It’s getting colder. At the beginning of this night, temperatures were around 13 degree Celsius. That was the first night in which I closed my sleeping bag. During riding, I put on a wind vest, even though it’s above 20 degree Celsius, it feels colder.

The day started with bike maintenance.  I looked at yesterday’s fail in daylight.

Bungee cord – cut. Chainglider, the small part in the middle – deformed.

Alfine gear-hub chain-guard – wasted.

I cut off the deformed end of the chainglider part. Doesn’t really make a difference. And I also cut off the chain guard of the Alfine gear hub. I’ll try to get a spare part, but it’s not essential. It only catches the chain in case it falls off the sprocket.

I proceeded with the planned chain maintenance, that means cleaning the chain and its chainglider casing, as well as putting some fresh oil on.

The chain glider keeps most dirt away from the chain, but once dirt is inside it stays there. So after sandy/muddy trails, cleaning it is mandatory. For tours like this, the chain glider isn’t of much help. In the city though, it’s a great thing as it also keeps your cloth from the chain.

The chain lost considerable tension during this first week. Given that it was new when I started, I wonder how it will look like at the end.

I started with 6 bar on both tires without re-pressurising them so far. The front wheel is now at 5.15 bar, the rear wheel at 5.35 bar respectively.

Before actually starting today’s stage, I had lunch at the camp site restaurant. It was already way past noon.

When I eventually sat on the bike, the term “pain in the ass” got redefined. Yesterday’s adjustments to take pressure from the hands, lead to more pressure on the saddle which didn’t go without consequences. There must be some law of conservation at work here, an equilibrium of pain that can be shifted either to the hands or the butt. I would never have imagined that the one big issue of this tour would be the human-bike interface. Never before did I have these problems, but I also never did such long rides on this bike before.

I stopped several times to readjust the saddle in a way that would wear down some new areas of skin, without too much success.

Outside town I went grocery shopping, I had to buy a lot of motivational snacks today. But even with these, given the pain and the very late start, there was no way I would make it to Göteborg today. The last 15 km before Varberg were rainy. So I stopped there at a lovely little camp site close to the sea. The camp site density increased a lot from Germany over Denmark to Sweden. At this spot, there are three neighbouring camp sites. It wasn’t trivial to enter the right one, meaning the one with the good reviews.

Here is a picture of today’s dinner setup. Ultra lightweight Primus gas stove (67 g), cartridge and tripod. Aluminum pot/pan set with non-stick coating and two small cutting boards. A spork for eating.

The menu these days is modern fusion kitchen: Asia noodle snack with little salami slices and roasted Polarbröd on the side.