Renting and Riding Bicycles in Five Countries

 Paris Training Race at Longchamp

During my five-week trip in Europe and Israel, I rented five of the six bikes I rode. The sixth bike I left at the monastery where my Cold War Army roommate is Bruder Timotheus in Darmstadt, Germany.  Each bike and rental is as different as the country in which I rode.

This was not the trip I planned. Originally I was going to ride as much as I could of the length of Israel, but my knee swelled up and hurt a lot on the day before the flight to Europe.  I rested my knee the first few days and rode with less intensity, but still had a great trip.   

PARIS

In Paris, I primarily rode the daily training race atLongchamp.  There is a two-mile road around the perimeter of the horse-racing track called L’hippodrome in the southwest corner of the city.  Every day that road is closed to traffic from 10am until sunset.  Groups of bikes and solo bikes ride the circle. Every time I could, I rode the circle, joining various groups of riders and riding their speed. The last day I rode there I did a dozen laps on a windy day averaging 19 mph.  There is a Strava segment on the 3km circle that is 21km.  Strava told me I averaged 31.7km/hr.  another time I rode a couple of laps at 14 mph with five riders in their 70s. 

One of the days I rode to the west suburbs of Suresne, Rueil-Malmaison, Chatou and Saint Germain-en-Laye.  The ride is hilly, beautiful and on a variety of roads. 

I rented the bike from Paris Bike Company in Malakoff on the south side of Paris. They rent high-end bikes for tours and by the day.  Sam Weaver, the owner, is an American who was a bike dealer in America and now has a shop for tours. He does custom bike fit for local clients. He speaks French well with a very American accent.  His rental rate for a carbon race bike with helmet, pedals and water bottles is 70 Euros for the first day and 30 Euros for additional days.  Importantly for me, the additional days do not have to be sequential.  I was in and out of Paris a half-dozen times during the five weeks I travelled.  I rented the bike for a couple of days, went to Israel and Latvia for two weeks, rode another day, left for Germany, ride two more days, went to Germany again, and then rode one more day at the end of the trip.  The bike was ready each time. 

JERUSALEM

In Jerusalem I rode different directions out of the city. In Jerusalem, leaving the city means riding steeply downhill for miles. And, of course, riding steeply uphill all the way back. In fact, the steepest parts of the ride in and out of Jerusalem are the first two or three miles.

In Jerusalem, I rented another carbon race bike from another American with a bike shop.  Moses, owner of Bike Way, is even more relaxed that Sam about the bike.  I had the bike I rented in Jerusalem for five days. When I returned it, Moses asked how many days I rode. I said four—I skipped riding one day. He charged me for just four.  His rate is $35 per day.  In February I will be in Jerusalem for eight days. I told Moses I would need a bike then, but between tours I was doing and the rainy season, I did not know when or how many days. He told me to take the bike when I arrive. When I return it, tell him how many days I rode. He will charge me for just those days. It may be just three days. That’s okay with him.

RIGA, LATVIA

I visited all three of the Baltic states in four days there: Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania, but only rode one day in Riga, Latvia.  The other days it rained. A friend who lived there was surprised I even had a three-hour window to ride one day. He said it rains or snows from October to April.  The Baltic states are flat and forested with the narrow roads common all over Europe. In the city of Riga there were bike paths along the river and I saw some bike lanes in the city. There was also cobblestones and very narrow streets in the old city.

In Riga, Latvia, I rented a touring bike at Riga Bike Tours and Rent.  In November there was only one shop renting bikes. The high temperature the day I rented was 35 Fahrenheit. It was the only day it didn’t rain.  I rode for about 90 minutes along the river until I got thoroughly cold.  The rate for the day was 7 Euros, but he only charged me five for the short ride. 

BERLIN

In Berlin, I had another one-day rental. Again, not a lot of options in November when the high temperature was in the mid 30s. The rate was 20 Euros for a day or an hour. I rode around the center of the city in the area of the central park called Tiergarten.  Two years ago I was in Berlin in July and the bike culture was evident everywhere.  There are bike lanes, bike paths, bike racks, and people riding fast and slow in suits and spandex all over the place. It is a really bike-friendly city. 

LUXEMBOURG

In Luxembourg, I rode one of the city bikes.  They were easy to use. For three Euros I could ride the whole day.  I rode up and down a long hill to a medieval village in the middle of the city, below city hall.

