click the pictures

Last Time

In July 1995, Wolfram and I set out to cycle to Germany. We had been planning a visit to his home village of Ringsheim in the Black Forest since the previous year, and it was his idea to cycle there. I asked a friend, Ron Sant, to work out the best route for us. I was so proud of Wolfram for being able to do this, being blind, that I thought more people should know about it, and contacted various tv people. Channel 4 decided to include us in the Real Holiday Show - which I did not know was a rubbish programme whose only aim was to make people look stupid. 

Unfortunately for the poor girl they sent along with us, she was unable to achieve this aim. My attitude was, Look Louise, this is our holiday. If you want to come along, fine, but don't expect us to  change anything because you're here. She was not really 'with us' anyway, since we were on bikes and she came in a camper van. The film company did not even provide us with something so simple as a mobile phone so she could keep in touch. In fact they were absolute skinflints - we did expect to get some hospitality out of Louise for our pains, she bought us one cup of coffee on the way down and said, "that's all you're getting". So all in all, we didn't really feel we owed her anything. We lost her on the trek across the fens, she was waiting at Walsingham, but we had to cut that part of the trip when we were so delayed by winds, and head straight for the exit at Felixstowe.

At the lakeside with Louise

Wolf on the bike

It took us six days to cycle down through England and we were so battered, bruised and demoralised by the time we got to Felixstowe, that we decided when we got to Zeebrugge we would take the train down to Strasbourg. This looked like failure, but as Wolf pointed out, we never said we would cycle both ways, all the way, and we had done the England bit. We could do the other bit on the way back. Consequently, we had to spend three weeks in Ringsheim as Wolf was due to collect some insurance money on August 1st. 

We gave ourselves a week's break before facing the unpleasant task of ringing Louise and telling her where we were. She flew over, and stayed in a local hostelry run by a one-eyed man and his son. Hearing she was vegetarian, they fed her two eggs at every meal. That was it, two eggs, nothing else. She subjected us to seven days of cross-examination, and left. She missed the best part of the holiday, the trip home.

We left Ringsheim, headed out across the Rhine at Kappel, and crossed the Vosges mountains the first day, camping at Gemaingoutte on the other side. 

(I will fill in the details of the rest of that trip later)

Fourteen Years Later - One Woman's Odyssey

Now I'm doing it all again - but in reverse

Nine of Wands - Vision Quest

There are no pictures of that ten day trip we made in 1995, because on the second day out Wolf's money belt, camera, passports and credit card, were all stolen. It was then that I realised that we were now on the Vision Quest which my Aztec Guide had predicted, standing in a row of beans on the allotments, the week before we left England. And the day before setting out from Ringsheim, I had picked up a single playing card in the street - the Nine of Wands (in tarot equivalent) which ever after signified the Vision Quest card for me - a position of supreme difficulty, which may overwhelm you, but which, if you win through, will put you several leagues further on your Path. This was what we were about to go through.

The Eight Days of Invisibility

"Why on Earth didn't you ask me to come sooner? I would have come at any time"

"I will come to you tomorrow!

"If you go too far, you can never come back"

"I can join you together in Spirit, if that is what you want"

What we learned, experienced and gained during that ten days, was the equivalent of the Aztec God's Descent and Rebirth, experienced over eight days, the period of Invisibility of Venus when closest to the Sun, ending in its Heliacal Rising. On the fifth night (the fourth of the Descent) we found ourselves with nowhere to camp and darkness falling. I was also too exhausted to go any further. We illegally entered the old camping grounds, between a main road and a canal, with a high speed railway in the background. That night there was a riot in the road. We had camped up right beside the high wall that sealed the site off, but there was a gate through which our tent could be seen. Luckily we had not lit a fire. Youths were fighting, rioting and smashing up a phone box. There was much anti-English feeling at the time, and we felt, if they saw us and our English bikes, we were done for. We sat up the whole night with knives drawn.

At last, in my extremity, terrified, I called on my Guide to help us. Wham! I saw him clear as day as he dropped down and landed in the tent entrance. Looking over his shoulder at me, he said "Why on earth didn't you ask me to come sooner. I would have come at any time."

With him in the doorway, I felt safer. I knew he would protect us. After a while, the rioting youths moved away, but we would hear the sound of them flare up from time to time in the distance. Then the Guide began to move, and I knew he was going. I reasoned that, if he was a figment of my imagination, I could force him to stay. As soon as I had the thought, he looked at me over his shoulder again,

"Don't try to stop me," he said, "I am going now, and you will be safe. But I will wait for you tomorrow on the road."

"How will I know where you are?" I asked.

"I will call you," he said.

I heard him calling from a small chapel on my left as we went down a steep hill. Wolf was in front, and speeding away from me. I called and called to him but he could not hear me. About halfway down the hill, the Guide said, 

"If you go too far you can never return. Beyond a certain point, I will not be here."

"I know," I answered, "But I cannot leave Wolfram." I felt myself pass the point where it was too late to turn back, and I caught up with Wolf at the bottom of the hill.

"You should have gone and left me," he said. "Can you go back?" I explained to him that I could not.  "Ask him if he can come again, somewhere else," said Wolf.

That night I communicated with the Guide. "I will try to come tomorrow," he said.

The last church we passed before leaving France and entering Belgium, he called me, again he was on the left. We went in. We found the Mary corner and sat together, the Guide communicating with me. At the end he said, "I am leaving now and I will not come back. But before I go, I can join you in Spirit, if that is what you want." I told Wolf what he said, and he said he wanted us to do that. So we sat and held hands, and were joined in Spirit, and the Guide left.

Neither of us ever forgot that experience. On the ninth night we camped in darkness at Le Lac des Vielles Forges. In the morning when I crawled out of the tent, I was face to face with the Aztec sign for the Binding of the Years, carved on a water pump. 

Fourteen is a Special Number

I'm doing it for Love

Wolf's Web

We talked of that trip often, and always said one day we would like to do it again, but never did. Now Wolf is on the Other Side and cannot bodily go, but he can come with me in Spirit and we can share this journey together.

This is the most fitting year to do it - fourteen years since the first time. Fourteen was always a special number for us. It was the difference in our ages, my birthday, and the number of steps up to bed.

So Wolf - I'm doing this for you - and for me - and for the Spirit Guide - and for our love - and for all the love that exists in the world between two people.