In Rüsselsheim I had an early breakfast together with my friend and host Jürgen, then he suggested that I should prepare a lunch package and gave me a hand full of bananas for the way. The day before he showed me a wonderful route through the hilly area called Odenwald. The route should be as short as possible, contain a minimum of height meters and little traffic of course.
Then I started at 7:30 am, outside the weather was warmer than the days before, maybe 3 to 5 °C, the streets were wet and drizzel fell from the cloudy sky. The yellow light from the street lights reflected in the wet street and also in the low hanging clouds. This caused a feeling well known to the people in the northern and central parts of Europe ,the feeling of having to leave the cozy security of a climatized home.
On the road to Darmstadt there were cars everywhere. The shoulder of the road was often pretty wide so I felt saver than riding really close to the cars. I often switched to the cycle/walking path when available but realized time after time that this alternative was in at least 50% of the cases a mistake, either slowing me down through massive detours or leading to dead ends. Having to cross the street in break of dawn didn’t increase my security in traffic either.
Reaching the city of Darmstadt I reached this important “kilometer stone” of my journey, symbolical for the successful end of the tour: the number 40 000 appeared on my kilometer counter. Mission accomplished! I could have missed the display of this number easily, there was no “magical feeling” or any other kind of signal from either the environment or my body, just the usual feeling of being packed in enough warm layers to master the last stage in winter Germany. My super VDO MC1.0 kilometer counter also didn’t give any signal at all: no beep, no vibration (as other devices would have done these days), no letter of congratulation or nice sentence from the tiny device mounted beside the 26″ rear wheel. Just a normal moment in a middle sized German city in another way too warm winter. Nobody took notice!
I was happy. Happy when looking back to this so rich part of my life, happy when looking at where I was now and happy when looking into the future. The smile appeared on my face again and the pedestrians passing often got infected when I greeted them kindly and smiled back.
Continuing towards the natural park Odenwald and slowly gaining in altitude on the way towards Reichelsheim I started to recognize the familarity of the landscape and architecture. These now brown, forest covered hills with the tiny villages, small streams leading downwards from every valley, the farms and wood processing plants, the cellar door sales from local farmers advertised near the road and of course the timber framed white-black houses or houses covered with tiny timber plates. This is the area I had explored for years on the mountainbike and in my early childhood together with my grandparents and relatives. This felt even more like home than the European way of life I already felt very familiar with during the last two weeks.
Cycling down from the “Wegscheide” crossing towards Hirschhorn was nice and fast riding and arriving at the bottom I reached the Neckar river. The water that flows down from somewhere in the Black Forest and passes my home only 50 or 60 km upstream. This navigable river led a lot of my cycling tours, it was always there with the lock in my home town Gundelsheim and sometimes even heavy floods. From now on I knew the route by heart, I’ve probably cycled it at least a dozen times and even more often from Eberbach, the town only 11 km from here.
I chose the slower version, following the cycle path, to get to Eberbach and switched over to the B37 road that later changed into the B27 near Mosbach and brought me to Gundelsheim just at dusk time. Nice time for the finisher photo in front of the castle Horneck, after 40 115 km. I took all the time to put the tripod on the cycle path, adjust the camera settings and get the shot. I had the time, I surely was not in a hurry this evening. A lot of cars passed me in their hurry to get from A to B really fast and enrich the lives of their passengers. They are several times as fast as I have been during the last 600 days. What do they gain? What do they lose?
Now I visit this place where I’ve spent so many years of my life, the house where I had grown up in, the street where I had learned cycling and the center of my little world until a few years back. A strange feeling in my breast.
I leave some stuff with my father who had reached home already more than a week ago, the tent and sleeping bag are drying in the cellar now. I shortly check the interior of my youth, my room, the kitchen and living room. A lot of memories are connected to these places, but I don’t feel like I had lost them, I don’t feel like I had missed them.
I start riding again and pedal up that “long” uphill from Neckarmühlbach to Siegelsbach; the high-brightness front LED lights are flickering when I reach the really steep parts with more than 10% gradient. I choose to take the even steeper shortcut towards Siegelsbach … and master it … of course. I am trained and motivated. Cycling through two smaller villages I reach Fürfeld and find the new home of my mother and sister immediately.
20 months no see! I park the bike at a bush beside the house, I ring the bell, I jump behind the bush! My wonderful sister Verena opens the door already expecting me, so I’m not very successful with terrifying her even only a bit! Now she’s falling me in the arms. I’m happy! During the trip there had often been a big distance and times with bad communication when the facilities were just not there. But now I’m back, back in a different NOW, but back with the people I love! I meet Andi, my friend and the longtime boyfriend of my sister, and my mother Martina only 45 minutes later when she comes back from work. And after lifting up the loaded recumbent bicycle many stairs I’m trained and able to pick her up. Even our dog Sydney is happy after shortly “talking turkey” with me 
A beautiful day and a condign and nice finish of the adventure.R
Congratulations !
Congratulations Daniel you are very strong men
Very intesing trip !
@Wim & Artur: Thanks for your congratulatoins my friends and fellow riders! I hope you and all other readers of mine have had a merry Christmas and I wish everybody who has followed my adventures a happy new year with a lot of nice cycling and socializing!
May the bike be with you!