Happy Birthday Bicycle!

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Happy Birthday, dear Bicycle!

200 years! That’s quite a feat, yet you seem to be as young and sprightly as ever; aging well and always open to change and improvement…

I’ll never forget the day we met for the first time. I had seen you before, but when you knocked on our door on my 5^th birthday, I was over the moon. At first my relationship with your green little self (it was before the days when everything girly had to be pink!) was a little wobbly and needed some support, but soon we ditched the spare wheels and started to go for a ride of a life-time. I still see myself cruising around in circles in the yard, reveling in the sheer joy of speed and movement and feeling the wind in my hair (it was also long before helmets!).

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Fast forward a few years, and your silver incarnation, equipped with a 3-speed torpedo gear system, roadworthy and thus quite a ‘serious’ bicycle, had become my daily companion on the way to school, to afternoon sport or to see friends. I’ll always appreciate the independence and freedom I gained, let alone the precious minutes in the morning, when I could delay getting up because I knew I could make up for it by pedalling harder. There was many a frosty winter morning when I arrived in the classroom with my fringe frozen from the condensation of my breath.

Do you remember our first real adventure together? It was just too exciting – a three day bike tour through the summery forests, organized by the local sports club. My friend and I were so desperate to go, that we lied about our age. Minimum was 12 years, after our pleading they lowered it to 10, and we just didn’t tell anybody that we were only 9 at the time. We had so much fun! And I think it was then that I really realized the potential that was hidden within your steel frame and turning wheels.

Over the years there have been many successors in a variety of shapes and colours; there was the green racing snake my grandmother had won in a crossword competition and which she didn’t really want because it wasn’t quite lady-like enough; a purple city bike with a bow frame, which I used to commute to university and which involuntarily found a new owner; that first mountain bike I just had to get to impress a friend I had a serious crush on. Then the golden Kona which became my first ‘work vehicle’ and which has not only carried me up and down many a steep mountain, but also tidied me over some tough times, and last but not least the slightly dull grey touring bike with the fancy back suspension and the auspicious name of “Steppenwolf”.

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Dear Bicycle, I really appreciate that over the years you have helped me save a lot of roubles (in petrol money) and that you enticed me to stay fit without having to the gym. You made me realize that I wasn’t made of sugar, or, in other words, didn’t melt away in the rain, and quite how much I love moving freely in the great outdoors. You gave me work and joy, and you allowed me to explore new regions – and later on countries and then continents – at the speed of thought.

You took me on journeys from the end of the world to the beginning of time. I learned from you that looks and colour don’t matter, that we, just like you, come in all shapes and sizes. Pedalling hard, I wrote entire books in my head, worked through personal issues, solved the world’s problems and started to appreciate the pleasures of an uncluttered, simple life.

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More than anything though I appreciate that you gave me freedom; the freedom to move independently at an early age, the freedom to explore my own boundaries, the freedom of thought by literally widening my horizons, and finally the freedom that only trust and belief in one’s own abilities affords. You made me happy and for this I am grateful!

So here is to the next 200 years of freedom, happiness, joy and diversity! Viva!

Finally done and dusted…

Peppertreechronicles proudly presents:

The HEALING RHINOS AND OTHER SOULS audiobook!

Experiment/adventure/challenge #1 for this year has been concluded! And after much sweat and tears this labour of love is ready to hit the shelves…

Hardcopies are 100% locally produced and available on CD in MP3 or Audio-Format.

To make the 2 MP3-CDs presentable was relatively easy, but what challenge to find a way to package the 8 CDs in audio-format!

I count myself extremely fortunate to have found a superb co-narrator with exactly the right voice to read Walter’s part and an exceptinally professional producer who was prepared to put excessive amounts of time and effort into this production.

A HUGE THANK YOU TO BOKKIE -THE VOICE-

and to FARAI from CABIN AUDIO in Prince Albert.

And now? What’s next?

I’m still not 100% sure how to go about the digital publishing. ACX seem out of bounds at the moment, since they are only available to authors in the US and UK – and more recently apparently in Ireland and Canada.

Does anyone have any experience with Author’s Republic or any other audiobook distribution site?

What do you think of perhaps serializing or podcasting the book?

I have heard (thank you Joanna Penn from the Creative Penn!) that some more changes are expected in the audiobook publishing scene?! And I am a little reluctant to sign up with anybody for 7 years, it seems a terribly long time. Any thoughts on that?

