Finally, it’s here! The tent we actually ordered: the Oppland 3 LW (2.0) Tent – 3 person | Black Forest Green. It was delivered to De Berghut in Hamme by express delivery. Today, I drove over to pick it up right away. Huge thanks to the shop staff, and especially to Nina, who kept us updated almost daily on the progress of this order. (See also Day -54 The Mountain Hut (aka De Berghut) and Day -53 Almost disappointed for the full story.)
In the meantime, we’re still working on preparing our muscles. Last Sunday (Day -8), we took a short trip to Haacht and enjoyed some delicious pancakes at Brasserie Hof ter Dijle.
We rode there together with our daughter Henrieke, her husband Pieterjan, and the grandchildren Juul and Basil. Pieterjan is an athlete and Henrieke rides an electric longtail with the grandchildren, so we really had to put our best foot forward. On that part of the trip, our average speed was 19.3 km/h. Not bad, given our current fitness level, but I doubt we can keep that up for a whole day yet.
In the afternoon, the rain started pouring again, which seemed like the perfect chance to test our rain gear. Leen had the idea of leaving our rain trousers at home, thinking our regular pants would dry quickly after the rain. Well, that turned out to be one of her lesser ideas. The downpour was so heavy that I ended up soaked through to my underwear for everything below my rain jacket. Not exactly how I’d like to spend a full day riding in the rain.
The top side of our clothing did it’s job perfectly.
I’m wearing a raincoat from Ayacucho with a 20,000 mm water column rating and 18,000 mm breathability, while Leen is sporting a 100% waterproof jacket from Didriksons. Both have lived up to their expectations.
Honestly, the stress of leaving the house and starting the journey is starting to build 😂. It’ll be great if we hop on our bikes next Monday and pedal north. The weather expectations seem to fluctuate, but after all, there’s no such thing as bad weather 😁.
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