Today I discovered that my bike has a “walking assistance” mode. I found this out about a kilometer into the nearly 9km walk home from Landstuhl, where my apparent slow leak turned into a fast leak. Of course it was the front wheel, making it hard to steer.

I recently got an ADAC (ah-de-ah-tse) membership which has a neat feature where they will assist you with your car or bicycle breakdown. The wait for assistance was 2 to 3 hours. Google maps said it would take me an hour fifty six to walk home.

I set out with the intention to do a loop to the north east of my house. It would be about 20 miles and go on the bicycle highway and some other neat attractions. 4ish miles in, though, and the road was closed, and not in the closed for most but not us bikes kind of way. Apparently it was blocked with significant amounts of trees downed on the trail.

I went back to the gallows along the road (they even had the nooses hung, along with a sign explaining the gallows site from the 30 years war) and found a different komoot tour to do. This one would be a few more miles, but it was beautiful out and I was feeling good.

This new loop would take me around several villages then through Ramstein to Landstuhl, and I planned on just skipping closing the loop and heading home on Kaiserstraße.

The landscape was breathtaking, green fields, forests and a river running alongside the bike trail. I went over several very cool bridges, and under a few others. Off to the said at one point there was a herd of dark gray sheep grazing next to the river.

Shortly before Steinwenden, I hit a patch of black ice in a turn, and my bike nearly came out from under me. I have no idea what correction my muscle memory did on my behalf, but I stayed upright and the only evident damage was smacking my left knee on the frame of the bike. I am pretty sure a really decent bruise is going to develop there.

Things became familiar when I got to Ramstein,and I now know what path to take when I ride my bike to work eventually. Right as I got to Landstuhl I noticed my front tire was getting noticeably flat. Oh no.

A cyclist ahead of me stopped momentarily and I tried to ask if he had a pump. He did not but pointed the direction to a gas station. I walked the bike there, and by the time I arrived, the tire was completely flat. The gas station could not fill my presta-stemmed tire, but even if it could I’m pretty sure my encounter with the black ice caused the tire to get pinched and develop a slow leak. Either that or I ran over something sharp somewhere. Either way I’d need a patch.

Other than my quads being rather annoyed at me for walking 5.5 miles after an 18 mile bike ride, the walk home from Landstuhl was rather pleasant. Several people asked if they could help and I explained in my bad German that I was ok and walking home was not so bad.

I got home, having been gone a total of 4 hours. I’m definitely feeling it, but yesterday my IKEA winged back chair came in so I can now relax in the living room with a cat on my lap and probably take a hot bath later. Good thing the bike has walking assistance.