Let me know what you think! Would love to hear from you!

Thank you, obrigada, muchas gracias y merci beaucoup!

Times fly… and indeed times have flown! Weeks have passed since my last post, since I set off from the “End of the World”, O Cabo de São Vicente, towards the northeast, and since i packed bike and panniers away again, waiting for the next ‘expedition’.
It’s been a ‘Journey to Portugal’, with Saramago weighing down the panniers, a pilgrimage of sorts through parts of ‘la España vacia’, a study in crossing borders and a discovery of French delights.
There are many stories to tell, but before I start I feel I should say THANK YOU!

Obrigada, muchas gracias e merci beaucoup! To all the people I met en route, to everybody who greeted me with a friendly smile, answered my questions, was happy to explain the way or have a little chat… There were so many!
And then there are those I never really met in ‘real life’, but who have been of very real assistance in their own virtual ways
There’s Huw Thomas and his Pedal Portugal website, as well as his two books, The Alentejo Circuit and Cycling the Algarve.
Before I left, i downloaded the books and studied possible routes, dreamed of all the possible adventures to be had. There were so many options! And then there are those Huw describes on his site. Perhaps I should add the Border Castles Route? Or ride from the Sea to Salamanca? Go to Lisbon or bypass it?

In the end I mixed and matched, and combined bits and pieces of various tours, and it was great – more about that, you might have guessed it, at a later stage.
A few days into my ride I was in doubt which route to take, and, on a whim, decided to contact Huw. Within an hour I received the most helpful reply – and so much more! I couldn’t have wished for better advice! So let me shout out a huge OBRIGADA to Huw Thomas and Pedal Portugal!
Obviously, Pedal Portugal was not the only source of inspiration!

Kat Davis from Following the Arrows had me dreaming of pasteis de nata and Templar Castles long before I left (and patiently replied to all my questions) and Salt of Portugal encouraged me to explore Portugal’s culinary delights. What a beautiful country you live in! Mais uma vez, muito obrigada!

Once I crossed the border into Spain, i followed the tracks of the Bicigrino, and although my journey was not a ‘real’ pilgrimage, i heavily relied on his route descriptions for the Via de la Plata and the Camino de la Costa. Muchisimas gracias!
Then there were the books, oh, the books…

Thank you to Ann Morgan and her fascinating blog A Year of reading the world!

And the bookshops! I kept on telling myself that it wasn’t such a great idea to fill panniers with books, and quite honestly, i thougt I had restrained myself severely, yet couldn’t understand why the load was getting heavier with every bookshop I passed…
Although the Velodyssey is a French cycle route, i was very excited to find a Spanish description thereof, De Hendaya a Nantes, by Adriá Tallada Cebrian, im a beautiful San Sebastian bookshop.

To keep me writing, making notes and scribbling down the facts and figures, there was no better way than using ‘The Cycling Travelling Journal’, lovingly designed by Claire and Anya from Puntures and Panniers. What a pleasure to use pen and paper in a time of digital madness! More about that a little later too!

So much for now, and another big KANIMAMBO to each and everyone …

Hasta la vista!
P.S. as I am writing so many thank-yous, I remember a Mozambican friend’s quip “obrigada não paga o pão”, but that shall be a story for another day.

Encounters #5 Fernando Pessoa

“Life is what we make of it. Travel is the traveller. What we see isn’t what we see but what we are.”

Fernando Pessoa. By now it almost feels like I’ve met him personally.

Travelling in Portugal, it seems hardly possible not to encounter this most iconic of Lisbon poets. Over the years, I’ve met him in the streets of Lisboa, sitting outside one of his faourite hangouts and coffee shop ‘A Brazileira’ in the Rua Garrett in Chiado; he’s greeted me for breakfast on my coffee mug in downtown Porto and his unmistakable face invites readers to delve into Lisbon’s poetry from every book stall at every airport in the country. My favourite incarnation of this writer, who allegedly used more than 72 pseudonyms, I encountered in Evora, where he braved the elements somewhat uplifted on the doorstep of the amazing “Fonte de Letras’ bookshop.

72 pseudonyms! He preferred to call them heteronyms, because he felt pseudonyms were too close for comfort. One of his most famous alter ego, Ricardo Reis, even became the hero of “The Year of Death of Ricardo Reis”, a 1984 novel by fellow Portuguese writer and Nobel laureate Jose Saramago. Inspired by the heteronyms was also Italian writer Antonio Tabucci, who was so enchanted by Pessoa and his work that he began studying the Portuguese language.

