Project VELAIA

Before leaving paris I created a sign for informing the people on the road about the world tour. I had already purchased some transparent plastic sheet and brought a cupboard box home from a Indian shop.

I put the following text on the sign:

So now the bike looks like this from behind:

And the first few days after cycling like this I definitely have realized a change in the behaviour not only of the motorists but everyone who reads the sign. It somehow lowers the hurdle to get in contact with me, it gives the people a topic to talk about, ask questions or give comments - I really like it!

One of the great opportunities it has created was the meeting with Celia, her son Melvin and Jessica. When she passed me in her car on the way back home and read the sign, she turned around and asked me “Do you want a bed for the night?”. I replied “Why not!”, and followed her car back to Saint Vaast de Longmont. There I could practise my French a bit and had a wonderful warm and cozy bed for the night. A BIG THANKS for this openness and the great hospitality!

That’s one of the things I love about touring cycling: Most often I have no idea during the daytime where I’ll spend the next night. But I’m always optimistic and if I don’t find anything, I just keep cycling until I find something - it’s really that easy.

If somebody (authorized) wants me to go (which I’ve never had so far), I’d continue and find another place - the philosopher (AKA dog) always finds a place to sleep. The next night after a really cold and winterly day with a lot of snow on the French roads, I was lucky again and found a nice “train stop house” to spend the night in. The bed was not that soft and unfortunately I didn’t have company at all this evening … but no reason for complaints. I spent a quiet, warm and dry night:

With the magical sign facing backwards I could have probably also gotten a bed in the following habitation this night, but I prefered the one shown before for obvious reasons!

In the border region to Belgium as of a sudden bicycle paths appear and in Belgium this gets a regular sight. This immediately remembered me to the last time I’d come through Belgium at the beginning of the tour. And even though I had a lot of rain and snow these days and almost always cloud covered skies I still enjoyed the ride a lot, I enjoyed the people, the familiar European architecture, even the supermarkets filled with all kinds of goods which I didn’t have all these long and exhausting months in South America.

Cycling in Belgium another before unseen thing caught my view and I almost couldn’t believe my own eyes:

I could understand it perfectly, but if I had written “Brotautomat” like the Belgish did in this case (”BROODAUTOMAAT”) I surely would never have made it to the final exams (Abitur) at (torture-)school!

Then I was about to arrive at Wim’s house in Vlissingen. Only problem: It got dark, I still had 40 km to go and not a clue how to get there.

That’s when an angel on two wheels passed me and the magical sign did a wonderful service to me again: Edwin, on his way back from work - on the bike of course! - took me back home, print me out the way to a ferry and checked whether that would take me over the water from Breskens to Vlissingen. He also printed a high detailed map of Vlissingen for me. Without his help I probably would never have reached Wim’s home that evening with my own power. Gracias mil vezes!

And you might think that was enough magic for the day … but no way! Yet another time I got witness of the magical kind of karma of my “sign creation”: The captain of the ferry bringing me over to Vlissingen spotted the sign and came over for a short chat and to invite me to the bridge. Amazing, almost incredible! So I got some really interesting information while we went our way through the heavily crowded channel - a lot of giant tankships there!

Again a BIG THANK you to everybody who helped and/or invited me these days!

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