Software Business in the Middle East

This is another post about the trip from Sweden to China by bicycle. All posts about the trip might be found on this link.

Translation from Swedish in free style. The original post might be found here. Pictures related to this post are stored on this link.

The map of the passed distance described in this post might be found here.

Day 12. Torun – Wloclawek. 60 km.

After the breakfast with bread, sausage, cheese and yogurt, the cyclists went further. The weather was excellent so they were riding under the bright autumn sun. The day was ordinary, just riding.

Day 13. Wloclawek – Leczyca. 80 km.

Pedalling the entire day, the cyclists set a camping near the hotel Senator in Leczyca – on the hotels lawn. The excellent tradition Polish dish with pork and potato was served for the dinner.

Day 14. Leczyca – Pabianice. 70 km.

The good start from the morning stopping only at the coffee-shop in town Zgierz to have coffee and another cheeseburger.

This stop was before the city Lodz where the traffic was terrible with a lot of retro-trucks on the roads. The guys stayed in the city as it was merely impossible to ride further in such terrible traffic (RK: I am afraid that really heavy traffic is awaiting somewhere later in Iran or Pakistan).

In the evening each of them got a bottle of wine in Lidl and a box of kex (RK: they seem to be really serious men ) and spent night around the mandatory bonfire.

Day 15. Pabianice – Radomsko. 80 km.

Tired from the morning, the cyclists started the ride towards a beautiful village to have a breakfast. The ride went by rough terrain and mountains appeared time to time on the horizon. The lunch went in a restaurant with lousy service and unpleasant waiters. In the evening, after the rain, the bonfire had the same sad and poor look and feel as the waiters in the restaurant.

Day 16. Radomsko – Pradla. 60 km.

In one of the shops Nino forgot his Gore-Tex gloves that was later taken by “entrepreneurial” driver from a bakery. The gloves came back to Nino thanks to one lady who pointed to the guy who had taken them. That guy was pretty unhappy to return the gloves back.

In another shop the cyclists met with a teacher who spoke pretty good English. The teacher invited them to the restaurant in another part of the city, where they ordered 6 portions of Bigos - the Polish national dish that consists of cabbage and meat. The chat with the teacher was really good – they talked about everything from Lada cars in Poland to UEFA Euro 2012 that would be hosted in Poland and Ukraina.

Day 17. Pradla – Krakow. 80 km.

The alarm-clock was set at 8 am since the next day guys planned to ride for 80 km on the pretty rough road that went up and down. The breakfast was eaten on the road side next to the shop. The ice-cold yogurt was almost of the same temperature as air – close to zer0 degree Celsius. That was the coldest morning since the beginning of the trip.

30 km from Krakow the hills were over and the road went down. IKEA was one of the first places the guys saw when they entered the city, so they just dropped they bikes at the entrance and run inside guided by the most beautiful smell of meet balls (RK: this is Swedish national food. Here in Dubai we used to visit IKEA just to have this dish) since the time when Vlad Tepes got his first canine tooth (RK: interesting idiomatic phrase, just curious if the guys invented it themselves or it’s commonly used in Sweden?).

After the lunch the guys got a room in Premium hostel that was not bad at all and started to decorate their room in red by hanging around their sleeping bags to dry them out. The Swedish flag was also hung on the wall. Then they showered as three river crayfishes in August.

The first thing to visit was Stare Miastro, the Old Town in Krakow – the historical and cultural centre as well as tourist place. Currently the plans are to relax for a couple of days and have a walk in the city looking around.

The trip goes as planned so far. The weather’s good although the rain waked the guys up several times in the morning. All three feel good, probably also because they decided to change the trip route and visit also countries of Arabian Peninsula. From Turkey they will go to Syria, Jordan, Israel, Saudi Arabia, United Arab Emirates (RK: Here I hope to meet the guys :-)). The final destination – Peking - is still the same.

The next post will be from Budapest where one of the cyclist’s sister lives. It will happen in a few days when they pass Tatra Mountains, or “The High Tatras” as people in Poland like to call them.

All posts about the trip from Sweden to China by bicycle can be found here.

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