EPISODE 19
Life is Wild (Part 2)
Barbados. Dominica. Guadeloupe. Martinique. These are some of the exotic Caribbean islands visited by André Plumeau with his bicycle, Frieda. In Part 2 of this double episode, André again defies the odds by sailing west from the Republic of Cabo Verde on various boats, with diverse crews. Eventually, a spontaneous assignment to pick up a sailboat in Florida separates him from Frieda and the rest of his touring equipment. He makes his way around the United States to Mexico, where he hopes to be reunited with Frieda. At the end of the episode, André reveals his surprise plan for the end of the year, which we also hope will come true.
Episode Transcript
Gabriel: Previously, on the Accidental Bicycle Tourist.
André: Yes, it was his boat exactly, a really nice boat. And the name of the boat was Life is Wild. Since this day. “Life is Wild” became the motto of this journey.
Gabriel: You just heard André Plumeau, describing his philosophy for this multi-year trip. If you thought that Part 1 of André’s story was crazy, just wait until you hear what happens to André in Part 2. It’s a wild ride indeed.
Sandra: You’re listening to The Accidental Bicycle Tourist. In this podcast, you’ll meet people from all walks of life and learn about their most memorable bike touring experiences. This is your host, Gabriel Aldaz.
Gabriel: Hello, cycle touring enthusiasts! Welcome to Part 2 of the “Life is Wild” double episode. In Part 1, we followed André from Portugal to Cabo Verde. If you haven’t heard that episode yet, I recommend that you go back and listen to it. In this second installment, we continue André’s journey with Frieda, his bicycle, across the Atlantic Ocean to various exotic Caribbean islands. Through the highs and lows, André’s joie de vivre, his exuberant enjoyment of life, shines through. This episode was recorded at a Wi-Fi-enabled jungle outpost in Costa Rica, so you will hear tropical rain and the chirping of birds in the background.
Gabriel: To catch up, you got to Cabo Verde and I guess you were there illegally somehow, but we don’t need to go into that. How does the story continue? And since this is a bicycle touring podcast, when do you return to your bicycle?
André: Well, actually, as soon as I got on Boa Vista, I stayed the end of the day and the next morning I asked to get on land. We got on shore, and the first thing I did is setting up the bicycle to go cycling again. So I was on Boa Vista and really wanted to explore the island. And so did I. Boa Vista is super dry. It’s very hot. In between of 10 and 4 in the afternoon, I couldn’t cycle anymore. I have literally not really seen big rain in two months in Cabo Verde, but at the same time it was not rainy season. It’s pretty funny, because it’s an archipelago from ten islands and nine of them are deserts and only one is really green, where they do all the plantation actually for all the others. It’s pretty funny and interesting too to see. They have a microclimate inside of the islands.
Gabriel: Interesting.
André: Interesting. So I’ve been cycling Boa Vista, I think for tewn days. Cabo Verde, I only cycled for you, not really for exploring or for entertainment. It became like a tool ready to get from one point to another one. So I arrived on find a boat. So I was cycling back to the kind of harbor in Boa Vista, but they don’t really have one, because I knew that it’s not there where I’m gonna find a boat because there is no marina. And most captains rather go to marinas. To increase my my percentage of luck to find a boat, I went to the island with the major harbor, which was São Vicente. So the thing is to get from one island to another island, well you can fly if you are lucky enough to be on an island with an airport, which Boa Vista is not. They only have a small one. So in the small ones there’s only connection flights with the neighbor islands. But at the same time, just because I was on on Boa Vista, doesn’t mean that I was rich. I mean I was still broke and needed to find a plan. In Cabo Verde, it was difficult because of the network. Network was pretty poor and also it was pretty expensive, and so my daily budget, basically – maybe it’s also interesting to understand – is eight dollars for a day. So I was always trying to stick to this. Kind of worked well. Of course, sometimes you cannot, but it’s good if you can stick to it. Yeah, maybe it was a little bit – how to say – unforeseen to get to Cabo Verde and maybe it was also a little bit much of excitement and not so much of a logic decision. Maybe. Because yeah, I needed funds. So, where can I get funds from? Not in Cabo Verde. So, however, I needed to find a solution to get on the other island. Flying was pretty expensive, so they connect the islands with a ferry, but this ferry only goes once in a week around all the islands, and the other days in the week you only can go through the next islands, which was, yeah, a little bit confusing and weird. And also, when I arrived there, the first week was like, “Okay we are sold out.” I was like, “Fuck, how is this possible?” This meant that I was then there the 21st of January and I needed to wait one more week, which would have been the 28th. Anyhow I was then able to find out, because a woman went into the store and she came out with a ticket for the ferry, and I asked her, “How did you get a ticket? Because it’s sold out.” And she told me, “Yeah, I go to São Nicolau.” I was like, “Oh yeah! Nice.” So, perfect. I can go to São Nicolau, which is in my direction. I just gonna try to stay on the boat. So basically I was buying the ticket for another destination but just stayed on the boat because for the destination I was going to it was all booked out. This is how I got, actually, from Boa Vista to São Vincente earlier than officially possible or expected.
Gabriel: I mean, the concept of a ferry being sold out is not that common. Usually, you can always fit somebody else on the boat.
