How did I get into the back of an ambulance?

"Why am I in an ambulance?" "You were passed out in the street unconscious." "Oh, I'm just drunk." "We're taking you to the hospital." "Why? I'm fine really." "Because you're drunk and we couldn't get you to regain consciousness." "But, why the hospital? I'm alright now." "Look, it’s free; you can sleep it off there." "Awesome." "Yeah, we call it socialism."

Well, this is a first. I awake from a night in a free bed at a local hospital. Why did I drink so much? I couldn't really tell you. Some days my luck is good with the first few people I meet, other times I wander the streets consuming alcohol. It was the wine. I drank a box on the train, then a six pack under a bridge. I felt the urge to flee Flam as soon as I arrived. I hitchhiked to Bergen. Another tourist town but at least it might have some bars. It did. I came to see the mountainous Fjords. Driven by the delusion they might impress me. They weren't as great as California, deterrent, but not as good. Some Russian women who literally came to Norway for Husbands gave me a ride. They asked if I was drunk. I told them I was sleepy, an obvious lie, and had missed my ferry to Bergen, also a lie. I choose not to pay for the trip, opting to hitchhike. I've picked up many hitchhikers. There's an expectation that they're likely intoxicated. They wake me near Bergen and tell me to get out. I'm out of it alright. I'm not sure what they were telling me, step out of the car, and realize I have no idea where I am. I stick out my thumb. I get picked up immediately by a parcel driver who takes me to the train station around the corner. My cool buzz drifts me into the station and I make friends with a group discussing the current football match being played between Barcelona and Manchester United. It's essentially the “Super bowl”. One of them leads me to a pub when we reach Bergen and it’s like a theatre inside the bar, with the game projected onto a wall and the room packed with fans. Barcelona wins and we all go cheering into the streets. It’s a riot. The fans are on the stage and tables in the bar, then on the fountains in the street. Apparently in Barcelona it was a legit riot with heavy property damage. They're serious over here. I ask some young 18 year old girls where old men drink; one of them points me toward a bar that her dad goes to regularly. I'm thrilled. The bar is everything it should be. I introduce myself around. Within an hour I break a glass and take my leave. I had met a man and his son who shouldn't have been there because it was a 23 and up bar, but his Father is a regular. I tell them about myself and my traveling. He tells his son not to listen to a word I say, that I'm a drunk and filled with tall tales. He's right, and I love it. However my tales are too real to be faked. I regale them about my career, my education, my professional salary. He scoffs at me. His son apologizes and says it is a very unbelievable story. They should have smelled me four days earlier. The next pub I find a heavy set woman with her friends. I accompany them to a late night karaoke bar. I dance with her, feeling deep into the gills on her back as I twirl her around the dance floor. I find myself again in the street, standing on a corner smoking a cigarette, surrounded by prostitutes. They blow me kisses. I ignore them. Some people are useless to engage with because they only want one thing, your money. I search for more cigarettes and end up talking with a woman near 50 who is pulling off a full bottle of wine. I drink most of it. This second bottle is what did me in. It was nearly 4 in the morning. I vaguely remember trying to get her to take me home. I needed to sleep somewhere. And upon denial, I finished her bottle and journeyed away, toward the end of the night.

I left the hospital in the morning, first being yelled at to get out, then once more for getting lost in the hospital. I'm barely conscious. I am in a sense of disbelief at finding myself alive. How did this happen? Ugh. I leave the front doors, into the dull fog. Directed to the train station, my attempt to get on the first train fails. It’s Sunday, and its full. My 5 hour wait is spent first in the train station on a bench. Within an hour, security pushes me on. The language of "Get the fuck out" is universal. I find a cemetery and consider sleeping with the dead, too serendipitous. I wander the cemetery and see a phone booth for a call box on the highway. I curl into a tight ball in the greenhouse warmth of this shelter for those...for me, but what am I? Did I really get picked up in the street? At least it was an ambulance and not a squad car. I've had that experience in America. I wake from a ray of sunshine on my face, look at the time, and run to barley catch my train. I try to sleep in my first class leather seat (sold of out second class again). My detox-shakes cause me to convulse and jerk in my sleep. I stare out the window, watching my hand tremble. I hold down the bile. I think back to the old woman and the 4 am bottle of wine. Did it really happen?

