The Spirit of Christmas

Someone back home in the States said to me recently that the Germans probably have a better understanding of the meaning of Christmas and the holiday season than Americans.  I don't know about that.  I can't think of one person back home who lauds the commercialism that the season now seems to represent.  Despite what the TV, store displays, and radio would suggest, I think that most people still value traditions, time spent with family or friends, and the time of reflection of the season, not to mention the food.  It seems that every year the shopping season gets longer, the music gets worse, and the decorations more frivolous and tacky.  We all complain about it.  And, while so far the wretched inflatable decorations haven't really caught on over here, I think Germany also struggles with a corruption of the season. I've heard repeatedly from several sources in solemn tones that when it comes to the insanity of the holidays, Germany is getting out of control just like everyone else.  Seriously, with barely an observance of Halloween and certainly no Thanksgiving, the shopping season started, oh, somewhere around October 1st.  While the leaves were still mostly green, loaves of stollen and bottles of Glühwein started appearing on shelves.  While we've been spared the media inundation since we don't watch local TV or listen to radio, a trip to the grocery store last night was the only proof I needed that the Germans are just as wacky three days before Christmas as Americans.

But, there is one thing I can honestly say makes the season better in Germany.  I give to you the humble Christmas Market, known in these parts as Weihnachtsmarkt or Christkindlmarkt.  Christmas Markets started in the German speaking world sometime in the late Middle Ages.  The one downriver in Frankfurt has been going on since at least 1393.  They coincide with the four weekends of Advent.  Traditional ones end the weekend before Christmas, but nowadays some of the larger ones stay open until Christmas Eve. They've since become regular features around the Western world.  There's one on the Champs-Élysées, you can visit one in Leeds, and Akron even used have a respectable offering about 10 years ago (it has, alas, become a sad shadow of its former self.  Oh, Akron...sigh).  But, the best ones are still to be found where it all began- Germany.

Market square of Rothenburg ob der Tauber

Fujifilm X-E2 18mm f/9 1/125

This season we decided we were going to take advantage of this most wondrous cultural offering and visit as many as possible.  Somewhere between steaming cups of Glühwein, nibbling on a Schneeball, and strolling through endless stalls of goods we discovered that we started feeling, well, Christmassy.  I have this vision of what Christmas is supposed to be like, it's some sort of mashup of Dickens, pre-Christian yule, and It's a Wonderful Life.  I imagine big pots of hot drink, lots of sparkly candles, carolers, simple or elaborate food items being showcased on festive tables, and a general feeling of goodwill amongst strangers.  In short, I think Christmas is supposed to be fun, to do exactly what the old yule celebrations did- scare away the dark, cold, and general unease of winter.  Here, for the first time in I don't know how long, it felt exactly this way.  We attended 6, and maybe we'll squeeze in one more this evening.  We went to tiny ones and we went to huge ones.  We had good weather and we had truly wretched weather.  But, at every single one we had fun and there was none of that oppressive and overwhelming stressed out commercial feeling at any.  Never once did I hear a single pop Christmas song.  There wasn't an inflatable Santa on a Harley in sight either.  So, without further ado, here are some shots from the markets.

Fujifilm X-E2 18mm f/10 1/160, edit Photoshop

 This spot is one of the quintessential shots of Rothenburg ob der Tauber.  Rothenburg o.d.T is probably one of the most well known stops along the Romantic Road, a tourist route from Würzburg to Füssen.  What it is known for are the Christmas shops, museum, and the fact the old town is trapped, architecturally speaking, in the Middle Ages.  It's a beautiful place to explore, but getting a wide shot without brightly clothed and bumbling tourists is nigh impossible.  I had hoped to stick around late so the crowds would thin out, but the weather was atrocious so we high tailed it home early.

Fujifilm X-E2 42mm f/4 1/180

Paper stars are a traditional decoration at Christmas.  They are typically hung in windows, and as you can see throw off a rich and festive glow.  I found myself drawn to the stalls that sold them, and finally after much jostling in Rothenburg o.d.T I found this one that was positively infested with the beautiful things.   Of course, while trying to get the shot, about a half dozen other tourists decided I must be onto something and immediately stepped in front.  Oh, the trials of the 5'3" photographer...

Fujifilm X-E2 55mm f/5 1/250

 Würzburg is a regular haunt for us, just being about an hour down the Autobahn.  It's the northern terminus of the Romantic Road and known especially for its Baroque architecture.  I was absolutely enamored with the cream yellow facade of the Haus zum Falken in all its lavish Rococo glory.  I found the bright red of the Marienkapelle a nice contrast to its more ornate neighbor.