André: Especially if it’s just a pedestrian. But then, even once I got through customs – or their kind of customs – before boarding actually the ferry, they were like, “Yeah, but you only booked as a pedestrian.” I was like, “Yeah, but I have a bicycle, so now you need to find a possibility to get me there.” Well, in the end they gave up, because probably of the language barrier, and I boarded the ferry. I stayed until the official destination but then I stayed longer, of course, too. Made it to São Vincente about 22nd or something like this. It was almost two days on the ferry. It was a long ride for a short distance.
Gabriel: Yeah it seems like it.
André: And it was horrible. Like, everyone there was seasick. People just kept throwing up. It was horrible.
Gabriel: Was it mostly locals or were there also a lot of tourists?
André: No, it was mostly local people basically. This why I was even more surprised, because I was like they must be used to go with a ferry from an island to another, or maybe they just never leave the island. I don’t know.
Gabriel: Yeah, it sounds like it.
André: I mean, I can understand that you’re sick. You yourself, if you feel okay, you just feel like you don’t want to eat anymore, because everybody’s puking and it’s, like, a horrible smell in the inside. So I just managed to sleep outside and to, more or less, live outside of the yeah, how you say that… kind of cabins? I really didn’t want to smell that.
Gabriel: Oh, it sounds awful. And for two days you had to endure that.
André: Straight. There were even people feeling sick for two days straight, from beginning until arrival. Horrible. I mean, poor people too.
Gabriel: You didn’t get seasick, luckily.
André: No, I did not get seasick. I mean, this is another thing which is pretty surprisingly, that I decided to embark on a sailboat without really knowing if I’m seasick or not. I mean, I have never been on a boat on real sea, only on a lake.
Gabriel: Right. That’s a pretty big jump.
André: Yeah, that’s a huge jump. Actually, I was not aware of it, especially since my entire family I think is seasick. I just never asked myself the question. Maybe this is actually the trick to don’t be seasick.
Gabriel: Yeah don’t even ask.
André: Exactly. Sometimes it’s just better what is hidden.
Gabriel: When you finally got to São Vicente, you got to a marina and you had the option to sail somewhere else?
André: Exactly, exactly. So, in general, Cabo Verde, they are very crazy for carnival and it says they have the second biggest carnival in the world. I mean, I don’t believe it but maybe it’s true. it’s big. This, definitely, and it’s super noisy. For me, it was it was a hard time, to be honest. So, traveling on the ferry I met people from Belgium. They were renting a huge Airbnb for like three people and you could live it with eight people, easily. They invited me to come over for a couple of days. Actually, also the guy from Belgium, which was really nice, because I found him also again on the ferry from Boa Vista to São Vicente, funny thing.
Gabriel: You mean Sylvain, your former crewmate.
André: Yeah, São Vicente was a real town, not like in Boa Vista. Boa Vista is a small island which right now gets a lot of attention for tourism, but São Vicente is way more developed than Boa Vista is. So, anyhow, I got to São Vicente, explored it also with a bicycle. For me, it was the very perfect thing to have, to get from one place to another every time when I wanted. Like a car, but not being a car. And everything was flat, so it was actually a very good vehicle to get from one spot to another, also because you can just go anytime you want. So I explored São Vicente, but I never really got far away from the harbor, from the marina, for long, because it was already 22nd and, yeah, sailing season came to its end. So I was trying and I was meeting captains and I really was doing the hustle, which I should probably have done in Las Palmas. And so I started, and I met many people and many people were, like, very happy, and then they knew about the story that I have a bicycle and then they turned down the offer, that, “Yeah, this is not gonna work. How do we fit the bicycle?” Ad so on and so on. Even, like, huge boats, where you’re like, you cannot fit a bicycle on that? It’s like just a joke. And, yeah, it was very very frustrating, for let’s say one week. And you’re gonna say, “Okay, one week, it doesn’t look so long.” Well, if you’re in a place where you really don’t want to be for so long, because São Vicente was noisy, was loud, was stinky, was… it was a city, was not so nice. And then, also, I have still been illegal at this time in the country which doesn’t make it more easy for me, because officially I cannot skip this island too. So I needed to get legal first. This was a very, very complicated process. I needed to find a crew that actually came to the island, which yet did not went through customs and who would accept to have with them disembarking from the boat. But if you disembark with more people than your originally had when embarking, it’s weird too. So however, for my birthday present… so I was celebrating my birthday in São Vicente, and actually it was funny because the day before I found a captain who agreed taking me and the bicycle over the Atlantic. So I was actually celebrating with them and we were supposed to go to Grenada, which is in the Caribbean, in 14 days. I was like, “Okay I have enough time.” We were trying to figure out if there’s some things to do in preparation for the journey on the boat. No, everything was all right. So like, okay, then we see let’s say next week and we agreed on it. I went away in the same time with a crew from Martinique, which I got to know on a Wharram catamaran. Wharram is catamarans which were supposed to be built by yourself, like home or do-it-yourself catamaran plans, and this boat was built by himself and we went on a journey for, like, one or two days to the neighbor island. I was like, “Okay, that’s good, so I will be back here and if there’s things to do with the boat I will be back.”