In 2017, I rode from Belgrade, Serbia, to Lviv, Ukraine, and part of the way back to Germany. I rode a Surly steel bike with flat handlebars and an 8-speed gear set in the rear hub.  This was the first—and last—time I rode with panniers. Carrying gear on a bike is Heaven for some people, but not for me.  After the ride across Eastern Europe, I spent a week with an old friend in Darmstadt, Germany.  He is a monk. I donated the bike to the monastery.  

On this trip, when I visited my friend Cliff, the bike was there and ready to ride. I rode to nearby Frankenstein’s Castle. It’s a beautiful road, climbing steeply up for three miles of smooth switchbacks. It was repaved in 2016.  After the slow climb up, I had a fast ride down.  The Brothers at the monastery prefer their touring-style bikes and only occasionally ride the Surly. So it is there when I visit and for other visitors who might want a faster ride than the balloon-tire bikes the Brothers ride.

I have ridden in more than 30 countries on five continents over the past 20 years, including most of the countries in Europe between Portugal and Ukraine. I am not a careful person. 

Steel Vintage Bikes: Awesome Cafe in Berlin

Steel Vintage Bikes in Berlin is a café decorated with steel racing bikes from the second half of the 20^th Century. They also roast their own beans. When I walked in on a rainy evening, they had just finished roasting Rwandan beans.  I had a double espresso and walked around the café snapping pictures.  I brought home a bag of their coffee.  

Visit to Buchenwald Concentration Camp: Russian Prisoners of War

For the past ten centuries, the worst fate a person in Europe could suffer was to be born a Jew or a Russian.  For those thousand years Jews were targets of persecution wherever they were. Ordinary Russians, for nearly a thousand years, were effectively slaves. Within two decades of their emancipation in 1863, Tsarist repression began again. Russians were killed. And a million Jews were killed in pogroms at the end of the 19th Century by the same Tsarist government.

Then Russian peasants revolted in 1917.  What could be worse than being slaughtered by Germans in World War I and the rule of the Tsar?  Communism.
Millions of Russians were killed by Stalin during his 30 years of rule.

In World War II, Russian soldiers fought bravely and eventually beat the Nazi Army.  But the Russian soldiers captured by the Nazis were treated as untermensch sub human.  At the Buchenwald Concentration Camp, the museum records the fate of Russian POWs. Many were executed and disposed of in mass graves or a crematorium.

In one of the saddest moments of a very sad visit, I saw the container below.  Nazi executioners dumped the bodies of Russian soldiers in a box lined with zinc for disposal.  The sad moment came from reading a book called Zinky Boys by Svetlana Alexievich. Fifty years after World War II, the Soviet Union shipped those killed in the War in Afghanistan home in sealed zinc coffins.

Alexievich, who won the Nobel Prize in Literature for her writing on the Chernobyl disaster, compiled an oral history of the Soviet war in Afghanistan and the suffering of soldiers and families.

When I saw slaughtered POWs were dumped into zinc bins, I thought of zinc the coffins the Soviets used, and zinc trash cans--zinc keeps trash cans from rusting.

Everyone brings their own experiences into a museum.  My knowledge of Russian history added a new dimension of horror to my experience of visiting the camp.

Of course, none of the horrors perpetrated by the Soviets in any way diminish the atrocities of the Nazis.  The Nazis slaughtered Russian POWs based on race, just as they slaughtered Jews and others for the same reason.

Mount Bental and a Battle That Saved Israel in 1973

The trenches on the Mount Bental Outpost

The Yom Kippur War in 1973 was arguably the last real full-scale armored war.  The American wars in Iraq in 1991 and 2003 were so lopsided in armor and ground attack aircraft that they could hardly be called armored warfare.
 The overwhelming triumph of the Israeli Army in the Six-Day war in 1967 led to terrible complacency in 1973.  The Israeli Army very nearly lost the war in fierce fighting both in the Sinai in the south against Egypt and in the Golan Heights against in the north against the Syrian Army.

The view from Mount Bental

The battle for the Golan Heights was one of the greatest tank battles of the 1973 Yom Kippur War or any war.  If the Syrian invasion force of 1,500 tanks and 1,000 cannon had broken through the thin Israeli line, the country could have been split in half and conquered in a day.

Between the Mount Bental observation post and Mount Hermon is the Valley of Tears where the battle was fought. An Israeli force of just 160 tanks slowed and finally stopped the Syrian columns. Though vastly outnumbering the Israeli defenders, the Syrians had to move through a narrow valley. In the end 600 Syrian tanks were destroyed.  Just seven of the Israeli tanks were still in service when the Syrians withdrew after their significant losses. The crews of the 153 damaged and destroyed tanks were nearly all casualties by the time the three-day battle ended.