Fujifilm X-E2 39mm f/4 1/125, Fuji Vibrant Film Simulation

For unique shopping, the winner this year was the Ronneburg Castle Historic Market.  The parking for this one was utterly atrocious and we found ourselves climbing a rather substantial hill for about an hour before we finally entered the gates of this market.  However, it was totally worth it, and an excellent test of my new Holdfast Gear Moneymaker strap system (more on that some other time).  Here are some olive wood items for sale outside of the castle.  The grain of the wood makes for some striking patterns on the objects, so I decided to utilize the Vibrant film simulation so they'd pop just a little more.  We ended up walking away with a wonderful snack bowl and polished horn spoons from this stand.  

Fujifilm X-E2 33mm f/4.5 1/500

 The weekend of the Ronneburg market was rather brisk, which caused some excellent steam action off our clay Glühwein mugs.  It was also a great opportunity to showcase the bright clarity of the Fujinon 18-55mm lens.  

Fujifilm X-E2 41mm f/6.4 1/250

There was something about this scene of smoke wafting around the straw strewn grounds of Ronneburg Castle, the laughter, the smell of meats roasting on open fires, and the folks strolling about in tunics with swords hanging from their waists that had me saying, "This is what I always imagined Christmas to be like."  Weird, I know.  Please bear in mind I spent a good portion of my younger years studying medieval customs and architecture.  Anyway, this isn't the best shot in the world, but it captures a moment.  That's what photography is for, right?

Canon 600D 100mm f/5 1/80

I've been carry a two camera kit to the markets, the Fujifilm X-E2 for mostly wide shots and the Canon 600D with the 55-250mm for close-ups.  Most of the action the Canon saw was at Ronneburg because of the wonderfully photogenic crowd that only a Medieval Fair can attract.  This lens is no where near fast (a constant struggle at cycling races), but it works well enough for the time being when I'm trying to zero in on one person or thing and crowds or my limited height won't let me get any closer.

Canon 600D 154mm f/5.6 1/80

 These two, St. Nicholas and the Christkind (a really perplexing character who is called the Christ Child, but most definitely isn't, being an adult female and all.  I hope to get her figured out by next Christmas), were a bear to photograph.  St. Nick is, of course, a favorite with the children and his partner was handing out candies to every child in the joint.  So, they were surrounded by quite the crowd of kids hell bent on nabbing a chocolate and parents hell bent on getting a photo of their children with the pair.  This was the best I could pull off, being smaller than the average German child or parent.  Plus, good St. Nick seemed overwhelmed with the whole situation and insisted on hiding behind his counterpart for most of the time.  I didn't blame him.

Canon 600D 135mm f/5 1/80

I spotted him just as we were leaving Ronneburg for the day.  Thankfully, he didn't make for much of a moving target for my sluggish long lens.  It was only after I was looking at it in post that I noticed the wonderfully carved head on the guitar. 

Canon 600D 100mm f/5 1/150

 Here is an example of handmade Christmas decorations that you will find all over the Markets.  This one happened to be on one of the trees at the market in Würzburg.  Something about the delicate simplicity of the straw creations paired with fruit on the tree hinted at an image of Christmases long past.

Fujifilm X-E2 23mm f/5.6 1/80, Vibrant film simulation

 The light on the day we went to Michelstadt was a bit gloomy, so I shot mostly with the Vibrant film simulation.  Michelstadt is known for its timber frame buildings and the whimsical Rathaus (Town Hall) is its most famous structure.  I would have loved to have had some snow on this day, for this town is just saturated in old-timey Christmas goodness already.

Fujifilm X-E2 55mm f/4 1/180

These are the famous Franconian Schneebälle pastries.  They're basically slices of dough that are wadded up and fried in a special contraption and then covered in something.  Traditionally, they are covered in powdered sugar (my favorite), but there are many variations of the ancient treat (supposedly the recipe has been around for 300 years).  Now you can get them filled with cream or soaked in rum and covered in chocolate.  The sugar coma possibilities are endless.

  

Fujifilm X-E2 18mm f/4 1/250, Vibrant film simulation

 Every market has a giant Christmas Pyramid.  The pyramids are traditionally from the Erzgebirge Mountains, but now are popular all over Germany.  Traditionally, they featured nativity scenes or angels, but now some feature more secular scenes of village or woodland life.  This is a more modern rendition featuring one of these secular scenes.  I took this snapshot for folks back home to have an example of some typical market scenes, without thought to composition.  The light was terrible all day and the sun was heading down at this point, but thanks to my X-E2's amazing ability at high ISO levels (1000), I was able to get it handheld.  

Fujifilm X-E2 55mm f/4 1/70

 Another time I was thankful for my X-E2's lowlight capabilities (ISO 1250).  Gosh, mirrorless is a wonderful thing! We went to this market with some friends so I didn't want to carry the full set up that day and just worked with the X-E2.  It was a great opportunity to test its wide range of capabilities with just the kit lens.  

Fujifilm ISO 1250 26mm f/11 1/70

I snapped this as we were leaving Michelstadt in the evening and the sun was getting low on the horizon.  Michelstadt ended up being our favorite market of 2014, maybe it was because we shared the time with friends or it was our first one of the year, but this one had just the right ambiance.

