The Road of Tears

There's really nothing worse than watching a grown man cry. Unless you're that grown man. After crashing my motorcycle on the Autobahn I was forced fight back the tears and make a decision to adventure forth or turn back. I was in a lot of pain and I figured only the adrenaline (and beer) rushing through my body was keeping me upright. By morning I would probably not be able to walk. So as romantic as being stranded and possibly hospitalized in Slovenia sounds I decided it would be better to go back to home base and regroup, convalesce, and continue my travels at a later date.

Why is it that the ride back always seems to take so much longer than the ride there. Just the turnpike to get myself turned around seemed to last forever. What's that up ahead?

A toll booth?

Talk about adding insult to injury. Now after crashing my motorcycle I'm forced to pay to turn around. What a joke!

So I paid my toll for traveling as far as I did on the highway and then I had to make a U-turn and get another ticket to go the other way. This just gets better and better. Is that a fire up ahead?

The ride back was hot, but at least I didn't have to fight traffic through the tunnels again. It would seem the traffic jam was one way only. Even with the lack of traffic I noticed my speedometer rarely read over 100km/h. It would seem that I was too rattled to open the bike up. At one point I was pretty distracted with the thoughts running through my head that I was almost run over by a passenger bus cruising along at a healthy 140km/h.

I stopped at a couple of gas stations along the way to check over the bike and rehydrate. By about the third stop I was more composed and I had faith that my motorcycle was mechanically sound. I started to pick up a little more speed as I closed in on Sibenik and Jadrtovac.

Trying to find the silver lining in every storm cloud, at my final gas stop, I walked away with a good piece of knowledge, nay wisdom, that I can pass along.

"Beer and ice cream don't mix"

I took my favorite left turn and it was starting to get dark when I pulled the motorcycle into Jadrtovac.
This is one motorcycle adventure that turned out poorly.