We're On a Boat

Sorry for the lack of communication, but now that we're on the road, our internet access is a bit skimpy.

Will and Zach arrived in Armenia on June 29th, and we spent the next week touring the country with my sisters, Meghan and Alethea, and Meghan's friend, Vanessa.  I took them to meet my host family from my first two months in Armenia and they met all of my Armenian friends in Hrazdan.  We had a big spaghetti dinner with everyone in Hrazdan on one of my last nights in the town, which involved not only introducing my troup to my Armenian friends but also my saying goodbye to these wonderful people who have been such a big part of my life in Armenia.

We toured around, visiting different important sites in Armenia and introducing the troup to my Volunteer friends who were still in country.  We went on a cognac tour.  We ate a lot of food.

My sisters left on Friday, July 6th-- our original departure date.   However, we decided to hold off on our train ride out of Armenia, mostly to give me more time to wrap up my life there.  Our plan was to take a train into Yerevan, hang out at the train station and run errands, and then board the train to Batumi, Georgia around 3 in afternoon.

One thing we have learned on our trip so far:  plans don't actually work, most of the time.

Despite the fact that the train from Hrazdan was supposed to arrive at around 7:15 in the morning, it actually arrived half an hour early.   While this was annoying, it wasn't too terrible:  we ended up hunting up three taxis who would drive us and our bikes to the train station for a decent price.  We got on the train to Batumi with only a little problems with our bikes-- we ended up having to stack them on the spare bed in our little room, after taking off the wheels.  All in all it was a pretty nice train ride.

However, once we got into Batumi we discovered that our original ferry to Varna, Bulgaria is no longer running-- they cancelled it about a month ago.  After much discussion and a lot of help from some local volunteer English teachers and Georgians, we found out that there was a ferry to Ukraine that we could take instead.  However, no one seemed to be able to tell us exactly when the boat would leave-- some said Wednesday, some said Friday, some said Sunday, but we had to come in on Friday to pick up our tickets….  Once we learned that we would not be catching a ferry in the next couple of days, we headed out of Batumi to a national park about 20k away from the city.  We rode along pleasant roads and over a mild pass, then hit 6 miles of gravel road we had to take down before we would reach the campsite.  It was difficult riding, especially with our bikes loaded down, but we made it to the visitor's center of the park and met a wonderful Georgian family who was celebrating a birthday.  They gave us wine and some food when we asked them if they knew how far we had to ride to get to the campsite, then rode on (mildly tipsy) another couple of miles. 

We ended up camping in a field next to a river.  We played frisbee when it wasn't raining and cards when it was.  The next day, after waiting out a couple hours of rain, we made our way closer to town and camped on the beach of the Black Sea.  We headed back into Batumi on Wednesday and were finally able to figure out the ships:  apparently there were two boats:  one on Thursday and one on Sunday.  However, the first time we came in the woman decided that the freighter leaving on Thursday wasn't comfortable enough for us, so she only told us about the Sunday one.  But when we came back, I guess we were looking a little ragged from camping and biking for a few days.  She told us (through our translator) that we looked "poor" and sold us the tickets.

So now we're on a boat.  We've been on the boat for the last three days, and while it's a great way to travel, it's also extremely boring.  The cabins are wonderful and actually very spacious, the food is decent (although very heavy on the sausage), and our two fellow passengers are a couple of wonderful Dutch guys who help break up the monotony that is our own company.  However, it's three days where we haven't been doing anything-- and I do mean anything.  A lot of naps.  A lot of reading.  A lot of watching for dolphins (there are quite a few that we've seen).  We're all going a little stir crazy at the moment. 


So, you may be asking:  now that our plan has once again changed, where are we going? 

The answer is:  we've kind of stopped trying to plan.  Not really…. but kind of.  We get off the boat just outside of Odessa in Ukraine.  From there we will ride south, cutting through a little corner of Moldova (mostly because we can't avoid it; partly because it's an extra stamp in the passport) and into Romania.  We've gotten a lot of good advice on places to hit in Romania, so we'll bike kind of south-west through the country, biking through a couple of beautiful passes and whatnot.  From there we'll probably stick to our original idea of biking along the Danube until turning off to see Croatia and Plitvice National Park-- that part of the "plan" still hasn't changed.  Again, Zach leaves sometime in the middle of this to fly home, and Will and I will continue on our merry way.