Today Mount Bental is a tourist destination.  At least a half-dozen buses labored up the winding climb, discharging hundreds of tourists to explore the trenches and bunkers and, of course, the gift shop.

The view is amazing and beautiful looking over both the Israeli Golan and into Syria. It must have looked entirely different with 1,500 tanks streaming out of Syria.

A Visit to Circuit de Sarthe: Race Course of the 24 Hours of LeMans

A Ford GT40 from the movie "LeMans 66" 

with yarn taped to the car to show airflow during testing

After seeing the movie "LeMans 66" in Paris (English with French Subtitles) I rented a stick-shift Opel and drove west to the town of LeMans, where in June of every year the 24 Hours of Lemans is held.  I have watched parts of the 24 Hours of LeMans on TV, but had never seen the circuit. I have been a fan of motor racing all of my life, primarily Formula 1 car racing, but also sports car racing at various times in the last six decades.

In most of the history of motor racing, the race tracks are known for curves.  The curves "Eau Rouge-Raidillon" at Spa Francorchamps in Belgium, "The Corkscrew" at Laguna Seca Raceway in California, Tabac curve on the street circuit of Monaco, the Maggots-Beckett-Chapel curves at Silverstone and so many more. 

But the signature of Circuit de Sarthe is not a curve, but the Mulsanne straightaway.  Originally run on roads closed for the race, the entire circuit is now a purpose-built race course, except the Mulsanne Straight which is Route D388 in the French highway system. It is open to traffic when no races are underway.

Until 1988 the Mulsanne straight was the longest straight stretch of race track anywhere: 6km or 3.7 miles of full-throttle.  Then in 1988 a Peugeot WM P88 reached a speed of 405km/hr (251mph) and the governing body decided something had to be done to slow the cars down. In 1990 track officials added two chicanes breaking the circuit into three consecutive 2km straightaways. This kept top speed at a safer 225mph.  At 250mph the downforce from the rear wing is so strong it can cause catastrophic tire failure. One car approaching those speeds famously went up into the trees. The car was completely destroyed, but the driver was unhurt.

The website says visitors can walk the track and go the museum. The museum was great with a century of cars and motorcycles, a few of which are in this post.  As it turned out I could not walk the track because there was a 24-hour sports car race in its final hours during my visit. I watched almost 50 cars ranging from race prepped Porsche 911s to a nearly stock BMW sedan circle the track at speed and under a yellow flag. 

Several of the cars spun at the second of the two chicanes on the Mulsanne straight.  They either went into the gravel or onto an escape road and rejoined. Even the cars that collided continued. I saw no race-ending crashes.

Next June I can watch LeMans 2020 and know what the track looks like in person as the top class 800hp race cars circle the 8.5-mile course for 24 hours and as much as 3,360 miles--the race distance record set in 2010.

Motorcycles have raced for 24 hours at LeMans since 1978

Thousands of scale model race cars fill the display cases in the museum

The Suite High of Jerusalem

My first night in Jerusalem was my second night in Israel. The first night I spent in Eilat. All of the second day I drove the length of Israel north from Eilat to Mount Bental near Syria, then I drove back to Jerusalem. It was Sabbath, I did not have a reservation, so I pulled off Route 1 just 20 miles from Jerusalem and surveyed my options on Orbitz.  

Since I had to park a car until I could return it to the airport, I needed a place with low hassle parking.  I chose the Crowne Plaza which wasn't very expensive and had easy access to the road to Jerusalem.  I have been a member of the Holiday Inn loyalty program since 1999 so occasionally I get upgrades.  

But not like this.  

The Crowne Plaza is a tall tower with 21 floors on height above the Central Bus/Rail station.  When I checked in I got upgraded to the 19th-floor suite.  It had a balcony that wrapped 3/4ths of the way around the hotel to the south, east and north and could have held a party for more than a 100 people.  The room was huge.  And best of all was the view. Here is what I saw on the balcony after I checked in: 

This was my room:

And this was the view in the morning:

The hotel: 

Ammunition Hill Memorial Site and Museum, Jerusalem

The view from Ammunition Hill of Jerusalem

One of the fortified trenches 

Ammunition Hill is the site of one of the fiercest and bloodiest battles of the Six-Day War.  The hill was taken by the Jordanian Arab Legion in Israel's War of Independence in 1948 and held until Israeli paratroopers and armored troops took the hill in June 1967. Michael Oren's book on the Six-Day War explains this battle in considerable detail.

