Entering Geres I descended steep beautifully carved valleys full of wild vivid colours down to a rolling river. I was seeing traditional autumnal browns and reds, shooting yellows, resistant greens, shocking blues and gentle purples all covered in a haze of heavenly white as the mist lazily rolled in the valley below me. On the arrival of this overload of ecstasy to my brain all the disaffection I had been feeling with cycling since I left Freddy's did a physical u-turn in the air before me magnified itself by 100 and hit me like a brick. I flew the 3 or 4 kilometers downhill into Geres to the sound track of beautiful calm bird song, eyes watering at the beauty and laughing slightly manically as I rediscovered my love of cycling.
I stayed in the mountains for a few days meditating and seeing some of the perfectly light blue waterfalls and sweet water lakes. The rains came, hard and followed me all the way up to Belgium. After 3 weeks of uneventful riding (train and bike) and disillusioning experiences of France I arrived in Leuven, Belgium the city that Lieve lives in. It is a very beautiful city and as soon as I arrived people instantly started being friendly. As if to make up for all the bad experiences of France and Belgium so far. Meeting Lieve again was magical, as soon as I saw her my stomach jumped into my mouth and dropped viciously back into its original place. The tiredness and coldness seeping into my bones completely forgotten. We headed back to her Kot where I collapsed into a starved sleep, my mainly unjoyful travels over. We spent the next days catching up and realising how good we were together. Lieve's birthday was a few days after I arrived and I met all her close friends at a party at her student accommodation. The weeks after that were largely uneventful, we just stayed at her Kot enjoying ourselves and making me familiar with the surroundings that I was unconsciously falling in love in.
At some point after I arrived we traveled down to the Ardennen, the best piece of countryside that Belgium has to offer. Not overly impressive but still nice and relaxing. Me and Lieve went with Gitte (the other girl I met in Granada) and Lieves other lovely friends, Alejandro, Sarah, Daan and Melanie. It was a nice couple of days and at the end of it Jack (who I traveled with to the Boom) came down from Sweden to stay with us in Belgium. Me, Jack, Lieve and Gitte all went to stay at Lieves for a few days after that. We traveled from Granada and back for those few days. The four of us reunited finding warmth from the love of Spain amongst the progressivly chilly Belgium winter. Me and Jack found a pretty cool squat a little while after that and Jack moved in as a preliminary home in Belgium before he moved to De Bereklauw, a crazy eco permaculture commune that was run by probably one of the best freegans in Europe. He had built the commune literally with his own hands out of free materials and all the food he had on the farm was either from dumpster diving or commune grown.
My birthday came and went, the evening before it we threw a party at Gittes place, it was a really good evening. The next day we wandered into cenral Antwerp where I tinkered on a nice piano (something I hadn't done in a long time) that a locally famous guy wheels from his house to the center of Antwerp to busk. Me, Alejandro, Jack and another friend Greetjeminke discovered the city of Gent that night and went to an amazing trance party that Astral Projections, some Israeli djs were playing at - who knows maybe this subconciously set the premise for travelling to Israel. I had been set a birthday mission that I needed to give 20 hugs to strangers that night. So when 11:56pm snuck up on me and I realised I had only given out 4 hugs I dived into a nearby Morrocan cafe and gave out the other hugs to 16 bewildered Morocan hardcore looking types - all sitting around tables playing poker - with one minute to spare.
Slowly the idea of leaving Belgium to continue my travels crept up on me and by late November I was thinking of my next destination. It was a toss up between England or Germany. But by pure coincidence Captain started talking to me on facebook one day around this time. Saying that there was going to be a party that the Shakzuka Project were throwing and I should come. So I quickly changed my decision and three days later I was in Israel. It seemed like life was sending my a lot of signs not to come here; my credit card for some reason wouldn't work when booking the flight ticket; when I was being driven to the airport by Gitte and Lieve we only just got to the gate about 30 seconds before it closed, and then when I arrived in Israel I was taken in by the immigration authorities and detained for two hours. But after being let reluctantly into the country with only a two week visa to enjoy this magical place I was greeted by two massive carebears holding a sign saying welcome to the rabbit hole (my persona here) and playing guitars. I knew at that point I had made a right decision and that I was well and truly home. I was beautifully Shakzuka ensnared once again.
At some point after I arrived we traveled down to the Ardennen, the best piece of countryside that Belgium has to offer. Not overly impressive but still nice and relaxing. Me and Lieve went with Gitte (the other girl I met in Granada) and Lieves other lovely friends, Alejandro, Sarah, Daan and Melanie. It was a nice couple of days and at the end of it Jack (who I traveled with to the Boom) came down from Sweden to stay with us in Belgium. Me, Jack, Lieve and Gitte all went to stay at Lieves for a few days after that. We traveled from Granada and back for those few days. The four of us reunited finding warmth from the love of Spain amongst the progressivly chilly Belgium winter. Me and Jack found a pretty cool squat a little while after that and Jack moved in as a preliminary home in Belgium before he moved to De Bereklauw, a crazy eco permaculture commune that was run by probably one of the best freegans in Europe. He had built the commune literally with his own hands out of free materials and all the food he had on the farm was either from dumpster diving or commune grown.
My birthday came and went, the evening before it we threw a party at Gittes place, it was a really good evening. The next day we wandered into cenral Antwerp where I tinkered on a nice piano (something I hadn't done in a long time) that a locally famous guy wheels from his house to the center of Antwerp to busk. Me, Alejandro, Jack and another friend Greetjeminke discovered the city of Gent that night and went to an amazing trance party that Astral Projections, some Israeli djs were playing at - who knows maybe this subconciously set the premise for travelling to Israel. I had been set a birthday mission that I needed to give 20 hugs to strangers that night. So when 11:56pm snuck up on me and I realised I had only given out 4 hugs I dived into a nearby Morrocan cafe and gave out the other hugs to 16 bewildered Morocan hardcore looking types - all sitting around tables playing poker - with one minute to spare.
Slowly the idea of leaving Belgium to continue my travels crept up on me and by late November I was thinking of my next destination. It was a toss up between England or Germany. But by pure coincidence Captain started talking to me on facebook one day around this time. Saying that there was going to be a party that the Shakzuka Project were throwing and I should come. So I quickly changed my decision and three days later I was in Israel. It seemed like life was sending my a lot of signs not to come here; my credit card for some reason wouldn't work when booking the flight ticket; when I was being driven to the airport by Gitte and Lieve we only just got to the gate about 30 seconds before it closed, and then when I arrived in Israel I was taken in by the immigration authorities and detained for two hours. But after being let reluctantly into the country with only a two week visa to enjoy this magical place I was greeted by two massive carebears holding a sign saying welcome to the rabbit hole (my persona here) and playing guitars. I knew at that point I had made a right decision and that I was well and truly home. I was beautifully Shakzuka ensnared once again.
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