Dennis "Schep" Keunen hurt his wrist a week before and still had to "pump up" his knee 10 minutes before the trip, it wasn't enough cause soon enough he had some troubles with his wrist riding wise, drinking was not a problem. 
After a fast diner with Verse Friet it was time to hit the road, 6 people in two small cars with 6 bikes and Eastpak bags is perfect to stay within the budget. First stop was Essen, Germany...Funbox Amalie is the name of the park but getting there is another story. I have been in shady neighborhoods before but this one beats everything, hookers, hookers and more ugly hookers. I can't imagine sending my kid to that skatepark/bikepark in the dark, NO FUCKING WAY! We kept the doors locked and found the entry of FUNBOX where "customers" parked their cars to have sex with the hookers. Of course it wasn't that busy in the park so we had it almost for ourselves.
Michael van der Lee had his 1 mile of manuals on the miniramp, Schep did some nice airs before crashing after a normal drop in. Riccardo used his frontbrake for some frontwheel lip tricks and Pim was warming up for a long time but never heated up, his ankle didn't feel good so we called it a day. 
Leaving the park in the dark was very entertaining, cars were parked everywhere and moving up and down so we were glad to move on to the Jugendherberge (YMCA) in Essen. This was totally the other side of the world, in the middle of the woods, very quite and the clercks weren't very Punk in any way. One of them was a bmx'er he claimed but we thought he was closer to an inlinewalker. Of course we brought more liquor and beer than food so after a warning of the security it was time to sleep. 
Youthhostels are a good place to stay, pretty cheap, nice rooms, clean but the problem is that the breakfast is from 7 till 9 am and that is too early after 6 liters of liquor and Pim giving the Coach a nice haircut. We all made it 10 to 9 so we had breakfast, some coffee and headed our way to Siegen, Germany. 
Bruno Hoffmann is the mayor of SIEGEN but was not in town to meet with us amateurs, being a Pro he was in Rochester NY for the Red Bull comp and got third by the way. 
Carlos is his younger brother and after switching from Soccer to BMX we will see more from him in the future. Bruno's dad Martin was present too telling that the Church " Books and Coffee " will built a new indoor park in the future! We will be back in Siegen when the "mayor" is back in town. The park that made Bruno a Pro is not too big but has some nice stuff to ride, it was kinda wet but it cleared later that day and locals showed up and had a short session with the PB team. 
Then we heard about a Miniramp in the middle of the woods so we followed a local bmx'er and found it, without him it was impossible. Than we were welcomed by Ralf Mauden! Yes our friend from Bro-Scoot.de. He bought a nice house in the middle of nowhere and built a very nice spine miniramp in the garden. I took pictures from the hills and say two deers so that's the envirement we are talking about. 
This miniramp was a part of the art exhibition in Cologne and Ralf bought this piece and worked hard to make it one of the nicest mini's I ever saw. Schep was out due to knee problems, Riccardo couldn't stop riding, Michael flowed all over the place and Pim did some flairs. 
Ralf Mauden is the king of Scoots and he still rips, 360's over the spine, x-ups, icepicks etc etc on his homemade Bro scoot. After the session we had some beers and very nice pizza from the local Pizzaria and were invited to come back after the winter, we will be back Ralf! Cologne is a place where the nightlife is awesome so we hit the road to the Jugendherberge from Cologne close to the trainstation. I have been in Cologne over 100 times but never say this YMCA, next time I sleep in a bed instead of the parkinglot at the Masters/Worlds. We still didn't manage to
kill all the beers and liquor so we did our best before we jumped in a taxi to the "Roseclub" at the Luxemburgerstrasse. I say Exel, Beowulf and other bands in this club when Dietz was the chef but now it's a nice club. We paid 5 euro entry fee and had a good time, picking up girls is not on the tricklist of our riders, it was Britpop night so after some hours we had a very F1 styled way back to the YMCA. 
Breakfast at 8:30 am again but we had an appointment with the new Wicked Woods Park in Wuppertal for a "private session" so we didn't have any problems to wake up early. People at breakfast were a bit strange but maybe it was us being different from the rest. Wuppertal at 10:30 in the morning was everything worth to sleep shortly. We were welcomed by Thomas and let us in the newly built pool. This is an awesome pool and was open for 2 days so totally virgin we had a good session and left tiremarks everywhere. 
The people at Wicked Woods are awesome, the park is super clean and the vibe is good, skaters/inliners/BMX'ers go hand in hand. We had some fun at the Eurogap with Michael doing a fakie to halfcab, 
Pim practising tiretaps to frontflips and Riccardo trying to kill himself on a Eurogap to quarter to wallride to quarter but finally found one braincell to stop thinking about it. After some teamphoto's on the railwaytrack it was time to hit the road to Aarle-Rixtel, after 613 euro we made it back home so next year the tour is called the PB 613 Euro Tour, coming to a town near you! Thanks to: PB Teammembers, Rik, Carlos & Martin, Ralf Mauden & friends, Thomas at Wicked Woods, SNAFU, EASTPAK, VANS and you for reading this story.
Paul de Jong
www.paulsboutique.nl
After doing a BMX 'zine for ten years (1987 - 1996) FATBMX made it on the internet. The year was 1998. Here to stay.