GO LANCE!!! REMEMBER THE ALAMO!!! (Day 3)
Woke up that morning well rested. After a nice breakfast of bread, the brothers and I split ways, them going for a ride up into the mountains, me sticking around town in hopes of seeing Lance and catching another ride. I was in the middle of nowhere-France and couldn’t afford to get stuck here as I had a train leaving Karlsruhe Germany at 4.40 that next morning.
I set out for the mountains with my Texas flag attached to a home-made flag pole - this tree branch which was dang near the size of a full tree in diameter. It was slightly ridiculous, extremely heavy, but got the job done. A Brit came up to me at one point and mentioned “Even the flag poles have to be bigger in Texas”. Damn straight.
Up and up I trekked, past crowds of people. I certainly got a number of looks from people but they were all genial smiles. The atmosphere was amazing, completely negating the fears I had going into enemy country with a Texas shirt and flag. Come to find out, nobody had a clue as to what the flag represented, and why should they? It was the University of Texas flag: they thought it was just a big ol cows head against an orange background. Instantly they attributed it to Texas, and thus Lance, and always did so with a smile on their face.
The carnival that is the caravan stretched by and I managed to enjoy it with a couple of other Americans I’d met on the side of the road. We enjoyed the candy and funny hats and alcohol free beer(?) while watching grown men literally fight children for anything that was being thrown to the crowd. These Americans were amazing kids, the husband even hailed from Texas, and they were spending an off weekend with their truck from the army base in Kaiserslauten.
Excitement started to build and the pelaton neared. We all jumped up into the truck bed and I waved my flag over the road. Lance stormed up the hill with the rest of his Discovery teamates. We all yelled, the entire crowd. This is what I yelled: “GO LANCE!!! REMEMBER THE ALAMO!!!” Is there anything that could be more appropriate?
We piled back into the truck and the GIs offered to give me a ride to the next point in the stage. Using state of the art GPS systems, we arrived just in time to see the pack rush by us again. And with that, I bid adieu to Lance. I had to start making my way back.
I got a ride with the GIs into the next town big enough to have a train station. I bid farewell to the Amis and wished them both luck - Don was headed to Iraq in November, not a fate I would wish on anybody, especially not an extremely friendly newlywed. From there I grabbed a train to the next biggest town in the area, where I managed to out-talk my way of a Riding-Black ticket (not that I can really talk my way out of anything in French). From there it was to Strasbourg, across the border and into Karlsruhe (where I was 80 cents short for the ticket. I was told to either borrow money or get off at the next stop. At least 2 people offered to help. Amazing…). In Karlsruhe I looked to meet up with the kids from just the previous party but it was in vain, leaving me to wander the streets like a vagabond until the clock slowly ticked away and I could get on my train back to the East.
I rolled into Dresden at 10.45. At 12.00 I met up with my boss and his boss for lunch and goodbye wishes. Life is incredible.