Gabriel: Since you had 14 days on your hands it sounds like you wanted to spend that time island-hopping with a crew that was eventually headed to Martinique.
André: Yeah, of course. The problem is we stayed there one, two days and then we left, but we never got back to the island where we came from. And I needed to get there because I have everything there: my bicycle, my bags. I literally just came with my passport and with my purse and with my phone to go with them. So I didn’t bring anything. And then we arrived on the main island with Praia. Praia is the capital of Cabo Verde and Santiago is the name of the island. So we came to Santiago, because they needed to pick up a new crew member. I was like, “That’s nice, but now I have all my belongings in São Vincente and I have a boat there. How do I get back there?” Because even if I wanted to get back there in time to leave with the boat, since there’s only one ferry traveling between the islands and it left the same day we arrived there, I had no real chance to really find the boat to go back to São Vincente in time. Except flying, and flying was pretty expensive. Like 250 euros, something like this. So I was like, “Okay that’s pretty fucked.” I called the captain, the captain where I was supposed to be on a boat with, and yeah he was not happy at all about this. He was treating me like a child. It was pretty amusing, to be honest, and he said, “Yeah, okay. Because you cannot be confident on this, he’s gonna kick me out of the boat.” I was like, “Why?” Very surprising. It was like, okay it’s fine. So in the end, I got sick in Santiago, because I got the only food intoxication I had so far on the entire journey, so I was lucky. But I was really far away from really comfy clothes or stuff like this, so I felt sick there, and if I’m saying sick I was really sick, like, with fever for 13 days. It was horrible.
Gabriel: Oh, wow.
André: We got back to São Vincente I was still sick. The carnival peak was going on. I was picking up my stuff on the other boat, because they did not left, actually, meanwhile.
Gabriel: So you could have gone with them to Grenada!
André: As I said, he refused to take me on board. And then I met a guy from Republic Czech. I was working for him, repairing his boat for about 10 days, and I could live on his boat too and could make some money, which was nice too. There was a lot of food and I could also take all the conserves and cans they had on the boat, which was pretty nice, so no expense for food for the next couple of days. And then February gone by. I met many captains, have been on many boats, but still the same thing: the bicycle is a problem. Many boat owners don’t want to bring it on the boat, because they’re afraid that it’s going to hurt somebody or it’s going to put some scratches on the boat itself. Don’t want to bring it because it takes up space. I mean, every argument is kind of valid but yeah, February gone by. I was confirmed already as a crew member by the captain sailing a brand new Oceanis, from Mediterranean to the Caribbean, but then his boss called the next day and he disagreed to embark a fourth person this time. So again I was let down. It was very, very frustrating, all this time. And then, finally, on 25th of February I met a crew from Germany, France, and Spain, and I was able to embark with them three days later. So they said, “Okay, I don’t want to take this decision by myself. I want to take it with the crew and if the crew agrees, you are welcome on board.” Because it was a small boat, it was a very tiny boat. On February 28th, we lifted anchor and we set sail towards the Caribbean.
Gabriel: Wow! So they agreed to do it. They said that’d be fine.
André: They agreed. Yeah, we went out. It was the captain’s birthday one day before. We baked together a cake. We went out together, we had a good… like, started to have a good time and to see if the routine is working. I was sleeping on the boat at the same time and yeah, then on 27th, later, we had the conversation about do we have a fifth crew on the boat or not? And yeah, they decided to… to do so.
Gabriel: Where did the bicycle go?
André: Actually, this was a pretty funny story. Also because, okay, I understood no one wants to have the bicycle, because it takes up space and so I was working on a solution to put the bike somehow outside. So on the first boat, I didn’t have any problem. It was clear for my captain, Ruben, to put the bicycle inside, so it never came to my mind actually that I will ever have to deal with the question like this. But then, on Cabo Verde, okay, I found out that many people don’t want to take you, because you have a bicycle. So, advice: If ever anyone wants to do that, never do it with a bicycle. Or if you do with a bicycle, bring a lot of time and a huge tolerance for frustration, because sometimes you’re going to hear things that don’t make any sense. So no, I was figuring out a plan and it was basically finding an industry that has this kind of stretch film, that we use also to preserve food in the kitchen, but this exists in the industry. They have it, like, to wrap things onto a pallet. And this actually is what I did. I was trying to find a store, a shop, who was either selling it or using it. I was looking for a storage hole where to use it, so I could maybe just lend it and don’t have to pay for it. And it worked. I wrapped the entire bicycle into a roll. They gave me a roll, which was really, really, really nice and kind of them. So I wrapped up the entire frame, the tires. Then I wrapped everything again together and I put it in the front of the boat, and this is where it remained for the next 21 days. We needed 21 days to cross the Atlantic.
Gabriel: Wow! What an image.
André: It’s funny. I mean, myself, I couldn’t really believe it. I only believe that once we were on sea. It’s a funny coincidence because yesterday I was posting about this. I’m really bad in posting things every week or something like this, but currently on my Instagram I’m telling exactly the story. So right now it’s, I think it’s chapter fifty. I gave a number to every post, so it’s easier to follow. Fifty is leaving from Cabo Verde with the sailboat, so if you want to have pictures about this, you can check my Instagram. The name is allmannsberger. A-double L-M-double N-S-BERGER.
