The country’s bears are one thing. Its tree roots are quite another. And then there is the gorse my wife tumbles into
I’m on a plane, in the middle seat between my wife – on the aisle – and a stranger who is occupied on her phone. I too am occupied, with work I should have finished before we left.
My wife, a nervous flyer, is in a restless mood. She snatches my laptop and begins typing. I wait, arms folded.
She hands the laptop back. At the bottom of the screen, under the half-completed article I’m working on, she has written: “The lady next to you is a horse-loving Democrat – I know this by watching her Insta feed.”
I give my wife a look that says: everybody else in this row is busy.
The next morning, we find ourselves in a Romanian village, examining our assigned bicycles. We are one of six couples on the trip, intending to cover between 25 and 35 miles a day, across fields and forests, in weather predicted to be somewhere between changeable and ominous.
I should point out that the bikes are electric. I was worried I might not be fit enough – the tour group sent us links to exercises and I didn’t do them – but the only thing I’m unprepared for is the jolt of power that drives the bike forward as soon as I turn the pedals. It’s like riding a fractious pony.
We spend an hour looking at a Saxon church before cycling out of the village, not quite in single file, on a rutted and potholed road. Eventually, we turn on to a gravel track heading steeply uphill, before plunging into some woods.
I am near the front. Far behind me I can hear my wife’s occasional shrieks of alarm; just ahead our guide Marco lets out an occasional whoop to scare away bears. Their presence is not theoretical: at a muddy bend he stops to point out a paw print the size of an oven glove.
As we thread our way through the trees I stand up off the saddle a little, to cushion the bumps. I swerve to avoid a root, but my back wheel catches it anyway. My left foot bounces off the pedal, and the weight of my right foot brings the pedal round sharply backwards, where it catches me square in the shin.
I look down: there are six jagged punctures in my leg, all in a row, like a bite. Blood is pouring out of the holes.
I decide not to make a fuss, because I don’t know some of the people in the group and this seems like an opportunity to recast myself as the unflappable type. By the time of our next rest break on a bright hillside, blood is running into my shoe – everyone notices. Marco finds some wipes in his first-aid kit. Bandages are produced from several saddle bags.
“You’re being very brave,” says someone.
“It was just a small bear,” I say. At one point three people are tending to my wounds, as if they might not get another chance to nurse anybody this trip. They needn’t have worried.
A minute after we set off again, my wife tips sideways off her bike and rolls silently down the hill into some gorse, emerging covered in deep scratches.
“Did you see me?” she says, when I finally circle back.
“No, I missed it,” I say. “I just saw the bike lying by itself.”
“I went flying through the air,” she says, holding up a bloodied elbow.
“I’m worried we’re getting a reputation,” I say.
As we ride down into the valley, past a lonely shepherd and his flock, the group immediately distends: the front disappears round the corner; the rear – where my wife is – never makes it over the brow of the hill. Those of us in the middle get off our bikes to wait.
“What do you think is going on up there?” says someone, pointing up the hill.
“It could be a lot of things,” I say. “None of them good.” Eventually two heads bob over the horizon – my wife, chatting and laughing with another member of the group. I can’t help but notice they are walking, with only one bike between them.
“It turns out I had a flat,” my wife says. “Marco’s up there fixing it.”
“Shouldn’t you be up there to ride it down?” I say.
“I may have sworn at him,” she says. “I can’t go back up there.”
We wait. After 15 minutes I ride up the hill, where I find Marco sitting on the grass, levering a tyre on to a rim. Then I ride back down to the group.
“He says he’s having the time of his life,” I say.
I glance down at my leg. Blood is seeping through the bandages. I have to remind myself this is day one of four. And we haven’t even had lunch yet.
Source: https://www.theguardian.com/lifeandstyle/2026/jun/06/tim-dowling-ebiking-holiday-romania