It’s not just a ride, it’s an adventure.
Warsaw- Kampinos Park- Płock Loop=342 km. Remember those US Navy ads from many years ago— “It’s not just a job…it’s an adventure”? Self-supported multi-day cycling isn’t just a ride—it is— you guessed — an adventure. Especially when undertaken by yourself. This was my first, multi-day solo trip on two wheels. Of course I missed my other wheel, but it was a wonderful experience with gorgeous weather, great riding and interesting things to see along the way. Maybe I am a lone wolf at heart, but there is something serene about enjoying your own company. This wasn’t some deep, solo, soul-searching quest, just some quality time doing what I love, with the pleasure of me, myself and I. And of course the added bonus of that inebriating sense of individual accomplishment. 
Day 1: Warsaw-Tułowice~77km: Staring from my front gate, I was able to make pretty good time to the campsite. I’ve ridden the first part of the ride quite a bit on day trips from Warsaw, but this was the first time I ventured deeper into Kampinos Forest. With the help of a map and the green bike blazes, the route twisted through forests and small villages. But also lots of sand. Lots and lots of sand. As it is still early in the season, a lot of it is still rideable, but I imagine as the dryness sets in, it will make for more difficult maneuvering. I arrived at my camp for the night, operated in conjunction with the PTTK , the Polish Tourist and Sightseeing Association, one of the oldest non-profit tourist organizations in Europe. They offered cabins and tent space (I chose the latter), but because they were still getting up and running for the season, I had the use of my own cabin for toilet and shower. Pretty sweet.
After the ritual post-ride beer, I headed straight for my sack, even skipping dinner. I was pooped. That’s the most difficult part of touring by myself— forcing myself to eat. Tyler never forgets to eat and is always hungry it seems. His favorite his nutella by the spoonful : )
Day 2: Tułowice-Płock~89km: Feeling guilty for skipping dinner, but still not hungry, I made myself my cous-couse medley that I was supposed to have for dinner, for breakfast instead. I had to choke down every bite, but at least I felt energized. My morning Turkish coffee probably helped, too. After the hard ride of day 1 mostly off-road, today was going to be a smoother trip through small villages up to Poland’s long- forgotten, old capital, Płock. It was perhaps my favorite day as I discovered some unexpected treasures along the way.
After taking some time to navigate through a poorly-marked section of the route across some beautiful (and soggy!) wetlands and out of the Kampinos Park loop, I hit the back roads. The route went around the edge of the forest and then into the wide expanse of farmlands. It had very little traffic, and in some sections, it was so narrow (but at the same time well-paved) with no vehicles, that it felt like my own personal cycle path. The only traffic I was likely to see were other cyclists— that is the locals, kids out traversing the terrain, old men with fishing poles, old ladies with baskets full of dandelions (for greens or wine, I wonder..) and people just getting from village to village.
I was only a short distance from Warsaw as the crow flies, but I was a world away. And sometimes it felt like I was back several generations in time. Some of the basic farmhouses had to have been at least a couple of hundred years old, with very little done to them except put in new windows.
Rolling along on my peaceful ride, I had some time for contemplation. I realized why touring the world by bicycle was my idyllic dream—by breaking down the barriers that keep us inside and by forcing us to the off-beaten track where few vehicles dare to tread, it combines all the things that I truly enjoy — history, culture, nature, exercise and adventure into the unknown— into one pursuit.
Such periods of reflection are often interrupted by those same points on which we dwell. In this case, it was to see the stork’s nest up close and personal.
These giant, majestic birds are getting ready for mating season and building their nests. On the electricity poles nearby many houses, platforms are built, which provide the perfect terrain for building a stork’s nest. I saw so many of these wonderful birds, and almost as many nests, that I lost count!
As for my dose of history and culture, there were two notable old, wooden churches along the way, dating back to the 1600s. The most memorable one was in Troszyn Polski, a small, tiny village in the midst of nowhere with the most magnificently cozy and grandly renovated church from 1636. Wow. The religious aspect of church does little for me, but from a historical and cultural point of view, it does really touch me in some mysteriously, haunting way.
My little camera does the interior little justice, but suffice it say it was adorned with some of the original decorations, including the high altar piece, and most other pieces were from a similar time period. While the Basilicas in fancy cities are worth the visit, the austerity of theses small village churches provides a sense of what grandeur was for regular folks back in the day.
When I finally made it into Płock, I was doubly beat compared to the day before. I really paid for skipping that meal. I was conditioning myself to eat light, but eat often, marking feeding times by points of low energy rather than hunger. I know some people rave about how much guilt-free eating they can do when bike touring, but for me, all the exercise just drives away the hunger.
