In Actual Fact…

#1 Tandem Bicycle. My former neighbours received a tandem as their wedding present which allowed them to spend their honeymoon cycling across the Alps. Each to their own and so on, and I must admit that I do own a two-wheeled contraption that occasionally does more than 100 miles a week/tries to kill me. However, if I ever get married I do not expect to use phrases like “We chose this route because it involved the hardest climbs.” Or “We didn’t get to shower for two weeks,” and “We’ll be cycling over the Pyrenees next summer” when discussing my honeymoon. And what job does this automobile-hating genius cycle to in the morning? He designs fuel injection systems for diesel engines for trucks and cars.

#2 Coach.
Benefits: It’s very cheap and there’s a service that goes from London to somewhere in Eastern Europe and stops in Stuttgart on the way.
Problems: It’s very cheap and there’s a service that goes from London to somewhere in Eastern Europe. Now, I didn’t actually see any head-scarf-wearing, wizened, old ladies transporting live goats and chickens on board (you have to put them in the hold, apparently – and the livestock) and after examining everyone’s passports at the channel tunnel, the French border police only took three passengers into custody, but I’ve tentatively come to the conclusion that I’m not really a long-distance coach traveller kind of guy. I’m going to sound more frightfully stuck-up when I say that I was pretty sure I was going to have my luggage stolen. I’d made the dreadful faux pas of taking a real suitcase from a known manufacturer, when the regular traveller would know that a plastic bag from Aldi is de rigueur.
In the end I arrived back safe and sound having covered just 550 miles (as the crow/airplane flies) with just one minor complaint – Ryan, who had left London at exactly the same time as I had, was already back in San Diego and had written a blog post to prove it, the git.
German Word For Today: “Reisekoffer” - Suitcase
Song playing as this was published: Belle & Sebastian “Sukie In The Graveyard”