Donkey and Horse are rolling again. From NZ to Europe with love.   Peddling through French countryside, nibbling the epic eurovelo network.  Panniers packed. A tent to call home. A simple life begins again. Can I get an Amen!

Steiners theory of 7 year cycles intrigues me. To this approach, what a 7 year cycle it’s been! A global pandemic.  Loved ones lost and found. Families started, grown and waned. A collective existential anxiety rollercoaster.  Continuing to learn to let go. Sitting comfortably with being uncomfortable. Building a home with the man I love. Rebuilding careers down under. It’s been a banger!

As the sun rises on a new chapter for Donkey and Horse, we’re all the more grateful to be writing from the road again. COVIDs rollercoaster was many things. Some took it in their stride but for most, it was a reminder of the breathtaking unpredictability of our finite lives.  However it arrived, whatever it took or gave, or if it’s simply a bad dream that has past, I hope you’re living a life of happiness, with those you love.

If you want another unpredictable-life reminder, try cycle touring.  Leaving NZ, we packed the house, shut down our working lives, rebuilt the bikes and travelled North for 32 hours.  Lesson one; with bikes in tow, travelling don’t come easy.  A $4.5K ‘additional baggage’ bill from Air Signapore and a $1K bill from hiring a car to reach our final destination vs getting the pre-booked train, because the bike boxes were too big, bought things back with a bump.

Shit happens.  Quite often.  It’s how we deal with it that counts.  Cycle touring provides a ‘Hieronymous Bosch Earthly Delights’ smorgasbord of change and challenges.  Pure childlike joy, bliss and freedom to a persitent click, lashings of rain, travel dramas and bouts of hangry that come with a safe-zone.  Accepting all things will pass, or just letting them go ASAP is eeeeeeessential.  We’ve hopped from very ‘comfortable’ lives, to choosing the uncomfortable. Perhaps the biggest challenge/reminder, to not blame those closest by.  The initial budget busting outlay has been forgotten and for reference, it wasn’t Brians fault 😉

We landed in Paris, and after trying to board the train and hiring a car, drove the 7 hours to Gujan-Mestras.  Big up to Mary for putting us up, calming us down and letting us use her home to readjust. Exploring the coast and surrounding towns, slowly re-calibrating our cycling legs.  We’ve 12 months of touring ahead.  8 months in France, Spain and Portugal, followed by 4 months in SE Asia.  Our goal 7 years ago, was to reach a year-on year-off lifestyle.  Flipping the retirement model whilst our bodies, joints and gooches can still handle it. 

Gujan-Mestras is a working Oyster farming village in the bay of Arcachon.  Quaint towns surround the bay and the seafood is appropriately scrumptious.  Mary showed us the sights and sounds before adjusting back to budget-biking life. From oysters and cool sauvignon blanc to rice crackers, cheese and crunchy-crudites.  Though as always, it’s the cycling and freedom we crave most.

The jewel in the crown of this coastal region is Arcachon town itself. Shadowed by the famous Dune of Pilat. A gargantuan sand edifice peering over the Atlantic coast. It makes our childhoods exploring the dunes of Cornwall and Tramore seem very prosaic.  The southern edge of the town is a nesting site for Bordeaux’s and Frances elite.  Winding roads, sea views, forests and houses straight from scenes of Amelie, bring the French fantasy. 

Rested and refuelled, we headed off from Gujan-Mestras on flat straight cycling paths, shaded by spindly native marine-oak and pine, briefly joining a eurovelo. These paths across the breadth of Europe are magical assets and the perfect gentle aid to bring our thighs back up to scratch.  The weather’s been patchy with daily rain.  But (perhaps as the adventure has only just begun ;)) there’s genuinely no-where else we’d rather be.  In a soggy tent.  Cooking under our trusty-tarp that got us through the Typhoon sandwich in Japan. 

Day 2, we joined the canal alongside the Garonne.  Shaded cathedral like heaven, pootling along it’s banks, cacooned by the majestic maples.  The cycle-touring fairy tale buzz slowly returning.  A reminder to stay agile to the daily changes arriving at our next planned campsite, it was closed.  Quick research revealed the ‘season’ in France starts from mid to late May to end September. Meaning many campsites are still deserted and boarded, ghosts of a forgotten summer.

A campsite closed, we busted the budget to stay at a gorgeous Pensionne (B&B) under the wonderful care of Gille.  Staying in a 16th Century merchant house in a tiny French town on the banks of the Garonne, belissimo! NZ is a fabulous place to call home.  The friends we’ve made, the people, the unique culture, the landscapes, the opportunities.  But nothing does it quite like Europe for a rabbit hole of history.  Each day, we cycle through villages, past country houses and over bridges, that quite simply blow our cycling shorts off.

From the Garonne, we crossed some hills (still in the rain) to reach Saint Sylvester sur Lot.  Setting up camp for our day off, being watched by the Notre Dam de Peyragude.  A Silver Glad Basilica built in the 19th Century on the ruins of Richard the Lion Hearts Castle.  (Are you catching this hairy-history-rabbit-hole, I mean, Richard the friggin Lion Heart!)

Another day on the Lot before we began our final few days traversing the undulating forested hills of the Dordogne region.  Stopping in soggy, beautiful french villages and towns. Waiting for the season to begin and the cacophonous crowds to (hopefully) bring the sunshine in their satchels. Rain has kept on our backs. Packing and putting the tent up in the mud and rain, a welcome baptism of cycle-touring fire. The countryside, conurbations and views never failing to deliver and the smiles stayed stuck to our faces.  We have a week with the Thompson family at camping Domaine de Soliel Plage.  Another big drive for this lifestyle as our 7 year goal, to have more time with those we love in the Northern Hemisphere. 

Our gorgeous friend Chris recently said, ‘happiness is desiring what you already have’.  Slowing down from the COVID and career merry-go-round, freedom, living outdoors, an adventure, a now bearded Brian (yum), Crocs emblazoned with our namesakes, time with those we love.  We couldn’t be happier. 

We genuinely hope you too, at least in part, are desiring what you already have. After the madness of the last 7-year-cycle, we’re all truly #luckytobealive, and as we switch off we’re reminded of the deliciousness of the #simplethingsinlife.

It’s good to be back. Till next time you big sexy bunch!

T&B