6/13/02, Luxembourg — I’ve managed to pedal as far as Luxembourg (well, actually, I rode the train the last part of the way).  It started pouring rain in southern Belgium the other day and I was forced to seek refuge in an over-priced and under-sized B&B in Nowhereville for two nights and a full day.  The only food around was a little sandwich shop across the street.  I wonder if the Donner Party suffered this much.  Finally, just as I was almost out of things to read, the rain let up long enough for me to haul ass 15 km to the train station.

Luxembourg is still as pretty as I remember it from years ago; however, it has modernized and the prices have gone up.  There used to be a palace guard that was costumed somewhat like those in Buckingham Palace.  He has now been replaced by an evil mercenary type who is armed with a wicked looking assault rifle, complete with bayonet, so it looks like the 21st century really is arriving here.

I’m going to spend the day on the walking tour of the old castles and medieval stuff and take lots of pictures.  In spite of the mercenary in front of the Duke’s little crash pad, this place still really is beautiful, even though the greedy, neo-fascist corporate enemies of the people have managed to install an obscene looking McDonald’s and Pizza Hut in the town square.  No wonder they don’t like Amerikaners.

I’ve pretty much decided to get a Eurail pass to cover more distance and do more sightseeing, not to mention the fact that I’m already getting saddle sore and I’ve only pedaled from Amsterdam.  Now I”m finding that I will probably have to buy the pass via the Internet from America and have it sent to me here rather than just go to the train station and pick it up locally.  Isn’t bureaucracy wonderful.

Talk to ya later,

Bill

6/8/02, Liège, Belgium — I’m in Liège, Belgium now.  This is not really all that far from Maastricht, but there are a lot of hills in between which make peddling a lot harder.  I did, however, manage not to get lost this time.  It seems to be a lot easier to take a wild guess as to the meaning of French signs than Dutch ones.  I’ll probably stay here for a few days and then head south to Luxembourg.

I haven’t been back to Luxembourg for a long time, but, as I remember, it is a real garden spot in Europe.  There was even an old castle that probably has a wicked witch living in it.

I’m thinking of getting a Eurail pass sometime while I’m over here, but it is a little complicated trying to gauge the price advantage these days.  In order to save money I would have to take five or six really long train rides within two months, and I still haven’t figured out just what I want to see yet.

6/4/02, Maastricht, Holland — I have made it as far as Maastricht without anything more exciting happening than getting lost in the Dutch countryside at least 100 times.  This is quite a feat, as I only peddled a little more than 100 km.

Maastricht is one of the prettiest and most interesting places in Europe.  It was first civilized by Roman legionnaires in 50 A.D.  The lady at the inn down the street appears to have been here to serve the conquering legionnaires their first horn of mead.  I’m staying at the Hotelboot, which is a real world class joint and one of my favorite homes away from home.  The Hotelboot was a riverboat back in the 1930s, and is now moored here and used as a hotel.  I wouldn’t be surprised if Hitler once stayed here.  This place has even more rustic old world charm and atmosphere than La Pension California in La Paz, and more opulent high class luxury than Pancho’s Motel.  Unfortunately, the prices have gone up to an extravagant $30 per night since my last visit, but it’s still worth it.

I’ve decided to take trains for at least some of my long distance traveling and not try to outdo Lance Armstrong again.  Aside from being basically lazy, I feel that on the last trip over here I spent too much time cycling and did too little sightseeing.  I’ll probably head west to Belgium from here and then be in Spain in 3 or 4 weeks.  They speak a civilized language and have lower prices there.

5/31/02, Utrecht — I really found a neat place to stay here in Utrecht.  It has dormitory-style rooms, which isn’t so unusual with the low budget places here in Europe, but what makes this place unique is that they don’t have separate dorms for men and women.  In fact, judging from the looks of the crowd here, I think that there are people of at least four or five sexes just in my room.  Other than that, there is nothing remarkable about the place.  Everyone kept their clothes on in the room last night and there were no orgies or anything fun.

