Into the darkness

It is cold. We put on our long gloves and ask for directions to be on the safe side. In fact, there is only one entrance and exit. A nice Mongolian-looking man drives ahead of us in his Lada and shows us the way. At the end of the town, I study the map again next to a gas station. Only about 45 kilometers from here, the Volgograd reservoir eats deep into the plain and interrupts the shore road. There is a ferry marked, but my gut feeling warns me unmistakably. When we asked a local yesterday whether the ferry was also in operation, he wasn’t sure. In the worst case, that would be 45 kilometers there and back only to have to take the detour around the reservoir. “That would mean a day’s loss and would be hard on our morale,” I say thoughtfully. “Better to take the detour,” suggests Tanja. “I’ll ask again at the petrol station,” I reply. The gas station attendant shrugs his shoulders. He asks two policemen who are refueling their police car. One of them grabs his cell phone and calls the ferry station. “No, the ferry boat is currently out of service,” we understand. The policeman shows me on our map which road we can take to avoid the side arm of the lake. “How far is it from here to Samara?” I want to know. He types 630 into his cell phone. “630 kilometers?” I am pleased with the acceptable distance, despite the long detour. “There, there,” he answers with absolute certainty.

We leave the filling station behind us with two liters of extra water. We see a sign. 780 km to Samara. A shock. Was the policeman full of crap? After 15 kilometers we reach the crossroads. From here we have to cycle 102 kilometers to the southeast, i.e. in the direction of Kazakhstan to the town of Pallasovka, before turning north again. “I can only hope that the policeman is right about the kilometers. There must be a direct connection to Samara somewhere that isn’t marked on the map. If this road doesn’t exist, we’re on a 150-kilometer detour,” I groan. As soon as we turn off, yesterday’s tailwind blows hard in our faces. “This can’t be true! This stupid wind!” I curse out loud, forgetting all my good intentions. Straining my legs, I ponder the pros and cons of this decision. There is a direct connection to Saratov on the other side of the Volga. However, over mountains that run out exactly on the western bank of the Volga. Mountains are not an alternative. I think I’ve made the right decision. But the wind puts a spanner in the works. By now I can feel how loudly my body is calling for a longer rest. All muscles, especially the thighs, are in a constant state of pain. But maybe it’s just the psyche playing tricks on me here? Who likes to take detours? And against the wind?

With winter coming soon and our destination still a long way off, we decide to reach Pallasowka today despite the wind. We head into the wind at around 15 strenuous kilometers per hour. We stop briefly at a gas station. Want to buy water. But the store no longer exists. Some men want to give us a huge watermelon. At least 10 kilos in weight. We must refuse. But we take a group photo to everyone’s delight. Then it’s straight on. The wind picks up and slows us back down to 10 to 12 kilometers per hour.

Is energy separable?

I try to concentrate on pedaling. Try not to waste energy by fighting against the wind. But the effort, the consumption of energy, the slow progress spark off unpleasant thoughts that I can barely control. The ups and downs of life are the theme again. Highs and lows. At the moment I don’t exactly feel on a high and yet I know that the supposed low is only constructed by my own negative thoughts. How difficult it is to always motivate yourself. Especially when what you are currently experiencing doesn’t fit in with your plans. Just the day before yesterday, Mother Earth had given me a little lecture on this and now, not for the first time, I’m starting all over again. Do not give up. Start again and again. Kick, kick, kick. A tendon or muscle in the right knee starts to hurt. My wrists also send unpleasant sensations. The hands fall asleep again and again. I have to keep taking them off the handlebars. Shake them so that the blood flows back and revitalizes them. It’s getting colder. The wind is like an oversized hand that constantly slows our progress. And yet there must be something good in this moment. Only what? Acceptance? Tolerance? Sure, what else. The old theme. Let events happen. Do not fight it. Let it flow. Active flow. Do what you can do. But then accept it when you can do no more. Not with your head against the wall. Acceptance. Tolerance. Tolerance towards other people, but also for yourself. Always the same old topic. I can’t hear it anymore. Why am I not able to accept the stressful or unpleasant times in my life? What makes it so difficult? It’s quite simple in the end. I say: “From now on, I’ll take things that happen to me in my stride. Yes, I’ll take them in my stride. Come what may.” And then something happens and I’m angry again. What kind of a stubborn and sometimes difficult person am I? Or not? Is this process normal? Is everyone affected? This is most likely the case. This would mean that no matter what happens to us, we humans have a similar learning process to go through. One on a bicycle, the other as a politician, mechanic, butcher, beggar, etc.

