think that we look pretty good for quys that just completed 100 kilometers into a 30 kph headwind. Of course, that's the end of the story and I should probably start at the beginning.
We knew that we wanted to do a long distance bike trip. We just didn't know where. After buying several maps for several countries we finally settled on the Netherlands (Holland). Julie's parents would be visiting and going to Holland would give us a chance to see Erik van Dyke, their one-time foreign exchange student.
We decided to bike first and stay with Erik and his family afterward. The first day was just a warm up. We rode from Erik's house to Rotterdam and then played tourist for the afternoon. The next morning we had our sites set on about 80 kilometers worth of biking. That would get us to a good campground. That was the plan.
I've always thought that I'm a good navigator, so I wasn't shy to take the lead. Off we went. It was an overcast day, but we had a map, the roads were well marked, and we were following a gigantic river for for the first leg of the trip. Everyonce in a while I would see the river through the trees.
After about 45 minutes, the gang (Greg and Dick) started to grumble that we were going in the wrong direction. "No," I said. "Look. There's the water, and here we are on the map. You're just turned around because it's hazy. Let's keep going."
They didn't give me much longer before insisting that we ask a native. "Can you show us on this map, where we are?" I asked the first man confidently. "Right... over... here," he pointed.
"No," I thought. "That's where we started this morning. We'd better get a second opinion."
So we went on until we found another man. This man was on a motor scooter, so he would know where we were. Of course, he practically pointed to the hotel that we had stayed in the night before.
I had brought us in a nearly perfect circle. The water that I was "following" was actually any number of smaller canals and rivers that dot the water logged land of Holland.
So having travelled an extra 20 kilometers, I was relieved of map duty. The rest of the day, going the right direction thanks to Greg's skills, we spent pedaling into a fierce wind. We even discovered that drafting actually helps.
We spent the night in a noisy amusement park campground. But that's another story.
