What a Long, Strange Trip

Yes, folks, the honeymoon's over.

It feels like at least a year's worth of experiences packed into a few months. Right now, after a week back in Seattle, we're still enjoying a familiar routine: sleeping in the same bed, reuniting with our cat, speaking the same language for a few weeks in a row.

It's really impossible to sum things up--I'm still trying to process the sensory overload. Instead, here are some random statistics:

Kilometers bicycled: 3,746
Countries visited: 12 to 14 (depending if you include the Turkish Republic of Northern Cyprus and Wales)
Days of cycling: 44
Longest day: 140 km (to Vienna)
Hardest day: 101 km (battling hills and a brutal a headwind to Bursa)
Average daily distance: 80 km
Average speed: 18 km per hour
Pannier weight: unknown, since we never weighed them, but probably around 40 lbs per person

Best cycling:

• Transylvania (when you can find a road)
• Tarsus Mountains in Turkey
  
• Austrian wine region
• West coast of Ireland

Most delicious food:

• Czech beer
• Israeli breakfasts (soft cheeses, salads, humus)
• Turkish desserts
• German bread

Most bike-friendly cities:

• Amsterdam
• Vienna
• Budapest
  

Trip lowlights:

• Turkish toilets
  
• Romanian "highways"
  
• British road signs
  

Gear we would take again:

• Ortlieb panniers
• Schwalbe tires (not a single flat on Hannah's bike!)
  
• Ear plugs
• Photocopies of credit card, passport, driver's license
  

Gear we would take next time:

• Mountain bike wheels (26-inch) for rough terrain
  
• More Ziploc bags (impossible to find and very useful)
• Kickstands
• Bar-end shifters
  

Words in the pan-European lexicon:

• Ciao
• Merci
• Problem
• Kaput
  

What North America could use more of:

• Turkish barbers
• Turkish baths
• Street food vendors
• Bicycling infrastructure from Germany/Austria/Holland/Hungary
  

Best hospitality:

• Everyone!
  

Thanks to everyone who put us up, fed us, offered to help, or just came up to say hello. New friends, old friends, new family, old family--the people made the trip memorable. We hope we'll get to cross paths again someday.

And, last but not least, thanks to everyone who's checked out the blog. It's been fun adventuring together.

Shalom, Lehitra'ot, Merhaba, Na shledanou, Auf wiedersehen, Vaarwel,
D & H