I find myself slightly saddened by the thought that the Christmas market season has come to a close and for the first time a feeling that there is a little magic to the season.  It's not the handmade goods, or the lights, or the food, or the spiced wine (ok, maybe it is the spiced wine).  I think that it mostly has to do with these wonderful markets fostering a feeling of well being amongst the vendors and attendees.  People go, and not just tourists, to have basic seasonal fun.  At the markets you can sing along with the carolers and fight the cold with a mug of mulled goodness just like the yule celebrations of yore, buy wonderful little homemade Christmas wreaths like those in a Dickens tale, and happily wish everyone you pass a "Frohe Weihnachte!" like one would in a German speaking Bedford Falls.  That just warms the cockles of my heart.  I hear there's still one market operating today down the road.  If you need me this evening I'll be standing around a barrel laughing with some strangers, sipping Glühwein, snapping some pictures, and feeling mighty pleased with the whole situation.  Who knows, maybe it'll even give The Dog a feeling of goodwill toward men.  Christmas miracles do happen...

More photos can be viewed on Flickr and will be popping up on Instagram

New Theme

Since we're rapidly approaching the end of 2014 (gah!), I thought it was time to turn more focused attention to this blog.  Should I keep plugging away, call it done, or revitalize it somehow?  I've had a blog in one form or another for almost 5 years, so the thought of giving it up fully is not my first choice.  Continuing on in the same way, however, is unappealing.  Writing up posts on what we did over the weekend or how cycling is going is getting a bit boring to write and probably even more boring to read.  Being an expat is no longer a new experience.  We're closing out our third year over here and despite the fact we're still not 100% sure what is going on and I haven't learned much German, this experience feels pretty normal.  We don't know what home is anymore, but I think that's because we feel evenly split after our second relocation.  Being on the banks of the Main in Unterfranken feels just as comfortable as being on the Cuyahoga in Summit County.  Sometimes, more so.

Anyway, my blogs have always been about sharing new experiences, be it becoming a bike commuter in Akron, Ohio or moving across the Atlantic.  It only makes sense to continue this approach.  So, Relish will be changing just a bit for taking a more focused theme.

Right before we moved to Luxembourg, the only camera I had was the one in my iPhone.  We thought, "Hey, we should get a decent point and shoot camera before we go because we'll probably want to take some pictures."  So, we picked up a Canon Powershot.  It's a great little camera.  But, something about this continent flipped a switch in me.  The people, the architecture, the food, the cities, the cultures, and the incredible landscapes inspired me.  I took that camera everywhere and despite its great performance, I wanted to shoot beyond its capabilities.  After six months I had upgraded to my Canon 600D, shortly thereafter I began adding lenses to my kit, and "taking pictures" became "photography" to me.  Miraculously, some have taken a liking to my work and have been willing to purchase items from my Twenty20 gallery.

So, in future posts I'll be turning Relish into more of a photography focused blog.  I plan to give background on pictures in my galleries and narrate how my exploration of photography is going.  I have a lot to learn.  There is a lot I don't get or know about.  Most of what I've discovered so far have been by trial and error or by accident.  It's not the easiest activity to get into or keep up with, but it is a heck of a lot of fun to try.  And, well, I relish the experience.

Anyway, that's what's up.  Don't worry, there will still be bike stuff from time to time.

Fujifilm X-E2, XF 18-55mm ISO 800 f/4.5 1/500

BIG Breath and....

It's been quite some time since I punched a few lines onto this blog.  August and September was all about training for a Century ride, leaving me with surprisingly very little say.  We had a rather pleasant 100 mile ride in mid-September and then after that a tight schedule leading up to our annual trip back to Akron.  Now, here we are at the very end of October.

The trip "home," the definition of which is up for debate, is an interesting experience for expats.  For those that can travel back and forth to their native land regularly the disconnect probably isn't as acute.  For those of us who only get back once a year or less, the experience can be, well, rather bizarre.  The more time that passes on assignment the greater the gulf can grow between then and now, here and there.  Sometimes, when faced with the reality that this is just an assignment and home will most definitely be over there again, the feelings are mixed.  Unless someone's expat journey has been completely negative, we feel a kinship with the new place sometimes equal to or even exceeding our native home.  But, for now here we are back in Germany for the time being with at least another year to enjoy it.

Besides all the fun parts about the home leave trip like sharing a drink at our favorite craft beer bars with good friends, enjoying a proper steak, and an early Thanksgiving meal with family, one of the annual events of home leave is making the rounds to all our medical professionals to make sure we're still doing good health wise.  I was looking forward to this year's checkup because I had a question.

