kaitsu’s travelling blog

On the road, again!

2011-07-11T13:36:00.000-07:00

We been on our trip almost one week now, and we've been on our ferry from Helsinki to Gdynia, after it we spend few wonderful days with our friends in Lodz :)

Travelling with bikes were pretty tough since weather stays hot and moist, since when we drove with Lodz to Cracow where we still are now, teperature was +30 degrees and sun was shining on pure sky. Of course its better have good warm weather than ugly weather with rain, but still it was pretty tough.

As I wrote, now we are in Cracow and tomorrow morning we are heading away from here, maybe through Germany to Belgium, or straight to Holland, we dong know for sure.. Yet! Time will show. Many nice things has happened on these days, and many things what we are going to laugh later, not those things are too close to laugh, but those are very good memories to think. One of those reasons for these trips are have some good memories I think.

Real trip 2011

2011-06-27T11:18:00.000-07:00

For some reason trip of summer 2011 is changed a lot. There is a new biker on this trip than before, and route is different than this picture which is below this text. Driving around Spain is not going to happen, but something else interesting is going to happen, thats for sure. About this, I'll write some more later, but ferry is leaving from Helsinki 5.7.2011 which is pretty soon :)

Trip 2011

2011-03-16T11:09:00.000-07:00

Yes, its time for planning a new trip on next summer :):) In this point it seems to be quite long journey through many countries which you can see from this picture:

Back home, back to warmth!

2010-07-29T01:58:00.000-07:00

Yesterday I came back to Finland, and back to my home. It was nice to find out, that weather in Finland is much more warmer what it was in Holland and Germany. Its true, that because this warm weather without rain, grass is dead some places on my yard, and my dogs suffer, its too hot to them.

Forecast shows colder weather for rest of the week, and maybe some rain too. Its good I think, even now I have a plan to head on the lakes for few days. Yesterday when I came, I spend few hours at my house, doing some things, and after that I headed to my boat, and to sauna. Water is very warm in here, and even its so hot, it was nice to warm up my boat sauna, and spend some time in there.

About my trip, we drove about 5200 km, countries what we visit was, Poland, Czech Republic, Italia, Monaco, Switzerland, Germany, and Holland. We drop France and Le Havre for some reasons, but there is years to travel, so maybe one day. Car worked on this trip perfectly, there wasnt any troubles, and this oil thing in the beginning comes because there was too much oil in gearbox, and after this little episode, there wasnt any troubles. Now I try to sell this car because I have my own motorcycle, and a car, although there is a lot of nice things in this car like air-conditioner, auto-cruise, automatic gearbox and so on, so its nice car to drive, and it runs approx 6,75 liter/100km through this trip.

It was funny when people in Italy for example tried have some cooling with opened windows in theirs car in traffic jams when temperature was around +36 degrees, they stared us when we drove with this old Camry with windows closed, maybe they didnt have a clue that we mught have air-conditioner in this car. It is useful thing in a car I think, it makes your driving easier in such temperatures.

2010-07-26T01:30:00.001-07:00

When Im writing this Im on the highway in Germany heading at Travemunde where our boat is going to leave tomorrow morning 3am. Few days with my friends in Holland were great, and now is time for come back to home. Friends send sms to me that forecast shows more than +30 degrees to my area in Finland, and when now its raining heavily in Germany, it sounds so nice. We stayed our nights in Winterswijk at bed & breakfast place what is in this picture, and it was great place to stay. People in this house are nice, and breakfast was so good that you can continue with it quite long through day. As we drove with our old car which I bought for this trip, I think that next time I would like to go with my Honda Pan European ST 1300. One reason for this, that we stayed in so many traffic jams which could be avoidable with motorcycle, and driving with motorcycle through roads is pretty great too :):)

2010-07-24T03:17:00.001-07:00

At last, Monaco, place where money lives! Today we visited Monaco which was pretty beautiful with all those suberb boats at the harbour. When you walk by those boats, you realize how much money someone can own, HUGE amount of money! By those streets where F1 cars runs through are beautiful with nice shops and and people are beautiful too. When you drive through those tiny and narrow streets away that area, you can find same views as else where too, normal houses with trash around the streets. Place is still worth to visit, but you should do your homework that you have something more to see, those few roads take only few hours.