Scandinavian Forestry

Pine trees mixed with oaks, maples, and other production confers and hardwoods. They grow on wood lots, true wood lots, no more than a hundred acres at a time.  Between them are cows and barns in fields, homes with rural parks and football fields for the youth and intramural leagues.  Finally, I see a pick-up truck, a Toyota, but a truck none the less.  Silvicultures vary in Sweden and Norway, anything from seed-tree seed step, shelter wood prep steps, commercial and pre-commercial thinning, and single tree selection.  All scattered in view sheds designated for the railroad.  This is forestry on a pure farming basis, removed from our feel good forestry in California.  Give these men and women a dangle-head single grip harvester to chop, limb, and buck.  Or give them an International harvester for the wheat and grains growing in the adjacent fields of their wood lots. 

Not all site is created equal. Flat rocky expanses of scrubby pine lay below the dense stands of confers on the rich foothill slopes.  A stand of manicured 15 year old Douglas-fir sticks out like a sore thumb in the endless pine.  They have been planted within a 50+ acre clear-cut. A small 300 foot buffer extends between the plantation and the railroad tracks could've fooled a less discerning eye.  Then homes, steep pitched roofs, more welcoming pick-ups, and a broadcast over the train intercom welcoming us into Norway.  I attempt not to scoff at the low productivity of their timber land.  I have not been away from the Pacific Northwest long enough to ignore the differences.  They have beautiful trees and great management difficulties that a Californian forester never needs to ponder.  From my view in the train, I can imagine everything covered in snow and ice, a world outside the reach of a Fanny Trekkers arsenal.  High school students gossip can be heard a few seats in front of me, their words are indistinguishable, but familiar.  I highly doubt they are discussing the forested view we are passing.  But, that is the whole idea, to make it unnoticeable; at least to the untrained eye.  It is my curse as a forester to not see beyond the forest at the beauty of an individual tree.

Wanna buy a bike?

Drinking a goblet of beer. The band is loud, screaming, and sincere. I had just smoked a cigarette and purchased a bike off a junkie in front of the show.  It doesn't come with a lock because he had obviously stolen it.  For 10 euro, it’s a good deal.  But now I've got an unlocked bike in front of the bar.  If it gets stolen, I’ll be fine with it.  They scream their lyrics and I think of how I wish my life was always like this.  I only worry about smelling bad the next day from all the smoke in this dive bar.  I can only imagine how bad my clothes smell already.  I consider them stale.  The bands are hardcore-metal and are on tour.  One of the bands is stoked to be playing their home town.  My less than honorable method of acquiring a bike has left me with little recourse or animosity over possible theft.  They SCREAM their lyrics, saying thank you after each song.  No one is speaking English but they can if prompted, unlike the French, whom I've been told will not speak English with you out of principle. Well if you’re going to get butt-hurt over having an "equal" language, then simmer down.  Look at the colonies that each Nation put in their Easter basket.  I think the UK had better planning. Better than all your eggs being in Africa.

My bike was stolen the next day while I was buying train tickets and looking for a bike lock.  The bike was gone and luckily I went and checked before going in and buying a lock.  I had shoved it between two bikes while inside and it was picked up within an hour.  It was a piece of shit though.  I've ridden worse, but it was pretty bed.  I had nearly hurt myself multiple times – it had weird peddle brakes, hard to get used to using. I had essentially paid for a shit bike and the knowledge of a junkie enjoying the removal of feeling and thought while slamming heroin through his burnt up veins.

