Post Script

I got back home on Saturday afternoon, I managed to last until Monday morning before I had to go out on the bike again (and you're right - that isn't High Wycombe in the picture).

On Wednesday I took the bike for an MOT test. Now obviously after more than 40,000 miles it didn't pass. So, having ridden for 11 months on bad roads, no roads, dirt, sand, mud, snow, corrugations, gravel, rocks, floods, landslides and river crossings what was the one thing it failed on? A deteriorated numberplate.

That's all folks

So if I was doing it all again what would I do differently? Well I'd take a universal sink plug with me. And that's about it. I'd try to carry less luggage but I don't know what I'd leave behind. Oh, and I wouldn't carry my water in two Fuller's London Pride water bottles. When you're riding across some of the hottest and driest places on the planet it doesn't half make you fancy a pint.

Not a good sign

And now the end is near...

Alles In Ordnung

I thought that perhaps the procedure for getting the bike back in Germany might be a little more straightforward than it had been in previous countries but it still involved going to 5 different counters in 4 different buildings.

The process starts at Cargo City South Building 501. Where is Cargo City South Building 501? Between buildings 537 and 534 of course.

Heading Home

Two days of train travel made a change, but everytime I saw a stretch of road out of the window I found myself looking at it longingly. So I decided to hire a car for the trip back to Frankfurt.

Its been a long, long time since I last drove a car and, even though it was only small, in comparison to what I´ve been used to for the last 11 months it felt like I was driving a bus.

With luck the bike and I will be reunited tomorrow morning and then I´ll start heading back to England. Which I suppose in a very roundabout way I´ve been doing ever since I left.

Zugspitze

When I left Buenos Aires the temperature was 30 degrees so minus 18 on top of Germany´s highest mountain came as a bit of a shock to the system.

Garmisch-Partenkirchen

The German Olympic team arrived in Garmisch last night. They´re sponsored by Milka, and now so am I.

Nurnberg

I stayed in Nurnberg at the start of the trip and I´ve returned for 2 very good reasons:

Unfortunately all the beer drinking has left me with no time to visit the pigeon museum, the beer glass museum or the garden shed museum. All good reasons to return I´m sure.

Waiting

The bike was meant to fly from Buenos Aires on Wednesday night but due to a problem with the paperwork it wasn´t put on the plane. The shipping agent is blaming the airline, the airline blames the shipping agent. It now won´t arrive until the middle of next week so instead of hanging around in Frankfurt I´ve decided to see a bit of Germany by train.

Frankfurt

Why Frankfurt? Well I could´ve flown straight back to England, but that seemed a little unimaginative. I chose Frankfurt because its a direct flight from Buenos Aires with Lufthansa Cargo, which has a good reputation for shipping bikes. But as it turned out it was cheaper for the bike to fly with Iberia via Madrid and more convenient for me to fly Alitalia via Rome.

Praise You

We´ve come a long, long way together
Through the hard times and the good
I have to celebrate you baby
I have to praise you like I should...

More than 40,000 miles and apart from consumables the only parts I've had to replace are the speedo cable, one oil seal and the starter switch.