2010-07-22T03:54:00.001-07:00

At Venice!! Its beautiful place to see, but its too crowded if you think that you would have a chance to see, and feel the athmosphere. Boats driving as they are in race together, horns blows if some one do a mistake. Some people are nice, but some are very bad with theirs actions, as I tried to buy a key ring, and wind blows few hats down, this old man almost got angry at me, like if it was my fault. He saw that I didnt even touch it, but still. Anyway, maybe in this time isnt best time to come because this huge amount of people, but its worth to visit, its beautiful.

2010-07-21T05:48:00.001-07:00

New day, new tricks, as you can see how I cool down my water bottle. Air conditioner blow so cold air, that it can cool this bottle :) Last night at Wien was quite restles because traffic noise comes to us and kept me awake time to time through night. Camping costed 20.10 eur per 2 person, a car, and a one tent. I noticed later that they took only 1 tent price (4,5 eur) so we save some money. Now we are heading to Italy and we have 250 km to Venice. We noticed that we some troubles with laptop, so only what I can do is read my emails with this phone which I use to update this blog, so there is only sms, and email to use.

2010-07-20T05:19:00.001-07:00

Few moments at Lodz is over, and now we are heading to Czech Rebublic, town called Brno. If everything goes fine, it could be that we drive straight away to Austria. Time in Lodz was perfect, I met my friends and we had good time with some beer a bit strange food :):) Local beer is perfect, even with ginger juice or with honey, believe me, I liked it ;) I saw new places at Lodz, and next time I will see more. So, now we are heading to Czech border and hopefully we can gain some more speed because we've been in traffic jams today few times which slow us quite much. Once again, I want thank my friends about all what you did to us :):) See you soon :):)

2010-07-18T12:04:00.000-07:00

We are reaching Lodz, there is 65km to go, and then is time for have some rest, and maybe few beers ;) Of course this day wasn't trouble free, since we went to gas station, my quite new visa-card with this micro chip made this woman next to desk quite confused. Of course she didnt spoke any english, so I was quite pissed because she spoke Polish and I didnt understand anything. When I cursing out loud next the desk, woman next to me said in Finnish 'how can I help you?' I explained the situation, and finally whole episode was over, and main reason for this was, that this woman didnt knew how to use this kind of visa-card. Sometimes is goog to open your mouth, even with bad words :)

2010-07-17T06:19:00.001-07:00

Finally at harbour, 3,5 hour before its time to head on the sea, so there is some time to waste. We drove quite fast on the highway, and when we finally stop for refueling the car, we had some trouble. Our travelling car leak oil from the gearbox. We found out that previous car owner was put too much oil in it, and now it comes out from place where you can measure level of oil. We made a deccission that we are going go on, so next turn is spend some time at the harbour.

Its settled now!!

2010-07-04T08:38:00.000-07:00

The date of my journey with my friend is settled. Even we dont have booked ticket on the boat, we are heading on the road 17th of July through those countries which are on that picture here in this blog.

Again we are teasing our lucky because we decide to leave our motorcycles at home, and we bought a car for 200€ which we are using with this trip. Its Toyota Camry with automatic gearbox, auto cruise, and with air condition in it (those really works). Its been long way on the road, and now I meant this car, there is 475000 km in it, but it seems working quite good, so we are going to test it if it last next 5000-6000 km's with us :):)

If everything goes just fine, we are spending our time on the road 2 weeks which is maximum time what we have, if its possible, we might come back sooner, but I cant be sure for it, we'll see.

If there is internet connection through this trip, Im going to update my blog, but like on our previous trip last summer, there was huge difficulties with connections, so I cant promise anything until I see how it goes :):)

So, now there is 2 weeks until it starts, I do my preparations for it, and I wish good luck to all and good weather :):)

Day full of happenings

2010-02-20T11:05:00.000-08:00

Today I celebrate my uncle's 70th birthday with my relatives, and after that I headed to the factory building a stand for GPS, intercom, radio and mobile phone to Ari's bike. Now it's ready, and we both have these stand's on our bike's, so now it only need a proper weather to drive. Hopefully summer come soon, and time for our trip.

New year, new tricks, new trip

2010-02-17T09:15:00.000-08:00

With increasing light new plan for this summer trip getting brighter and brighter every day. Of course anything can happen since my summer vacation is somewhere end of the July, but maybe its better plan soon than too late :) I made new stand on my bike for mobile phone and intercom system for my helmet, and now its time for Ari's bike. Through this summer it will show who is coming with this trip since I doubt that Im not going by myself through on this trip, but now its too early worry about this, time will show what is going to happen :):)

Trip 2009 is done now!

