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Imprisoned by my own curiosity. I felt as if I was looking up through trees that encircled my view, staring at the many branches and the fruits suspended beyond my grasp. I knew I could no longer be satisfied simply to lie here on my back, closing my eyes and dreaming of things out of my reach.
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I was up early, grabbed a table and a few chairs and set them up on the sand. I sat and gazed out on the empty bay writing until the others woke. A pot of coffee soon followed and then breakfast. The girls were taking about exploring the city’s bizarre, a female shopping ritual. I on the other hand I was invited to go with the men. Bear hunting was on the agenda. We all loaded onto a friend’s boat and headed along the coast to a location that supposedly had a recent bear sighting. …
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A bunch of us from the night before had agreed to gather for a late breakfast and had earmarked today as a moped day. We all kinda wandered up at the same time around lunch. Brad and his sweetheart, Elspeth and Dave were all I managed to convince that it would be a worthwhile experience. Elspeth had never been on a moped before but wasn’t shy about taking on new challenges. During her learning phase either Dave or I would tag along side. …
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It was very late, or to be more accurate, real early in the morning. Outside the station it was dark and cold, really cold. Neither one of us were equipped for that type of weather. The streets were covered in ice and our worn tennis shoes didn’t provide much if any traction. When we exited the station we had no idea which way to head to find ourselves a room. There were two others that also exited our train so we began following them in the hopes they would lead us down the right path. We came to a large boulevard lined with large office shaped buildings but there were no signs or lights that provided us any indication that we were heading in the right direction. …
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Thank God everyday was a sunny beach day. I began the day with some hair of the dog in a small grass shack that hugged the sand leading toward the water, just like yesterday. I struck up a conversation with a young lady who had given me a strange gesture after a fly had landed on her shoulder. We all look from different angles don’t we? She was disgusted with the idea that the fly was attracted to something on her body. I on the other hand would be more concerned with what the fly might have brought to me. It’s a wonderful world that has more than one color. …
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We rolled early into Hamburg. Since we had reduced our load to just the essentials, we could now fit all of our belongings into a single locker. We wandered about Hamburg searching for a suitable place to put down some breakfast and a few early morning beers. That day had been earmarked as a day to relax, to kick back and enjoy the city’s parks and its many bridges. …
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Walked up one of the local hills and watched the sun rise over the valley. Then I took a trek back to the pools to get a few pictures without people climbing all over in them. They were so beautiful and unique. Shallow petal shaped pools with large expanses that had the texture and the look of snow. I expected the crunch of snow but was met with the resistance of rock. I sat alongside them for rest of the morning, just day dreamed and enjoyed the view. …
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I was told of a nice beach just outside of Pisa so I snuck in an early shower again and took an early train out. Tuscany provided an enchanting landscape painted in pastels. I followed the tourists to the tower in Pisa, gave my two cents and climbed to the top. With all those people hanging all over it I was surprised it hadn’t fallen and decided to head down before it did. After strolling through the Duomo and viewing Ramous’s doors I wandered across the river to get a feel for the countryside and sat along the side of the bridge thinking. Truth, like art is sometimes in the eye of the beholder. …
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The wind blowing through the trees surrounding Versailles whispered voices from it past. Is it a revolt? No it is a revolution. Words. Words that had challenged the cast system of the church and the rich. Science, literature and invention tore the fabric of the aristocrats. It started here. A revolution now and then can be healthy thing. I followed an English speaking tour to gather additional information. It was a beautiful home but the maintenance bill must have been outrageous. I guess it is good to be King? …
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A small mini-bus arrived and toted us off to Pamukkale. I only knew what I had read in the bible and in travel brochures about Pamukkale. I understood that it was one of the seven churches Apostle Paul wrote letters to and was coined the “Cotton Castle” of the ancient world. There was an extremely old hot spring that was believed to have healing power and over time became a center of a pagan cult. Large limestone steatite created a beautiful arrangement of pools. …
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We discovered that the prior day’s information was incorrect. There were no boats leaving today. We got our Sabbath’s mixed up again. We had already packed everything up and trekked the long walk down to the docks. At first I had doubt that anybody was talking straight. I always had to ask a few to get some comfort in confirmation. We managed to gather numerous alike answers and concluded that we were stuck there another day, fuck. …
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There were no hedges, nor fences, in the bare and uniform countryside leading into the Netherlands. We were heading back into the crossroads of traffic back into the circus they had named Amsterdam. I could see no natural boundaries that separated the courtyard from the jester. …
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I woke with that taste of too many cigarettes and one too many beers and wandered toward a morning coffee before it was back on the road again. We started down the coast searching for another room, kind of back tracking over the previous day’s plans but we ended up in Monte Carlo instead. It had just begun raining as we headed up one of the steep hills looking for shelter and a cup of coffee. We sat down alongside a window and while we sipped our coffee I noticed a motorcyclist get hit from behind. …
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I picked up a pair of apples and a few candy bars for the trek, while Jim checked the train schedules. “Track four, ready to go” said Jim. After a minute or two with no train, it dawned on me that Jim most likely misread the schedules and picked the wrong platform. I retrieved the schedule from Jim’s bag, “I’ll hold the bags, you go check platform six” I bluntly stated. In the tunnel between the platforms I could hear Jim’s echo, “Its going!!” …
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The sunrise was a picture to behold. Sitting on that beach was like being the only person on the planet. Once we were all up and awake we attempted to hide the remains of the burnt telephone pole and headed up to meet the first bus to Nicolas. We were in need of a shower and food. We took advantage of the stop over on the way to Nicolas which provided enough time to grab some real food. We were all so hungry but still skeptical after the last experience. Once we stepped off the bus in Nicolas a little fat kid’s persistence persuaded us to follow him to an available room. …
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