Roadtrip to Hesse

On my path to looking for a place to live outside the city, today I am travelling to the region of Hesse, where I will inspect two different houses that are up for rent. The area itself is quite remote and I’ll need about 20-30 minutes on my bicycle to the next supermarket and roughly 20 minutes to the next train station.

Today’s bicycle of choice will be my trusted Canyon Inflite SLX 9.0 RACE.

After spending about 2 1/2 hours in trains, I will ride to the area where both of the houses are located that I’ll be inspecting. One is a pitched roof house with 2 floors, the other one is a flat roof of similar size but spread over just one floor with more room surrounding it. I currently have a strong tendency towards the pitched roof.

After inspecting both houses I’ll meet up with an old friend of mine who used to be my boss when I was still working for his hosting company. So I’ll add another 2 hours of train rides to my schedule today.

Onwards!

I got up a few minutes before my alarm would’ve been triggered. Had a coffee, packed my remaining things I hadn’t yet laid out yesterday, tested my bicycle bags once last time and went over my packing list. After taking a shower I made a last-minute decision against suiting up in bicycle clothing because I’ll only be spending about 90 minutes on the bike in total and it’s not the most comfortable clothing for rides on a train and for a late dinner. If I were to use cycling clothing, I’d have to bring a full set of civil clothing as well as shoes, because why even start the journey in lycra if I don’t also wear my much more efficient cycling shoes with a cleat that hook right into the pedals?

I also removed my laptop from the backpack because it was just too heavy, all things considered. I most likely won’t be needing it and if necessary, I can use SSH and tailscale to remotely access any of my systems from my Daylight Computer DC-1. So no vibe coding until I’m back at home on Friday.

In typical fashion for me, I slacked around a bit too long in the morning and so I had to hurry up attaching the saddle bag because my Ass Saver always covers the saddle railing, making it much more difficult to maneuver anything through it and the usual saddle bag relies on these rails being free of any obstructions. I managed to be on time to catch my train with enough of a buffer to even get a decent Americano for the ride beforehand. (I also have a filter coffee, because there’s 0 change I’d be spending a quarter of the day in trains with no access to decent coffee.)

It is still mindboggling that it took Deutsche Bahn this long to introduce bicycle carriages in their ICEs and the mounts are still too tight and inflexible for multiple bikes with different widths.

I forgot to pre-load the planned Komoot routes to my bicycle computer so I had to fiddle around with some dongles on the train.

Sweat, elevation and two wheels

I severely underestimated the gradients of the surrounding area. My fitness definitely isn’t where it used to be but I’m also not used to this much elevation, especially when you made the mistake of carelessly planning a gravel instead of a road tour. Yet here I was: 40mm tyres on a cyclocross bike, loaded with decently loaded saddle bag, a backpack, some water bottles and I find myself on a gravel path through forests and unpaved farmers routes.

I never lost trust in the bicycle itself, but I would be lying if I wasn’t worried about a last minute puncture due to the very loose, coarse and sharp gravel. My tyres weren’t even very optimized towards riding Gravel routes since I was riding almost worn out Schwalbe G-something Allrounders.

Seeing is believing

I arrived right on time, despite my pre-planned route being way off. For some reason the route I planned with Komoot didn’t start at the train station where I exited the train but… a different one, where my train wouldn’t even have stopped. Weird. Whatever.

Update from 20.08.2025: This is caused by a recently introduced firmware bug in my Wahoo Elemnt Bolt bicycle computer that I used for navigation.

I met the owner of the place and he turned out to be just as nice as I would’ve expected after our chat conversations. He was already expecting me at the entrance. I was glad that we didn’t get straight to business, since I was sweating and was still a bit out of breath upon arrival and I enjoyed the cooldown. We sat down, had a lemonade and got to know each other for a few minutes.

Inspection time

Then it was time to checkout the first hourse: The pitched roof was first on the list. The current renter still lives there and we got some alone time where she showed me around and confirmed that basically all the positive things about the area are actually true and that it’s not just some sales talk to get me to settle down there. I didn’t feel like taking any new pictures because the ones by the current resident where already very representative. I’d be buying the existing kitchen that she installed herself about 2 1/2 years ago for a fair price and we’re both sure we’ll land on a fair deal for some stuff she would like to leave in the house for the next renter. Since all of her things are in prime condition, it’d be a shame having to purchase all that stuff at retail prices.

I am still trying to figure out where I might put my lounge chair and TV but I’m sure I’ll find a good solution once I’m moved in. I can always sell the TV later if it turns out that’s it’d be too big. Perhaps having an extendable projection screen would be the smarter approach in the long run. We’ll see. No need to worry about that just yet.

I was surprised to learn that there’s an entire area behind the house that is part of the rented area that is left completely wild but I can make out of whatever I like. A neighbour dug himself a giant pool and I’m considering to maybe build myself an icebath in there. You know, the Wim Hof thing.

We then continued to check out the house with the flat roof but I was already convinced that the pitched roof is much more my vibe, inspite of it being smaller. Entering the pitched roof house instantly felt like vacation while the flat roof felt more like a small farm where I would need to spend a lot of time on tidying everything up to be closer to what I’m looking for. It also didn’t feel like home.

I’m completely in love with the entire place, the area surrounding it, the people I met thus far and the overall silence you experience whenever you spend even a few seconds just sitting down and paying attention to how different this is from almost ever-present city noise levels.

I am now among the final 3 people who are still in the run for this space so here’s to hoping that I’ll get confirmation some next week that I can move in by November.

The way back

Ice Cream and Espresso

For my way back, I was recommended a local ice cream maker that was en route to the train station where I got to enjoy fully homemade ice cream using mostly organic and local ingredients and they even managed to make a decent double shot Espresso. I slacked around a bit too long and had to hurry up in order to still get my train because I didn’t anticipate the rather steep ride uphill to even get to the station. That’ll require some getting used to.

Dinner & Friends

My friend in Mainz invited me to spend the night at his place so that I wouldn’t have to pay for hotels, worry about my bicycle being parked safely somewhere or even having to travel home on the same day. Unfortunately it took me almost 3 hours to get to Mainz so our dinner started quite late because of course my transfer in Frankfurt got cancelled.

My bicycle parked on the friend who hosted me

We had delicious Vietnamese dinner and inspite of the heat, we grabbed a few drinks and hung out in a park nearby his flat. We hadn’t talked in more than 3 years so a lot had happened in both of our lives. He seemed really happy with his life right now and we had a great time. Didn’t talk too much about computers and business but I couldn’t help but shill OMARCHY and Daylight Computer to him.

Another reason I almost missed my connecting train to Frankfurt was that I wanted to give him a big loaf of bread from the local bakery right next to the ice cream factory for his generosity of hosting me at his place. This happy accident already had our breakfast plans made out for us, when we got up in the morning.

Breakfast is ready

My way back home was a bit chaotic but it went smoother than the Deutsche Bahn app predicted. I had to abruptly exit the train in Bonn becase I wouldn’t have made my transfer in Cologne due to typical delays and I only got that notification right when the train came to a halt in Bonn main station, so the bicycle was still locked to the train and the doors almost closed on me while I unlocked it. Thanks to the dude who held them open for me or my journey home would’ve taken me at least an hour longer because exiting in Bonn ensured a smooth transition to Düsseldorf.

After my arrival I enjoyed some early dinner while reading up on some LLM developments on my Daylight Computer. I love this thing.