My last post on here was about a particularly brutal climb that almost did me in.  After that I started paying close attention to my performance on hills and during other activities like mountain trekking.  It became clear to me that something was up with my breathing.  In the past I assumed my complete meltdowns on hills had to do with overall fitness.  I assumed I was struggling because I was out of shape.  But, as the year passed this excuse didn't seem pertinent.  We were cycling every day and during our century training we were averaging 130km a week.  Our diet has changed to being mostly vegetarian.  My weight and other vitals were in the right places.  I was sleeping normal.  But, every single time I hit a hill on the bike, a set of stairs, or an uphill track while trekking I started struggling, big time.  Off the bike I manage, but always slow way down and need breaks now and then to catch my breath.  On the bike, things get bad on those hills.  For anything above a Cat 4, I often have to dismount to calm my breathing.

Then, one day we were climbing a hill at a particularly slow pace.  We had taken a break not long before for a snack and to replenish our water, but I was in a bad way already.  My husband led for a bit, then I took over, hoping that if I found a steady pace I could relax my breathing.  It wasn't working.  The wide spot in the road was a welcome sight and I pulled over, dismounted, and sat down, certain I was going to black out.  When I finally got back to a comfortable heart rate and breathing, I looked up at the hill, the road winding above me.  As I did so, a woman went past.  On a steel city bike.  In khaki shorts and tennis shoes.  She was breathing through her nose.  That was the last straw.  I was mad.

Something was definitely up.

So, I sent my doctor in Akron a note.  I have an amazing doctor back in Akron, and having her just an email away is a lifesaver.  Thank you, modern technology!  Anyway, after tracking my symptoms and performance it sounded to me that I might have been suffering from exercise induced asthma all this time.  She concurred with my theory and set me up for some tests when I came back to town.

Asthma tests are something else.  You spend two hours in a room with a technician blowing into a tube after inhaling a progression of medications as the tech instructs "BIG breath and..BLOW, BLOW, BLOW!"  All of that tests lung capacity.  People with asthma will have a marked reduced capacity during the test.  People without it will have the same results from beginning to end.  When I sat down with my doctor a few days later, she said, "I'm so glad you contacted me, because you totally have asthma!"  Apparently, I have had it my whole life, explaining why I could never run the mile in PE or keep up in any sports like soccer when I was a kid, hence being assigned more stationary positions like fullback.  I was under the impression that I wasn't "good at running" or that I wasn't "athletic" back then.  But as I've gotten older I've realized that being "unathletic" isn't a real thing.  My doctor confirmed.  She said we choose to be active or not.  Sure, not everyone is built to run a marathon or bench 250lbs, but everyone should be able to find something they can do comfortably that keeps them physically fit.  If you struggle despite being fit, then there is a medical reason for it.  Anyone should be able to exercise.

I don't know what my doctor thought, when I responded to to my diagnosis with, "Oh, thank God!"  I can't begin to describe the relief I felt with finally having a reason for why climbing nearly kills me, why I can't keep up in the mountains, why climbing the stairs to the top floor our house has me leaning against the door frame for a bit.   The thought of climbing no longer fills me with dread.  I know what will happen when I start heading up and I know why.  It's not because I'm a failure.  I have the tools to deal with it and now the odds are in favor of me getting to the top without passing out.  Sometimes an answer is all you need.  And, albuterol.

The mountains are my favorite place on earth.  Now, spending time in their heights shouldn't be such a struggle.

Yeah, folks, I'll be "doping" when I'm out on the roads.   Let me get that out there right now.  Along with my patch kit and PB sammies, I'll be packing an inhaler.  I've accepted that in order to keep this managed properly I have to reign in my riding when I have a respiratory illness to avoid aggravating the disease (hence why I'm typing this up today instead of HTFU on the bike with this head cold).  I shouldn't take up extreme altitude mountaineering either.  Sigh.  Oh well, I don't have the money for that anyway.  But, there is no risk of having to give up the bike.  I'm not expecting to take all the local QOMs, but climbing the stairs, yeah, I can do that now.

So, look out, Bavaria, as soon as I kick this darn cold I'll be back.  Here's hoping none of you in khakis and sneakers will pass me on a climb.  But if you do, let's be clear.  My chain slipped.

Fifteen Percent

Saturdays are the big ride days.  We haven't hit the big mileage yet.  This past Saturday was only 35 miles.  No big deal.  We could knock that out in about 2 hours, and be home in plenty of time to run errands.  I've been spending a lot of time thinking about what route to use for the century and decided that Saturday we would test out the terrain in one of the of the possible areas, a hilly, sparsely populated region east of the Main that's known for it's hiking and mountain biking.  There aren't that many villages, so traffic should be light.  The hills would be a challenge, sure, but challenges are good and it's not like there would be anything beyond a category 3.  They call the hills a "mountain range," but that's definitely a bit of an exaggeration to say the least.

