Day 1: July 16^th

We staggered 20 km to a café in Lubeck after debording our ferry confusingly named the Peter Pan and not the more obvious option: The Tinker Bell.

An elderly gentleman went through an entire charades routine to convey to us only that we are very bad at charades.  Later, in an attempt to be “with the times,” he handed us a CD containing what we think are his pictures of Lubeck.  We kindly accepted the gift even though we have absolutely no way to view the contents.  However, Germany seems to have a lot of old looking architecture, so maybe some of those places have CD players.  Or CD rom drives? Who’s even keeping track of what it’s called anymore?  And if you answer that question, you are an asshole.

Day 2: July 17^th

Old German men trying to give us advice or directions seems to be a theme here.  On 4 occasions already an old German man has showed up out of nowhere, demanded to know where we are going, and then he proceeds to tell us how to get there in essentially 100% Geman with wild hand gestures I have never seen in my life.

Now, we play along like we are getting every bit of it and thank them profusely.  This seems to both shorten the conversation and make all participants feel good about the outcome.  Actually the faking understanding does cause a problem, because we then have to act satisfied an leave our informational sign, only to then double back when the coast is clear.

Meanwhile, Germans at the tourist information or train ticketing kiosks seem completely unwilling to even try to help.  They just stare into your soul with their dead eyes and say “Impossible.”

In actual trip progress news we are finding the German trials to be the most straight forward and easy to navigate.  Though, they still have their fair share of tree covered or directionally ignorant signs.

Also we are discovering the inverse relationship between number of people and amount of privacy, making the maximum romance cycle adventure a lesson in “you have to work at it.”  It’s a predictable and good lesson, but sometimes you just want to win the lottery and never stop cumming, and its all easy.

Aside: German’s also really like to cram there bathroom spaces full of urinals.  It’s as if every WC is prepared for its equivalent of halftime at the super bowl, or build like powerlines and bridges with the 50 year storm in mind.

Day 3: July 18^th

There are days like today when we can look back and say, “We were so naïve.”

Various consequences occur when you live with blind confidence as your modus operandi. In this instance we rented a cheap room in Prague, days ago, assuming we could just show up in Hamburg, flash our smiles like FBI Top Secret Clearance Badge, board a train to Prague with our bikes and resume Maximum Romance – no problem.

Wrong. Problem is (just like you should never Google something you think is an original idea) everyone has the same idea, and all the trains and busses were filled to their bicycle capacity.

We took a dejected ride through Hamburg to the worst campsite of whole trip. Tomorrow the forecast calls for Brainstorms.

Day 4: July 19^th

It started raining as soon as we packed our things and left the parking lot . . . oh, I mean “campground”.

We ducked into a McDonald’s nearby which has become a surprisingly reliable source of free WiFi throughout the trip.

There, we occupied two tables, dubbed them our Bainstorming Command Center and proceeded to put all our resources on the tables.

I put my phone on the table. . .

We looked around and patted our pockets. . .

This is apparently our only resource.

With that and a travel weary inspired “fuck it all” attitude, we opted to spend our way out of the situation. Rental van to Prague here we come!

Being on a roll, we then booked a surprisingly cheap hotel near downtown Hamburg and got down for the rest of the afternoon and then the evening raising the upper limit of what we thought was possible with Maximum Romance.

This was the first hotel we slept in after over a month of travelling and that makes me feel pretty good, also the hotel was only $50 and it was SWANK!

The rented van was $360 but given that last minute train tickets were going to be about $150 each it turned out to be quite a reasonable deal.