An US-built, World War II vintage Israeli Sherman tank 

A jeep with a 105mm recoilless rifle

An armored truck

The museum on Ammunition Hill is underground. It has a film explaining the battle and a series of exhibit showing and telling hour-by-hour what happened as the battle progressed.

Memorial inside the museum

Multi-lingual exhibits

As with every military museum I visited in Israel, young soldiers are touring the museum learning about the history of the Israeli Defense Force and the key battles of their history.  

Another view of Jerusalem from the battle site

Another of the trenches

The Malmedy Massacre: Nazis Kill 84 American Prisoners of War

After visiting the Bastogne War Museum in Belgium, I drove northeast to the Baugnez crossroads, site of the Malmedy Massacre.  On December 17, 1944, a convoy of American troops in trucks was cut off and captured by a tank column of the 1st SS Panzer Division.

More than 100 American troops were herded from the trucks into a field near the crossroads. Nazi soldiers surrounded the Americans and opened fire with machine guns.  when all of the Americans were dead or wounded, the SS troops walked among the bodies firing a headshot into any soldier who was not dead.

At this point in the Battle of the Bulge, the massacred Americans were behind enemy lines until January. As the battle turned in favor of the Americans, advancing soldiers saw the frozen bodies of their comrades left in the snow. Eventually 43 soldiers were discovered in hiding who escaped the massacre, but 84 American soldiers were dead.

There is a memorial at the roundabout at the Baugnez crossroads.  The name of every American soldier killed is on the stone wall. 

Meeting Eastern Border Podcast Host on the Eastern Border of the EU and NATO

Kristaps Andrejsons, host of the The Eastern Border podcast.

On the third weekend of my trip, I drove from Vilnius, Lithuania, to Ludza, Latvia, to visit Kristaps Andrejsons, the host of The Eastern Border podcast. 

Ludza is Kristaps’ hometown and the easternmost city in Latvia, hence the name of the podcast.  The first thing we did was a small tour of the two big churches in the town—the Orthodox Church in the center of Ludza, and the Catholic Church on the hill above the big lake to the east of town. The Catholic Church shares the hilltop with a ruined medieval castle.  We took in the view of the lake, then went back to the car and drove southeast to Zilupe. 

The Catholic Church on the hill and the Orthodox Church in the center of Ludza.

Kristaps said Zilupe is the easternmost village in the European Union.  When I repeated this on Facebook, a well-traveled friend, Jim Trumm pointed out that Reunion Island in the Indian Ocean is part of the EU, and the place where the first Euro was officially used as legal tender. But if we stay in Europe and the Northern Hemisphere Kristaps is correct.

After a brief look at the dark border area of Terehova east of Zilupe, we went back to Ludza and said goodbye. Then I drove to Valga, Estonia, for dinner, completing my three meals in three countries plan for the day. 

Kristaps started the The Eastern Border with the same motivation I have heard from other creative, motivated people: he was pissed off. He heard a “so-called expert on Russia and Eastern Europe on CNN, who didn’t know shit (pardon my French) about Russia or Eastern Europe. …. It turns out she had been in Russia just a year, mostly in Moscow and St. Petersburg.”

Four years ago, Kristaps recorded the first episode in July of 2015. He discussed the economy of the Soviet Union. Three weeks later was Soviet Culture, the Brezhnev, then the War in Afghanistan. Chernobyl was the following March.  Most episodes are on Soviet or on games. Then in 2017 he added news from his side of the border.  Over time, he has added more news, Latvia 101, and still covers all things Soviet. 

Kristaps is animated and engaging and has a dry wit, so the podcasts are funny as well as informative.  He travels to the US occasionally. Last month he was in Boston and NYC.  He has also been to Fort Worth, Santa Monica and Seattle.  The five states he has been to represent at least a third of the population of America, both coasts, and the gap between Fort Worth and Santa Monica covers most of the range of American politics. 

As with the Jewish Story, whose host I also visited on this trip, I am listening alternately to current and early episodes. I found out about both podcasts after more than 50 episodes were recorded, so I have a lot of catching up to do. 

If you have an interest in Soviet Culture and if you want to hear how democracy is dying under Putin in the Russian Federation, The Eastern Border podcast is well worth listening to.