Utrecht’s claim to fame is that this is the home of the Waterleidingmuseum, or, in English, the Sewage Museum. This is no shit, there really is a sewage museum here.  I haven’t been able to find any postcards, but I did take a picture of it.  Sophisticated connoisseurs of neo-European culture come here from all over the world just to see the sewage museum.

My trip from Amsterdam has gotten off to a rather poor start so far.  I am seriously carrying too much weight again.  I was planning to do this on a boat, and packed way too much stuff.  20 km outside of Amsterdam two welds on my bicycle luggage rack broke from carrying too much weight.  Fortunately, I was right in front of a Volvo dealer when they broke, and was able to hold the rods together with hose clamps.  I’ll throw everything away that I just can’t live without and continue tomorrow.

Didn’t Confucius once say that a journey of 10,000 km begins with a single flat tire and then gets worse from there?  Or something like that…

5/29/02, Amsterdam — I had a nice boat picked out and was just about to buy it when I found that you have to be a Euro resident to get boat insurance over here.  There might be a way around that but I don’t want to spend half of my vacation trying to buy insurance.

I am planning to point the handlebars of the Skinkmobile in the general direction of Paris and Spain and leave in the morning.

Talk to ya later,
Bill

5/23/02, Amsterdam — We seem to be having about the same weather over here as you, a day of overcast and drizzle then a few gorgeous days.  Today was one of the beautiful days.  I went on a 50 km bike ride all over Amsterdam and the surrounding countryside. The scenery over here is incredible — just 1/2 hour by bicycle from the center of town are beautiful and really quaint little villages, cow pastures and windmills.  With all this, legal drugs and a liberal welfare system that anybody too lazy to look for a job is qualified for, you know that anyone in Amerika with a Van before his last name must have some insanity in his family.

I think I found a suitable flagship for the Symbionese Liberation Navy today.  I’m going on a test drive tomorrow, and if the engine sounds good I will begin my new career as a river pirate.  Another nice thing is that I’m buying from a dealer who will re-sell the boat for me when (and if) I go back to my boring life as a harassed substitute teacher.

So far, it looks like my master plan is going to work out just about the way my brilliant mind conceived it.  I will probably spend over four months living the life of a European international jet set playboy and yachtsman for very little more money than I would have spent just killing time and existing in Boring Old Azusa.

Talk to ya later,

Herr Kaaptan Van der Battle

N.B. As the 2000 presidential election limbo dragged on awaiting final results from Florida, TIME Magazine asked Miami Herald columnist Carl Hiaasen to write an essay on the cultural climate in that neck of the woods. It was so spot on and clever, at a time when a good laugh was sorely needed and much appreciated, that I started reading his uproariously funny satirical novels.  When I encountered the character Skink—a classic golden boy, a Vietnam combat hero elected governor of Florida who lasts two years in office before pitching the whole corrupt, sordid mess to flee into the Everglades and live off the land—I recognized a true soul mate of my brother Bill.  I called his attention to Hiaasen, and he was soon hooked.  In 2002, he was planning a return trip to Europe, and considering whether to travel by boat or bike.  He named his new bicycle “The Holy Skinkmobile.”

1/20/02—This trip is turning out to be a lot more complicated than my last European vacation, where I finally just ended up putting my bicycle on an airplane and going without even a decent map of Europe.  I just knew that Africa was somewhere to the south.  Now I have to think of things like, do I need a license? and what about insurance?  I have found some boats on a Dutch website that look like they will work for what I want to do, but the text is all in Dutch.

4/3/02 — Right now I’m thinking that unless I find a really good deal on a boat I will just ride a bicycle anyway.  Even after contacting countless Europeans from various Internet bulletin boards, I am still a little insecure about the boat idea.

4/17/02—I just finished reading Sick Puppy.  I’ve been giving the used Hiaasen books to friends rather than selling them.  He is slowly getting popular around here. I’ve even decided to name my bicycle “The Skinkmobile” in honor of my new role model.  I haven’t quite gotten his lifestyle down yet, but I did manage to live as a wild man for awhile in the woods behind cow pastures in Holland, Belgium, France and Spain on my last great trip, and I’ll probably do it again next month.  I think it may be awhile before I actually develop an appetite for road kill, but they do sell canned snails in France and I might try one this trip.