On the other hand, I realize that we humans are made of energy. Energy that is everlasting. That’s why there is no death. That was my enlightening realization in the Moldavian monastery. If it is the case that we are all made up of energy, then we humans are closely connected to each other, regardless of skin color and nation. Is energy separable? Not really, because whatever we humans do with it, it will always reunite. Associate with “All That Is”. Energy is God, God is energy. God is the cosmos, the universe. We are all connected. Closer than we would like to believe. Without a doubt, this also means that we all have similar or identical learning tasks to master. One on a bicycle, the other as a politician, mechanic, butcher or beggar. Well, if that’s the case, I don’t need to complain so much about myself. This means that other people also have a hard time with their learning tasks. Although this realization that I am not alone with my learning tasks might reassure me, it is not satisfying for me in this stressful moment. This realization is a relief but not a solution. So what is the solution? “Acceptance is the solution,” I hear inside me. Hm, nothing new, but at this moment it unexpectedly takes on a form that I understand better from within my being. A form that I think I have known for a long time, that I am familiar with and that I trust.

My legs are suddenly spinning more easily again. Turn the crank further and further, but currently a little more lively. It’s strange how the body reacts to thoughts. Negative as well as positive. If this is the case, and I have just proved this to myself once again, it makes a lot of sense to keep working on a positive mindset. Your performance increases and it also becomes easier to achieve your goals. Very good, very good. Now I just need the recipe to stay positive. “Don’t become dissatisfied. You’ve just highlighted what thoughts cause. Keep working on it. Let it flow. Don’t be disgruntled and accept yourself as you are. Then you will mature bit by bit. Ripen like an apple in the sun. Ripen until you fall from the tree into the bed of grass and unite with all that is,” I hear the clear voice.

After 80 kilometers, Tanja temporarily takes the lead. It still has the strength to stand up to the wind. Is in a great mood and obviously has an inexhaustible supply of positive thoughts today. I hang in their slipstream. This is a great relief as the front man creates a track, just like when walking in deep snow, and the pursuer does not get the wind head-on.

If we want to complete the 117 kilometers today, we have to work hard. We don’t take time for a lunch break. They only stop sometimes to have a snack and top up their energy levels. Then continue. Further and further into the wind. It’s getting dusky. Again, an eternally wide open country around us. Steppe on the Volga. Hardly or not at all populated. Occasionally shepherds on horseback herding their sheep or cattle. Just like in Mongolia. During a short stop at a forgotten traffic sign in the lonely landscape, a rickety car of unknown make stops next to us. A man with Mongolian features gets out and comes towards us. He greets us in a friendly manner. He asks us a mountain of questions and is delighted with the answers. Then he sings us a verse from a Volga German song. “Ha, ha, ha,” he laughs with great amusement and tells us that he comes from Kazakhstan. Tüüüüt! Tüüüüt! Sounds the horn of his old crate in which pumpkins are loaded up to the roof. The co-driver is obviously bored and asks to drive on. “Doswidanje,” the Kazakh says, still laughing, and runs back to his four-wheeled rust bucket, coughing, spitting and smoking as he slinks away. Once again we are alone in the endless expanse.

