Europe India trip: Day 4-5 - sightseeing in Hamburg & ride from Hamburg to Torring (Denmark) [16-17 Apr, 2023]

Denmark motorways are not as good as Germany, had to face a lot of cross winds. Also, my first time staying in a wooden hut.

The Hamburg youth hostel vibe was good & since I had checked in pretty late, I decided to take the next day off, do some Hamburg sight seeing & also start on my pending blog posts. I was fairly nervous about my ride as I haven’t ridden my bike before & it is an old one which could be susceptible to break down. But by now, my confidence in the bike had grown. In-fact, at places the bike held so well & accelerated with such a might, that I remember the term ‘pulls like a train’ which a lot of Vstrom owners used to say in various forums which I came across while researching on buying a used motorbike.

My bike resting on the other end of large parking area in the Youth Hostel Hamburg. You can read the German name on the board if you zoom in enough.

I was lazy to get up & by the time I had thought about & booked a walking tour at 11 AM, I realized I am too late to make it. So I decided to spend time finalizing my content at pocha.github.com/solo-world-trip instead.

I booked a St. Pauli tour at 2 PM which also takes people through the Beatles Square. I never knew Beatles band formed in Hamburg. Being a rock music fan, I thought, I should not miss this thing at least :). I was about to publish about my link to folks in my social circle but then I realized it was 1 PM already & I did not want to miss this walking tour. So I decided to post it in the night & left for the tour.

Hamburg train sign. It runs two trains - S-Bahn & U-Bahn.

German cycling path is very well laid out in most cities & Hamburg was not exception.

One of the venues where Beatles played

St Pauli has pubs where they display the languages people speak. So if you are Spainish & looking to talk to people in Spaonish, you look for Spain flag outside the pub.

Plays were running in Hamburg & all of these looked like the German version of popular plays in London :)

Beathles Square. Beatles were from Liverpool but they became a band in Hamburg & played at Indra strip club to start with, before moving to other more ‘rock clubs’ & eventually rising to fame.

When in Germany, eat German doner kebab :)

One of the Beatles vanues where they played

After doing a St Pauli tour, I took the train to the central Hamburg to see some of the architectural things. I think I made a mistake & sat on the train that goes the other side & then I just decided to go for a long train ride. I had a day pass so it did not really matter from where to where I travel. The central Hamburg area is called Rathaus

Some prominent Hamburg Church.

Rathaus or Townhall. Pretty magnificient building that I cudnt capture all

Some part of Hamburg that reminded me of Geneva

I came back pretty tired, decided to sleep & publish stuff next day. I woke up pretty early like 5 AM next day & then came down to the common area with my laptop so that I can publish my first blog post. I was able to do it & then I went in for breakfast at the hostel & started to ready luggage on my motorbike.

I had met a friend Simon from Hamburg when I was in Poland. I asked him about a mechanic in Hamburg as I felt my clutch cable is too tight & it might snap. He told me about Louis in Hambercook but when I reached the place I figured they were just accessories shop. I ended up buying some chain lube as I only have WD 40 & after riding my bike in rain from Munster to Hamburg, I had to lube the chain of my bike.

By the time I started from Louis, it was 10 PM. I looked up a mechanic shop in the north as I had to head towards the direction. I reached there but it turned out they do only Honda bikes. They told me about a shop 30 kms in the north & I decided to give them a shot.

The other place turned out to be majorly working on BMWs & very little on Suzukis. The folks there were considerate & had a look at my bike. I had put some WD-40 in the clutch cable as well when I lubed my chain in Hamburg (the gap day was for chain lubing which I remember now) & the clutch cable had become alright. They said they dont have clutch cable & they need to order one. They did look at my bike discs & front tyre & said they need changing though. I attributed it to they being BMW folks & want to be extremely safe & cautious, while I am more like the Kingray folks (the guys from whom I bought the motorbike) who are ok living on the edge. So I decided to just carry on.

I figured I need to fill petrol & ended up at a petrol pump where I met Folke, who was managing the pump. While having a coffee, Folke & I start to talk & that is when he mentioned about town Wacken where is from & how the place hosts some big metal festival.

Thats Folke

An elderly guy whose name I dont remember now. He came to me & said something like ‘Respect’ in whatever English he could manage. He did ask me about the bike, mileage & if I am not nervous riding such a weathered bike. He did say I should have chosen a Honda over Suzuki. I am not sure he understood what all I told him but well, we had a good time :)

I had to figure out my next destination & where I would stay. I saw a cheap jungle hut on Airbnb at a place north of Torring. It was listed for 15 Euros but I could not find it again. So I put the dates of future & found it. Then I messaged the host if the place is available today as I figured most host need at least 24 hour notice to tidy up the place. The owner responded & agreed to let me stay. So my destination was decided & I started to Torring.

The public restroom next to motorways where I stopped.

In the time of need, one can actually camp at these location as you have a toilet. But drinking water is not readily available. People also stop at these location to eat their food etc.

Soon I crossed into Denmark. I saw a checkpost & I was about to stop, but then the officials gestured me to keep going.

I then stopped at a restaurant which is at one of these side road parking area where you get in after taking a detour. The place was managed by a Turkish guy & the fish burger was yum.

The place name is Bolderselv, which can be read in the signboard in the background. The name did make me feel like I am in a Russian city :)

I reached Torring & stopped at a supermarket to be able to pick some food for the night. Since the wooden hut is in a jungle, I figured there might not be anything around to eat.

I remember that I had come into internal roads & somewhere I had to take a right turn which was at a slightly steep & cornering junction. While I stopped to look for incoming vehicles, I could not put enough feet on the ground & my bike slowly fell on the right. There was a car passing & the guy immediately stopped & came to help me. I was thankful that someone crossed else I would have stuck all by myself to pick the mamoth. Little I knew that in future, I will be stuck with similar situation but nobody else to help :).

The wooden hut., It was a pretty decent deal for 15 Euros

I reached the place with some day light & met the owner. She then told me that the place does not have toilet & there is a public toilet around 100m with shower & that is when I figured why the deal was cheap. It became pretty cold in the night so I ditched the plan of taking bath & when I went to the toilet & shower the next day, I was fairly surprised. But that is next day & for the next post :)