people seem friendly, the food is delicious and cheap and even the drinking water doesn't give me problems yet. Last night I spend my first night in a youth hostal, this night I hope to stay at another beautiful ;) couchsurfers place and monday the Mauritanian embassy opens its doors again to obtain a visa. Let's see what happens in between. Ciao! G

Morocco, here I come!

Elvis has left the building. After a week of 5-star care by my cousins Floris and Inge I should have gained enough of "the force" for a long time again, don't you think? A world-record Spanish hitchhike of 100 km in 1 hour with a BWX X5 brought me in Malaga where I encountered some serious Polish Erasmus party-animals. I also picked up my second Osho Zen book about Meditation: The first and last freedom, and am wondering if this will one day learn me also to realy enjoy partying again. At the moment I enjoy the free internet in a Mc Donalds to find myself some couchsurfers in Algeciras where I want to take the boat to "the dark side" of the world. To conclude I will give you my recently updated frequently asked questions top 3: Are you never afraid? Don't you ever feel afraid? Do some things make you afraid? Not yet :) Take care, G

To be or not to be?

Long time no message! After two weeks of hitchhiking I am back in Motril at my cousins house. I consider this experience long enough to tell you that hitchhiking in Spain for a male person is not like it is in the Benelux and surroundings. It took me 5 days to cover the 500 km to the south east of Spain from Madrid. And please take into account that I walked half of this and I took the bus the other half. Hours and hours of waiting on one place is not an exception, it is a rule. It doesn't matter, I had the time, won some patience, spend some nice time after three invitations from locals to eat and sleep in there house and besides, it was part of the game. Via a very quiet hippie oasis near Cabo de Gata I hitched through the Alpujarra or south part of the beautiful Sierra Nevada to Beneficio again. Here I hoped to meet the beautiful dutch girl again. And I did. By funny coincidence she was naked when I walked up the mountain to her tipi, but the story doesn't end as you might think... In stead, I met her ex, which was still in the picture. But, exactly this man inspired me a lot by giving me a Zen book to read from Osho. After Siddharta It made me again feel the will to live the life more as a witness then as a victim, lose instead of find my ego and enjoy the liberty of the absolute nothing. Don't worry, this might take me the rest of my life and it won't deprive my life of the things the conventional religions try to. And now finaly, I will try to get my ass on the road to black Africa! Ciao, Geert

Madrid

Hello there! I am still in Madrid, but not for long anymore. Tomorrow I will be on the road again, hitchhiking to Murcia. Hitchhiking in Spain seems incredibly slow, but my patience is also not to underestimate so let's see if these two go well together. Since my last message I helped Enrique move his house to Amsterdam and bought the book "the project me" for Thomas, so let's see if these friends of mine can get there life on the road again soon :) Today the spanish health system injected me with some stuff against Meningitis and Yellow Fibre and they gave me a ticket for anti Malaria. If all this is not going to help me through Africa, probably nothing will. For the nerds among us, after a lot of thinking, Yesterday I ordered a camera and the MSI Wind U115 with an extra 9 cell battery. According to youtube tests this will give a whopping 40 hours of textediting time to professionalize my diary. Besides, I hope this banned hybrid netbook will become a real collectors item to be one day sold for more money than I spend on it :) Ciao, G

