On to Lyon
June 7/06
Well, here I am in Strasbourg France, sitting on a
train. I was first
on with my bicycle luckily, or I wouldn’t have been able to board. The
train is not really set up for bicycles. Its old, the aisles are
narrow, not really wide enough for my panniers. It was difficult
getting it on board, and may well be more difficult getting it off.
Hopefully Lyon is the last stop, so I won’t have to fight with other
bikes.
Was very sad leaving Tubingen this morning. Angela
did not want to let
her emotions out, although I could see the sadness in her eyes. She
played a trick on me, said farewell at the house, then showed up at
the station, where I arrived late after getting turned around and lost
in the city. Don’t know how I did it but I missed a turn and wound up
in countryside amid the sheep and cows.
That woman and me have some sort of deep emotional
connection. It hurt
to leave her and I'm afraid I may never see her again. Tears welled in
my eyes as the train pulled away and she stood on the platform waving
goodbye. I told her I loved her, and that’s no word of a lie, although
I’m not sure what sort of love it is. She’s deep with Andy, they’ll
likely marry and have children one day. It cannot be romantic, although
I’d marry her at the drop of a hat, no question about it.
Now all of a sudden I’m in France. The scenery has
changed. I’ve
crossed the Rhine again and am back on the flats. About the only relief
I’m feeling is that I’m able to communicate a little more. I can ask
people to speak English in their own language. I understand numbers,
and some words. Gone is the gutteral abruptness of the German tongue.
Present is the rushed musicality and flowing sentences.
Stayed up until 2 am listening to music, eating
chocolate and sitting
out on the balcony looking at the sky, it was full of stars and the
moon. Angela told me, “when you see the moon, know that I see it too.”
It was the closest she came to saying anything really emotional. It is
not her way to speak directly of emotion. She seeks poetry, other
language.
I will miss her dearly.
There are high mountains in the distance out both
sides of the train.
To my left the foothills of the Alps, some miles away. To my right, I
don’t know, and I don’t have a map to tell me. I’m flying blind.
We all sat up until midnight, Andy, Angela and I,
talking the politics
of the European Union. Andy has some very straight views on the decrim
thing. He doesn’t agree with it. As Germans, both of the them are a
little touchy and think the rest of the world still blames them for
what happened in WWII. I don’t think they do. It was a good
conversation
that verged on debate. In the end we decided the one country in the
world that is in real serious danger of collapse is America, mostly
because it is the only one that seems disinterested and unaware of its
own mallais.
Afterwards I had a bath and kept my ibook humming
until the battery
wore down. When that finally happened I plugged it in, and found it
fully charged this morning, the first morning I was up in advance of my
hosts. We had breakfast together, and Andy came out and shook my hand,
wishing me happy travels before he went off to school. I like the guy,
but my real connection there was Angela.
The architecture has changed somewhat. there are
still red clay
rooftops, but the buildings have changed shape and style, and there is
a lot more crappy modern stuff. The lines seem less rigid, less
planned, There was a less clean, more haphazard organization to the
train station at Strasbourg. Less people waiting for the train as well,
and the trains themselves are less clean.
Its a zoo in here where the cycles are concerned.
There’s about 10
squeezed into tiny room set up for maybe two, and then my hulking load
on top of it all. Its driving all the other passengers a little wacky,
tho' wacky with a smile. I have just found out I am indeed going to the
last stop, which takes a lot of pressure off. With all the other bikes
piled against mine, I don’t need to worry too much about someone making
off with it or my gear.
The sun finally appeared in Tubingen, just in time
for my departure. It
was actually warm enough to wear shorts and a t-shirt, at 8 in the
morning. Here it is really hot, summer-like, and all the people are
wearing short sleeves. There are some clouds, but the sort that come
with hot days, not chilly wet ones. They spread out in the sky, like
beachgoers.
In a couple hours I land in Lyon, where I will put
up in a hostel for
the night, maybe two, depending if I like the place. I’m going to need
to pick up a map, maybe a phrase book, and get my bearings. I need to
realize I’m no longer in Germany, and accustom myself to the here and
now, which is remarkably different already, although there are indeed
castles on the hilltops and the land is much like it was along the
Rhine, although I’m along the Rhone now.
Anyway, more later from the hostel, or wherever I
land.
Later: On the Train
Hours later I realize the train ride from Salsbourg
to Lyon is six
hours long. I was expecting a quick ride!
So now I’m into a lengthy conversation with a
Hungarian born Canadian
ex-pat who now lives in Frankfurt. He’s on his way to central France to
study volcanic rock, he’s a geologist. Like me, he travels by bike and
rail, but hotels it, and dines in restaurants.
The hubub in the bicycle room has calmed. Most of
the kafluffle was
around students coming and going in the small towns along the way.
We are, four of us, two francophones, the geologist,
and I, begining to
talk to one another. Pulling out my ibook peaked the interest of one,
and that got the conversation going. The Francophones are using cell
phones.
There is some humid cloud building in the sky. Its
rather hazy out
actually, as the train rolls along the Rhone, through low hill country.
Had my first negatory English translation
experience. I asked a
conductor, “Pour vous Angles si vous ple?” He laughed at my French. I
apologized that it wasn’t perfect, and it seemed to irritate him that
I’d picked up his comment, made in French. Other than the conductor,
everyone is being tolerant of my unilingualism and we have a three way
translation thing going on.
