Day 101: Tuttlingen to Kirnbergsee

May 27, 2023

Last Day on the Donau Trail

There is some confusion in the campground on whether the restrooms will stay open during the night. Turns out they do get locked at night, but in the morning somebody props open another door to a large shower room that also has a restroom. We wake up very early again. Since we have nothing better to do we quietly pack-up and have our breakfast on a bench in the park and head out.

As we ride out of town we see these gardens. Patrick says this is also in Holland. People lease the land for a garden, then start "building" first for the tools and then more elaborately.

We stop for coffee and pastry. We sit inside and watch the daily routine of people shopping for fresh daily break. There is non-stop people lining up, fresh buns pulled out of the ovens, very efficient.

Today is our last day along the Donau (Danube) Trail. The official source of the river is in Donaueshingen, but it sounds like there is some debate about that because the “source” is really just a park where two smaller rivers converge. We make good time to the town, again because of very nice weather and a tailwind.

When we reach Donaueshingen, our first goal is to find the McDonalds, not necessarily for food, but to use their Wi-Fi. Both don’t seem available at first: they do not serve breakfast here and the Wi-Fi is down. The server helps us out though by giving the password to her own cellphone hotspot so we can check our emails. We have been trying to coordinate our meeting up with Maren and Chris tomorrow. There is an email that they will meet us tomorrow morning at eight at the campground we are headed for today.

We ride around Donaueshingen a bit: first to the confluence for some photos, then into the city park and city center to the official start of the Donau bike route. On our way out of town we spot a Subway restaurant for lunch. Then another stop at the Lidl for some groceries.

We are aiming for the campground recommended by Maren. It is nicely spread out along a lake. Because we took a wrong turn we approach the lake from the other side though and have to make our way around and climb another hill to get there. The reception is closed for an extended lunch but the tenting area is obvious so we pitch. A German woman who is in the same situation comes and asks us if we think it is okay to pitch without registering first. We reply we are not sure, but why not? She responds with “it is in our DNA to follow the rules” and has a good laugh with us. It is a holiday weekend and the campground gets very busy, but we get to pay for our site (expensive at 33 euros) and receive a key to the showers.

The best thing about the campground, together with the lake view, is the restaurant on-site. We enjoy some big cold German beers, another round of beers, then a pizza, then Apfelstrudel with ice cream and sahne (whipped cream). Even though the campground is busy and tents are only about 10 feet apart it does not get too noisy and we have no problem falling asleep way before everybody else.

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Today's ride: 54 km (34 miles)
Total: 4,019 km (2,496 miles)

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