The best laid plans can go wrong despite everything.
Today was to be one of those days.
After a lovely Polish breakfast, where the young chef explained what he’d made and had so much interest in me liking his food, understanding its local origin and no chemicals.
He’d made this lovely crepes with a light creamy filling. I enjoyed those with locally cured beef.
Everything has onions though. Onion and I are not best friends and these little balls he insisted I try…onion, onion and a bit more onion.
I secretly hid them in my disposable serviette, popped into my jersey pocket to deal with later.
We packed our bikes and Tony decided to pump up his front tyre. Lots of cursing, his tyre totally deflated and he could not get air in.
We were going nowhere.
I recalled seeing bikes at the back of the shed so went back into the small castle to enquire. A man arrived a few minutes later and said he had a compressor.
The wheel was removed, taken to the compressor and we had air and off we tootled.
After only a few km of sealed road we hit non sealed surfaces. Another 45 km or so today of varying surfaces.
This was shitty! When I see Tony sliding ahead if me and release his foot from the pedal cleats, I know to go slower than slow.
Riding through sand is hard, many points you push your bike.
At this nice junction in a forest we stopped to remove some clothing. It was only 11 degrees Celsius, cloudy, but with occasional sun we had warmed up.
Again today we mainly followed EuroVelo 10 and 13. Whilst having our routes clearly on our bike computers, it is always nice to see the EV signs.
We had sandy and muddy pot holes.
The undergrowth vegetation had changed. Lots of heath like plants.
These were cute. In two villages were thesedog poo bins. We could do with some of these near us for the ones too lazy to pick up after their dog and dispose appropriately, including a couple of public areas I try to maintain.
It is very pleasant riding through here. Nice trail and forest.
We crossed a bridge in the forest. Views to the right and left.
In Wladyslawowo we searched for a bike shop. We had been very conscious that our pump was faulty and if either of us got a flat we’d be a bit stuck and need to wait for the next cyclist to venture along.
Wladyslawowo is a large town and whilst searching saw a few interesting buildings.
Found the bike shop and this lovely bloke who is Polish but speaks great English.He has been touring around Poland for around 2,000 km so far. He went into the shop to assist with interpretations in purchasing a replacement pump.
We arrived on the Hel Peninsula, a 35 km sandbar separating the Baltic Sea from the Bay of Puck.
The plan was to ride to our accomodation, some 8 km short of the peninsula end, ride up there sans gear, grab dinner and head back to our lodgings.
Tonight we were booked into camp huts that looked ok in the pictures. I had lots of difficulties finding somewhere suitable for the bikes as most accomodation is privately owned apartments who were not keen on bike storage.
The bay was calm.
For the most, this was the cycle path surface.
Boats out of water.
Continuing on our merry way.
We were staying in a campground that had many good reviews. It looked like this from Booking.com images.
We could not figure how to get in there. There was a caravan storage place for derelict caravans and a desolate, abandoned, graffitied building with fences and locked gates.
We rode up and down the road.
We noted a small pedestrian gate not latched. We pushed through, riding through long grass, past what looked like the setting for a horror movie.
The place was abandoned and desolate and plain creepy.
We got to the cabins and quite clearly, they had not been used for some time.
There was noone waiting to greet us as per our check in instructions. I messaged them as there was no phone number.
Surrounding the cabins, maybe 50 metres away were more crappy looking caravans. One had a car and motorbike.
We just needed John Jarratt’s Wolf Creek character to pop out and I’d have screamed.
We could not stay here even as the only guests. We did not feel safe.
We made the decision to bolt.
The plan tomorrow had been to train to Gydnia for our next section so we headed to the nearest railway station. The ferry left too late in the day.
There is a one way train from Hel! Good to know.
There were ticket vending machines. I purchased two adult tickets but it would not let me do the bikes. The machine does not print a ticket.
The train arrived, we boarded. There were two other bikes on board. The Polish conductor protested in Polish re our bikes. He did speak minimal English enough to say that there was no room for our bikes.
I pleaded my case. He ended up rolling his eyes and blew the whistle and the train departed, with us on board.
He came back multiple times with long messages in Polish.
I handed over our credit card and he charged us for the bikes. Problem solved.
We later found out from a lady using her Google translator that only two bikes are permitted. We were bikes three and four.
The reason I could not add the bikes to the ticket was that those two owners had already booked bike tickets.
Fortunately they both got off within two stations.
So a bit of tension and we arrived into Gdynia to find a hotel. I had a quick look and noted two larger ones that may cope with bikes.
Took a mountain of energy to get the bikes out of the station, down stairs, up stairs, up ramps that were designed by non cycling engineers.
We found the Mercure hotel by chance. It was one of the two. I went in, booked a room and our bikes are in our room!
So here we are. I have requested a refund from Dodgyville Camping and Booking.com.
With self planned tours, you need to think on your feet and come up with solutions. You are self reliant. But it’s worked out ok.
The only down side is not seeing the best parts of Hel.
We have ridden 113 km today so another solid day. Here is our route.
That’s it for today. Thanks for reading 😊❣️🚴💪
yakkablog 