Gabriel: Okay, there it is. Life is Wild.
André: Exactly. And, yeah there’s a lot of pictures, but of course, the best pictures, never anyone takes them, because never everybody is ready to take them.
Gabriel: Good point. That’s so true. So then you sailed for 21 days, you said, and then you reached the Caribbean.
André: Exactly. So, with this captain we were embarking in São Vincente and the marina Mindelo. It’s the name of the marina. And we’re sailing, or putting course, on to Barbados, which is the most eastern island in the Caribbean. It’s also a very flat island. I think the highest peak is like 300 meters or something, but it’s a very green island. The people are super nice, very friendly people. They speak very good English and overall I like the food, but I have to say it’s an expensive island. So, um, Barbados, Caribbean, we went to Port Saint Charles, which is on the west side, and I think we had a total of 2,400 miles or something like this, from Mindelo to Barbados. I think we had an average of 4.8 knots. Something like this. We had a very calm sea, beautiful sunrises and sunsets. We didn’t had any drop of rain. We had so many wildlife to watch: dolphins, many seabirds. We were surprised to see small birds on the sea, basically. Very interesting. We had a biofluorescent plankton in the water at night, with the movement of the boat. Beautiful skies in the night, stars, yeah. Even myself, I started fishing. This is actually a funny story, at least for me. Before embarking, the captain told me: “Listen, this is a vegan boat, so we’re expecting you to don’t bring anything non-vegan on this boat. I was like, “Okay, I understand this, but if I bring, let’s say, a can of beef, you don’t have to eat it.” “Yeah, but it’s the rule. It’s a vegan boat.” Okay, bueno. So it’s a vegan boat. I respect everything, I eat everything. This was hard for me, to not eat meat. So, I love cheese and eggs but, however, on the fourth day or so I discovered that we have a fishing gear on the vegan boat, which was pretty funny. And I was like, “I just used your vegan fishing line.” And I used it and I was very lucky. Twenty-five minutes later, I had my fish on the hook and, yeah, was literally dissecting my very first fish in my life, on a moving boat. It’s funny. But was very good. I was very happy and obviously the vegans were very happy too, because they started to eat my fish.
Gabriel: But wait a minute. Then they’re not vegan.
André: Yeah, yeah, yeah. We can go through this conversation again if you want. I already had it.
Gabriel: Okay, well, we’ll just leave it at that.
André: Yeah, yeah, yeah, exactly. Obviously, I was asked to get more fish out of the sea, which I did because I wanted fish too. And so, yeah, five people started to like fish, which is a tremendous trend. It’s a very huge impact.
Gabriel: Yeah, I will say so. That’s a funny story.
André: For me too. I mean, a little bit of a pain too, because I would like to have some cheese or stuff like this, but at the same time, I’m really grateful I had this experience, because for myself I would have probably never chosen to make something, like, with the intention to be vegan. Of course, we have all been eating something vegan in our life without knowing that it’s vegan, and most people always have this opinion and prejudice that vegan food is lame and stuff. I cannot say so, so this is why I’m very grateful for the experience. The boys and girls made very good vegan food, which, yeah, has some interesting alternatives too. For example, I don’t remember the name – people who are going to listen to that are going to know probably, and who are vegan – there is a substitute for parmigiano which is basically just a fungus, ah, a champignon, a mushroom, God, I’m so confused with all the languages in my head.
Gabriel: I understand.
André: So yeah, but it’s actually just the dried bacteria and it smells and it tastes pretty good, but of course it’s not better than parmigiano. That’s not possible. But I’m very happy and grateful was good food.
Gabriel: Okay. And you got two Barbados but then you kept going with the crew? That was just an intermediate stop?
André: Exactly. So we have been on the boat. It was a small boat, actually. People were surprised, but the boat was 33 feet which is about 10 meters, and we have been five people on this boat. So there’s a lot of compromise for every one of us.
Gabriel: I mean, usually a boat like that has maybe three different sleeping berths. Was that the case with yours also? So, two people had to be sharing a berth?
André: Basically. We had a V-berth in the front, like V because it’s in the front of the boat, so it’s a V. So the V-berth was shared by, like, two travelers. I think they become a couple so far, so it was nice for them.
Gabriel: Sometimes close quarters can be a benefit.
André: Exactly. And we had the rear cabin, which was actually behind of the cockpit, which is really rare on this kind of boats, basically, but this one had one, and it was the cabin of the captain and from the girl from Spain. So I convinced them to be able to sleep in the saloon, next to the kitchen, in the living room, basically, so it was actually pretty good. I’ve always been sleeping many times before in the center berth, so it was really okay for me, if people also can be respectful enough.
Gabriel: Yeah, that is a bit of an unusual configuration.
André: Really, I like to be in the center point of the gravity of the boat, which basically was where I was sleeping, in the living room. I really have no problems with that, and I actually find it pretty, pretty comfortable for myself. But of course, I mean, you don’t have your own room so it’s actually a lot of impact in your own comfort, because in the morning you get up, you make your bed so that everybody can sit on it or whatever, so you never have really privacy too. You don’t have a door that you can can close or something like. I mean, privacy in general is a very big topic if you’re like five people on such a small boat.
