I See Dead People

So my adventure begins. My bike is out of customs (see release form below) and I get back to Air Canada to claim it.

Now I spend the next hour reattaching items to my bike while two of the Air Canada employees argue over the best way for me to leave the airport. German does not lend itself well to poetry or song (sorry Danzig) but when it comes to arguing there is probably no better language. Anyways they sort it out, and after a couple of phone calls they decide on a route for me.
So Elvis the world traveler, the adventurer, the navigator, the human compass. Given one easy decision takes the first wrong turn he can. Instead of heading East I go West. Doesn't sound so bad, but I do have a plan. Actually, that's all I have is a plan. I left my maps sitting neatly at home. Who needs maps when you have the language skills of a cactus?
Fortunately the Germans made it very easy to turn around on the Autobahn. 70 kilometers later not only did I manage to turn around, I actually found a gas station. You think we pay at the pump? We have it good compared to these guys.
I didn't really have much interest in seeing Germany so I'll go over the highlights. The Autobahn is not a dangerous highway filled with Death Race 2000 drivers. Most people travel 130km/h or less. I was doing 160 the whole way. I got rained on for half an hour. And I got to see a car full of dead people. I did slow down for that. Unlike Canada where they would close the highway and put tarps over the corpses the Germans just had a guy sitting at the side of the road with a reflective cone and a slow sign and they made you navigate through the wreckage. As a matter of fact I had to drive my bike through a puddle of blood to avoid the broken glass. Very civilized.

I didn't see too much of Germany. The Autobahn is not the most scenic of routes.I did enjoy the selections of beers at all the gas stations. I made good time and got to Plzen in about 4 hours. I missed the exit and drove a little too far but it wasn't too bad.

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You say Frankfurter... I say Wiener!

I know these next few blogs are a little timed delayed due to the fact that I took a hard left turn at the 'Super Information Highway' and ended up on the 'No Information Dirt Backroad'

Finding internet in many of these countries is like finding a virgin at a Hungarian wedding... It's nice when you do, but it's still pretty useless. The keyboards make it tough to write as well. They have letters and keys I have never seen before. For instance to make the '@' symbol you have to press Alt Gr and V. That was well thought out.

So in the immortal words of der Fuhrer, ˝I made it out of Germany˝

Picking up the bike went mostly smoothly. The Air Canada guys were happy to see me and with the exception of one former US Marine who stayed in Germany after his tour was up I still get the same reaction when I tell people what route I plan to take. ˝Are you Crazy?˝

I took my paperwork over to the German customs and I found out how to confuse a German. Apparently motorcycles don't have a category number in the big book of category numbers so the paperwork could not be completed. All this poor guy needed to keep on existing was to write a number down on the piece of paper that accurately represented a motorbike. I saw the look on his face that I would imagine many Samurai had just prior to committing ritual suicide. In the end a supervisor had to come over and issue a temporary category number. This didn't make the officer happy but it allowed him to save some of his honor and continue to breath.

I had a great time walking about Frankfurt the night before. It's not a bad town. There was a carnival going on at the river and more bratwurst than you could possibly imagine.

Here are some photos of Frankfurt.


My next stop is Plzen Czech Republic.

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