What we didn't tell the children
If the last post seemed a little bit Pollyanna-ish, it was because it was.
Before day one of riding
Ross came down with a cold
Clare was desperately ill for 8 hrs
But we started in good spirits
The first thirty kilometres of the ride was as per the last post.
We were taking wrong turns a bit and having to turn round when our GPS showed that we had diverged from the dotted line. On a bike this is not so bad as you cover enough distance to tell fairly quickly. We had stopped on a dirt siding on a narrow winding road and decided we needed to turn round. With his mind on which junction was our wrong turn I (Ross) headed back , on the left hand side of the road. Immediately a car appeared in front of him and there was nowhere to go but a deep ditch off the roadside. The bike stopped well but I finished in a crumpled heap having somersaulted over the handlebars.
The good news!
No head wound, no bleeding and my titanium leg was intact.
The bad news!
I felt like I had been run over by a bull. The part of my body that ached the most kept changing and new places kept saying hello.
What to do?
We were in a different country with no knowledge of Czech or the Czech health system. It was a public holiday. We had just over twenty kilometres to go to our prebooked hotel and transport for us or us and the bikes. It was only 8 kilometres to the next town.
We rode on, slowly and made it to the town. I was hoping for some comfort food for lunch but everything was closed so we ate a banana and chocolate whilst I summoned the courage to proceed.
The remaining 15 kilometres were very difficult, but possible, because there was a lot of downhill, we had very good gears, Clare did all the navigating allowing me to "just ride".
Arriving at our hotel, Clare gave me a thorough physical (nice!) and decided we needed X-rays for possible broken bones in the right wrist, left shoulder and ribs. Not happy Jan!
The tour company arranged to take our bikes and ourselves to the next nights stop where we would plan our new future.
Before day one of riding
Ross came down with a cold
Clare was desperately ill for 8 hrs
But we started in good spirits
The first thirty kilometres of the ride was as per the last post.
We were taking wrong turns a bit and having to turn round when our GPS showed that we had diverged from the dotted line. On a bike this is not so bad as you cover enough distance to tell fairly quickly. We had stopped on a dirt siding on a narrow winding road and decided we needed to turn round. With his mind on which junction was our wrong turn I (Ross) headed back , on the left hand side of the road. Immediately a car appeared in front of him and there was nowhere to go but a deep ditch off the roadside. The bike stopped well but I finished in a crumpled heap having somersaulted over the handlebars.
The good news!
No head wound, no bleeding and my titanium leg was intact.
The bad news!
I felt like I had been run over by a bull. The part of my body that ached the most kept changing and new places kept saying hello.
What to do?
We were in a different country with no knowledge of Czech or the Czech health system. It was a public holiday. We had just over twenty kilometres to go to our prebooked hotel and transport for us or us and the bikes. It was only 8 kilometres to the next town.
We rode on, slowly and made it to the town. I was hoping for some comfort food for lunch but everything was closed so we ate a banana and chocolate whilst I summoned the courage to proceed.
The remaining 15 kilometres were very difficult, but possible, because there was a lot of downhill, we had very good gears, Clare did all the navigating allowing me to "just ride".
Arriving at our hotel, Clare gave me a thorough physical (nice!) and decided we needed X-rays for possible broken bones in the right wrist, left shoulder and ribs. Not happy Jan!
The tour company arranged to take our bikes and ourselves to the next nights stop where we would plan our new future.
We saw a doctor in a health spa, joining a crowded waiting room with no apparent system for queuing. Realising our lack of Czech we were helped along the way by other patients who organised our place in the queue, alerted the nurse to our presence and generally smiled in sympathy.
The doctor was a jovial fellow with some English, his biggest difficulty was how to put me into his computer. No numbers, no address etc. The Xrays revealed no broken bones, just strains and sprains and contusions. So! we will take a car to our next hotel and see if another days rest is enough to recommence our oddessy.
Comments
Post a Comment