“My soul is a hidden orchestra;
I know not what instruments,
What fiddlestrings and harps,
drums and tamboura I sound and
Clash in myself.
All I hear is the symphony.”
Fernando Pessoa

“The Book of Disquiet”, (Livro do Desassossego, composto por Bernardo Soares), Pessoa’s lifetime project and what he calls a ‘factless autobiography’, is signed by one of his heteronyms, Bernardo Soares. It is also the source of many of the Pessoa quotes floating around the post cards and coffee mugs of downtown Lisbon and Porto.

“To write is to forget. Literature is the most agreeable way of ignoring life.”

Fernando Pessoa was a poet, writer, philosopher, publisher and translator, born in Lisbon in 1888. His father died when he was five years old, and after his mother remarried, the family moved to Durban, South Africa, where Pessoa would live and learn for the next ten years. He learned to love the English language and began writing and publishing poetry under various pseudonyms.
In 1905 he returned to Lisbon for good and embarked on a life of writing, publishing, translating and philosophizing. He died in 1935, and in 1985, fifty years after his death, his remains were moved to the Mosteiro dos Jerónimos in Lisbon, where he rests in the illustrious company of the likes of Vaso da Gama and Luís de Camões.

“To know nothing about yourself is to live. To know yourself badly is to think.”

From Reading to Riding

Times fly – never has it seemed more true to me. I had nowhere near finished reading all the books I wanted to read about Portugal, and had barely touched the surface of all the blogs there are to explore – about the country, adventuring and long distance cycling – when I found myself sitting on the plane to Faro. With my bicycle.

To say I could have been better prepared is an understatement, but I guess that’s what happens if suddenly the opportunity arises to turn a dream that has been festering for ages into reality. Now or never. If I didn’t take this opportunity, which had just presented itself, I might as well let go of the idea and move on. Which might have been the sensible thing to do, but also a testament to lost dreams.

The original idea, which had managed to get itself firmly entrenched into my head, was to ride from Kiruna to Cadiz, from the Polar Circle to the Southern Edge of Europe, from cool Scandinavia to warm Andalucia, from the lands of Scandi Noir to Flamenco country.

Why?
For many and no reason in particular.
Because I can.
Simple as that.

Well, that’s only partly true. There is more to it, somehow, although not very tangible. I’ve always been fascinated by the variety of landscapes and cultures and people that make up the European continent. They are so similar in so many ways, yet at the same time so different. The same difference. And what better way to explore that, than at the speed of pedaling two wheels. Where half a day’s ride can move you from one language, one culture, one landscape to another. Where everything suddenly looks and feels and sounds and smells different. Where borders between countries and provinces, cultures and languages can be crossed with a few pedal strokes.

Anyway, so now here I was with some unexpected time on my hands. So why not? I had to ask myself. Very simple, for two reasons. Time wasn’t quite enough to do the entire trip, and secondly, mid March was definitely a tad too early for my taste to cycle anywhere near the arctic circle.

I realized though, if i were to wait for the perfect conditions, I’d never go. So why not be flexible, cut the trip in half and start from the south. Follow spring from the edge of Europe to the centre. Start at the end of the world and ride towards the middle of Europe. See how far I get. Just do it. Now!

So here I am, a week into my great European adventure ( or the first half, anyway😉), a week from the end of the world.

A week of cycling through Portugal, of meeting new sights and sounds and smells and delights. Cork oaks and castles, pasteis de nata, bookshops and windmills. Also a week of encountering more books, and I wish I had the time to read them all, now, while I’m here.

But the road beckons and times fly…

Evora, March 2017

Encounters #4 Gary Grasshopper

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Gary Grasshopper or Luke the Locust?

May I introduce you to Gary Grasshopper. This elegant individual belongs to the Acrididae, and there are 356 different species. Some of them are winged and others wingless, but all feed on grass and leaves and are active during the day.

Gary’s antennae have less than thirty segments and are thus relatively short; he belongs to the short-horned grasshoppers, which tend to live solitary lives.