We headed out about 8am.  The shot of espresso hadn't kicked in yet, and my eyes were watering like crazy, the way they always do on morning rides.  The route was completely new as soon as we crossed over the river.  There wasn't any moment along the way that we could warm up and ease into it.  People who aren't cyclists don't understand that being on the road requires 100% focus.  You have to watch everything, everything, cracks in the pavement, stones that can send you flying if hit just the wrong way, drainage grates, stuff that's fallen off of cars that can also send you flying, big tire slicing shards of glass, piles of sand that are always randomly spread across turns, tree branches, roadkill, oil slicks, piles of animal waste, mud, children who haven't been taught to look both ways before crossing the street, old people who never learned and have miraculously survived all these years, loose dogs, horses, various types of balls rolling out of playgrounds and driveways, other bikes, skateboards, scooters, wheelchairs....oh, yeah, and the cars.  We have to do a lot of thinking and thinking for everyone else around us.  We have to be three steps ahead.  It's like chess- fast paced, things could get really bad if you make the wrong move kind of chess.   It's not just the physical exertion of cycling that's tough.  Sometimes a quick pedal to the grocery store is more intense than a 4 hour training ride depending on what we encounter along the way.

Saturday's route passed a rather nice castle.
Castles make climbing better.

The first several miles of Saturday's ride was one of those intense, nonstop experiences.  Saturdays are the one day a week people can run errands and they have to start early.  Shops are closed on Sundays and most close before 1pm on Saturdays.  During the week, most close by 6pm.  If you work all week, Saturday morning is your one shot to get what you need.  The first stretch of the route was along a particularly busy main road.  So, we were hauling right off the bat.  Then, we hit a construction zone which closed one side of the road with no traffic signal or worker controlling the flow.  That had us sprinting uphill a good ways to avoid getting creamed by a car coming up over the top from the other direction.  Thankfully, there weren't any cars, but I was close to the red after that.  It took a while to recover.  It wasn't too much later that we were off that highway, but when we left the traffic, we were in the "mountain range."  The climbs weren't that bad, except for the two times I dropped my chain.  There were a couple of cat 4's.  The biggest climb was a steady 2.5 mile, category 3.  It seemed to go on forever, but it wasn't horrific.  None of the climbs were horrific.  Climbing isn't the soul crushing experience it used to be.  It just is what it is.  The longer they are, the more are tackled, the better it gets.  Cycling becomes something else.

Then, in the last 5 miles, I had my soul crushed.  On the profile the last bump was nothing, just a blip.  You can't really tell what a climb is going to be like from a profile, a grade percentage, a distance.  This one started humanely enough.  We shifted down and got into the rhythm.  I shifted down again a few minutes later.  Then again.  Then again.  The grade just kept getting steeper, crazy steep.  I was tired.  This was the fifth climb of the day and I didn't have it anymore.  I started paperboying a little.  My husband was doing the pulling.  I kept wishing he'd go a little faster.  I didn't have the strength to take a pull, but my front tire was millimeters from his rear tire.  I was afraid my weaving was going to take him down.  I couldn't come alongside since the road was too narrow.  For some reason, cars kept coming up behind on this little road to nowhere.  Didn't they have somewhere else to drive?  There's nothing up there but a barn!  I had a stale Haribo frog in my mouth.  I didn't have the energy to chew through it; I was too busy trying to breathe.  The frog was in the way of the breathing.  I tried shifting down again, but I was out of gears.  I pushed the frog into my left cheek and tried to slow down the breathing.  I was in the red, way into the red, and I was out of gears.  One more gear would have been enough.  I was mashing the pedals, my legs were on fire, and we were barely moving anymore.  Then it happened, the same thing that happens on every climb like this.  You think you see the top, only to have the hope ripped away when the top just reveals itself to be a false flat.  This was supposed to be the little climb.  Breathing was becoming an issue.  I wasn't getting the oxygen to keep the legs moving and the heart beating at a bearable rate.  I looked up from my husband's rear hub to his back and called out in a really high pitched, raspy voice, "Need to stop.  I need.  Break."

"Yeah, ok. Yes."  I was relieved to hear what sounded like relief in his voice.  I climbed off and laid my bike down in the grass,  my breathing was what could probably be termed as hyperventilating.  I bent over trying to slow it down.  The frog was gone.  I don't remember eating it.  A car was coming up the hill, flying actually.  I cursed.  I can't just quietly die up here on this hill without some driver flying past staring agape at my physical failings and the drool running in a ladylike manner down my chin.  Seriously, where the heck are these cars going?  I gulped down a ton of water and unzipped my jersey.  It was humid.  I should have worn a lighter-weight jersey.  Or something.

It took a few minutes to get back to feeling somewhat normal again.  We clicked back in and finished the climb.  It was a little longer before I could speak properly again, though.  We got back to the house and after a giant egg burrito and a cold glass of chocolate milk, I looked at the profile again.

