The fact that things turned out a little differently than planned is also due to the two of them’s unconventional way of traveling. And that’s what they’re already known for in Zeppelin City. Her last adventure took her down the Danube by canoe – without any canoeing knowledge and with very little money. Things were similar on their bike tour.
Tired but happy in Istanbul: Vinzenz (left) and Paul slowly got used to cycling, and in the middle of Türkiye they were really fit. (Photo: private)
Without training, they cycle 5,300 kilometers
Table of Contents
- Without training, they cycle 5,300 kilometers
- Abrupt end of the bike tour at the Russian border
- No path leads through Uzbekistan
- How strangers become friends on a road trip
- The path as a destination
- Passengers with a shaman
- Face to face with the green cobra
- Vinzenz and Paul would like to tell many people about their adventures
So no special cycling training in advance of the big tour. “After Istanbul in the middle of Türkiye, we were really fit,” says Vinzenz, who completed his studies to become a music and mathematics teacher this summer. Fitting while doing, so to speak.
The Häflers, who went to school together in the GZG back then, always traveled in a group of different constellations until Istanbul. Starting in Würzburg as a team of twelve, over time there were fewer and fewer friends who accompanied them. The two of them are still happy about this experience of starting together. “If you want, you can cycle along – whether for a few kilometers or a few days,” is how they announced their tour, and friends and strangers alike followed this call.
The hammocks were often stretched between trees or posts – like here in a forest near Trebnje. (Photo: private)
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“We wanted to do the outward journey free of charge,” says Paul, who is currently doing his master’s degree in opera singing. So nothing was planned for travel costs in the tight travel budget – and that almost worked out. To Astrakhan in Russia, where the two arrived after 5,300 kilometers by bike in 45 days.
Abrupt end of the bike tour at the Russian border
On September 20th, her bike tour unexpectedly came to an end. It was not possible for Paul and Vinzenz to cross the border from Russia to Kazakhstan with their e-visa; this bureaucratic hurdle could not be overcome. Low point of the trip, frustration set in. What now? It was clear that they had to go back to Tbilisi, almost 1000 kilometers away; the motivation for cycling was gone.
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But the two are not new to traveling – they were able to draw on their hitchhiking experiences and hitchhiked back to the Georgian capital with renewed vigor. Now they had direct contact with the local people and learned about their enormous willingness to help. A man took the two of them along with their bikes in his Lada, drove them around for hours and gave them hot soup. It was good, especially for Vincent, who now had a bad cold.
In Tbilisi, the two left their bikes with Serena and Guido, who have now become friends, and then hitchhiked to travel east. “Azerbaijan has closed its borders, a visa for Iran would have taken six to eight weeks, so all we had to do to get ahead was to fly to Aktau,” Paul explains the situation, which actually went against the grain for the two of them, as they also wanted to make a statement for sustainable travel with the way they explored the world.
Became friends in Tbilisi and a safe place to park the bikes: Serena and Guido with their children. (Photo: private)
No path leads through Uzbekistan
Now it was supposed to go across Uzbekistan – but that wasn’t possible: “The border was closed in Beineu. Renovations are being carried out here for an indefinite period of time,” says Paul. What resulted in a detour of 2,500 kilometers to Tajikistan, the route now went through the Kazakh steppes. The road had long since resembled a track, wild camels and horses lined the path.
If you ask the two of them about the highlights of this trip, it just comes out of them. “Every day there was always something that you couldn’t believe – the dreams of the night felt more real than what you experienced yesterday,” Vinzenz still marvels. “We didn’t have any exact ideas about what we wanted to see, we always followed the locals’ recommendations,” says Paul.
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How strangers become friends on a road trip
The multi-day hitchhiking road trips with strangers were new to them. First they had the experience with Pierre and Agathe, a French couple traveling around the world. The two had rented a jeep, Paul and Vinzenz jumped on and were allowed to spend five days with the two of them on a breathtaking stage through the Pamir Mountains. So they drove on the highest highway in the world, with the eight-thousanders of the Himalayas in front of their eyes. “Pamir is the most remote place I’ve ever been,” says Paul looking back – no real roads, few people, often no electricity and certainly no network. And: children riding donkeys to school.
This also happened: The car of their “guest drivers” Pierre and Agathe stopped in the Pamir Mountains. (Photo: private)
Here they were in the first week of October, the temperatures dropped to minus 20 degrees at night – their accommodation was rarely heated. Her spartan luggage, which was once intended as cycling equipment for a completely different route, no longer fit at all. The two individualists, who don’t care about modern functional clothing, came close to their limits – and yet took it with their characteristic calmness. Unimaginable for outsiders: Vinzenz with Adilettes and Paul with old Birkenstocks on the move in the most remote corners of the earth. “I only wore my normal shoes to go hiking in the Pamir Mountains,” says Vinzenz and laughs.
The path as a destination
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On October 13th the time has come and they are at the border with China. From Kyrgyzstan it will go to Xinjiang at one of the rare crossings. “That was the most Kafkaesque border there is,” Paul still marvels.
In the next three days alone they will be checked 16 times by the police and will be asked to answer the question of where they are going. “The journey is our goal,” says Paul. We communicated with the translator on the smartphone. “When it comes to digitalization, the Chinese are 50 years ahead of us,” he sums up.
“In the first few days we were constantly invited, either by the people who took us with them or by random acquaintances,” says Vinzenz. A relief for the travel budget on the one hand, but priceless experiences on the other. They spent the night in hostels and simple guesthouses, in their hammocks and even under a bridge in Sichuan. “At times we were homeless foreigners who had no money. But we were welcomed like prodigal sons,” Vinzenz is still amazed.
Passengers with a shaman
This ride turned out to be special and spiritual: a Chinese shaman took them to the border with Laos, took a long detour and performed a healing ritual for a seriously ill friend of the two that captivated the pragmatic young men. When they talk about it, you can still tell today how touching it was for them.
In the meantime, the two of them had to look at the clock, as the return flight from Bangkok to Zurich had already been booked in the Kazakh desert. They managed to arrive in the Thai capital 48 hours before departure.
Face to face with the green cobra
But before that happened, Vincent had his own borderline experience. Looking back, he says: “We were a bit naive then” and refers to a short detour into the jungle. But less than two minutes later, Vinzenz storms out of the rainforest in his Adilettes. “Eye to eye with a green cobra. That made my heart sink.”
Another life-threatening moment for the two was a car accident in the Kazakh steppes. In the middle of the night, where a car only occasionally comes on the road, she hit the wheel of a truck head-on. Fortunately, neither she nor the car owner were injured.
At Bangkok airport, civilization had them back. Via Delhi and Tbilisi, where their bikes were still parked, they went to Zurich and then took the bus to Friedrichshafen.
Vinzenz and Paul would like to tell many people about their adventures
Once the many impressions have settled down, Vinzenz and Paul would like to work through their trip, the pictures, videos and stories over the next few weeks so that there will be a lecture in their homeland at the beginning of the new year. They don’t know when or where yet. If you would like to find out more about their trip: they both have the account @vinzenzvonpaul_ on Instagram.
