June 23, 2022
Back in December of last year, I posted a story on here about our friend Heike from Germany. She has a bike stored at our place in Texas (two now, actually), and comes once or twice a year to tour. At Christmas time we rode to Mexico together, giving her an introduction to the border crossing procedures with the bike, and a tour of some of our favorite places in Mexico.
Now it was our turn to visit her. We left Groningen and headed south again, taking the smaller roads along canals and crossing back into Germany, arriving at her house in Rees, on the Rhein river just before dinner.
Heike had read about our introduction to Aperol Spritz cocktails, and had them prepared for us when we arrived. While Diana unpacked the bike, Heike and I jumped on bicycles and rode to the grocery store to gather some dinner goods. It was great to catch up, and to see her world finally.
Sitting in Heike’s garden sipping Spritzes.
The next morning I changed the tires on the bike while Heike was at work. Although the original tires still had some life, I knew it would be difficult (and expensive) to find them in Norway, so Heike bought them online in Germany and had them waiting for our arrival.
Yes, even at my age, I can still change tires by hand on the ground, using tire levers. Which comes in handy. And will come in handy again, soon, unfortunately. Breaking the bead on these suckers is the toughest part, and I carry a MotionPro bead breaker, which hasn’t let me down yet. I’ve also found that going for a ten mile ride immediately before changing the tires gets them warm enough to help.
When Heike returned from work, we jumped on the bikes and rode the “back way” (a nice way of saying we went a way that might not have been perfectly legal for motorized vehicles) to a nearby town that had an outdoors store, as I needed a new can of camping gas for our stove.
With Heike just before leaving her place for a local tour on the bikes.
That evening, Heike took us to a buffet dinner at a place that is only open one weekend a month. The food was great, and we took the time to discuss her upcoming trip to Texas.
The next morning we packed up the bike, and Heike loaded her Africa Twin, and we again rode north into Netherlands.