Gabriel: Oh, definitely. If somebody needs to go to the bathroom, then they are going to go right past you.
André: Exactly, like basically after three weeks you know everything about everybody!
Gabriel: Yeah.
André: So we stayed on Barbados for, I think it was one week, and also I told them as soon as we arrived and we cleared in, I was like, “Don’t get me wrong, but I really want to be in peace and just to get off of the boat and I don’t want anyone to follow me. Just, please leave me in peace. I need the freedom right now.” I set up the bike – this is all I took, the bike and my backpack, with a sleeping bag, with a mattress – and I think I didn’t brought a tent because it was so hot. And yeah, I was circumnavigating the entire island by the bicycle. Saw beautiful places, met super nice people, had a very good time in Barbados, and even so far like people keep on asking you, of course, “What’s your favorite destination?” I’m saying, like, “Honestly, I really like Morocco, but also Barbados.” Barbados really impacted me, like, the friendliness and kindness of the people, the climate, the food and generally the island itself, so I really had a good time there, even if I was just there for such a short time, but I really enjoyed it. So yeah, this was Barbados, and from Barbados one week later I wrapped again the bike and then we were off. We had very strong winds. This was insane. in 14 hours we sailed straight away from Barbados up to Martinique, which was very, very good time. I think we had an average of eight and a half knots, something like this.
Gabriel: Whoa,
André: Was very good.
Gabriel: That’s fast.
André: At the same time, we really got beaten up by the sea.
Gabriel: I can imagine.
André: Then we went to Martinique, and in Martinique, I was back in Europe.
Gabriel: Martinique is one of three French island possessions in the Caribbean, meaning that they are formally part of France. The other two are Guadeloupe and the northern part of Saint Martin, or Saint Martin. In case you were wondering, the southern part of Saint Martin belongs to the Netherlands, where it is known as Sint Maarten. Consequently, the official language of Martinique, Guadeloupe, and Saint Martin is French and the official currency is the euro.
André: I was kind of happy, because, I mean, French is not a problem. I speak better French than I speak German, probably. Since being back in Europe I knew, okay that’s good. Here I can finally work again, legally, and so I was cycling basically from bakery to bakery because, yeah, I’m a baker, to find out if somebody has a job.
Gabriel: When you lived in Alsace, you had worked as a baker. You worked at a bakery?
André: So this is… well, this is a long story, but to cut it short, I kind of lost my company for audiovisual production during COVID, and yeah, I just started something new as a baker. Ah, since I’m a baker.
Gabriel: Okay, so you had an audiovisual production company, and then you became a baker, and then you traveled the world.
André: Kind of.
Gabriel: Okay, wow.
André: It was pretty funny, a pretty huge and nice coincidence. I found a pueblo, a small town, where I had a good beach, where I ran into people who were living in the same department as me in France, so we had something to talk about, and of course people trust you maybe a little bit more, because yeah, you’re from the same place and you’re charismatic and stuff. I stayed there for Easter weekend. I think I arrived less than a week before on Martinique, so I was for Easter there. They had a huge volleyball stuff happening in the beach going on was very nice. Was a good vibe going on there, and I slept there. I felt pretty pretty good, and the next day I went to the bakery and indeed they were looking for a head baker, and so I was like, “Okay, perfect. When can I start?” And I actually I started the next day, working.
Gabriel: Amazing.
André: So I had my contract, could work there and finally could make some money. This was, for me, the benefit of being back in Europe.
Gabriel: Yeah, for sure.
André: And the entire Martinique, as far as I know – and I’ve been a lot around, because later I kept on cycling – I saw many beaches, but this was the only beach that had public restrooms and showers. So the thing is, the setup was, I was bringing my bicycle and my big bags to the people who were from Alsace too – like, from my area in France – so I was able to store this there and they even said if I want to use the kitchen – because the kitchen was not inside the house, it was outside the house – I could use their fridge and use the kitchen, which was a very nice offer because I didn’t have the kitchen since I don’t know how long. And at the same time I was sleeping at the beach with the hammock between two coconuts. In the morning, I got up wrapped up the hammock, took my shower, I brought my hammock to the people from Alsace, and went to work. And this was what? Maybe two minutes from the beach, and after work I left two minutes from the bakery and was standing in the Caribbean Ocean, in the Atlantic Ocean. This was, like, yeah, perfect setup, actually, basically. The funny thing about Martinique, Martinique was the first place where I was pushing the bicycle, because it was just too steep. Daniel always was so surprised: “How can you pedal? How have you so much energy in your legs to get with your shitty setup and with this shitty bicycle up the hill?” I was like, “I don’t know,” but it was always like a kind of… um, how you say that? Orgulloso.
Gabriel: Proud.
