Insanity em retirei
I was thinking about buying a bike to get around the island more easily. Bikes are very practical pieces of metal. Dominique offered me his so that I could go around the island on my day off. I thought, ‘Oh, how nice of him’. Then I met the chef and told him I was borrowing dominique’s bike…and he laughed at me. Apparently, Dominique’s been trying to get chef to use his bike for quite some time now…
Me: Huh?
Slightly confused, I made my way to the bike anyways. It was a nice bike. I was happy. White and blue. I was happy. So I set out merrily on my way… I’d decided to go to Matira- supposedly the best beach on Bora, which is exactly halfway around the island. 10 minutes in I noticed that the chain was rusted together with the gears… so I couldn’t shift. It’s just stuck in the lowest gear possible; causing me to make 6 times the effort than I normally would to pedal… No matter, I was happy. It was the perfect day to go biking… there was complete cloud cover, but no rain in sight. So anyways, I bike past the church, past the dock, past Vaitape and into unknown territory… and then I noticed that instead of having a normal bicycle seat, mine was a rock. A plastic rock. Aren’t these bike makers smart… I pedal for a while longer and my butt goes numb.
So I get to matira… and I’ve got to say that the water’s beautiful… there’s a great shade of turquoise for as far as the eye can see…and you’re supposed to be able to walk all the way to the reef from matira. The beach was disappointing though, It was maybe 2 meters wide, that’s it. Nothing great, my own beach is waay nicer. So I bike a bit past matira and I find Club Med. Right behind the club there’s a muddy trail going out to a lookout point, so I tie up my bike and go take a look. Clambering up the hill makes you feel like a real explorer… there’s only a few steps that mark the way, and if you look back, you have no idea where you came from, its just thick jungle on all sides. A few minutes up and you get to a lookout on top of a hill, and its got a great view. On one side you see the beach and the extension of the reef, and on the other there’s a big bay and the town. It looked something like this:
Let’s just pretend that I took this photo and that this is Bora… I’ll take photos next time. Actually… it does look a lot like Bora… I think it’s the intercon here.
So, I got down from the hill, ate a hamburger… and noticed that I’d turned an interesting shade of red… no matter…I’d soon be back home anyways. I sat around a bit then walked around the beach and decided to go back. And then all hell broke loose.
First, I had to take a break from pedaling every 10 minutes so that my butt wouldn’t fall off. Then a freak monsoon came out of nowhere and completely drenched me for about 30 min. Following the torrential rains came gale force winds aimed directly at me, rendering all my pedaling futile and causing me to move backwards more than I did forwards. Butt break. Then my right pedal fell off. Butt break. Then my left pedal cracked. Then I turned from tan-rouge to an extra-crispy-fried-blood red and got eaten alive by a crazed flock of rancid chickens. Butt break.
Me: Huh?
Slightly confused, I made my way to the bike anyways. It was a nice bike. I was happy. White and blue. I was happy. So I set out merrily on my way… I’d decided to go to Matira- supposedly the best beach on Bora, which is exactly halfway around the island. 10 minutes in I noticed that the chain was rusted together with the gears… so I couldn’t shift. It’s just stuck in the lowest gear possible; causing me to make 6 times the effort than I normally would to pedal… No matter, I was happy. It was the perfect day to go biking… there was complete cloud cover, but no rain in sight. So anyways, I bike past the church, past the dock, past Vaitape and into unknown territory… and then I noticed that instead of having a normal bicycle seat, mine was a rock. A plastic rock. Aren’t these bike makers smart… I pedal for a while longer and my butt goes numb.
So I get to matira… and I’ve got to say that the water’s beautiful… there’s a great shade of turquoise for as far as the eye can see…and you’re supposed to be able to walk all the way to the reef from matira. The beach was disappointing though, It was maybe 2 meters wide, that’s it. Nothing great, my own beach is waay nicer. So I bike a bit past matira and I find Club Med. Right behind the club there’s a muddy trail going out to a lookout point, so I tie up my bike and go take a look. Clambering up the hill makes you feel like a real explorer… there’s only a few steps that mark the way, and if you look back, you have no idea where you came from, its just thick jungle on all sides. A few minutes up and you get to a lookout on top of a hill, and its got a great view. On one side you see the beach and the extension of the reef, and on the other there’s a big bay and the town. It looked something like this:
Let’s just pretend that I took this photo and that this is Bora… I’ll take photos next time. Actually… it does look a lot like Bora… I think it’s the intercon here.
So, I got down from the hill, ate a hamburger… and noticed that I’d turned an interesting shade of red… no matter…I’d soon be back home anyways. I sat around a bit then walked around the beach and decided to go back. And then all hell broke loose.
First, I had to take a break from pedaling every 10 minutes so that my butt wouldn’t fall off. Then a freak monsoon came out of nowhere and completely drenched me for about 30 min. Following the torrential rains came gale force winds aimed directly at me, rendering all my pedaling futile and causing me to move backwards more than I did forwards. Butt break. Then my right pedal fell off. Butt break. Then my left pedal cracked. Then I turned from tan-rouge to an extra-crispy-fried-blood red and got eaten alive by a crazed flock of rancid chickens. Butt break.
posted by aLEX at 4:48 PM
1 Comments:
What a great story. It so hooked me I had to read your entire blog. It sounds like you are having fun and doing well. Good Luck!
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