I stayed at a lovely pensionjat just a few kilometers outside the old city, in a quiet neighborhood. I got in with enough time to head into Old Town to look around and have some dinner— I always crave potato pancakes when I am bicycle touring in Poland!
Day 3: Płock - Tułowice: ~ 83 km: The plan was to re-trace Day 2 and head back to the same campsite before completing the Kampinos Bike loop and back into Warsaw. It was slightly less distance because on Day 2, just five kilometers outside of camp, I lost the green bike trail. Too tired to find it, I took the main road to the camp. So, in the morning, I tracked the trail back from camp to where I lost it. Of course, at the end of Day 2, I had a similar experience— losing the marked bike trail about 3 kilometers out of town—and taking a busy and nasty road the rest of the way in. It must be the tiredness of the day that gets to me. In both cases, fresh in the morning, I located the scent of my trail with ease.
Before heading out, I took another quick tour of Płock. While it’s neither grand nor spectacular, it has charm and something that is lacking in Warsaw— real Polish authenticity. Everything in Warsaw was either re-built after being demolished or built by the socialist realism movement. The state miasto, or old town, is particularly well-preserved, with a 12th c Cathedral, remnants of a Gothic castle and a lovely rynek, or town square. There are several museums worth a visit if you are into history or Art Noveau, but, alas, I still had miles to go before I slept.
Although route-finding is at least half of the fun of bicycle touring, it was nice to pedal some ground without having to double-check the route as often. I made up for the missed dinner of Day 1 with two breakfasts on Day 3, and I was feeling pretty good.
With all the bike trips we’ve done around Poland, the one thing we learned is that you don’t need to pack heavy on food and water, as there is usually a ‘sklep’ (or market) not too far between villages. I actually try to pack light, because I love stopping at the different skelpi, as it can be its own taste of the local flavor. They are usually about the size of a closet, often attached to someone’s house, but have quality goods from produce, milk, dairy, dried goods to meat and cheeses— definitely enough to make any meal of the day. They invariably have beer, too. There’s usually some chairs and tables outside and the sklep also double as the local watering hole, where people come to meet up and hang out. It makes me think how obscenely wasteful the so-called ‘convenience stores’ are in the US, where they are three times the size and sell nothing but empty calories and junk food.
I made it back to my campsite with lots of daylight left— enjoyed once again my post-ride beer, but this time made myself dinner and rested up for the long ride on the last day.
Day 4: Tułowice- Warsaw: 96 km: There are some days when you climb out of the saddle after a long day, not certain of whether you’ll actually be able to put your very sore ass back on it again first thing in the morning. Somehow, though, after a good night’s rest, especially in the clean fresh air, when you put that ass back to the saddle, it’s like putting on a broken-in baseball mitt, and it just feels comfortable and right. In fact, at that first moment with the first few pedal strokes, you’re quite sure your ass has never felt as perfect as it does perched upon the saddle in that moment. And even though your legs were wobbly the night before, you know they won’t be happy unless they are circulating in that incessant up-and-down motion. That must be the zen of bicycle touring.
The zen was with me in my final and long leg. Back into Kampinos forest and back to complete the loop around the park. After two days mostly in the hot sun and open farmlands, it was good to be back in the cool forests. There were even some nice single-track stretches of rollers that would be quite fun on a mountain bike. I made the most of them with my loaded-touring bike (which, after all, is just an old-school steel-framed mountain bike).
There were a couple of more points of interests, including more churches and Chopin’s birthplace at Żelazowa Wola. It is a lovely complex, but without much time to stop, I enjoyed a snack in the park grounds while listening to Chopin blasting out of the outdoor speakers that were everywhere in the gardens. The manor house is dedicated to how the museum became a museum. While it was a little to self-referential for my taste, I’m sure there are other parts I missed. 
At Kampinos Park Headquarters in Granica, there were also some well-preserved farmhouses. 
But I have to admit my favorite part of the day was just about as I headed out of the Kampinos. I saw lots of wildlife over the course of the trip— storks, deer, snakes, mice, woodpeckers, lots of birds I don’t know the names for, but the best was standing just to the side of my trail nibbling on some tree leaves.
They call this an elk, and again, my camera doesn’t do him justice, but he was HUGE, like a moose, just without the antlers. I am pretty sure I caught sight of the rump of one of these on another day as he trolloped away from me. They stand almost as high as a horse!
While I hope my next multi-day trip is with my other half, if he doesn’t make it back here soon, we’ll see where I am off to next on another solo bike adventure!!
See the full flickr set.