There is a canal with locks along the river. I’m
getting an idea that I
may be able to follow canals a lot my route, there are some running
from Nimes into the area of France where my friend Emma has her house.
I should also be able to follow one going out of Avignon, according to
the maps I’ve seen.
The conversation dies a little as time wears on, everyone is either
reading or text messaging. I’m back in the land of serious cell phones.
I’ve seen more since I boarded this train than I saw my whole time in
Germany.
The land, where it is not farmed, is full of trees.
Most look to be
between 30 and 60 years old, all of them disiduous, no evergreens
anywhere. The floor of these forests is thick with ferns, long grass,
and flowers. It is much more brown then it was in Germany. Clearly, it
has not be raining so much here.
Later: Lyon, France, the Auberge
The crazies have taken over the funny farm here.
Place is a mess but
its absolutely gorgeous. Then again, its a city of gianamous
porportions full of racing traffic, ancient buildings, gothic churches,
jam packed neighbourhoods, and panoramas of the city and foothills of
the Alps to make any painter or photographer squeal with delight.
As for the hostel, its badly mismanaged, and it
doesn’t help there’s a
bar in it, one that serves and serves and is tended by a rather
scurrilous ne’er do well who delights in playing with the house stereo
system.
The rooms however are quiet and seem relatively
safe. Clientele is
young, young and dumb, and have turned the palace into an animal house.
They are however a fairly well to do lot and, by the appearance of the
seven others I’m sharing with, I have no need to fear for my
possessions.
I do fear for Wheels though. I’ve triple locked it
to a fence inside a
locked compound that has security cameras. I’ve removed the front
wheel, green tarped it, and am praying no theives notice its there. Its
pretty much invisible where it is.
When I first got off the train I found myself
seriously considering
continuing my journey, which would have meant a six hour layover in a
train station, that in all likelihood would be closed. The elevator
from the train platform was out of commission and the numerous railway
employees standing around with their fingers in their derriers, and
their tongues wagging furiously, would not acknowledge my questions or
humour me with directions. In the end I had to manhandle Wheels, with a
full load on, down a flight of stairs containing about 50 steps. Almost
lost it at the top and tumbled my way down, which would have ended this
trip for sure, but I regained control and managed it.
Then I tired to use the phones. Not a payphone in
sight and none that
would accept my phone card. In the end I opted to approach a security
guard I noticed talking with a grouip of policemen near the ticket
wickets. He turned out to be a Jamaican, born in France, who has
maintained a phone relationship with relatives in the Caribean. He
spoke in a thick rasta accent, but was nice enough to find a tourist
map for me and point me in the right direction, which after two k of
heavy city traffic, and double bridges across the Rhone, led straight
up a killer hill that took me a half hour to climb, and quite nearly
did me in.
I hadn’t eaten, and had no energy for such
endeavours, but again I made
it, paid the 15.70 euro fee, secured a bed, cooked some beans with
garlic, jalapenos, onions and some sourdough bread. Then I sat out on
the courtyard behind the place and ate it while watching the sky over
the city turn pink. It was promising.
A little later I found a wireless signal in an upper
lounge and checked
email, then surfed a little of the area ahead. I found out there’s
campgrounds near Avignon and managed to locate where my Dutch pals,
Kees, Marjon and Tomas are. Its the opposite direction from Avignon I
want to go, but only a days light ride, 40 K. Not sure I’ll go there.
Think I’ll escape to Avignon as early as possible tomorrow, then find
me a map and figure out my next move. I may well train to Carssconne,
and put myself in easy riding distance of my friend Emma’s, whom I’ve
heard from, and now have directions to her house.
I’m back out in the courtyard now, alone at a table
under a small cedar
tree. The lights of the city flicker below, and the rumble of traffic
along the Rhone Drive echoes up the cliff. Around me people at a dozen
tables talk, drink, some loudly, some quietly. Others eat late dinners,
or munch on snacks. Straight ahead, and perhaps a hundred meters below,
the walls of the St. Jean Cathedral are lit to emphasize its gothic
spires. Its a ghostly thing. The centerpiece of the city, backed by the
a lit walk bridge, and the previously mentioned flicker of
lights. The city arcs in a bowl in every direction, and there are very
few trees or apparent greens spaces, except for the one I’m in, which
is lined with cypress trees, a trellis that supports a couple three
meter rose bushes, and the twin trunks of the baby cedar, mentioned
earlier.
An orange cat timidly patrols the scene.
I feel I’ve really gone somewhere, even if its just
Montreal on
Steroids!
Hopefully I will sleep tonight and not have to much
difficulty getting
myself, and Wheels, to the train station in the morning, and the train
will arrive at a gate where either lifts or escalators are functioning.
One of my first thoughts when I hit the miles of
concrete and clay,
mixed with steel, glass and neon, that make this city whatever it is,
was, “how did I get rooked into stopping in a place like this.” I’m
glad for it now. Its not my kind of place, too big sprawling and busy,
but I’m glad to see it. I know I’m in an old historic place with a
character all its own. It doen’t matter that I’m not so fond of the
particular character. It is nonetheless alive and unique, and from what
I’ve seen so far, worth a look at.
Its also warm, about ten degrees or more warm than
anywhere I’ve been
lately. I think it was a sweltering day here and the night air feels
good, a little cool, but downright summerish.
That’s it for now. Talk to you when I get where I'm
going.
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