With the weather forecast for the weekend predicting a sunny Saturday and heavy rain Sunday, I’ll probably save myself the long trip to Friedrichshafen and go ride instead. Thanks to folks like HappyMTB, who has been busy shooting lots of photos at Eurobike 2011, I can instead walk the show virtually from the comfort of my desk - now and all week.
★ collideousSaturday morning, I left the house for Eurobike at 4.30AM and walked to the train station to catch a train to Constance at 5.15AM. There were no buses at this early hour and I wasn’t going to kick my wife out of bed on a Saturday morning. At the train station I had the time to buy a Coke and a sandwich at an open sandwich shop. Seems like these shops are doing great business with the clubbers that are on their way home after a night of dancing and drinking. I had to stand in line for a while. Sandwich and Coke stowed away, I jumped on the train. It departed 5 minutes late due to a technical hiccup, but I wasn’t too worried about getting to Constance in time for the boat trip across the lake. 5 minutes is easy to catch up on such a distance. About 10 minutes after to the train rolled out of the station, a female conductor escorted by two security guys came to check everyone’s ticket. Another sign that trains at this hours were mostly loaded with drunk party-goers. By the time the train entered Zurich’s main station, the train was back on schedule. I got to Constance, quickly walked to the harbor to catch the catamaran going to Friedrichshafen. No luck, like everyone else who got off the train we were too late. The catamaran was already filled up to the last seat and they were not letting anyone else on board. We all had to wait for the next one departing in an hour. I used that time to head back to the train station to exchange a few francs and then stopped at a bakery for a Macchiato to go. I walked back to the harbor and got myself comfortable on a bench with a nice view of the lake. Time went by quickly and soon enough I was on the boat to Friedrichshafen. A short bus trip later and I walked into the bike show.
★ collideous