A very close relative of Gary’s is Luke Locust: apparently specific types of short-horned grasshoppers can undergo a personality change and turn into locusts under certain environmental conditions. When population density gets too high and food sources have become scarce, these grasshoppers can experience an increased release of Serotonin in their brain, which causes them to change colour, shape and behaviour. In other words, Gary turns into Luke; grasshopper becomes locust. Suddenly they eat much more, breed more abundantly and instead of each going their separate way, they fall into line and start moving as one.

Locusts are gregarious and often millions of the same species gather together to form threatening, ravenous, often destructive swarms, feared since antiquity. Apparently, a single locust swarm can consist of up to 80 Million individuals, and each one of those can eat its own body weight in plant matter each and every day. They can cover vast distances, cross oceans and deserts, and one particular swarm has been able to reach Great Britain from Northwest Africa in 1954, while another flew from West Africa to the Caribbean. But locusts don’t only eat, they are also eaten; in many cultures they have served as food throughout history and are valued as a protein-rich snack.

After our encounter gorgeous Gary went on wandering his own solitary path. Could he one day turn into Luke Locust?

Reading Countries: Journey to Portugal

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All things going well, in exactly one month from today, I’ll be saddling up my trusted ‘Steppenwolf’ and start cycling. Viva Portugal, here we come!

What better way to prepare for an upcoming journey, than to read about the destination? Not just travel books – novels, travelogues, short stories, crime fiction, anything goes…

After a quick browse on real life bookshelves I came up with the following pile:

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Monica Ali: Alentejo Blue

Barry Hatton: The Portuguese, A Modern History

José Saramago: El Viaje del Elefante / The Elephant’s Journey

José Saramago: La Caverna / The Cave

Pascal Mercier: Nachtzug nach Lissabon / Nighttrain to Lisbon

Ines Pedrosa: In Deinen Händen / Nas Tuas Mãos / No English translation available?!

Francisco Jose Viegas: O Colecionador de Ervas / No English translation available?!

Cees Nooteboom: Die folgende Geschichte / The Following Story

***

Not bad for a start! On the virtual bookshelves the choice is as usual near limitless…

There are of course the literary giants, Jose Saramago, Antonio Lobo Antunes, Eça de Queiroz and Fernando Pessoa.

Tell a Story, an awesome little mobile bookshop in Lisbon, recommended a bit of a younger selection:

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Jacinto Lucas Pires: The True Actor

Jose Luis Peixoto: The Piano Cemetery

Afonso Cruz: Jesus Christ Drank Beer

***

See you soon, Portugal! More about the travel plans coming soon!

Encounters # 3 Bubo, the Cape Eagle Owl

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I met Bubo (Bubo Capensis) during an evening stroll and was happy when I realized he wasn’t scared of me. He didn’t even seem to think of flying away. He sat on his branch, orange eyes taking me in, as well as his surroundings, while the wind was playing in his ear tufts. He looked straight through me, as if he just knew.

Watching him for a while made me realize (again!) that it is no surprise that people of all – or at least most – cultures have always been captivated by owls:

Symbol of wisdom for the ancient Greek, wizard’s mate in parts of Africa, harbinger of death in certain areas of the Americas and messenger of the gods and divine ancestors in Asia; ‘Owl’ is Winnie the Pooh’s wise friend, ‘Hedwig’ Harry Potter’s trusted companion, and ‘I heard the Owl call my Name’ by Margaret Craven was a New York Times bestseller.

Cape Eagle Owls are monogamous, call in duet and sometimes like sunbathing in the early morning. They eat mostly small mammals, including bats, but also small lizards, insects and crabs. Like many other species of owl, they are able to fly in effective silence, their unique wing and feather design suppressing all sound that lies within the range humans, and apparently most of their prey, can hear. Recently, scientists have been researching the owl’s flight mechanisms and wing design to improve human-made aerodynamic design.

A wise old owl sat in an oak,

The more he heard the less he spoke

The less he spoke the more he heard

Why aren’t we all like that wise old bird?

Ever since writing “Healing Rhinos and Other Souls”, I’ve been fascinated by owls. Many a night they accompanied my late writing sessions with their calls, some near, some in the distance. And to this day they remind me of Walter, who always maintained that he could chat to them.

“Walter had a special relationship with owls all his life, and the night after he died, the eagle owl in the terminalia tree outside his house in Vaalwater called incessantly, until the early hours of the next morning.” – Healing Rhinos and Other Souls, p298

Thank you!

