I tolerated a white bread and dry corn flakes breakfast at the Unity Hostel then slipped into my still-damp bib shorts and left in search of a bike shop from which to procure chain lube.
All appeared to be going well enough—The Green Machine felt especially light and spritely: ‘I guess those rest days paid off,’ I thought.
Then, as I reached the edge of Budapest and stopped to take a photo of a skatepark beneath a highway, it hit me. My handlebar bag was missing. It’s the only bag that matters, the whole kit and, yes, the caboodle too! It housed my irreplaceable trip journals and my passport, among other important items. An immediate panic-induced shot of acidic bile jolted my stomach and a cold sweat smacked my face.
‘Where did the bag go?’ Then reflexively, ‘Who took it?’
After 30 seconds of anger at the alleged thief, I realized that in my haste to get my bags out of the elevator and onto my bike I probably left it on the hostel stairwell.
So I pedaled like Lance from the outskirts of the city back to Unity Hostel. “Please let it be there, please let it be there,” I mouthed as I rode.
‘How much would I pay for my bag to be where I left it when I arrive,’ I asked myself, ‘$1,000?’ Luckily, I didn’t have to answer this query because my bag was right where I had hoped it would be at the bottom of the staircase. WHEW.
My sincerest apologies to those I’d convicted of a certain type of thought crime.
At this point I rechecked my luggage and left Budapest for the second time in half as many mornings. The ride out of the city was a mix of nice river roads, a detour that a concerned cyclist posted directions for (thankfully), and a hellish freeway that lasted an hour with semi’s whistling inches from my left ear.
Despite the hectic start to the day, I felt good and wanted to ride into the evening so I flagged down a couple of cyclists coming from the opposite direction to ask if they’d passed any campsites within 25km. They said that campsites were few and far between, in the truest sense of the phrase, so I stopped at a pension with an open room for 16eur.
I recommend staying here at the EuroVelo 6 Stop Pension. The husband and wife who own it are gracious hosts with supremely comfortable lodgings for the weary rider.
The pension was near a Lidl, which I rode to and picked up some food for dinner: hummus, bread, and bulgur did the trick.
A good day. Funny how it can take losing something to come to understand just how important that thing is. Thanks to this morning’s mishap I now know I’d be in despair if I lost my journals. They’re the only irreplaceable things I have with me on this trip aside from my health so I was at first self-critical over having lost them, that was until I reminded myself that even loving parents forget their own children sometimes.
The Day’s Miscellany
Three pullup challenges, two of which with the same design 