Bruge

We're six days into our trip and very few of us have had time for an internet cafe stop. I'll work backwards in recapping the glorious highlights. Some names will be mentioned, but not all in this post. We'll make sure everyone is outed at some time during the trip.

Let's get one big word out to you: peregrination. There it is--slides right off the tongue, no? It means traveling with a destination in mind. On my fourth tour of Europe I am clearly a vagabond, making decisions on a whim, on a hunch, on a dime. This group of 18 year olds, however, is not--I'm happy to report--not haphazard. They move with a purpose and resolve, and it's impressive.

Yesterday many rented bikes taking them out of this medieval fairy tale of a city into the countryside. The early drizzle did not deter them. Some ventured to the coast, to Blankenberge, but most headed north to cross into the Holland city of Sluice, 17 kilometers away. I was with that group. We were instructed to take a canal street past four windmills and then cross a highway onto a river bike trail which would lead us to the Nederlands. That we did. This riverpath was idyllic with tall grasses and giant cottonwoods lining the way into a vanishing point artists dream about. As the hazy morning cleared, nightingales sang, while cormorants, kites, and magpies swooped from tree to tree, over and under wooden bridges, past an occasional fisherman. The grasses gave way to shoulder-high rhubarb plants and Pieter Brueghel and Pliny the Younger waved to us. Along the way bikers clumpt--I'll take that as a word for now--together, stretched apart, but mostly stayed together. The wind picked up and knees weakened but again that resolve kicked in. Alex Laetsch, a veteran of the Tour de Tuscany took the lead, sometimes relieved by Anna Minniti who was a tomboy until age 10, so she says. Alicia Mooradian coasted contentedly with her ipod nano and Mark Paulsen appeared from out of the blue or the sky to hobnob with the leaders. It's when Kelly Kodota lost her sandal, and I fell back to retrieve it, that I lost the group. Somehow Kelly, athleticism intact, caught up to Victor Poon who had dropped his camera on a missed hand-off (camera's OK). Both caught the group who had lost the trail and were walking their bikes through cow dung. Sensing something amiss and smelling something remorseful, I doubled back to the other side of the river never to be seen again. It was not the first time I have abandoned the group. At the end of the Literary Pub Crawl I vanished, ghostlike into the Dickensian walls of the venerable Lamb and Flag. I will continue to lead them where they want to go--Oh the places they will go--but will hesitate to hold their hands on a round trip excursion.
Truly,
LV, The Literary Vagabond