Day: June 13, 2014

Second day at the community

/ Jackiie / Leave a comment

I slept around nine hours, and woke up a quarter past nine. It was raining, so I went out to cover my bicycle saddle. Luckily I had left the bicycle beneath a tree the night before so there were no much rain on the leather.
I joined the others for breakfast, but ate my own, to hold down the expenses.
Before lunch I was planning some routes, counting kilometres until Paris (as I will have to fly home to my brothers wedding, and I think I will be in Paris by then) and also planned for the next couch surfing places and such.
Then, I went back to my hut, but heard that they were training on their music. There are four of the guys who are having a band, playing Stomp music (you use things not intended as instruments as instruments).

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Then, they invited me in to see the number they were going to perform on stage, and it was really awesome! If you want to listen, they have a facebook page (http://www.facebook.com/heartbeatgroup) and also a website (http://www.heartbeatgroup.dk/)! Check them out!
At lunch, I made another portion of the mozzarella-pepperoni-peanuts-pasta mix and again ate with the people at the community. Afterwards I helped with the dishes, and then went to my hut to read the first book in the Hunger Games trilogy. I read until dinner, with a little pause for a blog post, and then ate dinner with them. After the dinner there were ice cream, and I ate home made caramel and liquorice ice cream! It was really nice!
Then I did some more dishes, as it felt like a really easy task to help with.
I then continued to read, even though I joined the others and half looked at the football game. I spent the rest of the evening reading and went to bed at 0200, after I had read the whole book. It was a really nice day!

My sleeping gear!

/ Jackiie / Leave a comment

I have said earlier that I would do posts about my gear, and I will start about a post about my sleeping gear!
The first thing on the list is my tent! I have read about many bike touring people that have chosen light weight tents, and also recommended other people to do that. Myself, I felt that I would live in it for about a year, and did not know what adventures I would embark on. Therefore, I wanted a really robust tent, that I could also use for other adventures before and after the bike trip, that would not need to be pegged down (so that I could pitch it at a parking lot if needed) and also had space enough to feel like a small home for me. My choice fell on Hilleberg Allak, as I have always had great experience with all the Hilleberg tents, and I really like the easy solutions.

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It has two openings, one on each side. It also has small went openings in the roof on the outer tent beneath the overlaying cloth, and on good nights, you are able to open it up, take away the cloth and see the stars.
The inside is, as you see, able to really open up. When there are not many animals and you would like to have an open place, you can get it really open. Also, the mosquito nets inside are really big.

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From top left> The black pillow is actually a MSR Dromedary Bag, made to hold 10 liters of water. It is really durable, and I read about the tips of using it as a pillow, and it really works!
Then, we have the mattress. I have used Exped SynMat M UL earlier, an inflatable mattress, and it is too short, and also not really super durable as it is a UL mattress, but really light. Instead, I choose an Exped SynMat LW, so it is bigger (longer than me is a big plus) and also more durable. Sure, it is a tad heavy, but as long as it is on the bicycle, I don’t mind. The dimensions is 197x65x7 centimetres.
The yellow packsack is a Exped Schnozzle Pump Bag. It is a lightweight packsack that you can connect to the mattress, fill the sack with air, and push it into the mattress. It saves time and energy, and it really is wonderful!
My sleeping bag is a Marmot Plasma 15. It is rated down to -9 degrees celsius according to the EN standard, and as long as it is warm, I use it as a blanket. As it weights 900 grams, I do not see the point to buy a new summer sack that weights 300 grams less, and I will also sooner or later come to colder climates.
The red sheet is a silk sheet, formed as a sleeping bag, and made to be used as it is, or inside of the sleeping bag. It gives some extra warmth, and is also great at the warm evenings or mornings when the full sleeping bag is not needed.
My sleeping pad inside of the tent for showing the space:

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