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Published: August 5th 2010
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Skytop Lodge
Slumming it in the Poconos Day 0 - Poconos to Frankfurt
This is a blog about motorcycling in Eastern Europe (not sure whether you would include Turkey) so throw in plus Western Turkey. It starts in the Poconos in Pennsylvania, USA. Immediately this tells you something about the blog, and more to the point, the blogger. The point being it does not matter how much you travel there is always a sense of awe when one evening you are in the Treetop Lodge, in (sort of) new England, America and the next in Linz, Austria. Of course this is stretching it given time differences, treating plane travel time as warp speed and other omissions, but you get the point.
Even the most jaded traveler cannot but be impressed by the contrast. One moment you are in a scene where the Great Gatsby crowd meets folks from the Kennedy compound and in the next strolling by the side of the Danube in Linz. To provide a little more context, I had been invited by the graduate students of the Computational Biology and Medical program of Cornell and Sloan Kettering to give the keynote at their annual retreat. Turns out I arrived the evening before the
crowd and was greeted by the idea that to have dinner I had to wear a jacket. Rather than inflict myself to the left over sweaty armpits of other less than worthy folks like myself, I found a “Tap Room” in the basement where I could muse over the Sunday New York Times and have a snack in hiking boots and tee shirt. The privilege still cost me $40. When you take a look at the Inn you can see why it is a jacket kind of place. Starched casual shirts and grey slacks seemed to be the norm. Where were those less than casual graduate students I wanted to be once again? Next morning, assuming the meeting started at 9am I went to the meeting room - no one, but a great buffet breakfast for about 100. I did my best but left about 97 behind. Had the meeting been cancelled and the student organizers forgotten to tell me and the hotel staff? Fear not about 9:40am up shows two buses with my kind of people to displace those with pretences and who knows whether the bankroll to go with it. We were off and I enjoyed the meeting immensely.
After a hop (2 hr drive to Newark), skip (plane trip to DC) and jump (flight across the Atlantic) I was in Frankfurt and ready for biking. I love Lufthansa. What other airline would have a flight arrivals lounge as well as a flight departure lounge. A place to shower before you leave the airport! A business class ticket helps of course. One has to again get used to the European habit of an old lady hanging around, and sometimes in, the men’s facilities, but go with the flow is what I say. Besides the facilities were immaculate with a rain shower type fixture etc. etc. I was ready to start riding.
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Bohdan Shmorhay
non-member comment
Reading you five by five in San Diego
Looking forward to hearing more about the road. Day 0 pictures and text are looking good -- coming through five by five (loud and clear, in radio lingo). Ride fast, ride safe.