I feel like an ox turning the millstone. Step stoically. Kick, kick only that the sprocket moves under my legs and not a millstone. It’s getting dark. I motivate myself with the thought of one, two or even three cold beers and a tasty snack in a warm room. But the question remains whether this even exists in Pallasowka? Will we even come across a Gastiniza? It’s getting dark. Hardly any cars. Hardly any cars all day. A very beautiful cycle route if it wasn’t so incredibly strenuous. Tanja is the driving force today. She tracks the path and motivates. It’s good that we are able to take turns with this. Signs on the roadside show the kilometers driven. First 90 then 95, 98, 105. It is pitch dark. The headwind has calmed down, gone to sleep so to speak. I’m back in front. Let my four wheels turn in the night. Drive them with my energy. Energy from the all-encompassing whole of the cosmos. Tanja’s LED headlights dazzle me in my rear-view mirror. Lights appear sporadically. Small, inconspicuous, barely recognizable at first, but then they become real. “We can do it, we can do it,” I motivate myself quietly. At the entrance to the village, men work in a dilapidated workshop. “To the left, over the bridge,” they say, and that’s all I understand. As we cross the bridge, the road forks. “Where to now? No one there to ask,” I say, exhausted. It is pitch dark. No lighting in the outskirts of this city only 28 kilometers away from Kazakhstan. Then a car roars out of the maw of the yawning night. It’s coming straight at us. Instinctively and somewhat desperately, I raise my hand. It could be that the driver stops and tells us in which direction we have to go and where there is a Gastiniza. In fact, it holds. As if he had just fallen from heaven or was an angel sent by the cosmos. “There’s a gastiniza. Follow me, I’ll take you there,” he says graciously. My body mobilizes all its strength once again and we cycle after the rumbling vehicle at a speed of 18 kilometers per hour. Then, when a barrier makes it impossible for him to continue, the nocturnal angel stops. “Back there where you see the light, that’s where the Gastiniza is. Good luck and have a good journey,” he says goodbye and disappears in the dark as he came.

“I’m sorry. We don’t have a room available,” the woman at the windy, half-collapsed reception startles me. I almost collapse too. “Please, please look in your book again,” I say, now completely exhausted and certain that we can set up our tent in front of the stairs of the house in an emergency. Her eyes now look at me more intensely and suddenly take on a soft gleam. Thank God, I think, regaining confidence. Then she really does look at her thick book again. “We have a room, but it’s not cleaned,” she apologizes in a friendly, almost caring voice. “You have a room? But that’s wonderful. Cleaned or not, we’ll take it,” I reply very, very happily. Then she shows me the room on the second floor. There is garbage from the previous tenant on the table, the beds are littered and the toilet has not been flushed. “Do you really want to take it?” she asks again. “Sure, we’ll clean up,” I reply in a good mood. Then we carry our equipment into the dirty room and lock the bikes in the anteroom next to the registration desk. While Tanja is clearing up the garbage, the nice lady from reception comes and makes the beds. In no time at all we have an overheated place to stay for the night. My wish for a cold beer is also fulfilled as there is even a small store in the Gastiniza. Highly satisfied with our performance, we now sit in the parlor, drinking beer and eating pistachios, bread, canned fish and pickles. We don’t mind that there is no running water. No shower either, of course. That we have to flush the toilet with water from plastic bottles, the plaster is falling off the walls and the guests are having a party in the next room. It doesn’t matter. After a day like that, you become modest, very modest. Takes every little thing as a gift. The main thing is that we managed the 117 kilometers today. Mostly against the wind. We are tired but happy. Happy to have arrived here in one piece. Happy not to have to camp in an open field next to a town. Happy about the insights the day has brought. About insight, about remembering what you have already supposedly learned. We are happy to have lived another positive day. A day that, as so often as a traveler, began with an uncertain end. A day full of challenges for body and mind. Challenges that we were able to overcome and that made us stronger.

While we’re still eating our evening meal, we decide to rest in the cabin tomorrow. Sleep in, get fit again to find the road to Samara or to complete the long detour. To then reconnect with our originally planned route.

We look forward to your comments!