Beneficio

Hi Babylonians, how are you? I am feeling as happy as ever again, after some amazing days especially in the community of Beneficio in Orgiva. It took me a couple of hours walking and hitchhiking to reach this place 30 km north from my cousin in Motril. The place is situated in a relatively green valley northwards of Orgiva where 20 years ago some English hippies started the community by squating and later partly buying the abandoned land. Others were invited to join and one lived next to love and peace with some rules of no alcohol, no dogs, np open fire and no fixed buildings. Nowadays, the place has converted in complete anarchy and is occupied by all kinds of people. The magic words are freedom and ganja/marihuana. Almost everyone is stoned the complete day, but still in a communicative way. In my opinion the art of freedom that is lived here is mainly getting away as far as possible from the capitalistic world which everyone calls Babylon. The place hosts a lot of travelers like me, some of which are staying for months or one winter, but some people have lived here since the start with their complete family. Some act very social and close to nature wheras others live their life very isolated in a bunch of plastic garbage. Some live in tents or tipi's, others have constructed their complete houses. Some are probably very wealthy, others are extremely poor. To resume, it is a complete chaos. After one day though I found some people that did fit my state of mind somewhere up in the forest and spend some great nights with them, the fire, chestnuts, tea and ganga. The thing I didn't find much was the feeling of a community in harmony, because it hardly exists anymore in this place. This is the main reason that I didn't feel like staying for a long time. But then again, I spend the morning that I left with a Dutch girl somewhere near her tipi situated on an extremely quiet place, higher on the mountains, sharing our lives, enjoying the sun and nature, and swimming in an amazing home-made swimming pool. It left me with a fairytale in my mind and a feeling of going back some of the days that lay ahead. I am very interested in what will happen... At the moment I am in Madrid, saying hello to some friends, and afterwards I think I will be heading to Murcia to pick up the route to Cabo de Gata where I ended by bike. In the meantime my plans have changed a lot and I am thinking about sending the bike to Holland and continuing walking/hitchhiking through Africa. My idea is to invent myself some internet-job that gives me the opportunity to work and travel together for a long time, but I will only start working on this theme when I have returned in NL maybe before next winter. Enfin, that's about my story for the moment. Please don't hesitate to share some interesting things of your life if you think of me one day. Un abrazo for now, G

No more biking

Guapos y guapas, I am in Motril, Andalucia!!! 1 Thing, the last 350 km's I hitchhiked with my cousin who was nearby for business. A pain for the "transport your life on a bike" part of myself, probably a gain for the other "safe your back, you only have one" part. Besides of a splendid 25-30 degree weather here, I spend some time with my family getting to know there life little by little. Going to business meetings in the vegetable export sector, bringing kids to school, the household things and dancing the tango with locals, it's all part of the game. Next days I will pass Granada and visit some friends in Madrid. This time I will make up my mind on the next step. My current feeling is that I will look for a place to stay for a longer time to give the back some rest and if this doesn't fit my travel-mind I take the backpack to Africa. More and more I am becoming interested in the black part of Africa as an alternative for the Northern part. Some secondary variables as climat zones, leaving my bike alone in Andalucia and a house which will be demolished end 2010 have me bothered a little, but these are all to overcome in some way. Time will learn me what will happen but I am still open for any suggestions :)

Rendez-vous at midnight

Guess what, I am still alive! I had a variable time cycling from Barcelona to Alicante where I am surfing a couch right now. One of the highlights definitely was the day before I arrived at Alicante. The spanish bakers didn´t cooperate very much on my yesterday bread schedule and I got that much fed up with them that I contracted the Lidl to supply me with a 1 kg Christmas Stoll. Together with the wind it got me into an astounding human powered world record braking coverance of more than 100 km on 1 day for a person with back problems without hearting his back. In complete dark, around 23:30 I passed the highest point between Denia and Calpe at 200m above sea level on the N322. Then I let myself fall into the depth again to Calpe to look for a place to spend the night. At midnight I noticed another cyclist on the other side of the road and I stopped to say hello. The man turned out to be some Petr from The Chech Republic. Together with a friend he hitchhiked to Italy and France where his friend left him. Then he bought a bike with only 1 gear but no less then 6 bags and made it as far as Calpe. There his legs were starting to hurt him too much and he decided to stay for a couple of days or weeks for a rest. These days he made himself his own campingsite in a little forest between the motorway and the railway with his tent, cooking place, benches, rock-fridge, water and foodstock. He started to make drawings on the beach for 5 euro´s each. Besides he discovered that the supermarkets around didn´t close their garbage containers and he was really swimming in the most luxurous food you can wish yourself as a homeless person. That night we shared our lives, watched the stars, made a fire and drank some tea. The next morning we ate bread with a lot of ham and eggs and enjoyed the sunny weather. Once again, an unforgetable experience...

