Tag 11 (Bozi Dar in the Krusne Hory [mountain range]; Wednesday 99.04.21;
distance = 42.2; time = 3:24; odometer = 1252.1) -- It was cool, but not
evil cold (like I had been waking up to )this morning. Being very dry last
night helped the take down go pretty quick. The sun was out when I crawled
out of my sack, but as I rolled out, it was gone and the normal grey was
there. At the first town I got to (which was only a couple of kms from my
perfectly isolated campsite), I saw a place that I thought might have
groceries. Hmm. The windows of the place were almost entirely obscure by
Marlboro stickers. Hmm. It just didn't look like a food store -- but since
I had only seen one place that did look like a food store (back in Tachou),
I decided to check it out. Fascinating. It was a food store, and there was
a long counter with food in its displays and food on shelves behind the
counter. The customer had to ask for everything -- shoplifting = nil. I got
2 boxes of cookies, a big bottle of orange soda, 4 Jogurts, 4 pastries and
a candy bar for 98 KR (~$3). The guy said something about the glass soda
bottle I was going to decant anyway, and when I brought back the bottle, he
gave me a handful of worthless change. I felt very rich and very guilty
right then. Onward. Next goal. Notice CLIMB. I had frequent map checks and
equipment shuffling. When I got to Nejdek, I took a bad turn and had to
CLIMB a big hill, until I got to the next town that had a sign on it. Nope.
This is the wrong way. Back down, try again. This time I was on the right
path. I could tell, because I was going up and up and up. Whew. Wearing
rain pants and climbing is a drag. I did get my jacket off about 3 km into
it. There was plenty of snow at the top and it was even snowing when I got
there. There was a mini descent which didn't really lose much altitude. And
then I found myself at the TOP of a ski run. There were some Seili Bahns,
and I wondered why they were there (I thought Swiss-style lumberjack work).
Nope -- skiing -- not enough snow here, though. The slope was really not
much better than Staublig. I was freezing cold at this point, and it was
raining/snowing pretty hard. I ducked under a shelter and ate 3/4 of my
Jogurts (check the dates!! you can't take that stuff for granted here).
Only a couple of kms later, I had CLIMBED to my next little town, but I was
still cold. I saw a nice-looking restaurant with a fenced courtyard and
windows to keep an eye on the bike. I'll note (?) an odd thing here. Most
people seem to have a dog. They all live chained up or in a pen in a corner
of the yard. They don't get much attention and are, therefore, very
irritable and barky. There are signs everywhere "Pozer Pez" = beware of
dog. This restaurant had such a dog who barked incessantly. It turned out
that this place was a highly swanky restaurant. The rich people came here.
These people drove German cars, had cell phones and wore sharp clothes. The
guy at the table next to me talked to 3 different people in 3 different
languages during his meal. I have a feeling his "girlfriend" was charging
by the hour, just like his cell phone -- she was probably cheaper. So I had
an awesome, huge gourmet meal and as many hot chocolates as I could stand ~
$7 US. Oh boy! How luxurious! I thought it was pretty funny to be there
stinking, filthy and looking like a guy who'd just ridden through a
tornado. The real irony is that I probably was THE richest person there.
So, now that I was warm, stuffed and happy, I was looking for my trail out
of town. The signage sucked here -- admittedly I wanted a pretty obscure
road. Well, I got one! Not quite the right one, but totally awesome. This
road went out of town and into the woods. It was VERY rough and I could
barely do 8 kmph. In the absolute middle of nowhere, I came to a house that
was all closed up (with working shutters). I loved this house and its
setting. I want that house! It was so cool! A bit farther along, the path
degraded more and more. Finally, I had to push the bike through snow for a
couple of kms. At some points, I was afraid I'd wander off the snow-covered
road and lose the road. Nope. Since this was a false turn, I couldn't
figure out where I was on my excellent map. Hmm. I didn't get too worried.
Despite the fog and drizzle, I knew I was only a few kms from a road
somewhere! And sure enough, eventually, I popped out on a road and got my
bearings and resumed normal riding. While riding on the very rough paths, I
became very annoyed at my rapidly worsening hub problem. My rear hub was
not engaging to drive properly, which was very irritating (and just about
castrated me a few times). It was raining and very foggy when I got to the
next town. I decided that riding in such thick fog was a bad plan and that
I should try for a room and work on my hub. So, I got a 120 KR room --
$4!!! My God! Common showers, but damn good ones. They had a perfect locker
room for my bike. Wow! I went out and did some shopping. This little town
had a "bakery." They barely had anything in it to sell, but I bought a lot
of it for the change you find in the dryer. Then, to this town's micro
grocery. Same set up. I did notice that a roll of film is way expensive,
but what I bought was still under $3 US. That includes a 2-liter of Coke, 2
Bounty bars, a pen and a lighter (I needed to singe some of my cords), some
more Jogurts and 5 post cards. Incredible! This is a border town, and I
walked over to the Asia market that is at all border towns. Fascinating.
There were no whores here (on parade anyway). This little town has a cop
station and seems very touristy for CZ. I think that this town is pretty
clean cut, trying to attract German hikers and skiers, etc. Back at the
hotel, I got my wheel off and started working on the hub. Tricks to get the
cassette off: rest the wheel on a piece of firewood, so that the gear teeth
of the free wheel are on the log. Then whack your "cassette cracker" with
another piece of wood. Worked great. Next tip: to work on Philwood hub
ratchets, you don't need to remove the cassette. Oh well ... the spring on
this thing looks pretty kaput. I hope it makes it! I did clean out grunge,
so that seems to have helped it a bit. We'll see tomorrow. Back in the
room, I wrote post cards, this (journal entry), and planned. I washed some
clothes in the shower and now that the radiator's on, they'll get dry. Yea!
I love this country.
![[Bike]](./only2500b.gif)
