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September 7 Thursday sunny Bicycle touring Germany Bright and early I was cycling back to the bike shop. I strapped Sharon's broken bike rim to my rear rack and rode back to Bad Schandau, Germany, while Sharon stayed back in camp. I'm too early. The rim hasn't arrived yet. At 10 AM, a car stops in the middle of the narrow street and unloads a bike and two rims. Yay! The shop owner shows me the rim. Oh, rats! It is a solid bolt axle, not a quick release. I assume he'll change the solid axle to a quick release. He disappears into the shop while I wait on the bike shop steps. After a couple of minutes he comes and gets me. He can't get Sharon's old cluster off. Where is Arran when I need him. The bike shop owner doesn't have the right size tool to remove the cluster. Terrific. And to thin, when we were bike touring in Ireland and I was going to buy the $12 tool there the guy in the bike shop said, "I wouldn't buy one. Every bike shop will have one." Sure. Yeah, right. Except this one. The bike shop owner shrugs. He shows me another cluster, but it has only 28 teeth for the largest cog - the same as the one we sent home after buying the 32 tooth sprocket in Ireland. The bike shop owner shrugs again. What can I do? I decide to buy the 28-tooth rear cluster. Hopefully we can find a bike shop somewhere that will be able to remove the 32. DM143 later including labour, new rim, new cluster, new tube and tire, I restrap both rims onto my bike and cycle back to where Sharon is waiting in camp. She sees her new rim. Instead of a flow of loving appreciation for what I have accomplished, she is glum instead. It's not a quick release axle. It's not a Schrader tube. It's a 28-tooth cluster, not a 32. And the new tire is one of those phony tread, like one I bought in when we were bicycle touring in Holland. Woe is me. After some convincing Sharon installs the new rim. She takes off the new tire and puts on her old one. While doing so she finds that the installed Presta tube is an 18 - the tire is a 35! That little tube must be stretched pretty thin inside that new bike rim. We pack up and attempt to make some miles away from Bad Schandau. On the first hill, Sharon discovers her rear derailleur will not shift onto the new cluster's large sprocket. We stop and adjust the derailleur amidst a swarm of yellow jackets. Still no go. Sharon is fed up. She wants to return the
whole thing, get our money back and take the train to Pirna to
get the bike parts she wants. He takes the rim back into the bike shop and removes the axle. He then proceeds to cut off a scientifically calculated amount (eyeballing it) and puts the axle back together. Sharon exchanges the crappy Continental tire for a knobby made in Czechoslovakia one. 4:30 PM, and off we cycle. We bicycle back, retracing our route back to R* amid rush hour traffic. We turn south through town and are soon bicycling beside a refreshingly clear brook. The world is starting to look like a better place. At a no entry sign, one of those with just a red circle on a white background, we pull our loaded touring bikes to a stop to reconnoiter. I find a level spot above the creek. It entails a stiff uphill push through brambles, to what Sharon disaffectionately refers to as the "tick farm." We actually see a few ticks crawling around. Later, I find a tick embedded in my ankle. After it has made no response to being soaked in benzine, Sharon jabs the tick out with a needle, causing me immense pain, much to her delight I'm sure. In the morning Sharon finds a tick embedded in her forearm. Isn't camping fun? We've decided that bicycling in Czech isn't in the cards and we have abandoned attempts to enter. We figure we probably wouldn't find our Kiwi bicycle touring friends, Arran and Rebecca, anyway. Oh, yes, and we've stricken the work "check" from our vocabulary. We now use "enquire" instead. |
