Alright back in action. I paid for two more hours so perhaps I can get through everything. Alas, my slow typing. I arrived in Halle on the 20th to find a room that I had booked last October. The room was, as it turned out, down the road to bike destruction. I had a prety good map from mapquest but there were no good roads leading to the small, well village is really to strong a word, group of wealthy peoples' homes in the countryside. The roads were built I guess by the Roman army as it made its way north back in 400CE. They were loose, jagged, potholed brick affairs with only their antiquity for redeeming qualities. Actually riding on them in cars was probably ok. For me it was a little like riding over railroad ties. When I found my place for the next two days there was a huge fence and gate around the house and yard which was a good thing because there was also a large German Shepard waiting to eat me for dinner. The place was very nice, considerably larger than my apartment in Seattle, and very quiet and comfortable. I had been warned by Gaby that dialects in and around Leipzig were difficult to understand and I found this to be immediately true. I understood very little of what my new hosts had to say. But I was content and happy not to be riding across a lunar-like surface anymore. The next day was sure to be a challenge and I slept well and prepared a plan for getting to Leipzig for my first World Cup game. In the morning I decided to try an alternate route back to the train station in Halle. It was a little out of the way but I guessed that this one main road would be better and in fact it was. That was the first of a series of good choices that day. It was 9 miles back to Halle but it only took me 40 minutes compared to the 2.5 hours it took for me to reach the place the previous day. I made a good map as I went so that I could find my way back. When I got to the train station there were many people dressed in Iranian and Angolan colors also going to the game. I put one of my bike bags in a locker (tools, rain gear, etc) and locked my bike up with the hundred or so others outside. I decided to proceed to Leipzig by train and on foot. That was good because in Leipzig the stadium was close by the station. In Leipzig I got lunch before the game and as the place was packed, a couple asked if they could join me at my table. You hear that that is common in Germany but this was the first time it had happened. I said yes of course and it turned out that they spoke excellent English. We chatted and ate and it was very nice. The game was fun, people dressed all up and cheering. I had great seats. The weather was suppossed to rain and instead it was about 90 degrees, humid and sunny. It was so hot-man. I went to get water and found the interesting system that Germans use at festivals for drinks. I had encountered this before but assumed that it was a local phenomenon. The drink is 3€but you pay 4. 1€ is a deposit on the cup that you get back when you return it. It's a good system that creates less waste. I'm in favor of it. I guess in the US we're concerned about the ability to sanitize plastic cups but this doesn't seem to be a problem here. I couldn't spend enough time in Leipzig. It seems like a great city. I hope to go back. I took a train back to Halle and rode my new route back. It was a very fun and successful day. The next day, the 22nd, was like American Gladiators. It began with me having to break out of my home's compound. I was all ready to go when I looked to the gate and hoped that it was not locked as it had been before. In fact it was locked. My hosts were not to be found so I stared at the gate and contemplated options. There was only one so I took the bags off of the bike and started over the gate. There I am in a wealthy suburb breaking out of my accomadations. Wierd. Kinda fun though and I felt like a kid enjoying the real world obstacle courses of gates and misadventures. I was down the road to find the Saale bike route along the Saale river which leads north out of Halle and links up with the Elbe outside of Dessau. It took way too long to find my way out of Halle. Maybe three hours later I was on the outskirts of Halle when I had my first real bike mishap. The jittering vibration from the roads had taken its toll. I was cuising along happy to be on paved roads when I heard a loud pop and then a dragging noise. I expected a flat but instead my rear rack had broken loose from the bike frame. The two bolts holding to the frame near the seatpost were gone and the whole affair rotated backwards and was dragging on the ground behind me. I pulled over and examined it. A small group of older German patrons from a nearby restaurant gathered to assist or comment or shake their heads. They were distressed and kept saying kaputt and schäde (unfortunate) and offered to call a taxi for me. It got worse when I looked and saw that a weld on the rack near where the rack meets the wheel was fully broken. When they saw this they were just beside themselves. It was a wonderful moment of preparedness. All those years of taking 6 overnight bags to Jim's house had paid off. I was so proud as I busted out my little green bag of American resourcefulness. I opened my spare container of screws and bolts and other assorted hardware and produced two better, longer bolts to replace the absent ones. (Why I hadn't had these in in the first place is unimportant just now.) I got the rack back in place and rebolted to the frame. Now the breakage. I pulled out a hose clamp (Kenny's suggestion) and wrapped it around the broken weld. Then three zip-ties later, zip-ties are the new duck tape you know, I was all fixed. My onlookers were amazed and kept repeating to one another my actions as if I had been a great footballer making all kinds of great plays. I was very proud. In 20 minutes I was off and running. The roads had been crap but also I decided that the bags were too heavy and that I would ditch some stuff in Berlin. By the time I reached Dessau, the home of Bauhaus arcitecture, it was 70 miles, 8 hours later and I was beat. I found that I can do 70 miles but I am not good for much else the rest of the day. Dessau was probably an ok place but it wasn't speaking to me just then. Probably because I had wanted to get to Lutherstadt-Wittenberg that night where the youth hostel is located in an old castle. I found the train station in Dessau and went to Wittenberg. I arrived at the castle-hostel about ten minutes after they had closed. Bummer. I had to take a room that was ok- but staying the night in a castle it was not. The next day I had a ticket for a game in Berlin. I caught a train and got to Berlin with plenty of time to store my stuff and find the Olympiastadion. The game was a pretty boring affair but the stadium is unbelievable. It's one of those places that I've seen so many times in old reel footage of Hitler and the 1936 Olympics with Jesse Ownes winning four golds. There is a street named after him outside of the stadium. I got to my room that I'll have for the next five nights and felt very happy to be still now. I need to look over my bike and make some decisions about the future bike routes. I had anticipated being able to move between bike routes on roads but after the bad roads I think I will try and stick to bike paths and take trains in between. We'll see.