Day 6 - Haapsalu, Estonia - Pedaling Forward

Joan's View

No stars visible last night. Drat! We both slept well though and enjoyed our 9:00 breakfast made by chef Helen again. Tony said we had a shorter ride today, about 25 miles. Tony also worked on the chain last night so I was actually pedaling forward today. I could even focus on the surroundings today. No sign of moose yet, just moose warning signs.

                                                                                              

Tony forgot to put his insulin pump on activity mode, so we stopped for an apple break. Quite a few bike paths today, paved and gravel.

Found this restaurant along the bike path with an interesting fellow. The restaurant looked Russian from the likes of this bloke and was listed for sale. We are thinking that the Estonians rarely frequent a Russian establishment so business is way down.

Tony realized that our trip today was only about 15 miles instead (google street view planner error) so we were taking our time getting into Haapsalu. We stopped at a Coop for more apples. Several people took interest in our bike there. One young guy on his own bike was working Uber Eats and took a long break with tons of questions. We eventually saw him two more times this day. 

We also stopped at an old cemetery to investigate some graves going back to the 1500s, but the giant mosquitos are relentless on Tony because he needs to wear shorts and short sleeves. They like to camp out there and keep sucking blood whether you move or not.

Arriving at our Airbnb, look at the name of our room. It is an old, old house with a water closet door that touches your knees when you close the door.

Tony is very careful about where we store the bike, but the building's entrance turns to go to the entrance of Grandpa's door. The bike would not fit unless he started to take it apart. Bike plan B for this night meant moving it into the old, old garage after the host ok'd it. Tony put the bike lock on the old, old door.

 

We went for a nice walk through main street Haapsalu to check out the old part of their city and what remains of a castle and stone walls.

Walking back, Tony found a beer stand to do more taste testing. Notice the nice wooden stein that we bought in a hand made shop. I did almost zero begging about hauling the stein in the bikes bags because someone was willing to haul it himself. 

That same place also had Vienna apple strudel! Hmm, beer or apple strudel?

Dinner was Sushi to Go right across the street from us. It had a 2.7 rating but we decided to go for it anyway. We called Linda & AJ before our sushi got there because we thought they might be available, and, yes, they were. AJ & Linda were waiting for Wade to have lunch.

Tony's Extras

I could tell immediately that Joan was pedaling forward. She is more efficient pedaling forward and her comments about having to focus on pedaling backwards went away. I would say that she was complaining, but she told me that she wasn't complaining, just stating the facts👍. Part of making a new World's record in putting the tandem together, sometimes you need to go backwards to go forwards 😂

We did get a comment from my ex-friend Dan. He said he would miss envisioning Tony's frustration level. We were riding against the wind the last two days, instead of complaining I was glad to just have our tandem.

Here is some other great news. The temperatures are high of 60 degrees and low of 50 degrees for the next two weeks. I can dress like it is summer with only a little bit of sweating and Joan can dress like it is winter. 😀

Couple other things that were pretty cool to me that you will probably not care about. This table and stools at the Russian restaurant looked like it is made out of wood, but were highly crafted out of concrete.

One more thing you probably won't care about, but when the bartender poured the beer I got at that stand of the picture above, he pulled the handle forward till it got to the line on the glass. Then he pushed it backwards and foam came out to fill the last 1/2" with foam. I need one of those. I will need my ex-friend Dan to figure out how to do that. 😁