Road Trip with Des
With the event over - and everyone has probably seen the results, with Jonah at 9th and David crashing out -we're tending to team stuff. Jonah would have been on the podium if he hadn't have nailed a couple of penalties. That's racing though; the penalties count. And Cyril! Running out of fuel 100 km from the special stage end? That's almost impossible. Was it sabotage?
Des and I are driving the truck to Nürmburg last night and crashing in a hotel. German hotels are SO CLEAN. Everything just so. The power to the room turns off when you remove your card key. Internet is cheap. Rossa sent me this little gag movie today, and nothing is funnier in Germany than Hitler jokes. Plus I am a GS rider.
It's good to hear a language I can pronounce on my own and often decipher. No complaints about Hungary, of course. I'll be less able to deal with French, as I usually am. This'll be my first time in France actually. But in Germany I can say please, thank you, good morning/day/evening and other things. I am less of a clueless traveler. More empowered.
So the bike has to go to Paris to some guy named Eric, for the Trans-Oriental Rally next month. At six thousand miles, much more of a Dakar than the CER. Then we're off to Calais to take a ferry to England, meeting Sid from Rally Pan Am, and maybe someone named Giles if we're in London soon enough to go out on the town. I'm connecting with my own friends in London as well, for a few days before going to Amsterdam to decompress for a couple of weeks. I'll probably try to mix them all together, since I enjoy that kind of social chemistry.
Quick breakfast, back on the autobahn. I'll have some six hours to tag and sort photos, though certainly I'll be quite distracted, between scenery and conversation.