Traveling Light

Staying at a Hostel in Westport Ireland, I met a man from Calgary.  He commented that I was traveling light.  I did my normal spiel on Fanny Trekking and he said he'd never heard of it.  I told him I researched extensively before starting out and found nothing on the subject.  So I’m, in fact, the first Fanny Trekker on earth.  And having made it through a week and a half Fanny Trek before, I hold myself as the foremost authority on the matter.

My position is still very strong.  I’m on my third pair of socks and second pair of insoles for my boots.  I find that thin socks keep my feet from sweating (or stinking).   I ditched my underwear a few days ago – I’ll try to grab a new pair soon – for now I’m commando.  I haven’t managed a Laundromat yet, but have ironically been showering regularly.  Ironic because I detest showering; I’ve been showering far more often than I do in normal life. One of the women I stayed with in an apartment in Liverpool, insisted on washing my shit.  I obliged.  My legs remain strong, but I’m developing runner’s knee – a pain behind the knee from extensive use. I thought of seeking treatment, but opted to take the best advice a coach can give his players...walk it off.  I walked approximately 15 kilometers yesterday, through the countryside of Wicklow County.  

Another critically important aspect of Fanny Trekking is eliminating weight.  When I was in New York last year, I got off the bus and immediately started viewing the city.  It was all around me, huge. Skyscrapers ripping through the air, tickling heights reserved for mountains alone, their towers of babel protruding from a sea of languages.  I had no intention in those moments to have my eyes shut-out within the confines of a walled-off room while doing the requisite baggage storage of a traveller.  I lived that moment, then and there.  On that trip I was traveling with a backpack, unfortunately.  I needed to carry extra clothes for a wedding.  I made it well enough, bumping into people, bouncing off walls, awkwardly slamming about while standing atop the empire state building.  What hell a backpack is.  Inevitably my travelling partner had enough herself and I was amiable to trek-off to the isolation of a room.  We went out later but didn’t manage to cover much ground due to exhaustion of our morning with pack.  If only we had brought fanny packs...

Bowie to Bowie

A man gets thrown against a wall and onto the sidewalk by two unarmed policemen.  Police in much of Europe do not carry guns or Tasers, they just knock the shit out of you old school.  I cross the street and snap a photo while moving down to the next bar with some college students that just finished their exams.  It’s an unfortunately slow night throughout Dublin.  The bar we go to is named Coppers, and most of the patrons are either nurses or cops.  The cops are all working overtime for the Queen’s visit.  I leave the fellas at the next bar and try to find my way back to the Pub where I left my hoodie; I'm not quite resigned to giving it up yet.  I find a wool blanket on the street and pick it up; fate.  Why not just sleep in the street?  The city is on lockdown anyway and most Hostels are filled-up.  I find my hoodie then stop for a beer on the sidewalk with a group of homeless men.  We discuss homelessness, sleeping outside and fear of the police.  One gets a phone call.  There's a huge protest across town where the Queen had laid a wreath earlier.  I hoof-it at lightning speed; the thrill of a righteous protest is exhilarating.  I approach the park.  Distant sirens are heard.  I see a few uniformed officers, but my search for youth on the streets is in vain.  The phone call is likely a prank, or misinformed, no one is there.  The days of protests occurred before I reached Dublin by train.  Others are likely to occur, but no one can ever get within a mile of the Queen.  I take my blanket and find a bush; my luck is good, it doesn't rain.

They're spending millions on the cost of the Queen’s visit.  Bombs have been found on busses.  There are constantly helicopters hovering over the city.  It’s all a show of intimidation.  The police are everywhere, blocking alleyways and standing on street corners.  I've seen female officers in pants 4-sizes too large.  Perhaps they're cadets!  Every manhole cover and utility hatch in the sidewalk has been welded shut to prevent the placement of bombs.  At least the cost of the Queens visit is less than the royal wedding.

