Day 2. Hangovers, outdoor pools and asylum applications..

I was rudely awoken at around 9 am by the annoying sound of French people nattering away in the tent adjacent to mine. Think I must of had about 2 hours kip and my head feels like it was about to explode.. urgh.  The sun was bleaching down so I  was also sweating my tits off, I crawled out of my tent to reluctantly take on the day. Jo was already up and about but Wally was still fast asleep so I woke him up so he could share in my pain. It was clear that we were all on the same page and it took some time for us to feel human again.

After pulling our heads together we headed over to an outdoor pool in Kreuzberg to relax for the afternoon. We built our bikes up and set off on the ride across town messing around on a few spots around Kultureforum on the way. 

Kreuzberg is a nice part of Berlin and the eastern end has preserved some of the counter cultural vibe that attracted scores of students, punks and hippies in search of an alternative lifestyle long before the reunification of the city. We made it to the pool which was a converted container ship that floats on the Spree river with a bar, decking and sun loungers to boot. It was refreshing to take a dip and chill for a while enjoying the view across the river.

The night time was spent drinking around the campsite until the wee hours talking to a few of the other characters around the bar. We met an aging Canadian called Guy who looked like the text book hippie activist who had came to Germany to seek asylum from the Canadian government as he believes that they are committing treason against the people for the involvement in the Afghan/Iraqi war. Turned out he did have some valid points but unfortunately for him his asylum application has been turned down and he has to go back to Canada in the next few days. 

Day 1. Duct tape, flights and tents..

Got up at 330am to get to the airport to make our flight to Amsterdam at 5.55am. We had packed our makeshift bike bags to the brim packing the bikes, clothes, tent etc all into a bag designed for carrying a bodyboard... hefty doses of duct tape was then applied to reduce the chances of it giving up the ghost after 5 minutes. 

The baggage allowance was 20 kilo for each bag and a surcharge of €12 for every kilo over that, I think we all started sweating it when we lumbered up to put our bags on the scales. Mine was 25k but luckily the wife put it through without any charge, Wally's and Jo's being way over too. 

When we went to pass through security things didn't go as smoothly, as soon as Jo's bag went through the x-ray machine the security neck started twitching, little did we know that he had all of his tools taped together like a makeshift cluster bomb as well as 2 full size bottles of sun tan lotion! He had to run back down and put the stuff through in his luggage and we made the flight on time. 

 

We waited for our connecting flight in Amsterdam and arrived into Berlin TXL airport for around 11 am. Once we pitched our tents we got our heads  down for a couple of hours. The first thing we did when we woke was locate the nearest Imbiss (kebab house) and promptly ordered a chicken doner each. The doner was invented in Berlin by a Turkish immigrant in the 80's and the city has the largest Turkish population in any city outside of Turkey so you know the 'babs are second to none! The heavens opened soon after and rained for most of the day, we mooched around Mitte for a while and ran into Ratty and the rest of the lads while we sat drinking outside of a restaurant. 

The evening involved more drinking from bar to bar, met up with Ross and went to the local techno beach bar until the wee hours. After finally getting back to the campsite everyone was done- long and tiring day. 

Holidays

It has came around so quick I cant believe it, seems like yesterday that we started talking about the summer and now its here (well the season is but not the weather). We fly to Berlin via Amsterdam on the 5.55am flight tomorrow and unfortunately the weather aint looking much better than it is here- rain is forecast until Monday at least. Looks like riding will be off the cards for the next few days then :-(. Meeting up with Kenny B and his lot tomorrow so if there is no riding the activities will more than likely involve boozing... well we are on holiday after all!

We're in Berlin for 3 weeks and hopefully will do a lot of street riding, in the short time we were there last year we found some amazing spots. The city is about 40km across so who knows what we will find. Not sure if I'll have internet access for the first week as I'm camping but I'll try and get an update sorted as soon as I can and share some of the spots we find.  

Oh yeah, Whitley Bay skatepark apparently opens to the public on the 21st July, went down tonight and it looks amazing, I know I've said this about 10 times but it really does. Enjoy, I'll be there as soon as I get back on the 31st!