2009-07-12T03:57:00.000-07:00

Our trip with motorcyckles is done now, I hope that I can do some other trip in this summer, shorter, and in Finland. We were 13 days on the road, around 3000 km's all together, 3 different countries if you don't count Finland, and lot of new memories :)

I download more pics in here now, maybe later I write something more about this trip, and maybe there is more pics to see, we'll that later.

Last morning abroad, at Gdansk

2009-07-09T21:41:00.001-07:00

Our ferry leaving from Gdansk this morning. Almost 2 weeks passed so quickly and soon is time for Finland :) Yesterday we drove about 350 km from Lodz in here, we had heavy rain (there is no hard conditions, only bad equipments) and everything went well.

Through Germany to Poland

2009-07-07T02:50:00.000-07:00

So, we managed have tickets to ferry which leaves on friday morning from Gdynia, Poland to Helsinki. I called to Finnlines on yesterday morning, and when we got our reservation, we packed our things asap, and headed on the road. We drove through whole day from Winterswijk hotel to Lodz, Poland and when I check how long was our trip, I noticed that we passed more than 1000 kilometers. So, now we are at Lodz, and on thursday morning are going to head to
Gdansk.

Heading back to Winterswijk from Zeewold

2009-07-05T12:33:00.001-07:00

When Im writing this we are already back to Winterswijk. Our weekend was perfect, visiting airfield, place called Aviodrome, having so good time with good company :) In the evening having grill things surrounded by friends. Thank you again about all what you did for us.

Of course something bad happend too, we forgot to have boat tickets for certain date to get back to Finland, there is no room for us from Rostock to Helsinki anymoore. Only thing what we can do is trying to have boat tickets from Gdynia, Poland to Helsinki, or drive through to Germany and Denmark to Sweden, Stockholm. From Stockholm with ferry to Turku. If we have to head to Sweden, i mean that I can't see my friends in Poland which is sad, but tomorrow morning is going to show where we are heading.

Its more than hot

2009-07-02T08:22:00.001-07:00

We were spending our time today at city center with very warm condition. We have troubles with our walkie talkie between those two bikes. For some reason those phones dont work with normal batteries with headsets. So, we bought rechargeable batteries since seller told that poor quality batteries dont produce enough power for headsets with this handheld radio. In the evening we are going to charge those batteries, and we'll see what is going to happen. We notice that through long trip, it would be nice to talk to each others. So, lets see what is going to happen. Tomorrow we are going to head to Zeewolde, be prepared :)

Finally at Wintersvijk

2009-07-01T06:01:00.001-07:00

Its quite warm, maybe close 30 deg, town is small but interesting. Its funny (and good) how many bikes is in this town. People goes everywhere with bikes, and with kids.

I had a good plan...

2009-07-01T04:04:00.001-07:00

. .to download pics in here through my trip. But, there is something, mobile operator or something else stops my multimedia messages, so I can't download any pictures, so far. We'll see if there could be any progress, and things getting better.

EDELL: Leaving from Vuosaari harbour

2009-06-30T23:05:00.001-07:00

Long journey to Rostock begun! Because time on the sea is going to be long, there is more than one day to figure out what to do in this quite tiny boat.

On the road, again!!

2009-06-29T05:35:00.001-07:00

Now it seems that Ari have a bike

2009-06-06T23:22:00.000-07:00

Yamaha Dragstar 1100 Classic -03

If something can happen, it...

2009-06-04T04:56:00.001-07:00

Few moment ago it happens, Ari's bike's engine broke, and today they picked it up to junkyard. Crankshaft fails and there is no spare to buy. So, it's time to find another bike to him, because we are on the road on 29th of june :)

It's settled!

2009-04-08T12:06:00.000-07:00

Time is settled, if everything goes as we planned, we are heading on the road 29.06.2009 and time will be around 3 pm. Boat is leaving from Helsinki around 9 pm.

From Siilinjärvi to Helsinki is around 4oo km. Few times refueling bike's through this trip to Silja Line's boat harbour, into the a boat which carry us to Rostock, Germany! From there to forward... Who know's yet!

Summer getting closer

2009-03-22T10:36:00.000-07:00

Summer getting closer and our summer trip too. On this summer, if Ari and I can have our summervacation on same time, we are heading on our new trip to middle Europe with our motorcycles. Now it seems that first we are heading to Rostck, Germany with ferry from Finland, and next from there to Holland. Then from there through Germany to Poland (yes, again:) ) and then back to Rostock, and to Finland.

Now it seems that I can update this blog with my mobilephone, so I have plan to write some things in here through our journey, we'll see.

In here you can see our tourmap: