As I am sure you recall from the previous post, the streets of Amsterdam are very busy. People on bikes, scooters, cars, and light rail street cars are coming from all directions.

Many are on the phone or deep in conversation with their companions. There are crossing lights for pedestrians, but we learn pretty quickly that the bikes don’t always stop and sometimes go whizzing by.

Each of us has stepped out in the road on more than one occasion and had a “close call” and had to get back out of the way. We are trying to be vigilant and protect ourselves. By the second day of walking around and seeing the sights of Amsterdam, I am really zoned in on watching everything that is going on around us.

Here is the part I left out of the previous post because I didn’t want to make the visit to the Anne Frank house about anything except her story. This is not the story I wanted to tell, but it’s the truth. It happened so quickly, I still don’t know exactly what happened, but I suppose I was distracted by all of the places I needed to look to be sure to stay safe. And even though we were not in a congested or really busy area at that moment, I was looking up rather than down and I stepped in a recessed grate depression that was probably around 18 inches by 18 inches and sunk down about 2 inches in the brick sidewalk. I didn’t know what hit me. I twisted my right ankle very badly and I went down. Hard. I was wearing pants and scraped the left knee on the way down, but there was searing pain in the right ankle. I couldn’t speak, and so many thoughts went racing through my mind as the adrenaline raced through my bloodstream. Most prevalent (and some of the few that I can write in this blog since my son and in-laws are reading it) were, “I’ve broken my ankle…we have 5 weeks of cycling planned…how will we make our second ride up Mt. Ventoux…I’ve ruined everything…”

I was eventually able to get up, but the day changed pretty significantly as the going was pretty slow from place to place. And for me, the reality that I had really injured myself and I wouldn’t be able to walk it off. For Roger, probably a lot of frustration. For both, now wondering what we would be able to do on the tandem over the next 5 weeks.
Dr. Eve and Dr. Roger researched on the web and diagnosed it as a class 3 sprain. We iced it a few times on that first day, but the next day was a day of travel to the South of France with few opportunities to elevate and ice.

I have one picture of the injury after 72 hours.

Many are aware that I am obsessed with my steps. I’ve worn a Fitbit since 2012 and for over 2 years I have averaged over 20,000 steps a day. Well…things are going to be different for a while.
Coming next, the bike comes out of the cases!