2010-06-21 49 9

Location

Today's location is a few metres from a forest track in the Gramschatzer Wald forest.

Country: Germany; state: Bayern (Bavaria, EU:DE:BY); administrative region: Unterfranken; district: Würzburg rural district

Weather: clouded

Expedition

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When I started out, the clouds had some dark parts, but I just hoped for the weather be stay dry and so it did. I cycled to Rimpar, where I forgot to take the field track I usually use, so I had to climb the next hill (~100 m elevation) on the country road used by many cars. I survived. Not much later I turned onto a forest track which was in surprisingly good condition and led me to the hashpoint. I took the first look at my GPS unit 500 m from the hashpoint, then cycled with the GPS unit in hand. The GPS receiver died. I stopped to take the spare batteries out of my bag, but found out that the spare batteries must habe been the ones on my kitchen table. Meh. So I took the other GPS receiver instead. After cycling a bit too far because the GPS was lagging behind, I stood on the forest track near the hashpoint. The GPS receiver told me "9 m north", I went there, it said "6 m west", I went there, it said "12 m north", I went there, it said "36 m south and 18 m east"... In short, it was the longest GPS dance I ever did, and this time it was not to get that last decimal correct but to get a picture of the unit showing me within something like 10 metres or less. The indicated distance jumped far to every side, and whenever I saw mostly correct coordinates they were gone before I could take a picture. After a while I had walked over every square metre within 20 or 25 metres of the presumed hashpoint, so I stopped this futile hunt for the GPS proof.

Out of the sticks that were lying around near the hashpoint I made a marker. It was the first one in a long time, due to either forgetting to make one or the place not being suited for one. Some of the sticks were so rotten that they turned to dust when I touched them. Then I cycled back. The long straight part of the country road west of the hashpoint will from now on be called "the roadkill mile": First I saw the shredded carcass of a deer in the roadside ditch. Shortly after, I saw a mole lying a few centimetres from the asphalt. I stopped and went back to it to save it from four-wheeled doom, but it was lying still and didn't move when I touched it with my foot. A more thorough examination told me it was dead :-( When I was another 200 metres down the road I saw a mouse sitting also a few centimetres from the asphalt, not moving when I rode by. Because I was in the curving part of the road I didn't stop. The rest of the way home was without other special occurrences.

When I took a shower after the expedition, I saw a black dot on my wrist. "Oh, dirt...", I thought and continued showering. shower, shower "oh, the dirt is still there, strange..." I took a closer look, and "AAAAAAH, TICK, AAAAAH, TICK, TIIIICK! badger badger badger... MUST KILL KILL KIIIIILLLLLLL!" It was sticking in my skin with its body standing away, so I could grab it with my fingernails, rip it out and drown it in the soapy shower drain. I didn't even take the time for a closer look, so I don't know which growth stage it was, the size was about 2 mm.

I cycled 15.9 + 15.2 = 31.1 km