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604030tour - Jesse DeGraff

Hi there! We are Margaret, Jesse, and Erin. Mother, Son, & Daughter. We’ve set out on a bicycle tour through France, Germany, Belgium, and Luxembourg, celebrating our 60th, 40th, & 30th birthdays respectively.

While this tour certainly wouldn’t go down in the annals of biking lore as any kind of achievement (like Mike & Cindi Travis of downtheroad.org), it has some special significance to us. When Margaret was a teenager, she did a bicycle tour through many countries in Europe as part of a youth hostel group. In 1986 at the ages of 40 and 20, Margaret and Jesse rode from just south of Modesto, California, to Vancouver British Columbia for the World’s Fair. And now, as Margaret turns 60, Jesse 40, and Erin 30, we’re off to do Europe again (at least in part).

Since we couldn’t take all of our friends and family with us physically, we’ve created this blog on travelblog.org so that others can at least follow along and enjoy a portion of this very special trip. We hope you enjoy the tour as much as we’re hoping to!

Jesse DeGraff
Saturday, June 4th, 2006
San Diego, CA
The eve of our trip.....

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Joined on: June 5th 2006
Last Login: July 14th 2008

Blog Entries: 7
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Blogs & Travel Journals

by 604030tour, order by Date newest first.

By 604030tour
June 26th 2006

All Good Things...

Europe » France » Île-de-France » Paris

Sunday, the 25th of June All good things must come to an end, unfortunately. We started today by meeting one of Erin’s old foreign-exchange students, Charlélie, at the Arc de Triomphe at 11:00. It was a rainy day off and on all day, but at least we weren’t riding in it again. We strolled down the Champs Elysees, eventually going to a unique restaurant that also was a technology showcase for Renault, of all things. We were meeting Charlélie’s parents there for lunch, and had a wonderful time catching up with him, and talking to his parents about all things under [View Full Entry]

By 604030tour
June 24th 2006

Back to Paris

Europe » France » Île-de-France » Paris

Saturday, the 24th of June Started out our train ride today by almost missing our train. We were an hour early, and a train pulled into our platform within 10 minutes of our being there. We thought it was a different train and would be moving on, but time wore on and the train didn’t move. Margaret had gone down off of the platform looking for drinks, and Erin and Jesse were on the platform looking at the train, looking at their watches, looking at the train, etc….We finally looked closely at the train and noticed a digital sign that showed [View Full Entry]

By 604030tour
June 23rd 2006

The Mosel Valley

Europe » Germany » Rhineland-Palatinate

Tuesday, the 20th of June Our original plan when we walked the 2km down to the train station yesterday was purchasing tickets to Triere, and we’d ride from there to Köln. We looked at the map again before bed, and realized we’d blown our math again and couldn’t make it to Köln. Math is hard! So, when we got to the train station this morning we spent 20 minutes or so getting the tickets exchanged for Cochem, quite a bit further down the river. The Luxembourg train station has an AMAZING amount of traffic going through it! Luxembourg’s population basically doubles [View Full Entry]

By 604030tour
June 19th 2006

Vouziers to Luxembourg

Europe » France

Friday the 16th of June Good news = It’s cool today and not raining. Bad news = Long ~30 mile day with some pretty bad hills on our way to Doulcon. The scenery has changed some more, as it’s wont to do on long trips, with the fields of grain turning more to pastures filled with cows, sheep, and some horses. We all kind of felt like we hit a wall about 2 hours into the ride. Riding every day, the hills, and the headwinds are starting to catch up to us, apparently. We had lunch at a memorial to the [View Full Entry]

By 604030tour
June 15th 2006

Vertus to Vouziers

Europe » France

Wednesday the 14th of June Finally, a day where we bike out of town and don’t have to go up a hill! As well, we didn’t get lost going out of town this time. The last several days have been VERY hot while we were biking, so we decided that we’d wake up early and start the ride early in the day before it got too hot. This was a GOOD plan. The ride out of Vertus and towards Mourmelon-le-Grand where we were planning on staying was wonderful. The weather was cool, there was just a little bit of breeze, and [View Full Entry]

By 604030tour
June 13th 2006

Catching up the entries.....

Europe » France

The Left Side of the "Stage"
The left side of the "stage" for the shows in Provins. They use an outside section of the 13th century wall that's around the city.

Sorry it’s been so long since our last update, but it’s been impossible to find an un-locked wireless signal for awhile. We’re finally at a hotel that’s got it’s own wireless connection, so hopefully I’ll be updating with some pictures as well. - Jesse Friday, the 9th of June Everybody up and ready to go by 8 o’clock, no problem. Unfortunately, our cab wasn’t. The desk clerk the night before had called to arrange a cab for us at 8am, but by 8:10 he wasn’t there. We had the day clerk call another cab company, and THEY hadn’t shown up by [View Full Entry]

By 604030tour
June 8th 2006

The flight and first day!

Europe » France » Île-de-France » Paris

Sunrise
Sunrise over Europe as we approach the coast.

Well, we started out our trip by almost missing our plane out of San Diego! Our tickets said boarding was at 7:00, but they’d moved it up to 6:40. After waiting in line at check-in for almost an hour, and then waiting about 15 to 20 minutes to clear security, we figured we’d have time to grab some breakfast to go at McDonalds. Jesse & Erin waited in line while Margaret went ahead. Food and drinks had just arrived when Margaret came around the corner saying “We’ve gotta’ go, NOW”. She’d just gone to gate and found they’d finished boarding and [View Full Entry]

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604030tour | Jesse DeGraff | Travel Blog

604030tour - Jesse DeGraff

Blogs & Travel Journals

All Good Things...

Back to Paris

The Mosel Valley

Vouziers to Luxembourg

Vertus to Vouziers

Catching up the entries.....

The flight and first day!