Oh, so that's what a quarter mile with a 15% uphill grade feels like.

Gear Check: BikeInside

When we moved here, The Company changed a lot in our assignment contract.  One of those things was that we received a company car, a big ol' VW Passat.  The thing is pretty big as Euro cars go, which is nice for traveling (not so much for Euro parking).  The only minor downside to receiving a car that is basically free is that our roof bike rack from our old car isn't compatible with it.  A new roof rack wouldn't be that expensive, but it would only fit a Passat.  So, by the time we move home we'll have two racks we won't be able to use.  Of course, the alternative would be a hitch rack, which would work with any car.  But, since the car isn't ours, we can't install a hitch.

Enter BikeInside.

www.bikeinside.de

We determined that the best solution for our situation was a system that fit inside our car.  If it was universal, even better.  Lo and behold, a company in Germany makes just such a rack.

BikeInside is compatible with pretty much any model vehicle on the road.  You can check their list here.  It works basically like a tension rod, bracing against the right and left interior sides of your vehicle.  It can be installed towards the front of the car with the seats folded down, or in the cargo area depending on what works best for you bikes.  The front wheels of the bike are removed and the forks fitted into the quick release bracket on the rack.  It takes less than 5mins to get the bike inside the car and attached to the BikeInside.  It can fit up to three bikes at a time depending on how much room you have inside your vehicle.  The rack itself barely takes up any room so you can leave it in your car all the time if you prefer.  But, thanks to no tool installation you can remove it after every use.  Now, depending on your vehicle, you may have to break your bike down further, either removing the seat post or rear wheel or both.  Additional accessories are available to ensure a proper fit and stability.

So, even if you don't have the situation we do, you may want to consider BikeInside for these reasons:

1.  Protects your bike from the weather during travel.

Because it is extremely frustrating to get your bike all nice and clean for a trip just to have it gunked up on the highway while on the top or back of your car.

2.  Increased security

Keeping your bike in your car reduces it's chances of getting nabbed while your stopped for dinner or you're the gas station.  It won't be obvious, especially if you have darkened windows, and you can always throw a blanket over it too.

3.  Doesn't affect fuel consumption

With the bikes inside the car you won't get any of the drag that you get from roof racks. Drag increases fuel consumption.

4.  Doesn't add length or height to your vehicle

This is a huge plus for parking.  A lot of hotel parking in Europe is in underground garages, making roof racks impossible to use.  Parking spaces are also smaller, so extending the back end of the car with a hitch rack can cause issues.  Of course, this isn't as big of a problem in the States, but if maneuverability is a concern, BikeInside solves that problem.

5.  Keeps your bike stable inside the car.

A lot of people find it easier to haul their bikes inside their car, usually by just laying them down.  For one bike this isn't a big deal, but if you are hauling more than one it can be a hassle.  Bikes shouldn't be stacked on each other.  Pedals and handlebars can get caught in spokes, derailleur arms get bent.  The BikeInside keeps your bike upright, stable, and safe from entanglement.

The BikeInside in use in our Passat.

A wheel bag is a good idea for car travel as well.

We've tried our BikeInside for a couple of months when we've wanted to take the bikes further afield or travel with them.  It was a huge help when we drove to Denmark a couple weeks ago.  As you an see above, our bikes fit inside the car while still allowing plenty of space for luggage.  For our car it is necessary to remove the seat post, but the rear wheel can stay in place.  We picked up a cheap dual wheel bag for our front wheels and that tucks in nicely alongside one of the bikes near a passenger door.  With our two bikes and wheels inside, we still had plenty of room for a couple suitcases, camera bags, and a couple duffels filled with cycling equipment.  That still left ample space to pick up a couple souvenir items on our trip.  We didn't have any issues with parking, now that the bikes were inside the car.  When we spent an afternoon at Lego Land, we were confident that the bikes would be safe tucked under a cover, going unnoticed.  It poured for the entire drive home at the end of the weekend, so we were very thankful to have the bikes inside and dry.

So, I highly recommend picking up a BikeInside if you are looking for an internal bike rack system.  They work in almost every car and with almost every style of bike.  While you can't pick them up at an American dealer, they ship internationally from the website.  At about $160.00 (w/o shipping), it's a reasonable and valuable option for transporting your bikes.

We're very pleased with ours!

Pedaling About

So, here we are, rolling down into the last half of July.  The Tour is in full swing and here in old Bavaria the temperatures are on the rise.  We're at 90F this afternoon so the shutters are pulled down, the fans are blowing at maximum velocity, and occasionally Cat 1, Cat 2, The Dog, and myself climb up to the top floor (there are 5 in this wacky house) where the floor air conditioner is and enjoy a civilized temperature for a few minutes.

The cycling, however, is still going on.  Last weekend, we treated the bikes to a fieldtrip in Denmark to cycle around an island in the Baltic.  Let me tell you, Ærø may be a little place, but it packs quite a bit into it.  For cyclists it's one of those places that is just about perfect.  Despite it being Denmark, there are some decent hills.  Because it's Denmark, there's plenty of wind.  Because Ærø is special, there's plenty of coffee stops, good food, fantastic people, clear roads, big views, old churches, and even a craft brewery.  Oh, and there are cobbles.  Plenty of teeth jarring cobbles.  And, when you're done riding for the day, the sunsets can't be beat.

Empty roads and beautiful skies.

One of the quintessential windmills

Typical lane in Ærøskøbing, the oldest port town on the island.

House in Ærøskøbing

The amazing beer of Ærø

Great place to try your legs on some cobbles.

Island residents sell homemade items from their doorsteps and trust you to leave the money in the provided can.

No caption necessary.

But, that's going to be it for the traveling for a while.  For the rest of this fast moving summer we're focused on cycling closer to home.  The Rapha Womens 100 ride is, of course, this Sunday.  Once again, I will be joining other women all over the globe to ride 100km to support women's cycling.  While it'll just be my husband and I on our own since there aren't any organized rides in these parts, there are plenty of organized and supported rides around the world to join up with.  So, if you're up for doing 100km on Sunday, join us!

And, after that?  Well, the two of us are going to tackle something a little longer.  Over the next couple of months we'll be training to attempt our first century ride.  Without anything else going on, might as well give it a shot, right?  I'll let you know how it goes.  But, I have to admit I'm looking forward to the next couple of months just being about the bike.

The Mountains in Our Minds

The trail branched off from the main route just outside the town, and after getting through that gauntlet of a town it's at this point in the route (the one I call Crosswind Way), that I settle in for a short recovery before the said crosswinds kick in after the turn onto the road.  I never gave the trail a second thought.  Except where it intersects the Mainweg, you can't see it.  It disappears into a grove of short, thick trees and the shade of the overpass.  It looks like one of those little branches that appear all along the cycle routes for taking local traffic into the outskirts of neighborhoods.

But, I am bored.  It's not that Crosswind Way doesn't have it's rewarding scenery.  It does.  It passes through a deep valley cut by the Main, covered in vineyards.  There are some red stone ruins dotting hill tops, flat river barges, small towns, and sweet smelling woods.  But, after time, even things like that become old hat.  I am itching for a change of scene and a change of wind.  A glimpse at the map indicated this trail would lead me down another valley into the ominous sounding Odenwald.  Ominous sounding forests are just what I need.  So, at the last second as I head down the hill out that town, I lean right and turn under the overpass.  There is no wind, for a bit, but as I come out of the shelter of hedges and farm buildings on the other side of the highway, it hits me full in the face.  The cross winds of Crosswind Way are now a headwind, the constant headwind of the Main Valley.  I shift into a smaller ring and got into the drops.  I don't see many people, just the occasional retiree on an old upright, with a "morgen."  I come out of the rhythm for a nod and a smile.  I'm just out to explore, no need to retreat too far into my head and ignore the world.  I'm finding a new one, after all.  I pass through a nondescript town, with gravel based businesses lining it's outskirts.   Gravel mining is a thing in these parts.  Shortly after exiting the town streets, I hit my first stretch.  I shift into the next smaller ring, but keep my hands on the hoods.  The faster I ride over the gravel, the smoother the ride and the less chance of wiping out on a loose spot.  My eyes search for a clean line around the holes and squishy patches and my tires find it.  I'm not a huge fan of gravel, just because of what it can bring- punctures but, once I'm on it, I can't help but not enjoy the rush of attacking it at full speed.  I'm out of the town, long out, the road ends at a T; no indication of which way the next town is.  That's the way you go exploring on a bike in Germany.  Pick a town name on a sign and follow the rest of the signs there.  I pause for a moment and pull the map up on my phone.  I could take the road on my right, or see where this gravel takes me to my left.  A huge flat bed truck carrying half a dozen tractors rumbles past throwing dust on me from the road.  I turn left.

The gravel ends in a parking lot for a shooting club.  A quick scan of the lot reveals a break in the trees where there should be another road which will take me on to my chosen town.  I hope this isn't one of those shooting clubs with the target course in the woods.  I follow the path, just a dirt single track now, dip below the parking lot, around a patch of fist sized gravel, over a footbridge and onto another gravel road.  The gravel continues for another several kilometers before petering out and depositing me in another town.  I have no idea which one, but the sign says my destination is still quite a ways off.  With the pavement firmly beneath my tires, I breathe a sigh of relief from the gravel rattling, and kick into a more civilized pace.  A turn here, a turn there, a camp ground, a group of bird watchers, a farmer straight off of a postcard sitting in the bed of his truck with a pipe in his mouth and his dog at his side.  The countryside rolls by.  The hills rise around me, no vineyards, just dark trees- the Odenwald.  As I round a bend a large hill looms up in the distance, red walls crown its brow and a tower perches on the crest.  Another castle.  But, this one is new, so I let my eyes linger on it for a bit, before the hill twists out of sight.  After all this time, I still have a thing for castles.  They are huge monuments to this experience.  Reminders I'm not in Ohio anymore, reminders not to take that for granted.