André: Exactly, proud. It was a kind of a thing, like a proudness thing, uh, that I don’t want to give up on a hill and to push the bike. So this always got me more motivated in my mind. However, in Martinique I needed to give up. I could not anymore. I saved it somewhere. I don’t know how many percent it was steep, but it was insanely steep. I could not anymore. Like, the front tire didn’t remain anymore on the road, because it was just too steep. So yeah, I had to push the bicycle for the first time. I kept on exploring the island with the bicycle too. I have to say, if you want to ride bicycle as an exercise, Martinique maybe is a good place to do it, but they have the worst drivers. So, driving and with the bicycle on Martinique and Guadeloupe, the two French islands, are horrible, because people just don’t pay attention to cyclists. So don’t do that. I went with my bicycle still to Dominica.
Gabriel: Dominica, did anything happen there?
André: Dominica, for me, is a very nice place to go. If you really want to retire somewhere, go to Dominica. Land is cheap, the nature is very rich, you have every exotic fruits literally in your garden. There’s only 70,000 people there. It’s a great place. And Dominica happened that I met Steve, the guy who I just met again this week, who I’m here in Costa Rica right now.
Gabriel: But not randomly.
André: No, no, no. This was planned.
Gabriel: Okay, with you anything is possible.
André: That’s true. So I went to Dominica without my bicycle, because I was never supposed to stay in Dominica. I was supposed to come back from Dominica to Martinique, but this captain, for some reason no one really knows, needed to leave the island very quick. And I was like, “Okay, but I still feel like exploring this place. I’m gonna stay here.” Which I did. I was like, “Okay, if I want to sail back, I just can still do it.” Then I really enjoyed Dominica. I stayed there for three months, which is the maximum you can stay there, and managed to bring my stuff, which means Frieda and my bike bags and all the gear and all the stuff, actually all my stuff, to bring it from Martinique on another boat sailing up to Dominica for four or five days. So yeah, I got my stuff there. I explored a huge part of Dominica with a bicycle. It’s very hilly and very steep, so I did a lot of hitchhiking too. Hitchhiking with a bicycle on cars it’s a very new experience too.
Gabriel: I have a name for that, André. It’s called hitchbiking.
André: Hitchbiking. Okay, perfect.
Gabriel: I made it up myself.
André: Hitchhiking is… I agree. I agree with that and I found it so convenient that I was telling myself, why have I been so stubborn and stupid in Martinique and kept on wanting to get up the hills with a bike? I should have hitchhiking, exactly, earlier, because actually it was very easy to do, at least in Dominica. I’m very grateful for Dominica being so easygoing on hitchhiking, because it’s just inside of their culture. Meanwhile in Martinique and Guadeloupe, which are very developed islands, you’re not very welcome if you are hitchhiking, and people don’t want to take you also, when you try to hitchhike, it’s very hard, even though it’s well-known that their own bus system is never on schedule or they’re losing buses. Once I have been waiting, I think, three hours for a bus at a bus station and there was an old lady with me. It was super hot outside and she was already there when I arrived at the bus station. And then I started to put out the hand to ask for a ride and she’s like, “Uh, good luck,” but like in… I don’t have the words to explain it, but she was not very faithful for it. However, 15 minutes later I got a car and of course I gave it to her. Then, I think 10 or 15 minutes later again, I finally found my ride, but it was horrible. Like, for European islands being so badly developed, it’s worse than the Deutsche Bahn in Germany.
Gabriel: Well, that’s saying something. The old lady said she was 18 years old when she reached the bus station and she’d been waiting ever since.
André: Yeah, exactly. She was waiting for 62 years. Horrible. Horrible. I’m telling you. No, hitchhiking worked pretty good in Dominica. Okay, next funny story. I got contacted by a captain who I met in Cabo Verde, if I feel like doing a boat delivery. I was like, “Dude, you know that I don’t have any permit, that I don’t have any license. I know how to sail, that’s for sure, but I mean, I only crossed the Atlantic and have been sailing here and there in the Caribbean, so far. He’s like, “Yeah, that’s okay. I’m gonna teach you the rest. if you’re interested, you’re on my crew list, I book all the flights.” And yeah, this is another story how I got to get to Florida to pick up a boat and bring it to Rhode Island. And then the hustle began again. So I was in Dominica, finding a boat to bring me up to Guadeloupe, because Dominica you cannot really go from there anywhere. Then I found the captain I also met in Cabo Verde before and who was looking to get to Guadeloupe, so I sailed with him to Guadeloupe, two days. I stayed on the boat, I think for 10 more days, because I was looking for a boat in Guadeloupe, bringing me up to the United States. So then I found another boat which went to Saint Martin. Saint Martin, shared island between the French and the Dutch people. And then I got to Saint Martin and then I found a very, very super-cheap flight to get me from there to United States, because it was rough again. Saint Martin is a very developed island with a lot of density. You cannot just stay somewhere. You’re, like, always surrounded by people, and to be honest, the vibe and mood there was not inviting at all. In Saint Martin I got a flight for I think 70 dollars, super cheap, from Saint Martin flying me to Florida. Yes. But in the meantime I did not check my phones and I was not online at all, that I got a mail from the marina in Florida telling me that meanwhile I was sailing up from Dominica to Saint Martin, that they got hit by a storm and that the boat I was supposed to take from there got halfway flooded inside, and which I finally did not get back up to Rhode Island, because I didn’t had any business anymore in Rhode Island. And I can tell you, in Florida I did probably the most crazy things of sleeping outside in urban areas. You would say I’m a crackhead, but, yeah, Florida teached me a lot on this side. Traveling the way I traveled, like being kind of a hobo a homeless guy roaming around United States, it’s totally not the right country to do that, because they have really stupid laws and a lot of restrictions and yes, it’s not so welcoming as another country I would say, in United States than in another place. So I would not recommend doing this in the urban areas in United States.