Barcelona & To be continued?

Hi there! Some things have happened since I passed the white place and ended up at Elna near the Cote d'Azur. These days I tried to survive the Pyrenees, and I think I actually did pretty well. With my 20kg luggage I could cycle almost painlessly up to 4% and the steeper things I mainly walked to save my back. Although this is definitely not the best way of organizing a cycling trip it was doable. Sometimes I could even enjoy the views more than usual because walking I didn't have to concentrate on the road that much. The descends were of course also better than ever. The real problem arose as I got the point that the Spanish coast after the Pyrenees seemed to be equally or even more hilly for a couple of days extra. This didn't do me any good. Still, which I didn expect is that this part of the coast is very beautiful to cycle. Another thing that happened is that I didn't organize any Couchsurfing this week. Combined with the backproblem and doing the Nacional-II together with a lot of cars almost all joy disappeared these days. I was not having a lot of fun for the first time since the start :( Of course there still were some highlights of which the best one a beautiful lonely beach (cala), the sand, the sun, like a fairytale or a dream a girl appearing out of thin air in her bikiny and disappearing in the water behind some rocks. Not to forget some amazing wandering in the amazing city of Barcelona last couple of days. Anyway, after a lot of thinking and feeling (yes sir!) I decided to take the bike for a last time tomorrow with about half of my luggage to try to find some flat Spanish roads. If I still don't have any fun or my legs keep being hurt I take the bus to my cousins Floris and Inge in Motril in Andalucia. This could be already tomorrow, after 3 days, two weeks or a month, whatever it will be. Well, that's it for now folks, hope to give you some more positive news next time. Geert

La Cite Blanche

La douce France not only has a lot of abandoned castles, but it has a lot of abandoned houses in general. On my way from Grenoble to the Cote d'Azur, following the Izere and Rhone, I encountered dozens of them. The most impressive place of all was La Rousette, somewhere between Valence and Orange. After having passed a huge white coloured factory, I entered an equally coloured street. Big blocks of high majestic houses on each side of the street, all apparently in good technical shape. But still, completely abandoned. I felt as in a ghosttown, a filmset, after a nucleair bomb or the arc of Noach, but not in my real world. Then, suddenly, some cats run out of a house right above me and I see some plants in front of the door. I went up the stairs to have a better look. After a few shouts, an old man comes out and lets me in. I discover that it is Joseph, the only person that stayed in this factory village after things got automised half of a century ago. The place is called La Cite Blanche or white place on a local newspaper hanging on the wall. Jojo has only 4 teeth left which makes his french nearly uncomprehensible for me. We have a pastills with water and ice, watch the television and hopelessly try to communicate. I ask him if I could stay for the night, because it already was the time for it. He keeps asking where I would spend the night, but also repeatingly using the word gendarmerie. I suppose in some way he liked the company but just couldn't understand why this stranger on his bike suddenly appeared in front of his door. I left Jojo with two bottles of water, an inspired feeling and a greet. Every day there are happening things like this, which make me feel very happy. Stories of fellow travelers, a night in the bed of a beautiful couchsurfer, a completely naturistic village, suicidal alcoholistic neighbours, a night with punks their dogs on a pitoresk beach, I can assure you that this life has it all. Enjoy life and my warm regards from Elna/Perpignan. CU after the Pyrenees. Geert

Grenoble

A week has passed and I am still in Grenoble: o.a. reading Riaan Mansers never ending cycling trip around Africa, rewriting my diary, refiltering and fixing my gear, learning some more french vocabulary, shopping and cooking for my working mate, wandering around in the city, playing the piano and hiking the spectaculair Sangle de Bellefont. I also thought about and decided to continue the trip following the Isere and Rhone to Avignon/Arles, take the cote d'Azur to Barcelona and eventually end up in Andalucia where I want to spend the winter and give the leggs all the rest they need. In particular I have become pretty interested in two hippie-havens which are in the South-Eastern Cabo de Gata and in Orgiva near the Sierra Nevada. I didn't even know this art of people still existed! Let's see how my parents generation spend there youth :)