After thirty or so kilometers, I've arrived at my destination, but I don't know it yet.  I'm expecting to roll out into a town center, paved in cobbles, with a church in the middle, and a bench next to the church.  That's the usual choice for a break to take a snack and refill the bottles if I need to.  I don't need to yet and the way to the quaint center is hidden around construction barriers and passing local traffic.  I decide to take the easy way through the congestion and head straight at the intersection.  I'll sort the way to the church bench after I get out of this cluster.  But, I don't.

It's not long before the road takes a severe uphill grade.  I'm basically committed at this point without making a u-turn.  I'm definitely leaving the town, almost as soon as I arrived in it, and I'm going up. A wooden, hand painted sign on the right of the road points up the hill I've unintentionally arrived on.  It says "Berg."  I glance up to the top of this hill; just the hint of red stone peaks through the trees.  The berg I saw from the valley below.

Sometimes the mind does weird things.  Things that are huge, things that terrify us, that intimidate, just stop being a big deal.  The butterfly feeling never hits.  We say, "I'm not afraid of you today."  We don't know why, we just aren't.

I don't make a u-turn.  I stop thinking about locating the town center.  I want to see this castle instead, and do so I have to climb this hill.  So, climb this hill I will.  I focus.  My head in its weird non-panicky state says, "Find the rhythm.  Speed isn't rhythm.  Just go up the hill.  Just go up.  If your speedometer is reading single digits, who cares?  You're going up this hill.  When you get up there, and you will, your life will never be the same."  And I find the rhythm, or it finds me.  I'm in the sun, full on my back.  I breathe through my mouth.  A bead of sweat runs down my left temple and falls on my shoulder.  Switchback.  I'm in the shade.  I took the turn tight on the inside as a red hatchback passes.  I hear the telltale grind of dropped chain.  I roll into a wide spot on the side of the road and sort it out.  I must have bumped the shifter when I stood up in the turn.  I click back in and keep going up.  Sorry, I'm not going to let the dropped chain dissuade me.  I'm going up this hill.  Switchback.  Sun.  The grade steepens.  I downshift and put my hands on the tops.  I hear the sound of laughing children coming fast behind me, and then they're on me.  In two firetrucks.  They barrel past, a small head pokes out a window and looks back, waving.  Sorry, kid, I'd wave back, but I'm kinda in the middle of something.  Switchback.  Shade and a break in the grade.  But, the road is positively pocked with holes.  This will probably hurt on the way down.  I leave it in the low gear and spin my legs out a bit, swig a bit from the bottle before the next increase hits a few meters ahead.  Ok, I should probably fill my bottle at some point.  There are no more switchbacks, just a steady increase in the grade.  Sun.  Shade.  Sun. Shade.  The sound of water somewhere.

Sun.  The trees are below me, just the castle sits above.  I run out of road and find the fire trucks at the same time.  Their passengers are running around the playground at the base of the fortress.  I pass between these random emergency vehicles and smoosh my front tire into a parking lot filled with loose pea gravel.  I'm going so slow at this point, it doesn't matter.  It's like landing on a feather bed.  My bike and I swim out and make our way to the near vertical cobbled road leading up through the castle gate.  The cobbles are set in such a way, basically stepped, so vehicles and shoes have something to grip, but there's no way I'd be getting a bike up that.  A sign nearby say's don't even try.  So, I unclip and walk, pushing the bike along the path next to me.  Another sign advertises a museum and the toiletten, aka. places to refill my bottles.  We climb through the first gate into a courtyard with a cannon.  We stop and turn around.

All that emotion I expected to hit me at the start of the climb, finally arrives.  But, it's not the butterflies of fear, the choke of trepidation.  It's a lump in the throat.  It rises, and my eyes well up.  A big green landscape wraps itself around me and below me.  A big old castle stands behind me.  I got here on my bike, the whole way.  I climbed a hill, pretty darn big one, a category 4 actually, on my own because I wanted to.  Because I said I would.  Because I couldn't let this hill or any other scare me back down the road.  I climbed.  I climbed.  It went pretty good and here I am.

The mountains in my head had been defeated with that climb.  My life isn't the same.  After filling my bottles and having a quick snack, I headed home the way I came.  The descent down that hill was the most fun I can ever remember having on two wheels.  Descents are a reason to climb.  But, the climb itself is the real reason.  With every pedal stroke, we get higher, stronger in the body and in the head.  If this hill can be climbed so can others.  The road is wide is open now.  There is nothing to fear.

Don't believe me?  The next day I climbed two more hills just like it.