Gabriel: At this point, what had happened to Frieda?
André: Okay, okay, okay, okay, I need to rewind. So, when I was in Dominica, Claus, the captain from Ireland, was leaving from Dominica to Guadeloupe, so I brought everything on boat. The plan was for him to stay in Guadeloupe and to make business, but then he wanted to go back to Dominica, and I was like, “Okay, I thought that you were sailing up to Saint Martin, where I wanted to go to. Then he changed his mind and I was like, “Okay, can I leave my stuff on your boat?” And he said, “Yeah.” And he was supposed to drop all this stuff at Steve’s place, who is now with me here in Costa Rica, but he never went back to Dominica, because my plan was to get a sailboat and to sail down to Dominica too.
Gabriel: Just to be clear, at this point, you were in Florida and wanting to sail back to Dominica.
André: Exactly. That’s why I said okay, Dominica is going to be the good place to drop stuff, but since he never got there. Then, at the beginning of the year, he called me and he said, “Okay, I’m crossing the Canal of Panama now.” I was like, “What the fuck? This is really the total opposite of what you actually wanted to do!” And, “Yeah. However, I still have your stuff with me. What can I do with it?” I’m like, “Yeah, okay. Are you going to Mexico?” “Yeah, yeah. I’m going to Mexico.” It’s likem “Okay, perfect. I’m in Mexico, so you will be on the Pacific side?” And he agreed. “Yeah, yeah, of course.” And I said, “Yep, perfect. Then, just shoot me a message once you’re on the coast of Guatemala, before coming to Mexico.”
Gabriel: Okay, so much time has passed that you’ve traveled all around the United States, including Area 51 in Nevada, and made it south of the border to Mexico.
André: Exactly. Well, apparently we have been at the same place at the same time, around Puerto Vallarta. Except that he never let me know that he was in Guatemala, so I was already 800 kilometers more south than he was when he finally texted, because I asked him, “Hey, where are you? Because I’m on my way to Guatemala.” He said, “Yeah, I’m almost in Puerto Vallarta.” I was saying, “Okay. Well, that’s a problem. I have been there.”
Gabriel: He was sailing north and you were traveling south, but he didn’t warn you, so you didn’t notice they in Puerto Vallarta.
André: So, I think in June… May, June, something like this, I put on an advertising on Facebook groups for bicycle travelers, if somebody wants to pick up my gear, because it was not really interesting for me to drive almost 2,000 kilometers to get my stuff.
Gabriel: So, wait. The captain just offloaded the bicycle in Puerto Vallarta?
André: Something like this is what he did, because, yeah, it’s… it’s a very, like, I don’t have any other words for that, but it was a very fucked up communication and situation. He kind of just loaded up some things without asking me prior or whatever. So yeah, but I didn’t knew. He never let me know, I found out. So I did a donation advertising on social media for people to get it who would like to travel by bicycle or whatever, because literally everything is in this gear. I have a tent in there, I have an inflatable mattress, I have a normal mattress, I have a poncho, I have all the cycle gear, I have the tools, the spare parts, all the stuff for the bike, including two new tires. And yeah, so I made up an advertising for a donation on social media and I found somebody. He sent me pictures of what he got and then I found out that it was not complete, because for me I asked him if everything is still complete. He said, “Yeah, yeah.” Okay, and yes, so I found out that there’s gear of me missing, and actually the donation was a donation against sending me a small parcel with my recuerdos, with my souvenirs, which was a cup, a couple of coins, and a couple of seashells. So that’s it. I didn’t want it anymore, so this was the donation. And the donation, somebody picked it up. I asked him, I think last weekend, if I can get an update, if he sent me the things or not, because I don’t have anything yet at my address. And at the same time he’s not replying to me, so maybe I’m in a scam. I don’t know, but this is all I could do at this point. I was already in Guatemala when he finally reached Puerto Vallarta so yeah.
Gabriel: Okay, so that means…
André: So that means that right now my bicycle is somewhere in Mexico, around Puerto Vallarta, and all the gear too, and maybe it has another life, although the guy never replied me. I just checked, I never got an answer.
Gabriel: This person that replied to your Facebook post was going to pick up the bicycle and ride it somewhere or… I’m still struggling to understand that part.
André: No, I was advertising for a donation for somebody who would like to have a bicycle and it was, for me, a ticket to hopefully get my stuff, so it was just kind of a trade. So the one who wants the bicycle sends me the parcel and basically that’s it.
Gabriel: Okay, so maybe this person kept the bicycle and didn’t send you the parcel or…
André: Yeah. Well, this is how it is so far, yeah. I don’t know anything about this stuff.
Gabriel: Well, that’s a sad end to the story.
