Day 5. May 1. Marijampole (Lithuania) - Augustow (Poland) on a bicycle

Distance: 101 km, Marijampole - Augustow

Total distance: 463 km
Profile: + 470 / - 421 m

Expenses: 0

Highlights: pouring rain and mistakes

I woke up quite early and, thinking that my host was still asleep after the party, decided to use what I had available to make breakfast, so buckwheat boiled on the barbeque grill it was. Then Paulius woke up, we had some tea and he even showed me around the town. And his wonderful mom gave me a whole bag of home-made apple chips (great snack I'm telling you).

I decided to use the main road - didn't want to ride any excess kilometers today. However I still rode about 100 today: after Suwalki (which I called "colourful houses town") I was attacked by pouring rain and, not checking my phone enough because of it, used a road sign for Augustow (while there was another shorter route) and that added a little loop. It was also quite windy all day, so I rode quite slowly: I left around 1 p.m. and arrived around 8.

My host in Augustow is Ian, an active older guy who travels around the world with his bike (Thailand, China, Cuba... and tonight he's leaving for Japan for three weeks). He showed me some lifehacks he uses to overcome the language barrier: laminated cards with phrases in their language such as "show me a cheap bar" or "where can I put a tent", so that he can just show them to people and they will read and understand what he wants.

He has a family business here, a guesthouse where he gave me a whole room for three people. There are no tourists here today - they just opened up this season, I'm their first guest after winter break. Ian also actively couchsurfs: he told me that in China he couchsurfed 36 out of 40 nights. And his stories about Cuba (he says he goes there at least twice every year) made me really want to visit it too.

Link to route: http://ridewithgps.com/routes/10414180

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