On popular demand

Here's the Picture of the Room - before I messed it up. :D

Where I live

This is the door to my first room for the stay here in Dahab. Pretty posh at 30 £/day (Egyptian, that is). The bike is the biggest blessing and extremely useful to have around here. Lisas stories of riding through the balkan and south from there make me want to take off for a grand tour already, but for now it's dahab and diving for me. :)
As for diving, the water is great, the new suit is perfect and the color is signature style - no-one has a suit in light olive green with bright-orange seams.
I wonder why.. :)

It is done, I am there.

Here I am. And here is all of my luggage. :)
So many things happen here, that it'll be much to write all of them
down. After taking off to MUC at 2:30 I have had but some short naps on
the plane and now it's 21:04 (Dahab time from now on).
Got the plane, all luggage arrived unharmed, the bike is reassembled and
I am SOOOOO happy I have it here!
Apart from the familiar faces at desert Divers and the different
Restaurants, The first Person I got to know is Lisa. A German, now
living in Schottland, she rode her bike here from the Netherlands. How
cool. Luck even worked better, as she will be leaving tomorrow and still
needed a box for her bike - until I had my bike put together. Just too
well that I won't be needing the box anymore now, so she's provided with
everything she needs to get her ride back home.
The chill has started to reach me, too. Hanging out a El Salaam with the
wind blowing - somewhat cooly, some music playing and free
wireless... :-)
P.S.: In case You're wondering: The first picture shows my intended breakfast at 2:30 - but I only had the coffee :)

Bike packing

Noch 'ne Herausforderung. Das Fahrrad einpacken ist ungefähr so gut wie
schon weg sein. Nach all den Paranoiageschichten, die ich beim Radhändler gehört hab, bin ich
gottfroh, dass es Kabelbinder gibt und noch mehr um das Packmaterial,
das ich da bekommen hab. Innerhalb von zwei Stunden wird aus einem
Fahrrad ein Schaumstoffumhüllter Klumpen - alles ist festgezurrt und
nicht mehr wieder zu erkennen. Wer hätte gedacht, dass das Rad zusammen
mit dem Werkzeug tatsächlich da rein passt.
Die Monoflosse hat sogar auch noch Platz gefunden und ist da jetzt
hoffentlich sicher genug.

Healing

So the flat is gone and the wounds from cleaning it out are healing as

well. Life is getting back into gear and going on.
Looking at that picture I do look kinda used these days. What a ride.
Now let's see what I can do for that bike to get it in shape for the trip.

The end of an era

It is done.
The dive centre Schiffstraße 38 in Konstanz is no more.
Mere hours ago, I dropped the keys into the landlord's mailbox.
That's it. Done and over with.
And what a load that takes off my chest. The information still has to
settle, but it's good.
So I'm cat-herding again, earning my place to stay at the H/Ds'. :D Goodie.

five, four, three, two, ...

Wuaaahh!!!

Why worry!

Why do I ever worry when there are soo many wonderful people around that just know when and how to chip in to save me. With things going wrong on all sides (which is what things do, after all) there's allways Benno, Dani, The Brownies, the H/Ds, Uli, Elvira, Jörg, Elke and Jochen, Oli, Christoph, Christophe, the girls at work and everyone else out there, creating order where there was chaos, lending cars where stuff needs to be dumped, lugging around and putting up with the stuff I don't want to dump, giving a new home to the things that need one, and most of all, being there, coming over to see me off, letting me crash in their place, listening, giving advice, ...

Fabulous friends I have indeed.

Thank You all.

Beat up and cat-herding

So I did go to the hospital to have that head looked after. Everything looking good and the thing has been taken care of.
Now I'm Toni-sitting. There she is, dozing peacefully in the background, right on the tip of my nose :^)
Back home there's still stuff to do, of course. What music to take? Still more stuff that needs to be dumped or given away. - No end.

It's a dangerous business, moving out.

Still in Konstanz, still busy cleaning out the flat and deciding what to keep and what to dump.

Today, two more trunkloads of debris were taken to the Werstoffhof (the dumpster, essentially) and one of them struck back! Check out papuga's Blog to see how a piece of trash-to-be can still get You a nice lump and probably a scar on the head. Maybe I'll have a scar to remember this exodus. :)

Also, I decided to take the bike with me. That's what I built it for after all, so it might just as well come along for the ride. More stuff to think of now: What parts to take? What's still to be repaired, looked after before leaving? Etc. ...

As for diving? Umberto confirmed my spot for the Apnea Academy Instructors couse in May, so here's the first challenge in Egypt. Will I actually make it through the course? Whooaaaa!!

So how does it feel, leaving (almost) everything behind? It's cleansing and scary as well as a challenge. It brings back lots of memories of things that have happened here, people I have met and pieces of me that I will leave here, whatever I do.

Essentially it's good, I guess. Time will tell.