André: Yeah, to me too. I’m kind of emotional, actually, about this topic. Yeah because on one side hey somebody is giving away bicycle and gear. I mean you could just lube the chain and inflate the tires and you can go tomorrow, basically, because, I mean, it was a complete pack. There was everything from the gas stove, there was even gas cylinders, clothes, shoes, there was even food in it, spare parts, tools, and whatever. I mean, it was complete, like, it was really complete. I only left the boat and my gear with my 40-liter backpack, and in this 40-liter backpack I just put the most essential to me. So yeah. Yeah, it’s a kind of a sad, sad end, or it would be kind of a sad end. I mean, I’m not judging yet, because he never replied me, but this is how it feels. Yeah. This is all about the social media you see.
Gabriel: Oh, no. Earlier, I had said social media is not completely evil and then now I may have to revise that.
André: Yeah. But you see…
Gabriel: It is evil.
André: There’s not only black and white in the world, gladfully.
Gabriel: So let’s end our conversation on a more positive note. Maybe you have some news of Daniel? You said he was on an around-the-world trip. Briefly, what did he end up doing, from the time you said goodbye in the Canary Islands to now?
André: So as far as I know, he’s doing pretty good. I mean, I know things. I’m not sure if I can talk about this here. But what I can say is that he remained in Las Palmas for the entire year of 2023, until he moved, I think, later on the opposite side of the island. He also saw a couple of other islands and also he has been in Greece for some time. In Greece, he was working for a kind of a sub-brand of Tui, Tui traveling agencies, doing, I think, bicycle tours with tourists. So he was actually, yeah, providing the tours. That’s what he did, and then he flew back to Canary Islands, and as far as I know, and I hope, he fell happily in love.
Gabriel: I see. So, he got off the road.
André: He got off the road, at least for some time, and I don’t know what’s going on right now. We didn’t talk for a couple of weeks now. I know that he turned 34 in late July and that’s all what I know right now but I think this is a way better and more positive note.
Gabriel: Falling in love and working as a bicycle guide, that’s good. And, as far as your own life, you’ve traveled all around, and you’ve ended up in Costa Rica, and you seem to be having a good time there, so that’s also positive.
André: Of course, it’s very positive. I mean, I met so many, so many good souls and persons and people during this journey. I mean, you have good and bad people everywhere. You know, during this entire journey I was pretty lucky at some point. I literally didn’t got robbed. A few things disappeared when the bicycle was unattended in Cabo Verde, but you know, at some point, you can understand it, because it was valuable stuff, unattended. No one was watching it, in a very, very poor part of the world. I mean, I can understand this. What did I lose? Some gear of my luggage. Oh, and my helmet got stoled. Oh, and also, I don’t know how you call them…. a Thermos. You call them Thermos? I don’t know.
Gabriel: Yeah.
André: That’s what disappeared, but otherwise I was pretty lucky. On my former journey with the van in 2016 I had an attempt of a robbery in the middle of the night in the country where I was really not expecting it. It was in Morocco. I would rather have been expecting these kind of things happening actually in my hometown, to be honest, but not abroad. So it’s always about sharing, like, giving and taking, so it’s actually sharing of experiences, maybe of values you have. Maybe of valuables that you have, or whatever it is, but I think it’s very important also to understand about time to share the time with the right persons and the right people and I think this is something also this kind of journey brings to life at some point.
Gabriel: Yeah, very good. My last question is, how many months then have you been on the road until today? Obviously the bicycle part of the adventure ended a while ago, but you’ve been away from home for almost two years.
André: Almost two years. Yeah, that’s right. So I’ve been on the road with the bicycle from November until September, so ten months. I have been accompanied by the bicycle, and I’m on the road on this journey now in my… what is it? My 22nd month. Yeah, it’s the 22nd month, and nothing of, you know, of all of this was ever planned.
Gabriel: And no plans to stop anytime soon either.
André: I have no real plans to stop anytime soon. There’s one thing I really would like to do. It’s like a kind of a present for my grandma. My grandma is going to turn 90 this year and I would really like to see her, so I was thinking about flying home as a kind of a present for my grandmother, because she’s getting old and she was already being pretty scared, when I had her on the phone, that she’s afraid to never see me again in her lifetime. So I think it would be a very nice present to just be there at her birthday at the end of the year.
Gabriel: Well, see, that’s a much more positive way to end it, and if you want, I can include that or I can leave it out. I would leave it in. I think it’s very sweet. If you give me permission.
André: Yeah, you can leave it in. I mean, she’s not gonna listen to it. She will not understand English.
Gabriel: No.
André: You’re, like, literally the first person who knows about that.
Gabriel: Oh, okay. Well, other people will soon listen, but she won’t, so it’ll still be a surprise.
André: Exactly.
Gabriel: The transcript for this episode is available on the Accidental Bicycle Tourist website. I welcome feedback and suggestions for this and other episodes. You’ll find a link to all contact information in the show notes. If you would like to rate or review the show, you can do that on your favorite podcast platform. You can also follow the podcast on Instagram. Thank you to Anna Lindenmeier for the cover artwork and to Timothy Shortell for the original music. This podcast would not be possible without continuous support from my wife Sandra. And thank you so much for listening. I hope the episode will inspire you to get out and see where the road leads you.
André: Yeah, maybe you can find an animator who can put, like, a bicycle who’s just, like, driving random.