The next day I started making arrangements to take about a one-week vacation from the cycling trip to visit with family in Germany (for the third time). I decided to leave the bicycle behind in Moldova so I could pick up exactly where I left off with the cycling. I bought a ridiculously-priced ticket on Moldovan air, and after nervously explaining to Moldovan customs officials that the powdery pills in the two plastic sandwich bags buried in my dirty laundry in my luggage really were vitamins - rather than the drugs they appeared to be - I was allowed to board the plane to Frankfurt. Eileen came out from San Jose to visit (yea!!!) and we all met up with Marcus and Gabriele, and later on with Gisbert and Heide. It was really great to see everyone again - thanks a bunch! I got the sense that people were not thrilled with my photographic efforts on the group photo that I took, so I will refrain from posting it here. It was great spending New Years grilling on the Raclette followed with some intense Rummykube sessions. At the end of the week I made a short-lived visit to Munich, pictured here. Even though my time in Germany was short, it was a lot of fun, and pretty relaxing (except for the 10km run that Marcus and I completed on New Year's Eve [Marcus won]), in a family way. (1-5-05)

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Munich, Germany

From:	Brent	(Mon Jan 10 15:57:09 2005)
Mike, Everyone I know on 2 wheels is shocked you survived the icy roads of the great white north. Please post an estimate of the number of km you travelled on iced-over roads. True grit and determination, my friend. Here's to keeping the rubber side down, bp
From:	Michael Kopp (mk)	(Tue Jan 11 06:26:01 2005)
Thanks for the kind words. I will have those figures for you shortly. I am definitely out of the ice bound north. Today was spent in the Carpathian Foothills in Romania with just a windbreaker. Warm weather, yee haw!
From:	Michael Kopp (mk)	(Tue Jan 18 05:19:37 2005)
I did not hit snow until I entered Finland. It was 2,605 kilometers from Tornio, Finland, to Kiev, Ukraine, where the snow and ice began to disappear. But not all of that was iced over - from southern Estonia through the Baltics to northern Belarus the roads were pretty clear, except for occasional patches of ice or snow. Then south eastern Belarus to northern Ukraine got wintry again. Excluding the Baltics and northern Belarus from the total brings the figure down to 1824 kilometers on iced or snowy roads.