EV10: Day 4: Eisenach to Erfurt

July 05, 2018 - 93 km

Instagram post:
#day4 went well. I rode from Eisenach via Gotha to Erfurt where I did a little sightseeing and had dinner. Then I continued north and could shower at a lake close to the shelter I had looked out for the night. And just in time before the rain started I got there. Unfortunately there were some ants, so I decided to put up my hamock tonight.
Just 15 meters away is the exact spot where Martin Luther was struck by lightning 503 years ago, resulting in some “visions”, which caused him to start the Christian Protestant religion.

Even though there was a lot of rain this night and, I did not get struck by lightning, so I won’t share that same fate, I guess. #cycle2finland #93km #503hm

Something happened that night, which I did not mention in my original IG post in order not to worry anyone: I typically piced my spots in remote places where I would not expect any people to come by at night. However, as I had put up my hammock and after it started raining - I noticed that there was still quite a bit of traffic with some sketchy-looking old cars and I wondered: “I hope I did not pick the local drug-dealing spot to rest for the night.” And so I hid my credit card somewhere in my luggage, in case I would get robbed and then went to sleep.
In the middle of the night maybe around 3 A.M., while it was raining heavily, somebody came close to the shelter and rang his bicylce bell. I woke up from my deep sleep, looked into the bright light of his bicylce in confusion and immediately offered to make some room for him.
He just shrugged it off and said: “No, that’s ok.” and left.
To this day I don’t have a good explanation who this could have been. It can’t have been police or a hunter – why would they be out with a bicycle during rainfall?

I slept here.

Route