I've found a few very Portlandia bars in Dublin.  They serve their own house lager and have an extensive organic menu during the day, with many vegetarian options.  At night they have live music on three floors.  One of the bands is a two piece group, one on guitar, the other on drums.  The drummer has braces.  They play all original songs in a Bowie fashion.  Their music is loud.  Actually, many of their songs are about David Bowie.  They dress like the clash and together can't weigh more than 220 lbs.  At the end of their set, the singer strikes the symbols with his guitar, distorts his amplifier, and drops his instrument onto the stage floor.

I wanted you right when I saw your Bum Bag.

I had subtle plans to meet an Irish lass while traveling.  I didn't think it would happen in Liverpool, but when they're on holiday too...  

It was actually due to the charging situation with my Tablet.  I was left stranded not being able to search for things, or find where I was going as easily as before.  It also left me without a time piece for the first time in years.  I've always wanted to go without a Babylometer, but with cell phones, they're always at hand.  I found myself in Liverpool walking the streets looking for a Hostel, I bought some beer and drank it in some roadside bushes while changing my socks and putting new insoles in my boots.  Carlsburg Strong Ale, 9% gravity, it's basically European malt liquor.  I had finished a couple of cans and was heading back in the direction of where I thought I saw a Hostel on the map that morning when I came upon a karaoke bar.  The rest, let's say, didn't involve me finding a Hostel for the night, and I learned that Bum Bags are attractive to some women (they call them Bum Bags because a Fanny is on the other side in England).

I awoke still drunk, in the city of the Beatles, searching for something.  Normally, it's not known to me what I'm walking toward, and then I'm shown why.  I found what is called English breakfast; basically, it's a fried egg, sautéed mushrooms, baked beans, potatoes, blood pudding, British banger sausages, a steamed tomato, thin sliced ham, heavily buttered toast, and black coffee.  Later, I was told in the UK this is exactly what people eat when they're hung over; it's also what the English eat every day.  I learned this from an individual in Holyhead who was Welsh.  I traveled there by train that evening to catch a ferry to Dublin.  It's a small town on the coast surrounded by farms.  I had 6 hours to kill before the ferry left at 2:30 in the morning for a red eye.  I just started walking and eventually found a beach that looked exactly like Caspar in Mendocino.  I walked back to town in the dark and found a Pub.  The drinking age here is 18, and I'm still not quite used to it.  I ended up in a Pub where almost everyone was 18, and just getting out of Secondary School.  In school in Wales you have to learn the Welsh language, and in Pubs in Wales, they all want to teach it to you.  It sounds a lot like German, but less aggressive. 

I'll try to keep posting as I go along.  I actually resolved the credit card issues and charging situation on my Tablet today, so you should be seeing more from me.  I've been writing volumes in a notebook, and what I've written here actually doesn't do it justice.  You can pick up a copy of my other writings after they're published.

Preparing for Europe

Preparations have begun for my two month stint in Europe.  I will be traveling with only the clothes on my back and a fanny pack.  I'm coining this type of travel as Fanny Trekking.  I've traveled like this before during a visit to the southern U.S.  There wasn't a single problem that wasn't easily overcome, and the advantages outweighed the disadvantages 10 to 1.  Why even bother with extra pants, extra shirts, extra socks.  I rarely change my clothes; once a week or less anyway.  When things get too funky you can easily purchase a new pair of cheap cotton socks, (I know many backpack travelers who do this).  And unless your planning on attending a wedding, a banquet, an opera, or a royal wedding, you can get by without dress clothes.

The main essentials include a phone/camera/WIFI device (plus charger), a tooth brush, and some books – although my new Galaxy Tab will act as my e-reader.  You need space to store tickets, passport, and any postcards you might pick-up on your way to the Post Office.  A pen is good, and a small pair of cotton gloves.  Women often require some additional feminine products, but I'm going to ignore that for the sake of this blog.  You need a place to store some cigarettes and a lighter, a flask, and while in Europe hopefully some snuff.  What else does one need, and can't all these things fit in a fanny pack?

I'll be updating regularly while on the train, and my itinerary is extremely loose, consisting of a clockwise circle of Europe starting in London.