Adventure #1:The Idea

***Release “Healing Rhinos and Other Souls – The Extraordinary Fortunes of a Bushveld Vet” as Podcast and Audio book. (Just let it go! It’s been ready for a while, but my old friends, Ms Perfectionism and Ms Procrastination interfered… )***

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How are ideas born? Where do they come from? Why do they sometimes linger for a while, before they raise their heads and demand attention? Do they have a life of their own?

Where exactly the idea came from to experiment with audio books and podcasts, I don’t know. However, once that it was there, it seemed obvious that “Healing Rhinos and Other Souls” would be the perfect starting point. But how to go about it?

‘Things will happen when the time is right,’ my magic life-coach friend said and, as usual, she was right. After pondering for a while, things suddenly started to happen. Bokkie Botha, whom we’d later just call ‘The Voice’ kindly volunteered to read the parts of the book written from Walter Eschenburg’s point of view. The narrator’s voice, I felt, I could do myself, for better or for worse. bokkieb-1

But where and how to do the recordings? Turns out that Farai Bloemendal aka ‘Farai the Producer’ has set up shop in town recently and is running a small but very professional recording studio. Wow! When the time is right…

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‘Farai the Producer’

A huge thank you here to Bokkie and Farai!

Things were running smoothly and production was nearly done, when we hit a serious roadblock. I had read the small print of the “Audiobook Creation Exchange” before, or so I’d thought, but somehow it had slipped my eye that in order to use their services, one needed to be a resident with an address and a bank account either in the US or UK. Dismay! How could I have missed that? And now what?

Ms Procrastination was celebrating, while Ms Perfectionism just said, “Perhaps it’s a good thing, after all you are not a professional narrator, and it’s not perfect!”

Ms Pragmatic replied, “Mmm, but what about the time? The money? The effort? The favours?”

I remember lying on the sofa, listening to this conversation in my head. “Hey, what about me, I really like it! And I want it published!”

“Do you? Although it’s not perfect?”

“Yes! It may not be perfect, but we all gave it our best! And after all it’s a memoir, and a personal book and I think people will just love Bokkie’s voice, and…”

More pondering and wondering followed.

“Hey, I’ve got an idea: Why not publish it as a podcast, serialize it, one chapter at a time!”

“Good plan; then people can listen to it for free , and maybe that’s a good thing? Then you don’t have to worry so much about it being perfect!” says Mrs Pragmatic

“Yes, and also remember, what you give is what you get,” I hear my magic life coach friend chip in, “you never know what kind of wonderful magic you are going to release.”

“Ms Pragmatic, now it’s your turn to find out how to go about it! Soundcloud, itunes, youtube…”

“Ok, Ms Procrastination, I’ll do that. Can’t be that difficult, we’ll start in the New Year…”

“And remember, it doesn’t have to be perfect… Just give it your best!”

“yaa, but…”

P.S. Progress report to follow soon

Encounters #2 – Jiminy Cricket

When out and about, adventuring, experimenting, traveling or simply walking, I’m often amazed at the sheer variety and beauty of what I encounter along the way. At the same time I feel humbled, because I realize how little I know. So:

“Open your eyes, take note, read up – and learn something new.”

Randomly, random facts, at random times.

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Jiminy also goes by the name of Koringkriek, Corncricket, or South African Armoured Katydid. This fascinating, fat and flightless fellow’s proper name is Hetrodes pupus, and he grows up to five centimetres in length. He lives along the escarpment regions of the Northern, Western and Eastern Cape Provinces in South Africa, where he particularly enjoys the succulent Karoo and Fynbos biomes. He doesn’t cross the Orange River, but his cousin Acanthoplus lives further to the north where he eats millet and sorghum and is eaten by chicken and sometimes their owners. In general, Koringkrieks eat everything and anything, but preferably plants, insects and occasionally bird nestlings.

Jiminy’s body armour of vicious looking spikes and thorns serves as his outer level of self-defence, making it more difficult for birds and lizards to swallow him. Should that not be sufficient, he can autohaemorrhage, in other words spray a portion of haemolymph at his attacker, with a reach of up to six centimetres.

But beware Jiminy Cricket! – After this so-called ‘reflexive bleeding’ a meticulous cleaning of the body is required, in order to avoid attacks by his mates. Particularly when times are tough and their diet is lacking protein and salt, Koringkrieks tend to become cannibals!